June 16, 2024

The following transcript has been electronically transcribed. Any errors in spelling, syntax, or grammar should be attributed to the electronic method of transcription and its inherent limitations. You know, since the dawn of civilization, mankind has always had a very odd relationship with death. We've always known that death is coming. There's never been a civilization whose people did not understand empirically that death is coming. Death comes to everyone. They saw this every civilization has seen this that death comes to everyone and this death that touches Everyone has always been a point of great I guess consternation for people because all people at all times We've always had a deep sense that death was not the end every civilization known to man There's no civilization in the history of mankind of which I'm aware that has not had a sense of death that something comes after this. Now, civilizations will know that something's coming after this, but yet we don't know what, and we don't know how to handle it. We don't know how to approach it because what lies on the other side is so unknown to us. But all civilizations will, they will know that the death is coming and they will know that it's not the end of their existence. Now, some, particularly modern people, may push that aside, may convince themselves that that is not, that is not the case. But all people naturally know that death is not the end, and so we speculate about what lies on the other side. Now one of the things that is true about all civilizations as they speculate about what's coming on the other side, all those speculations tend to always follow the same pattern. And that pattern is that they will imagine an existence on the other side of death. That is simply a reworking of this existence, a modification of this existence. Maybe it's a utopian type of existence. Maybe it's a worse existence than this one, but in whatever case that may be, it's always of the same characteristics, of the same nature as this existence. Let me just give a few examples of that. For example, the, the ancient Greeks. They would believe that when they, put their dead, their dead in the, tombs, they would put a coin in their mouth. And that coin was to pay for the passage over the river Styx on the boat that took them across the river of death. You see the continuity there? It's the same basic things of this life. There's a river, you gotta cross the river, you need a fare. Or the, For example, the Plains Indians, the North American Indians, they would often bury their braves with a horse and a bow and an arrow so that they could hunt in the next life. You see, just the same thing that's in this life, just a little bit different. Or Eskimos, the Eskimos of Greenland, would They would bury the people with a guide dog so that the guide dog could guide them through the next life. You see, it's just the same thing reworked into a different type of existence. I read not too long ago about a, an ancient tribe of people that would bury their dead with a map. of the next world so that they knew how to get around the next world. And I thought, isn't that crazy that somehow they believe that someone in this life has a map of the next world and that's going to help you get around. But all these, these things that are prevalent in every society, as we imagine what's on the other side, our imaginations will always be more or less what's on this side, and then As we come to our passage today, we come face to face with this question that they come to Jesus with, and this is going to show us evidence of the very same thing as this question is brought to Jesus of the resurrection. Let's read our passage beginning from verse 18. And Sadducees came to him who say that there is no resurrection. And they asked him a question, saying, Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies and leaves a wife but leaves no child, The man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. There were seven brothers, the first took a wife, and when he died, left no offspring. The second took her and died, leaving no offspring, and the third likewise, and the seven left no offspring. Last of all, the woman who also died, in the resurrection, when they rise again, whose wife will she be? For the seven had her as wife. Jesus said to them, Is this not the reason you are wrong? Because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for the dead being raised, have you not read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God spoke to him saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He is not God of the dead, but of the living. You are quite wrong. Let's pause right there and ask for God's blessing. Father, we pray, Lord, as we've just read this passage of Scripture that you would help us, help us to see your glory and to perceive your light, impart to us spiritual understanding that is beyond the natural man, cause us to see you rightly and seeing you rightly to love you and to adore you more deeply. We pray, Lord, that for your guidance, we pray, Lord, for your filling and your equipping in the time that follows. We pray this in Jesus name. So here in verse 18, we're introduced to a new group of people, the Sadducees. We read in verse 18, And Sadducees came to him. That's the first time that Mark has mentioned anything about the Sadducees. Now the Sadducees, we should know a little bit about them. The Sadducees are a group of people that we know actually very little about. Because the Sadducees did not survive the disaster of AD 70 when the city of Jerusalem was sacked and the Romans came and demolished everything. That was the end of their existence. But not only that, they ceased to exist, but in addition to that, none of their writings survived. We have no writings from Sadducees, we have no correspondence, nothing from them to tell us of their beliefs firsthand. So the only thing that we know about the Sadducees is what we know about them from their enemies. Which would be, of course, the New Testament has accounts of the Sadducees, also Josephus. Has accounts of the Sadducees and there are rabbinic writings of the Sadducees. None of these are favorable to the Sadducees, so you can imagine being a group of people that history only knows you by what your enemies said about you. So maybe perhaps a little bit of a slanted view. But what we know about the Sadducees is not very flattering at all. They were a religious sect of people in Jesus' Day, and by religious, I use that term loosely. They were more a political group than anything else, but they were a political group that had. strong religious ties. So their politics were very pro Roman. They were pro Roman rule. They were pro Herodian. And so they much liked the Romans being in charge because the Romans kept them in charge as well. They were known as the priestly group. The priests often came from the Sadducees. So there was a very, very tight connection between the Sadducees Therefore, we see Mark's train of thought here. As Jesus enters into the temple, remember that Jesus doesn't cleanse the temple. He condemns the temple. He curses the temple. And starting from the cursing of the