Matthew 22:23-33
The Pharisees, that’s the religious group that wants to be fair-you-see, is defeated in trapping Jesus in the question about taxes. So then the Sadducees, the ones who are sad-you-see because they don’t believe in the resurrection, try to trap Jesus their trick question. A woman who was married becomes a widow so is then given to his brother and so on as seven brothers die and finally the woman dies. The Sadducees ask whose wife she’ll be in the resurrection. Jesus corrects the first mistake by clarifying that marriage is not an issue in heaven. But more importantly he directly confronts the Sadducees about their misunderstanding about the resurrection. God “is not the God of the dead but of the living.”
The concept of eternal life is hard to get the mind around. The Bible does not go into great detail about what that means but the resurrection of Jesus points to the truth that there is eternity. Tolkien represented this idea with the race of elves that were immortal. C.S. Lewis in his 6th book in the Tales of Narnia has the four children running “high up and higher in” to reality and adventures beyond. Others like to think of choirs in clouds. It is comforting to think we will see our beloved departed hopefully without all the “oops” we know we need to apologize for. In Kenya the people would often overlook grievances because the person might be their neighbor in eternity.
Jesus is very clear. God is the God of life and not of death. We can be confident that God is working for our good no matter how horrendous our situation. So what aspects of life are precious to you as you think of eternity? Let us do an acrostic of the word “life” today…
L is for __________________
I is for ___________________
F is for __________________
E is for __________________
The journey of Lent is about a journey with a God who is willing to go the whole way that we might have life, and life more abundant. He has our back today. Thank you, Lord.
On the Way to Wonder 