Formalism's Blindness to Mercy and Divine Power

The Jews witnessed a man delivered from thirty-eight years of misery—yet their reaction was horror, not compassion. They possessed no human sympathy for the sufferer whom hope deferred had made sick and hopeless. Instead, they shuddered at the breach of the Sabbath. 'Sacrifice' eclipsed 'mercy' in their moral calculus. Maclaren identifies the root: formalism twists men's judgments of the relative magnitude of form and spirit.

Jesus responded by grounding His action in Sonship itself: 'My Father worketh even until now, and I work.' God's rest is not inaction—preservation is continual creation. All being subsists because Elohim is ever working. The Son co-operates with the Father, and for Him, as for the Father, the Sabbath law does not apply.

Yet the Jews fastened upon the blasphemy they perceived: that Jesus claimed a special Sonship that vindicated disregarding the Sabbath. They missed the miracle entirely. The charge of breaking the Sabbath faded into insignificance before what they heard as presumption.

Here lies the paradox Maclaren captures: Christ claimed divine prerogatives that would render any man insane—yet simultaneously claimed to be 'lowly of heart.' He declared Himself capable of doing whatsoever the Father did, living in such complete unity with Elohim that no trace of self-will tinged His perfect spirit. The world listened, reverent, as in the presence of the best man that ever lived. Strange goodness, to claim such divine prerogatives, unless the claim is valid. Formalism blinds; only love sees.