The religious leaders confront Jesus about how he observed the Sabbath day. In response, Jesus shockingly claimed that he was the Lord of the Sabbath. Now, their disagreement about the purpose of the Sabbath is about to escalate further. This was a set-up. They were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus and condemn him, because in their eyes, it was wrong to heal someone on the Sabbath. These religious leaders lacked compassion and mercy for the poor man with the shrivelled hand. They were only using him. They were happy for the man to continue suffering for the sake of proving a religious point. Jesus is heroic in his response. He tells the man to stand up in front, where everyone can see him. Then he directly challenges the people there to confront their horrific hypocrisy. When Jesus asked this question, everyone remained silent. There was no mercy in their hearts. While everyone was silent, Jesus looked all the way around to everyone in the synagogue with anger on his face.