Text:\u00a0 Luke 20 :27-38<\/p>\n
I walked into the home.\u00a0 I knew what I would find, at least what had happened there.\u00a0 A man had died, a husband, a father.\u00a0 Of course, there was sadness.\u00a0 But I sensed something else.<\/p>\n
I sat down with the wife and asked her if she had a pastor or priest.\u00a0 No. she \u00a0I then asked.\u00a0 Do you have any kind of beliefs?\u00a0 She said, no, nothing like that<\/i>.\u00a0 Then I knew what I sensed when I walked into that house.\u00a0 Not just the sadness that death brings, but a dark kind of hopelessness, the hopelessness of unbelief.<\/p>\n
I walked into the room.\u00a0 There lay my mother.\u00a0 We had flown all night to get there.\u00a0 She was barely alive.\u00a0 The Alzheimers was finally about to claim another victim.\u00a0 I spoke to my mother whose faith I knew.\u00a0 I prayed for her and then I left.\u00a0 That night came the call.\u00a0 She was gone.\u00a0 Tears were not far behind those words.<\/p>\n
A few days later, I stood in another place.\u00a0 A small church in New York. There I had the privilege of ministering to family and friends with something that helps God’s people to rise above our natural grief.\u00a0 It helps us deal with those pictures in our mind of how bad off our loved one was.\u00a0 As we think about those who fall asleep in Christ, we have a very special kind of hope.<\/p>\n
And that brings us to what happened in our Gospel. It’s kind of a strange thing.\u00a0 But not that unusual for our Lord.\u00a0 His enemies come out to confront Jesus, to show he’s wrong.\u00a0 You might think this would be just another religious argument. \u00a0But no.\u00a0 Here we can listen to our Lord and say with hope in our hearts:<\/p>\n
I believe in the resurrection of the body
\nand the life everlasting.
\n<\/b>I.\u00a0 Man’s wisdom questions and denies it.
\nII. \u00a0My Lord Jesus proclaims it
\nIII.\u00a0 God’s Holy Word teaches it.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It was Tuesday of Holy Week.\u00a0 Jesus was teaching in the temple courts.\u00a0 Many people had welcomed Jesus on Palm Sunday. But the religious leaders were now determined to find a way to kill him.\u00a0 In two days, they would succeed in arresting him. In three days, they would succeed in getting him crucified.<\/p>\n
Luke tells us, that on this day, some Sadducees came out to question Jesus. Here it helps to know something about them. They were one of the religious groups that made up the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council.\u00a0 The High Priest was a Sadducee who by now ran the temple like a profit making business.<\/p>\n
Luke tells us something important about them.\u00a0 They said, there is no resurrection<\/i>. In fact, they were like some liberal preachers today. They did not believe in life after death.\u00a0 It’s right now, that counts.<\/p>\n
As far as the Bible was concerned, they only accepted the Torah as God’s Word, the first five books of the Old Testament.\u00a0 Not the words of the prophets.\u00a0 Not Isaiah, not Daniel, Only Moses.\u00a0 Only 5 of the 39 books we call the Old Testament.<\/p>\n
So this day the Sadducees weren’t looking for spiritual guidance. They wanted to discredit Jesus.\u00a0 They wanted to show that a belief in the resurrection was foolish.\u00a0 Here it’s not important that we spend a lot of time understanding how they tried to set Jesus up.\u00a0 It’s more important you see what they intended.\u00a0 \u2018After seven husbands, at the resurrection, whose wife will she be?\u2019\u00a0 They must have said with disdain dripping from their lips. Resurrection, no such thing.<\/p>\n
It seems to me to me these Sadducees serve as an example. Not an example to follow but one to beware of. For they show us where man’s wisdom leaves people.\u00a0 It leaves people with this short life and nothing more.\u00a0 It leaves them starring down a big black hole called death.\u00a0 It leave us with a gnawing uncertainty about what we will face on the other side.\u00a0 For man’s wisdom, this world’s way of thinking, questions and denies<\/b> the resurrection and the life.<\/p>\n
And I don’t have to tell you.\u00a0 There is a Sadducee who lives inside each of us.\u00a0 He’s with us now as we hear God’s Word, questioning, bringing doubt.\u00a0 He’ll be with us as we approach death’s door.\u00a0 Yet thanks be to God. In spite \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 of what man’s so called wisdom would tell me, I believe as you do. I believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.\u00a0 For my Lord Jesus proclaims it<\/b>.<\/p>\n