temple, we have episode after episode of Jesus confrontation with the temple leadership. The Sadducees would represent a firmly entrenched group of priestly temple leadership. So they're very closely connected to the temple. They're very political. They're rather liberal. But in addition to that, we know a little bit about their religious beliefs. We know that they rejected. Not only the prophets and the writings of the wisdom writings, but they rejected everything except the Torah, the Torah, the Pentateuch or the first five books of your Bible known as the books of Moses. Those were the only books of the Bible, the Scriptures that they consider to be the word of God. They rejected the prophets. They rejected the Psalms. They rejected all that literature because they rejected all of that. In fact, they also rejected essentially everything spiritual about their Jewish faith. They rejected the existence of angels. They rejected the existence of demons. They rejected, of course, the afterlife and the resurrection. You might recall in Acts chapter 23, there was this incident in which Paul is on trial before the Sanhedrin. And he perceives as his trial is going along, he perceives that the Sanhedrin is made up almost evenly of Pharisees and Sadducees. The Pharisees who believe in the resurrection. And the Sadducees who don't believe in the resurrection. And so Paul then brings up the resurrection and he says, the only reason I'm on trial is because I believe in the resurrection, which had the effect that he wanted, meaning that the Sanhedrin erupted into chaos as the Sadducees and the Pharisees began to argue with one another over the resurrection. And then Paul was sort of let off the hook. So this, that's the case. There's a, they'd rejected all everything spiritual about Judaism. They, they held the law. Okay. the writings of Moses, but because the Torah said very little about angels, but it did say something. Remember what the Torah says about, says about angels? There was that one episode where God said, The second person of the Trinity, God the Son, along with two angels, comes and meets with Abraham. You remember that episode? And they're on their way to Sodom and Gomorrah, and they tell Sarah that she's going to be a mother within a year. And then they go on to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, and it's the two angels that do the destroying. Other than that, that's the only mention of God. Angels or the demonic and there is no explicit mention of the resurrection. And so therefore they reject the resurrection and all these things spiritual. So that's a little bit about the Sadducees, the background of them. They are enemies of Jesus and being enemies of Jesus, they come together with the Pharisees who are their enemies as well. But as the saying goes, The enemy of my enemy is my friend. So here the Pharisees have now come together. So again, verse 18, And Sadducees came to him, meaning Jesus, who say that there is no resurrection. So there's a reminder there. This is the qualifying characteristic about the Sadducees, is that they do not believe in the resurrection. So they say that there's no resurrection, and they ask him a question, saying, and here comes a question. This question that is this rather, Well, fanciful type of quandary that they have no doubt concocted because as you read the story, just it's clearly a story that they have fabricated to create the most asinine case against the resurrection that they can come up with. And as you read this, you get the sense that this was sort of a It was maybe their go to question as the Sadducees and the Pharisees contended with one another About the resurrection that perhaps this was sort of the go to scenario as they would argue with the Pharisees They would say hey consider this there was this woman married and married and married and married again What whose wife is she so this is the question that they come to Jesus with so the question revolves around a practice known as Leverett marriage Leveret marriage is told to us or explained to us in Deuteronomy chapter 25. I won't read that. You can read it. You can peruse through that on your own. You probably are familiar somewhat with the ancient practice of leveret marriage. The way it worked was this, was when a man died without a male heir, then the brother, if the man had a brother, the brother would take the widow as his, as his wife. In order to raise up a male heir and that may the purpose of the male heir was to carry on not the brother's name, but the first brother's name, the whole purpose was that so that his name wouldn't die out. It was not a very popular practice. It was not looked upon with a great deal of favor among the ancient Israelites. There's a couple of occasions in the Scriptures in which we see that quite plainly. If you might, think back to Genesis 38. Remember in Genesis 38, there was that fellow by the name of Onan, who was in the same situation, took his brother's wife, and what he did was he, performed the act, but then withheld the seed. That's, that's about as explicit as I can really kind of get right now. That's, that's the sanitized version. But you see there that the point was he did not want to raise an heir for his brother. Why would that be? Because if the wife, if the widow of his brother conceived, he would have to raise the child, but it wasn't his own. He would have to pay for the child, bring the child up, raise the child, but yet it wasn't his name that he was raising up. So he was an expense. He was a liability. We've talked before about this particular culture and just what a liability it was, what a, what a drain on resources. It is Small Children work. And so for that reason, it wasn't highly favored. There's another instance in Ruth chapter two. Remember in Ruth chapter two, there's a whole story of Naomi and her two sons have died. Her husband has died. And here she is. She has just her daughter in law, Ruth. And then there's that whole debate about the closest of kin and how the closest of kin is to take her or to take Ruth, which is her, her daughter-in-Law. And then Boaz wants her as his wife. And so they then, then negotiate so that Boaz then takes over that responsibility. So in both instances, you see that it was not a particularly favored kind of practice, but that was the practice and the purpose was to carry on the line. Or to carry on the seed of the one who died without an heir. So they create this fanciful type of scenario. The scenario is, there was this one woman, and she was married. Her husband died without a male heir. And then he had a brother. And the brother comes along and takes her. And then the next, he dies. And the next one comes along and takes her. And then he dies. And the next one comes along and takes her. All the way down to seven. And all seven die. And then she dies. So tell us, Jesus, whose wife will she be in the resurrection? So what an odd case that they bring to Jesus, right? It's almost like the situation that they create and they bring this to Jesus is one in which they said, let us just make the most absurd argument that we can against the resurrection. Because, two dead brothers would