Luke 20:27-38
November 9, 2025
27 Some
Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him 28 and
asked him a question: “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies
leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up
children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven
brothers; the first married a woman and died childless; 30 then
the second] 31 and the third married
her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. 32 Finally
the woman also died. 33 In the resurrection,
therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.”
34 Jesus
said to them, “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in
marriage, 35 but those who are considered worthy of
a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are
given in marriage. 36 Indeed, they cannot die
anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children
of the resurrection. 37 And the fact that the dead
are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks
of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of
Jacob. 38 Now he is God not of the dead but of the
living, for to him all of them are alive.”
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In
the days when the Romans controlled Judaea there were a lot of different groups
among the locals. Two of the most
prominent were the Pharisees and the Sadducees.
The Pharisees were, in a way, the liberals. They believed in observing the Law laid down
in the Torah, but wanted to do it in a broad way. If you weren’t supposed to travel more than a
mile from home on the Sabbath, say, then they would ask whether you might not
consider your whole village your home so that you could visit family who lived
a mile from your house. The Sadducees
were more strict. They would insist your
home meant your home, your house, the place you eat and sleep. But the big difference between the two groups
was that the Pharisees believed in life after death, and the Sadducees believed
that dead is dead.
Now,
by “life after death” the Pharisees did not mean that each of us have a soul
that continues after the body gives out.
They meant that on a future universal day of judgement all the dead
would be raised bodily from the grave to stand on the earth and answer to God
for their deeds, good or bad. In Jesus’
description of the Last Judgement [Matthew 25:31-46] that’s what he talks
about, though he speaks of something more when he says how
“these will go away into eternal
punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” [Matthew 25:46]
Jesus and
the Pharisees had a lot more in common that Jesus and the Sadducees, which
explains the episode where they thought they could trip him up with a question about
the life of the resurrection if they pushed it to its absurd extremes.
It’s kind of fun to see Jesus push
back repeatedly, each time in a more pointed way.
First, it’s something along the
lines of: “You dummy! Do you really
think that the life of people raised back into existence would be just more of
the same?”
“…those who are considered worthy of a
place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are
given in marriage. Indeed, they cannot die
anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children
of the resurrection.” [Luke 20:35-36]
Then he addresses the real argument, the one about
whether or not there is a life to come.
“And the fact that the
dead are raised”
(which is the question on the table,)
“Moses himself showed, in the story about
the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac,
and the God of Jacob. Now he is God not of the
dead but of the living, for to him all of them are alive.”
[Luke 20:37-38]
That, in turn, is a way of raising a yet deeper
question for them: “What kind of God is this, who is
“God not of the dead but
of the living”?
Do
God’s actions make no difference in those who experience his power and his
love? No. The Sadducees, no less than the rest of God’s
people, should know that to encounter him is to be changed, sometimes in
dramatic ways. It is right there in the
scriptures.
Moses, whom he cites, met
God at the burning bush and was changed from a fugitive hiding out in the
desert into a prophet who would confront the Pharaoh of Egypt, and lead the
whole people out of slavery into freedom, then was used by God to provide them
with guidance on how to live in ways that would keep them free in spirit as
well.
Jesus mentions Abraham
who, long before Moses was born, became the father of nations because of his
trust in God’s power to give life. Paul
would later write of him,
“He did not weaken in faith when he
considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was
about a hundred years old), and the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No
distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in
his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced
that God was able to do what he had promised.”
[Romans 4:19-21]
And
even though it had not yet happened when Jesus was confronting the Sadducees’
questioning, the greatest example was yet to come when three women who had
stood by watching as Jesus’ breathed his last on a cross went to the tomb where
his lifeless body had been quickly placed and found it empty; and when two of
his confused and disappointed disciples had met a stranger whom they suddenly
recognized and who then just disappeared; and when other disciples who had gone
fishing recognized him standing on the beach, waiting to share breakfast with
them; and when the Pharisee Saul who had been persecuting Jesus’ followers looked
up and saw a blinding light and heard Jesus’ own voice speak his name.
The God of Jesus – “he
is God not of the dead but of the living.”
To live with him is to be changed, here and now, in ways that work to
bring God’s own hopes and plans for us to life.
To live with him, here and now, is to live with pardon for all that is
past and hope for all that is new, day by day.
To live with him, here and now, is to be
“children of God, being children of the
resurrection.” [Luke 20:36]
The First Letter of John lingers on that thought.
“See what love the Father has given us,
that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are. The reason
the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved,
we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we
do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see
him as he is. And all who have this hope in him
purify themselves, just as he is pure.” [I John 3:1-3]
We are on our way, here
and now, to something good.
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