But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”
Jesus had just healed a disabled man at a pool in Jerusalem, and He did it on the Sabbath. The Jews accused Him of breaking the day of rest. He did not defend the act. He pointed to what His Father had never stopped doing — and His accusers heard the claim He was making about Himself.
Why God Is Not Resting
God did rest once, when creation was new. That rest ended.
C. H. MackintoshA Sabbath in the strict and proper sense could only happen when there was nothing left to do. It belonged to an undefiled creation — a creation with no spot of sin on it. God can have no rest where there is sin. Look around, and you learn that God cannot enjoy a rest in creation now. The thorn and the thistle, and ten thousand other sad and humbling fruits of a groaning creation, rise before us and declare that God must be at work and not at rest. Could He rest amid the sighs and tears, the groans and sorrows, the sickness and death, the degradation and guilt of a ruined world?
The creating is over; something else has taken its place.
F. B. HoleThe seventh day was a day of rest for God. His work had involved both creating and making, but all was now complete. From that time until now He has plainly not set His hand to work of that order. The entrance of sin made it necessary for Him to take up work of another order. The Lord Jesus referred to this when He said, "My Father is working until now, and I am working."
An Answer Found Only Here
Notice what Jesus does not appeal to.
J. G. BellettIn the other Gospels, when people challenge the Lord for doing His works on the Sabbath day, He answers from the case of David eating the holy bread from God's house, or the priests doing work in the temple, or the way His accusers themselves would lead out their donkey to water on the Sabbath day. But here, in John's Gospel, He does not plead what David, or the priests, or His accusers would do or had done. He pleads what the heavenly Father had always been doing in this needy, ruined world.
The Kind of Work It Is
This work is grace, and the scene at the pool shows what that means.
J. N. DarbyChrist had come to work. What makes it so blessed is this truth: it was not man's work and man's strength; the Father and the Son are the workmen in our salvation. The law required man to work, just as the pool of Bethesda required a man to be quick enough to get himself into it. But in the gospel, it is God who works: "My Father is working."
"My Father" — The Claim Behind the Words
The two words that inflamed His hearers were not about the Sabbath at all.
William KellyIt was an overwhelming answer. They knew nothing of fellowship with the Father. He, not they, could call God "My Father," and loved to say that He "is working until now." For the Father could not rest in sin, He would not rest in misery. This is not yet God judging. So He was working as Father, and working until now — though only now was He declaring Himself Father, in and by the Son. Jesus, the Son, had fellowship with His Father, unbroken and perfect.
His hearers drew a conclusion about equality with God. That conclusion needs stating with care.
J. A. TrenchIf the time for God's rest had not come, the full time for His work had, so that people might be made ready for a place in that rest. The Jews were right to take the Lord's words as involving His equality with the Father. But for that reason it could not be true that He made Himself God. The truth was this: being in the form of God, He did not treat equality with God as a grasping at something that was not His own. Instead He emptied Himself — that is the wonderful word — and took the form of a servant.
Where the Working Ends
The Master's answer settles something for His followers too.
G. C. Willis"Sabbath" means "rest," and the Lord said, "My Father is working until now, and I am working." The Lord Jesus could not rest in a world full of sin and suffering. He could not keep the Sabbath down here... No more can a true Christian keep the Sabbath in such a world. He has no more right to be resting here than his Master. If his Master must work, so must he. But in Hebrews 4:9 we read, "So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God." The Sabbath rest is ahead of us.
Summary
- Sin broke the rest. God rested over a spotless creation. Thorns, tears and death ended that rest, so He took up work of another kind.
- Work of grace. This work is not judgment but grace. The law asked a helpless man to move himself; at the pool, God moved instead.
- Father and Son together. In John, Jesus points to no example from David or the priests. He points to what His Father has always done — and does the same Himself.
- "My Father" is the offence. Those two words claimed a place no one else could take. His hearers heard equality with God in them.
- Rest still ahead. The work ends in the Sabbath rest that remains for God's people. Until then the servant works, like his Master.