Children of the Resurrection

 

My dad having a conversation with the 
younger generation. 

Scripture:

Luke 20:27   Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him ²⁸ and asked him a question, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. ²⁹ Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; ³⁰ then the second ³¹ and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. ³² Finally the woman also died. ³³ In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.”

Luke 20:34   Jesus said to them, “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; ³⁵ but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. ³⁶ Indeed they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. ³⁷ And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. ³⁸ Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.” ³⁹ Then some of the scribes answered, “Teacher, you have spoken well.” ⁴⁰ For they no longer dared to ask him another question.

Observation:

This is the second in a sequence of questions that the religious leaders pose to Jesus. The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection and only accepted the Torah as authoritative scripture. Therefore, the teachings of the prophets and the psalms were not a part of their historical understanding of God. The question they posed to Jesus came from something called the levirate marriage. 

The beauty of Jesus’ response was that he brought up Moses. Obviously, the story of Moses is in the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament. Therefore, Jesus gave them an answer regarding the resurrection. We are all called to be children of the resurrection, and Jesus gave them, and us, a glimpse of what this future life will look like, where we will not die anymore, as children of God. This opens the understanding to eternal life, where God is the God of the living, and we are all made alive. 

He answered so well that they were afraid to ask him anymore questions. 

Application:

It may be my age, but in the last couple of years it feels like we’ve lost far too many good people. I realize we’ve also been in the midst of a pandemic but there’s been too much death to experience. Daily, I see new posts on social media about these losses.

Just the other day my husband’s uncle passed away. He was the final parent, aunt or uncle, on both sides of the family to die. That means that we are now the oldest generation alive within our families, and that’s a strange feeling. You begin to have more thoughts about death and what is to come. I remember talking to my dad after my mom had died and I mentioned the “hope of heaven” — and he immediately corrected me saying, “the promise of heaven.” That’s what we hear from Jesus in this passage, for there is a promise of a resurrected live for those who are children of God. 

What a difference it makes if we live like children of the resurrection. This changes our perspective on life in the present, for this is just a foreshadowing of what is to come. We serve a God of the living, for we are alive in him. Therefore, those who have gone before us who have been in Christ, adopted into the family are like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, children of the resurrection. 

As the oldest generation to be alive in our families, I feel a mantle has been placed upon my shoulders. It is our season to make sure that we are living as children of the resurrection. Our faith needs to be secure in Jesus Christ, our adoption completed. Only then can we live in peace with this life and the life to come, passing along the promises to the next generation. 

Prayer:

Lord, thank you for the promise of the resurrection. Amen.