And haven’t you read in the law of Moses that the priests on duty in the Temple may work on the Sabbath? Matthew 12:5 (NLT)
Does God contradict Himself in the Scriptures? Because in giving the law He said you shall do no work on the Sabbath Exodus 20:10 yet here Jesus says and quotes the law that one can work on the Sabbath.
The Sabbath means rest and God’s kind of rest isn’t necessarily cessation from work but ceasing from struggling wherein are cares, worry, confusion, anxiety, exhaustion, and stress. It is letting go of sweating in our own efforts to make things happen.
The Israelites had since their ancestors been slaves in Egypt for centuries under hard labor. They were going to Canaan with that spirit and attitude that they had to slave and struggle for everything. God wanted them to enter into His realm of liberty and rest where yes true there’s work but not with that attitude of a painful laborious toiling. The Sabbath law wasn’t meant that people do exactly totally nothing but rather to let them know that it’s not by natural human might or struggle but by the Spirit and power of God we live and are sustained.
Working on the Sabbath means you can have better and faster results resting or relying on God’s power than striving on your own.