It’s interesting how Jesus made use of their words. They intended to trip him up.\u00a0 But here as in other times, Jesus used their question to hold up a wonderful truth. There is a resurrection of the dead. There will be a resurrection to life just as Job confessed long before:\u00a0 And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh, I will see God<\/span>\u00a0 (Job 19:26)<\/p>\n Here Jesus describes that life to come. He says, we will be like the angels<\/span>.\u00a0 By the way, he doesn’t say, we will be angels like you sometimes hear.\u00a0 He says we will be like them<\/i>.\u00a0 How so?\u00a0 After all, angels are spirits, not flesh and blood like you and me. Jesus tells us how.\u00a0 In the life to come, our relationships will be different than they are now.\u00a0 Like the angels, we will not marry or be given in marriage.\u00a0 For marriage is for this life only.<\/p>\n And I realize that when we come to these words of Jesus, we might feel troubled.\u00a0 I’ve heard people say, I don’t want to think about that.<\/i> I can understand.\u00a0 I\u2019ve felt that way myself.<\/p>\n But remember what Jesus says here.\u00a0 They are God’s children.<\/span> \u00a0In other words, in the life to come, we will ALL be family.\u00a0 We will ALL be united as sons and daughters of our heavenly Father.\u00a0 And no one will be left behind.\u00a0 No one will feel lonely or left out.\u00a0 We will ALL be family in the best sense of the word.<\/p>\n And we will be like the angels in another way.\u00a0 Like the angels, we will never, ever face the prospect of sickness or death again. No longer will our eyes fill with tears.\u00a0 No longer will words like cancer and heart disease trouble us.\u00a0 No more will we have to struggle with grief.\u00a0 For we will live, no more to die.<\/p>\n But did you notice who can look forward to that?\u00a0 Jesus said.\u00a0 Those considered worthy.<\/span>\u00a0 Did you hear that?\u00a0 Those considered worthy!<\/p>\n Wait a second.\u00a0 Doesn’t the Bible say, there is no one righteous, not even one.<\/span> Doesn’t the Bible say, All have sinned and fall short.\u00a0 So how can you or I or anyone be considered worthy of the resurrection?<\/p>\n There is only one way.\u00a0 The way of grace. To believe in this One standing here in the temple courts.\u00a0 The eternal Son of God who became your brother.\u00a0 He lived each day of his life for you, being the kind of person we will never be.\u00a0 There is only one way.\u00a0 To believe that he went to a cross where he offered his perfect life for you.\u00a0 That there he took upon himself your punishment and mine.\u00a0 So much did he love us.<\/p>\n And so here is the good news for us unworthy sinners: Jesus says…my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.<\/span> (John 6:40)\u00a0 Did you hear what your Lord proclaims?\u00a0 Eternal life.\u00a0 He will raise us up, all those who have taken their last breath with faith trusting in him.\u00a0 So yes, I believe. I believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.<\/b><\/p>\n Yet why should I take Jesus at his word when the Sadducees seemed to make more sense.\u00a0 Why should I walk by faith and not by what my eyes plainly tell me.\u00a0 For dead is dead and there seems to be nothing more.\u00a0 So why take Jesus at his Word?\u00a0 Jesus rose.\u00a0 Jesus lives. And because he has risen, you and I can know.\u00a0 We will follow.\u00a0 Every one who falls asleep in him will live body and soul, Saints Triumphant<\/b>. My Lord Jesus proclaims it. <\/b><\/p>\n But there is another reason that Jesus points to. These Sadducees could have known it without him telling them.\u00a0 For what did Jesus do here? He pointed them back to Moses, the one prophet of God whose words they accepted.\u00a0 So I believe in the resurrection for another reason as well.\u00a0 God’s Holy Word teaches it.<\/b><\/p>\n Notice something here.\u00a0 The Sadducees quoted Moses to make Jesus look foolish and so too a belief in the resurrection.\u00a0 What did Jesus do?\u00a0 He took the very same book, Exodus, to show what God clearly teaches.\u00a0 You remember.\u00a0 Moses went up the mountain where God spoke to him from a burning bush that did not burn up.\u00a0 He said to Moses, I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob<\/span>.\u00a0 Jesus then told the Sadducees that those words were full of meaning.\u00a0 Moses showed that the dead rise, he told them.<\/p>\n How so?\u00a0 Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were long since dead and buried.\u00a0 But in these words, God spoke of them as alive, not dead and gone and just a memory.\u00a0 Their souls were with the Lord in heaven just as the souls of our loved one who have died in Christ.<\/p>\n But here Jesus points beyond that.\u00a0\u00a0 For God is not the god of people whose bodies will stay in the grave.\u00a0 As Jesus says here:\u00a0 He is the God of the living<\/span>.\u00a0 He is the God of people who will live as we were meant to, body and soul at the resurrection, Saints triumphant!\u00a0 God\u2019s holy Word teaches that <\/b>and so I believe it.<\/p>\n So we go to the cemetery where we commit the bodies of those we love.\u00a0 Or we gather for a memorial service.\u00a0 Someday our turn will come.\u00a0 But this we know.\u00a0 Through our tears we can say.\u00a0 I believe in the resurrection.\u00a0 And we can know.\u00a0 All is well. <\/i>\u00a0All is well in Jesus Christ who is the Resurrection and the life.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Text:\u00a0 Luke 20 :27-38 I walked into the home.\u00a0 I knew what I would find, at least what had happened there.\u00a0 A man had died, a husband, a father.\u00a0 Of course, there was sadness.\u00a0 But I sensed something else. I sat down with the wife and asked her if she had a pastor or priest.\u00a0 No. she \u00a0I then asked.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermon"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":491,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490\/revisions\/491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}