Haggai 1:15b-2:9 Psalm 98 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17 Luke 20:27-38

For he is God, not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.  Luke 20:38

In our Gospel lesson for this morning from the twentieth chapter of Luke, Jesus has made his way into Jerusalem.  The familiar accounts of the triumphant entry are in chapter 19.  Luke’s Gospel tells us of only one visit to Jerusalem in Jesus’ adulthood.  Throughout this study of Luke’s Gospel, which began at the beginning of our Church year last December, we have been moving toward this point.  We have been walking with Jesus toward Jerusalem, and we know what is ahead for Jesus in Jerusalem.

The setting for today’s Gospel lesson is the Temple in Jerusalem where Jesus is teaching.  By this time, nearly 400 years after the Greek conquest of this Eastern Mediterranean area, debating had become a common practice among local philosophers gathered to share and exchange ideas.  But, this scene described by Luke is not just spirited debate among religious and philosophical leaders.  The tension that has mounted against Jesus beginning in his homeland of Galilee is coming to a cataclysmic head in Jerusalem.  Here in Jerusalem particularly, the religious leaders reject Jesus’ emphasis on the poor and humble who are the main focus of the Jesus that we come to know through Luke’s Gospel; and, these religious leaders are threatened by Jesus’ intention to include the gentile non-believers, any outside Jewish ethnicity and tradition, as children of God.

The most skeptical of the listeners gathered in the Temple are the Sadducees, described by historians as the “elite upper crust.”   Sadducees, the Bible tells us, do not believe in resurrection; they do not believe in everlasting life.  In other words, when your earthly body dies, you die – dead and gone into nothingness – the end, lost and forgotten.  For the Sadducees, there is no hereafter with God, thus, neither do they believe that there are angels to guide us on earth and greet us in heaven.

The Sadducees depicted in our lesson are seeking to humiliate Jesus.  Their intention is to force him to admit the absurdity of the resurrection or, at least, to falter in his explanation of it.  Additionally, they are putting pressure on him in hopes that he will make statements that violate the Torah – the Law of Moses; violating the Torah would give them clear evidence to condemn Jesus and discredit his mission.

Thus, the Sadducees pose this ridiculously hypothetical question of marriage in the afterlife.  In contrast, Jesus responds with great sincerity and wisdom, drawing his answer directly from the words of Moses.  Responding with the revered, indisputable words of the Torah, Jesus defeats the Sadducees at their own game.  He steps into their court, plays by their rules, and successfully defeats the goals of their disingenuous engagement.

Jesus is well aware that his time on earth is coming to an end.  In fact, the crucifixion will occur before this week in Jerusalem is out.  The resurrection message – the affirmation of the promise of everlasting life is most urgent and essential.

Jesus explains that after our earthly death, we are like angels; there will be no need for marriage and procreation.  We are children of God, children of the resurrection, children forever alive with God.  Moses himself affirmed the fact of our everlasting life in his encounter with the Lord in the burning bush so many centuries prior to this day in the Temple. From the bush God speaks as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob – the patriarchs of God’s chosen people who died hundreds of years before Moses lived.  These patriarchs are the foundation of religious heritage. Moses affirms that they remain alive with God.

The perpetuity of Abraham and the words of Moses are not to be disputed by even the Sadducees gathered with Jesus here in the Temple.  For God, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob live on just as does every child having been born into God’s kingdom.  Death is an earthly thing; it is not a continuation of life as we know it here; it serves only to transport us into everlasting life with God.

Surely, the dynamics of our bodily resurrection are a great mystery – a mystery we cannot fathom in this life except to be assured that God will not abandon his creation.  Jesus does not give us many details, though before this week in Jerusalem with the Sadducees is out, he will find out for himself what it is to be resurrected in the body.

I dare say all of us have had the joyful experience of sweet reminders or even striking messages from those we love who have gone before us.  Often, I would head outside after a frustrating conversation with my mother in the last months of her life as her mind was growing weaker.  No sooner had my foot hit the bottom step of the back porch before the church bells at the Baptist Church would begin chiming the hour.  The installation of the church bells and their continued chiming of the hour throughout town were mostly the result of my mother’s passionate persistent effort and monetary donations in my father’s memory.  If the bells didn’t ring, the church secretary was going to get a call from Cora Leigh.  Afternoon drives almost always included a stop along the street beside the church so that she could glory in the beauty of the marking of the hour.  Time after time, just at the right moment the bells would ring and I sensed my father’s presence and his kind entreat, “Take care of your mama.” My impatience was checked by the reminder of this legacy as I turned around to return to my caregiving with a greater since of gratitude and blessing rather than annoyance and inconvenience.

Because we live on with God, those who have lived and died before us continue to speak to us today.  How that happens is a big question that we continue to ask.

But, if I were going to be wrong about something, I’d prefer to take being wrong about the consequences of my death rather than wrong about my expectation of life.  I don’t want to be wrong about eternal life – eternal life with God, with the angels, with all the saints, with all of you – children of the resurrection giving praise and glory to God – the God of the living.