have proved the case, wouldn't it? Two, two dead brothers would have created the same scenario. But yet they go through the whole process of the seven brothers. It's almost like I can't help reading the story and, and not thinking that this is some sort of perverted Seven Brides for Seven Brothers kind of thing. You know, there's seven brothers and only one bride and instead of dancing and singing, they die one by one. But it's this odd sort of scenario where these seven brothers came and nobody asked the obvious question. Because the obvious question that nobody seemed to ask is somebody needs to investigate this woman's cooking because something is happening That all seven of these brothers died. I think she's probably flavoring the meals with arsenic or something of that nature So but nobody asked, you know, how is it that seven brothers died? But it whatever whatever the case may be There's this case in which these seven brothers died and the question is well who's wife is she in the resurrection? Now, Jesus could have answered the question very straightforwardly and very plainly, but he didn't. Instead, he chose to get to the spiritual matter underlying. He could have answered the question by simply saying, Well, the law says That since none of these seven brothers had an heir or none of the six following brothers had an heir She's the wife of the first man, but he chose not to go that route He chose to dive deeper into the underlying spiritual problem the underlying spiritual matter So there's these seven brothers verse down through verse 22 verse 23 and the resurrection when they rise You can kind of hear the sarcasm in their voice In this supposed resurrection, when they rise, who will they, who will they, now here's just a side point that I want to make here. As they make this absurd argument against the resurrection, doesn't this remind us of how it is that the unbelieving world, when they have arguments against the Christian faith, their arguments always tend to be absurd ones. Have you noticed that? Have you noticed that the arguments against faith seem to themselves be a greater stretch of faith? Then the faith itself that they argue against. Have you ever heard? I'm sure we've all heard these. Ridiculous questions that sometimes are posed, you know, can God create a rock so heavy that nobody that even he can't lift it? He's like that's just a that's an asinine question kind of like the Sadducees bring to Jesus Instead of a question that comes to Jesus to say Jesus. We're having trouble understanding the teaching about the resurrection that you believe in help us to understand Let us pose this question that presents a problem for us help us to understand instead. They present it in such a So they present this question verse 23 in the resurrection when they rise again, wink, wink, whose wife will she be for the seven had her as wife. Now, notice, notice Jesus response. Verse 24. Jesus said to them, is this not the reason you are wrong? Let's pause right there and just appreciate what Jesus said. Is this not the reason that you are wrong? In other words, you are wrong. I just appreciate the fact that Jesus did not say. Well, I sort of understand this a different way. You have your understanding, but let me tell you my understanding and see how you like this. Try this on and see how this fits. I have a different perspective. Let me share my perspective with you. Instead, Jesus says, your interpretation of the Scripture is this. wrong. He says that twice at the end of the passage. He's going to reiterate. You are quite wrong. The words translated. You are quite wrong. There literally means you are deceiving yourself. You are self deceived. Jesus's view of Scripture and the interpretation of Scripture is a black and white view, meaning in Jesus's view of Scripture. There is a right interpretation. It's not a scale of, well, to you, this interpretation might work and to this other person, this other interpretation might work instead, Jesus's perception of Scripture is that there is a right understanding and you don't have it. Don't you just relate to that? Don't you just relate as the Holy Spirit within you testifies when you hear truth? Isn't the Holy Spirit testifying to you? That is right! Now, when we think about our modern world and how our modern world is just so consumed by this, With the tolerance of ideas and our world is so upside down with creating your own reality, even down to your own gender and what you want your reality to be and how there's no objective truth and truth can be for you whatever you want it to be. Don't you just appreciate the fact that the Scriptures reject that altogether? That the Scriptures present us with a There is a reality that says there is a right interpretation of Scripture, and there's wrong interpretation of Scripture. And if we could look to the Scriptures, we would find such abundant confirmation of this, such abundant evidence, that that's how the Scriptures perceived themselves. Think with me, for example, of Paul's words to Timothy, in 2 Timothy 2 and verse 15, Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, Rightly handling the word of truth. So the necessary implication there is that if there is a right way to handle the word of truth, there is also a wrong way to handle the word of truth. Or we could think of his words to Timothy and 1st Timothy 6, guard the deposit entrusted to you, the gospel that has been entrusted to you. Or 2nd Timothy chapter 1, follow the pattern of sound teaching which I gave to you. Or again and again, he will tell Timothy, guard the doctrine that I have taught you. As you appoint elders in the churches, make sure that those elders guard the right doctrine that I have given to you. Or Acts 20, chapter 20, the same type of thing. Galatians 1 and verse 8, the same type of thing. We have a Scripture. We have the Scriptures that say to us, there is a right understanding of the Scriptures and there is a wrong understanding of the Scriptures, which is why it's so significant that the people of God endeavor to understand their Scriptures rightly. There is not one interpretation that might work for this group and another interpretation that works for this other group and another interpretation that works for this other group. Because when two interpretations of Scripture don't agree, one of them, at least one of them, has to be wrong. And that's not to say that We understand our Scriptures 100 percent rightly. But it is to say that that is the endeavor of the church to understand the things of God as they have been given to us. Because there is a right way to understand and there is a wrong way to understand. Now continuing on, he says, Is this not the reason that you are wrong? And here's the reason, Because you know neither the Scriptures, Nor the power of God, you know, neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. So first of all, he says, you are wrong. And the reason that you're wrong is because you don't know the Scriptures. Now, do the Sadducees not know the Scriptures? Well, I mean, Jesus said that they don't know the Scriptures, but in another sense, don't think they do. I mean, they're coming