GOSPEL READING:
Luke 20:27-3827 There came to him some Sadducees, those who say that there is no resurrection, 28 and they asked him a question, saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the wife and raise up children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers; the first took a wife, and died without children; 30 and the second 31 and the third took her, and likewise all seven left no children and died. 32 Afterward the woman also died. 33 In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as wife."
34 And Jesus said to them, "The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage; 35 but those who are accounted worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, 36 for they cannot die any more, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. 37 But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed, in the passage about the bush, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. 38 Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living; for all live to him."
Meditation: Is your life earth-bound or heaven-bound? The
Sadducees had one big problem - they could not conceive of heaven
beyond what they could see with their naked eyes! Aren't we often
like them? We don't recognize spiritual realities because we try
to make heaven into an earthly image. The Sadducees came to Jesus
with a test question to make the resurrection look ridiculous. The
Sadducees, unlike the Pharisees, did not believe in immortality,
nor in angels or evil spirits. Their religion was literally
grounded in an earthly image of heaven.
The Scriptures give witness - we will rise again to
immortal life
Jesus retorts by dealing with the fact of the resurrection. The
Scriptures give proof of it. In Exodus 3:6, when God manifests his
presence to Moses in the burning bush, the Lord tells him that he
is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He shows that the
patriarchs who died hundreds of years previously were still alive
in God. Jesus defeats their arguments by showing that God is a
living God of a living people. God was the friend of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob when they lived. That friendship could not cease
with death. As Psalm 73:23-24 states: "I am continually with
you; you hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and
afterward you will receive me to glory."
The ultimate proof of the resurrection is the Lord Jesus and his
victory over death when he rose from the tomb. Before Jesus raised
Lazarus from the dead, he exclaimed: "I am the
resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die,
yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall
never die. Do you believe this?" (John 11:25). Jesus asks
us the same question. Do you believe in the resurrection and in
the promise of eternal life with God?
Jesus came to restore Paradise and everlasting life for us
The Holy Spirit reveals to us the eternal truths of God's enduring
love and the abundant life he desires to share with us for all
eternity. Paul the Apostle, quoting from the prophet Isaiah
(Isaiah 64:4; 65:17) states: "What no eye has seen, nor ear
heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for
those who love him," God has revealed to us through the Spirit (1
Corinthians 2:9-10). The promise of Paradise - heavenly bliss and
unending life with an all-loving God - is beyond human reckoning.
We have only begun to taste the first-fruits! Do you live now in
the joy and hope of the life of the age to come?
May the Lord Jesus put his hands on our eyes also, for then we too shall begin to look not at what is seen but at what is not seen. May he open the eyes that are concerned not with the present but with what is yet to come, may he unseal the heart's vision, that we may gaze on God in the Spirit, through the same Lord, Jesus Christ, whose glory and power will endure throughout the unending succession of ages. (Prayer of Origen, 185-254 AD)
Psalm 17:1,6-9,15
1 Hear a just cause, O LORD; attend to my cry! Give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit!
6 I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; incline your ear to me, hear my words.
7 Wondrously show your mercies, O savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand.
8 Keep me as the apple of the eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings,
9 from the wicked who despoil me, my deadly enemies who surround me.
15 As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with beholding your form.
Daily Quote from the Early Church Fathers: Jesus cites Moses to affirm the resurrection, by Cyril of Alexandria (376-444 AD)
"The Savior also demonstrated the great ignorance of the
Sadducees by bringing forward their own leader Moses, who was
clearly acquainted with the resurrection of the dead. He set God
before us saying in the bush, 'I am the God of Abraham, and the
God of Isaac and the God of Jacob' (Exodus 3:6). Of whom is he
God, if, according to their argument, these have ceased to live?
He is the God of the living. They certainly will rise when his
almighty right hand brings them and all that are on the earth
there. For people not to believe that this will happen is worthy
perhaps of the ignorance of the Sadducees, but it is altogether
unworthy of those who love Christ. We believe in him who says, 'I
am the resurrection and the life' (John 11:25). He will raise the
dead suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye, and at the last
trumpet. It shall sound, the dead in Christ shall rise
incorruptible, and we shall be changed (1 Corinthians 15:52). For
Christ our common Savior will transfer us into incorruption, glory
and to an incorruptible life."(excerpt from COMMENTARY
ON LUKE, HOMILY 136)
