God of the living

Read > Luke 20:27-40

So He is the God of the living, not the dead, for they are all alive to Him (v. 38).

The Sadducees, an active Jewish group during the time of Jesus, were more interested in politics than religion. They accepted the Pentateuch, the five Books of Moses, as their only Scripture. With their emphasis on the material world, they didn’t believe in angels or the resurrection of the dead (Luke 20:27; Acts 23:8), for they claimed that Moses did not write about any of those things.

The Sadducees gave Jesus a hypothetical situation (Luke 20:28-32) involving levirate marriage – where the surviving brother of a childless, deceased man would marry the widow to preserve the deceased brother’s family line (Deuteronomy 25:5-6). They intended to show that resurrection was both impossible and absurd.

Jesus responded, “Marriage is for people here on earth” (Luke 20:34). Whilst it is to be permanent on earth, it is not a permanent fixture in God’s eternal purpose (v. 35). The exclusiveness of marriage will be replaced by the perfect fellowship of believers with one another and with God (Matthew 8:11). And since there will be no death and no need to replenish the human population, there is no need for marriage and procreation. When people are resurrected, they are transformed into glorious immortality – like angels (v. 36).

Then, citing the writings of Moses, Jesus referred to the burning bush episode (Exodus 3). At that time, God told Moses, “I am the God of your father – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob” (Exodus 3:6). Moses wrote of God being their God in the present tense, “long after Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had died,” to prove that these patriarchs are still living (v. 37). Jesus affirmed what the Sadducees denied, the existence of angels (Exodus 3:2) and the reality of the resurrection (v. 6), with just one passage from Moses! – K. T. Sim

More >

·         Exodus 3:1-6

·         Job 19:25-27

·         John 5:28-29

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John 5:28-29 speaks of the resurrection of two groups of people – those who rise to experience eternal life, and those who rise to experience judgment. What will it be for you? What do you need to do to experience eternal life?