to Jesus with a question from the Scriptures. And so to say to them, you know, you don't know the Scriptures. What Jesus is saying is there is a world of difference between being familiar with the Scriptures and knowing them. There's a world of difference between having read the books of Moses And knowing them in your heart, there's a world of difference between having read the Scriptures and perhaps even memorize the Scriptures and having them written on your heart. There's a world of difference between that. There's a world of difference between saying I know what the Bible says and really knowing it in your heart. This knowledge of the Scriptures, this deeper perception of the Scriptures, This is the life of the church, and this is the catalyst for every true and genuine revival that the church has ever experienced. Think with me of just a couple of examples. You remember the example of King Josiah? King Josiah, when the land was in such spiritual decadence and the revival brought on by King Josiah came about when the Scriptures were discovered hidden in the wall and the people said, we forgot about these and they read the Scriptures and they were convicted and hence this revival came among the people or the revival by King Josiah. The priest Ezra, the revival that sprang when he stood before the people and all day long read the Scriptures in their language. And they said, we forgotten about these or just think fast forward several millennia to the reformation of the 15th century, when the gospel of Jesus Christ was recovered, when men began to read their Scriptures and say, we've gotten so far from this. Let us give ourselves to the Scriptures and the revival that ensued after that was a true and genuine revival This is why remember a couple years ago the whole Asbury revival thing This is why I was took a basic skeptical position to that because that revival movement included no Return to the Scriptures no devotion to opening the Scriptures and saying what does the Word of God say? There were Scriptures that were read You But there was no explanation and exposition of the Scriptures. So the Word of God, the knowledge of the Word of God, this is our endeavor as Christians, brothers and sisters, to know the Word of God. Because let me say this to you, and I don't mean this in any way pejorative at all. You do not know the Scriptures as well as you think you do. And that's true for every one of us in this room. You do not know the Scriptures as much as you think you do. And you do not know the Scriptures as much as we need to. The Scriptures are our lifeline and our deeper, more penetrating knowledge of the Scriptures, of taking the Scriptures and implanting them into our heart. As James will say, the implanted word that saves you, implanting those into our heart. That is the journey of the Christian. So he says you are an error because you do neither know the Scriptures. So, it's at this point that we reach, I think, the meat of the passage. So, everything up to this point was kind of like milk. And from this point is when we really, I think, get into the meat of the passage. Because, let's think about what Jesus is saying. You are wrong. The reason you're wrong is because you don't know two things. You don't know the Scripture and you don't know the power of God. So it makes sense to us why Jesus would say that you are wrong because you don't know the Scriptures. But why does Jesus say you're wrong because you don't know the power of God? Well, let's think about the situation that the Sadducees brought to Jesus. They bring to Jesus a situation that in their mind makes the resurrection possible. If not improbable, impossible. They've created this situation that makes the resurrection so awkward in their view to say, well, which, which a husband is she now going to be wife of in the eternal state. And so in their mind, they've, they've, there's a situation that makes this resurrection improbable or difficult or even impossible. Therefore, negating in their mind the power of God to work this according to His plan in ways that they don't understand. And that's the whole problem. And so you can imagine what's in their mind that created this situation that makes this resurrection from the dead something that in their view can't really happen without creating a whole lot of problems. They fail to understand the power of God. It's much like people that wrestle with the resurrection today and all of us do this. We all wrestle with the bodily resurrection that the Scriptures promise. And how do we wrestle with the resurrection? We wrestle with how's God going to do that? How's God going to resurrect from the dead all of these bodies of the billions of people that have existed since man was created? And no doubt the Sadducees wrestled with this too because you know what? They were ancient people but they weren't stupid. They saw with their own eyes that everybody dies and it's not very long after they're dead that there ain't much left of them. After just a short, a relatively short time, they're just bones. And eventually even those bones are no more. And what about those who would die by other ways, perhaps eaten by an animal? A lion comes along and eats a farmer while he's out in the fields and part of his body becomes the lion. And then you just follow the pattern because then sooner or later the lion dies and the jackal comes and eats the lion. And now part of the lion, which was part of the man, is now part of the jackal. And now the jackal is going to die and something's going to eat that, or if nothing else, just the worms, the worms, which devoured the body. And then those worms will become part of the soil that grows things that we eat. I read a story several years ago about a small country church in New England. I forget where this was, Massachusetts. I think this small country church, true story in England that had this prize apple tree growing beside the church. And they, and this, this tree produced. Wonderful apples that the people enjoyed these apples every season until once one day they realized that the apple trees roots had grown into the cemetery of the church and the people then began to think, Okay, what are we? What are we eating with these apples? Because that's the cycle of life. That's the how the God has created this world to work. That which composes our bodies after death becomes part of the rest of the creation. It becomes part of other living creatures, and it becomes parts of plants and animals and even other people. In fact, if we were to even think about this further, if you think about your body right now, your body is not the same body that it was ten years ago. And I don't mean that, you know, okay, my body's not the same. We all know that to be true. But what I mean is literally The molecules that make up your body have all been recycled within the last decade. So nothing of you is literally what it was 15 years ago. And so that presents a problem to the Sadducees, to us as well. How is God going to do this? How is he going to resurrect bodies when the parts that make up those bodies are now other people's bodies and other animals bodies and who knows what? And