In today’s Gospel, we return to the Synagogue on the Sabbath where Jesus is teaching. Again, the Pharisees are watching to see whether he would break the law. And Jesus obliges. There is a man with a withered hand whom Jesus cures while at the same time throwing out a challenge to the teachers of the law, ‘What is allowed by the law on the Sabbath? To do good or to do harm, to save life or destroy it?’

In asking the question, Jesus draws attention to the extremes we sometime go to in misbegotten zeal or, as in the case of the Pharisees, for the love of power and the ability to control.

The message that we are given is that power in office comes from God alone – he has vested the elected with the responsibility to discharge their duty mercifully and with love. For those of us not in higher office, the rule still applies – to demonstrate the loving face of the Father at all times and in all places.