because they can't understand it, they don't believe it. And that's why Jesus says, You don't understand the power of God. I call it the small souls of the Sadducees, because that's really what we're talking about. Do you know that the human soul is incapable of believing the things of God? Until the Spirit expands that soul, grows it, and that's what we're talking about. Kind of like a stomach. You ever been sick? You had the flu for seven days, 10 days, something like that. And you couldn't eat anything for a week and a half. And then finally you start feeling better and you eat a little something. You eat about four bites and you're full because that stomach has shrunk down. Well, once you start eating, it'll go away. Expand back. That's like the soul. If you don't feed the soul on the realities of God, that soul shrinks, and it can't grasp them. It can't take them. It must be expanded by the truths of God, by the realities of God. And these Sadducees, in their unbelief, have a small soul that says to them, If I can't understand it, it can't be true. Therefore, this resurrection can't be true. And let me give you a reason why. Here's the story of seven brothers. You see, they come to Jesus. Unable to believe what they cannot explain. And Jesus answer? You don't know the Scriptures, nor do you know the power of God. The power of God who created all of this from nothing, who raises up every one of you from nothing. He has the power to resurrect in bodily form all those who have died. We know not how we know that there's continuity. We know in the resurrection, you will be the same person and there will be continuity between this body and the eternal body. But we don't know how God can do that. We don't know how he will bring that about. But our souls are large enough through the feeding of our souls by the truth of God to be able to say, I believe it, even though I cannot explain it. Because that's the hang up. They don't understand the Scriptures, they don't understand the power of God, and they have this view of the next life, like we said earlier, that's basically an extension of this life now. Because you see how they phrase the question, whose wife is she going to be, Jesus? There's these seven brothers, they all had her. They're viewing the next life as just the next step after this one. Basically like this one. That they gotta figure out who, whose woman she belongs to. Whose woman is she? They're seeing the next life in terms that are basically just like this life, only a little bit differently. As we say, you know, sometimes the more things, the more things change, the more they stay the same. That's the prevalent view of the next life. The more things stay the same, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Meaning, that is the dominant view of fallen man. of whatever comes after this life, as we said earlier, we may have different perceptions, different ideas, but all of them are basically a version of this life. Now, some idea of an earthly utopia of an earthly paradise, like the Muslim idea of eternity, the 72 virgins. It is a man made Man centered view of utopia that basically looks mostly like this life now with just all the best things that this life has to offer That is so prevalent that is so prevalent that view of eternity that that view of the resurrection that view of the next life It brought to my mind a cartoon from Gary Larson that I put in into your notes This is an 18 years the first time I've ever seen Put a cartoon in Scripture note in the sermon notes. So I thought that maybe in case you're getting a little bit bored in the message that a cartoon would help. So I'll put you a little comic strip in there, but take a look at you may remember this one. You may have seen it before. As you can see here, it's just a depiction, the standard depiction of someone in the next life. He's wearing a bathrobe and he's got wings and he's sitting on a cloud. Look, he even has his glasses. Did you notice that he even still has his glasses? And can you read the inscription? Wish I'd brought a magazine. Do you see it? Do you get that? Do you understand that that perception is saying that life is basically like this one. We're going to sit on a cloud, we'll have wings, and we'll wear, wear bathrobes. But we sure would like to have a magazine to help pass the time. Do you see the faultiness of that view? Do you see the parallels between whose wife is she going to be? And furthermore, do you see the connection between we can't believe in something like that. How is that going to happen? Do you see how it all fits together and how Jesus is saying, this is your problem. Because you do not understand the Scriptures, Nor do you understand the power of God and failing to understand the power of God, you see God's eternal existence that he has planned for his people as something that your imagination could come up with. That basically just represents your idea of utopia. There are two ideas of fallen mankind about the next life that are both wrong. And the first one of those is this idea that the next life is just an earthly utopia. All the things that we like here on this earth are just there and made better. If you like it here, well, it's going to be there and it'll be more of it and better of it. This is exactly how the Sadducees are coming to Jesus and saying we don't see how this thing could even happen They do not possess as we read in 1st Corinthians chapter 2 how Paul says to the Corinthians The heart of man cannot perceive What God has prepared for those who are his, it's beyond your imagination. As Paul goes on to say, the spirit has to reveal that to you. They are incapable of that. But nevertheless, take a look with me at first Corinthians chapter 15, I'm sorry, first Corinthians chapter 15 at the bottom of the page. It's unfortunate, I guess, that we only have one hour, not two. If we had two hours, we would turn to 1 Corinthians 15, which is the Bible's most important passage on the resurrection. But not having sufficient time to do that, I just want to pull from 1 Corinthians 15 one thing out of that whole chapter that's about resurrection. Here's what I want to take a look at. Here's what Paul says to the Corinthian believers. He says this, But someone will ask, So, Paul's two letters to the Corinthian church are a bit dicey. You've read through Corinthians and you can, I'm sure you've perceived, you've picked up on the fact that there's a little bit of tension between Paul and the Corinthian church. The Corinthian church was a handful. They were making themselves a real problem for Paul. And so among the problems that the Corinthian church was having, apparently one of the problems was that there was at least some of the people in the Corinthian church who were like the Sadducees saying We don't see how God could resurrect people in bodily form. We don't see how that could happen. Now, we know that they're asking in that way. There's this sort of this unbelieving type of asking because Paul rebukes the question. If they were just asking, how does God do that? Paul wouldn't have answered like this. Instead, Paul rebukes the question. So we know that the question was being asked like this. How can God do that? We don't think God can do, we don't think God can bodily resurrect all these people. And so here's what Paul says, Some say, How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come? And look at his answer, You foolish people. I don't know if you've ever read that before and thought, Wow, Paul, where did that rebuke come from? How does God raise the dead? What sort of body do we have? And Paul answers, You fool! Did you ever think about that rebuke? That's a sharp rebuke. Paul says, You are a fool because you don't believe in the power of God to do what you can't explain. You don't believe in the power of God to bodily resurrect those people when you don't see a way that it could happen. And Paul says, You foolish people! Just like Jesus says to the Pharisees, to the Sadducees, You are wronged because you don't understand the Scriptures and you don't understand the power of God. So once again, for verse 25, I'm sorry, verse 24. So Jesus said to them, Is this not the reason you are wronged? Because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. And then he's going to go on to answer their question. Verse 25, verse 25. For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. So Jesus says you don't know the Scriptures. Let me go on to tell you the Scriptures. You know where that Scripture came from? Nowhere. Nowhere does the Bible say anything about marriage after this life, except for right here. This is the only place, nowhere in the Old Testament, is marriage between people in the next world addressed. So Jesus is giving new teaching here. Jesus is saying to them, He says, He says these words, For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. Let's be very careful there when Jesus says they're like angels in heaven. Jesus does not mean that we are like angels in every way. Look at what he says. Look at the context of what he says. That is not what Jesus is saying. Jesus is not saying that when we enter the next life we become angels. That is so frustrating to me how Christians will think in such terms that so and so who's gone on now they've been promoted to an angel or my little angel in heaven or my dearly departed mama who's an angel in heaven right now. No, they are not. No one has ever gone from being a person to an angel. People don't become angels. Jesus says they're like angels in this one way. This one way in the context is they don't marry and they don't procreate. That's Jesus's point. He says they're like the angels in heaven. So what he, how he describes them, notice how he describes, they neither marry nor are given in marriage. Jesus is describing an eternal reality that they cannot perceive. And so how is he going to describe it to them? It's like, imagine this, imagine the scenario in which you meet this person that has been born and raised and they've lived their entire life, North of the Arctic Circle in Northern Canada. And they've lived their whole life on frozen tundra. And, this is before the internet and all those pictures. They've never seen, that's their whole life has been the tundra of Northern Canada. And you meet this person and you are from, let's say you're a native of the Bahamas. And you want to explain to this person what your home is like. And they say, well tell me, what's it like, this Bahama place? That you're from. Tell us about that. And you say, well, Oh, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. It's there, there are palm trees everywhere. Palm, these palm trees, wait, wait, wait, palm trees. What's a palm tree. Oh, a palm tree is, is a, this tree that sort of grows in those stair steps. And, and it only has these branches up at the tree. What is this tree that you talk about? Oh, a tree is this. Big plant that grows up out of the sand and it grows. Wait, wait, wait. Sand? What is this sand that you speak of? Oh, sand is like dirt but it's dry and it's real gritty and it's, and it's, it's, it's the stuff on the edge of the beach where the, where the waves of the ocean, whoa, waves? Ocean? You get my point? There is no way that you can describe to that person the Bahama Islands. The only thing that you can do is say to them, there's no snow, there's no ice, there's no polar bears. That's all you can do is tell them of what they know that's not there. And that's what Jesus is saying to them. There's not. Marriage there. There's not the giving of marriage. There's not the procreating there that's here. And so that's his explanation. For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for, verse 29, verse 26, my eyes aren't working. As for the, as for the dead being raised, Have you not read in the book of Moses in the passage about the bush how God spoke to him saying I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. So then Jesus goes to the Scriptures to say let me show you from the Scriptures. The resurrection from the dead from the Scriptures, and it goes to the passage about the bush. Have you not read? Have you not even read that? The passage where God says, I'm the God of Abraham, I'm the God of Isaac, I'm the God of Jacob. So have you not read that passage? So in going to the Old Testament to prove to them the resurrection, the first thing that comes to my mind is the passage that Jesus chose to go to. Do you think it's the clearest passage that shows the resurrection? It is not. In fact, there are a multitude of passages in the Old Testament that show the resurrection much more clearly than does that one. Look in your notes at Daniel chapter 12 and verse 2, for example, and many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt. You see the passages from Job, Psalm 17, verse 15. Take a look at the Isaiah passage. If Your dead shall live, their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy. For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will bring birth to the dead. That's pretty plain. I mean, that's pretty clear. That is clearly saying a bodily resurrection. Why didn't Jesus say, The prophet Isaiah tells us this, Or the prophet Daniel said this, or the Psalms say this. Why do you think Jesus went to the passage he went to? Remember we said earlier that the Sadducees reject everything but the Torah? And so instead of saying to them, Listen, if you believed in the writings of Isaiah, let me tell you what Isaiah said. Or listen, if you believed in the writings of Daniel, let me tell you what Daniel wrote. Instead of doing that, he goes to the one part of Scripture that they accept. In essence, he says to them, I will show you the resurrection from any part of Scripture you wish. And he takes them to the part of Scripture that they accept, that they receive as the Word of God. So he takes them to Exodus, to the second book of Moses, and he takes them to the bush passage, where God says, I am the God of Abraham, I am the God of Isaac, I am the God of Jacob. Now, when God says this, the whole key to this, you ask, well, how is that showing the resurrection? The whole key is in the verb tense. As Jesus points out, God is not the God of the dead, He's God of the living. And so God says, I am the God of Isaac, the God of Abraham, and God of Jacob. And so by saying, I am, and not, I used to be, or, I was the God of Abraham, He's saying, right now, I am the God of Abraham, meaning, what does that mean? Abraham still exists. Does that prove the resurrection? We're still not there. What that says is that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob still exist. That doesn't say that they have been resurrected, which they have not. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are still awaiting the resurrection as we will be. And so when Jesus says that they still exist and they still know him as God, He says this to the Sadducees as though they should understand that to mean the resurrection is true, and you should believe it. So somehow what Jesus says should show them that the resurrection is true and valid from the Scriptures. Which, in fact, if we think about this for just a moment, think about Abraham. Remember Abraham from the Scriptures? Remember how the writer to the Hebrews said that Abraham, when Abraham was told to take Isaac up the mountain and sacrifice his son, you remember how the writer to the Hebrews said that he believed that God was going to raise him from the dead? What Scripture did Abraham know that proved that to him? Do you remember? What Scripture did Abraham have that showed him that the resurrection was true? Answer, none, because there was no Scripture written yet. The books of Moses had yet to be written. And so what the writer to the Hebrews is saying to us is that the understanding of the resurrection is something that should be plain and evident to all people, even if you have little or no Scripture as Abraham did. So what Jesus is saying is this. That Abraham believed in the resurrection, the passage of the bush demonstrates the resurrection because Abraham, Isaac and Jacob still exist. The promises of God are still valid. Now think with me for just a moment. How did God make Abraham? He made Abraham as body soul. Think with me back to Genesis, how God formed them from the dust and breathe life into them. God created mankind from the start as body soul. He did not create a soul and then say, let me now give you a body. He created from the moment Adam existed, Adam was a body soul. From the moment Abraham existed, Abraham was a body soul. So therefore, the purpose of God was to create his people as body souls. Therefore, if the promise of God does not include the bodily resurrection, then the purpose of God is defeated by death. And that cannot be. His purpose cannot be defeated in death. Therefore, Abraham could know, without having Isaiah 26 to look at, without having, Exodus 3 to look at, Abraham could know, this is how God created Isaac. And so, therefore, for God's promise to be valid, He must mean that He's going to raise Him from the dead in bodily form. Do you see? And so, this is Jesus point. If you know the Scriptures and you know the power of God, then you know that the bodily resurrection has to be the fulfillment of His purpose for His people because that's how He made His people from the very beginning. And that's Jesus point. You know, neither the Scriptures, nor do you know the power of God. The bodily resurrection is the only thing that fulfills the purpose of God. And so Jesus refutes from the Scriptures, from the passage about the bush. Now, verse 27, He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are quite wrong. So there's our passage. What I want to do in just the last few minutes that we have is I want to take our passage and I want to use it as a jumping off point for something that I think that some Christians, not all Christians, but some Christians really struggle with. One of the areas, one of the things that I have heard more Christians struggle with than almost anything else is this very issue that Jesus says in the next life, your spouse in this life. Will not be your spouse in the next life that marriage is something that exists in this life only and after this life It ceases to exist between humans and so over the years I have known a number of Christians particularly Christians who have a vibrant healthy thriving Marriage between two believers. I have experienced this create sadness In consternation at the thought that the precious thing that they have in this life will end and won't exist into eternity. And so I think that this is the perfect point to take Jesus' words, take them at face value and say, let's think this thing through and let's understand why Jesus is saying this and what he's actually saying. Alright, so let's first of all be clear that Jesus is emphatically saying that earthly marriages do not survive death. I mean, that's what the vow, that's what the vow states, right? Till death do us part. So Jesus is emphatically saying, there's no twisting of his words here. We can't, we can't look up any Greek words and come up with some nuanced meaning of what he's saying. He says it plainly. They are not given in marriage in the next life. That there is no marriage in the next life. Furthermore, to make, first of all, the problem, or the struggle, so to speak, the struggle over this idea, to make the struggle even greater, Jesus is actually saying more than just earthly marriages don't survive death. Jesus has taught us that no earthly relationships survive death. Notice with me, this is the third time that Jesus has redefined the family in Mark's Gospel. The third time. Mark chapter 3. Your brother, your brothers and your mother are waiting for you outside. Who are my mother and who are my brothers and who are my sisters? Turning to his disciples, these are my brothers, these are my sisters, these are my mother. Those who hear the word of God and do it. Then, just recently in chapter 10, Jesus, we've left everything for you. Truly, truly, I say to you, there's no one who has left mothers or fathers or brothers or sisters for my name's sake in the gospel who will not receive a hundredfold in this age. Amen. Remember, we talked about that and we said what Jesus is saying is that the family of God then becomes a far greater resource on this life than anything, than any biological resource. Okay. So two times Jesus has gone out of his way to redefine the family. Now he goes out of his way to say, listen, Once this life is over, this earthly marriage, these, these earthly marriages are also over as well. Does it make sense to anyone, does it make sense to anyone, that Jesus would say to those who are saying, listen, your biological mother and brothers and sisters are outside, and Jesus says, no, these are mine. The kingdom of God is here. And these are my brothers and sisters doesn't make any sense that he would redefine family for the kingdom of God on earth. And then when we get to the kingdom of God in heaven, it certainly reverts back to the same thing. That doesn't make sense at all, does it? So when Jesus redefines family, what he's saying is that the kingdom of God redefines family forever. And so what we should take from that is that in the next life, marital relationships as well as parent child relationships, as well as brother sister relationships have ended. That, my friends, produces, I think in the very least, consternation among many believers. And there's several reasons that it does that. And I think that this is a really helpful thing to think through and work through. Because what I want you all to see, here's what I want you all to see. There is no happiness, or joy, or pleasure, or joy. Or contentment in this life, which you will lose in the next. There is no happiness, no joy, no contentment, and no pleasure in this life that will not be infinitely multiplied in the next. That's what I want you to see. So how do we get there? When Jesus says that these relationships will not continue into the next life, I think that that produces difficulty that produces a struggle in many Christians for three reasons and here's the three reasons and let's walk through those three reasons and hopefully you'll see a connection into the next life. The three reasons that I think that it really causes difficulty for a Christian to be told in the next life. My, my sainted mother is not going to be my mother or my dearly departed father is not going to be my father. That causes difficulty first of all because I think for most people, the earthly family is the closest place you have ever come to experiencing unconditional love. Is that true? That the family is the, is the closest that you've experienced in this life to unconditional love. That's what the family is supposed to be. It's supposed to be that environment of unconditional love. And if the family is healthy and godly, then it's a place that at least shows you what unconditional love should be like. And the thought of losing that in the next life can be difficult, that can be a struggle. But brothers and sisters, there's nothing lost. There's nothing lost. That unconditional love that the family is supposed to show in this life becomes the norm for everyone in the next life. Meaning that if you have had the blessing of being in a family in this life that showed you something about what unconditional love looks like, Everyone in that life will show you what perfect unconditional love looks like. So there's no loss. There's only infinite gain. That's number one. But that's, I'm going to sort of set that one aside. That's the easiest one. The next two are the, I think that's the struggle. There's two other things that I think sort of stick right here. When we think about a spouse no longer being a spouse, and maybe a mother no longer being, having that motherly relationship or a father no longer having that fatherly relationship. And the first of those things, let's just call it authority. Is it not true that all of these earthly relationships that we're talking about are earthly relationships that have a necessary component of authority? Fatherly relationships, motherly relationships, the relationships between, between spouse, there is a necessary element of authority in that relationship. If there's not, then it's not healthy, it's not Christ like, it's not godly. It has that element of authority within it, authority and submission. When we enter the next life, it necessarily, by needs, must be, there's one authority, and only one. And we will perfectly submit to that one. And so to continue into eternity with that type of, well, he's my dad, he's always going to be my dad. You know, he's always going to be my son. He's always going to be, she's always going to be my daughter. By needs that must come to an end because we are now in the presence of the authority to whom we perfectly submit for eternity. And this earthly life that taught us about his authority has served the purpose of showing us and teaching us that so that we are then prepared to enter into that. So imagine a father. Father son relationship in which there's zero authority. There's zero recognition of authority. Is it not true that that is no longer a father son relationship? Because the authority aspect is fundamental. If that completely goes away, then that cannot be rightly called a father son relationship. And in the next life, he is the authority, the only authority. Now the last one that I think can maybe create a hang up for us is this idea, first of all, of unconditional love. When we enter into that existence. We will experience perfect, perfect unconditional love from the millions of souls that are there. Secondly, the idea of authority. When we enter into that relationship, into that existence there, we will experience, for the first time ever, we will experience perfect, sinless submission to perfect righteous authority. Thirdly, the third hang up I think is exclusivity. And I think that's really the big one when we think about a spouse, or when we think about a father or mother or child, isn't a significant part of the preciousness of that relationship, isn't that contingent upon exclusivity, particularly the marriage relationship. There's that exclusive nature that has to be there, and it has to be healthy. If there's not the exclusive nature of the marriage, it is not a godly marriage. And it's not a healthy marriage. My wife. I don't want another man looking at her and desiring her because she's mine. She's nobody else's. She's nobody else's for anybody to look at and desire. God gave her to me and nobody else. So there's that exclusivity there. So when we think about the next life and we think about, well, my husband will be there, my wife will be there and we'll be there with Jesus and we'll be perfect and we'll be sinless. But we'll lose that exclusivity. We can't help but to think that something's lost. And I think that's the crux of the struggle, that something's lost. That even though we're in eternity together, and even though we're experiencing perfect bliss, We still have lost the exclusivity of our relationship together. And here's where I think that the spirit has to enlarge our souls to see his truth, something bigger than, than what our souls can, can see apart from him. The exclusivity and the marital bond is meant to teach you of your eternal exclusivity. To Christ, your exclusivity to the spouse passes way to the exclusivity, to the savior. You are his exclusive people and he is your exclusive savior for eternity and in a way that the human heart cannot comprehend in this life. The preciousness, the value of the exclusivity of the marital bond was meant to prepare you for the eternal exclusivity to your true bridegroom. And so nothing, not one ounce of anything that's joy or comfort or pleasure or satisfaction or contentment, not one ounce is lost. But instead it is infinitely multiplied upon itself. Infinitely multiply so that whatever joy and pleasure and satisfaction any earthly relationship rightly shows you in this life can necessarily, by definition, only be a taste of what he has prepared for us in the next life. Now, brothers and sisters, If you hear that and you think, well, that sounds like a reasonable explanation, but I still just can't get my heart around the Scriptures teaching that my spouse is no longer my spouse in eternity. The last thing I would say, you know, neither the Scriptures nor the power of God, the power of God to make. What you think is a loss into an infinite gain. I think that's what Christ would say to us today. He would say, my child, believe in the power of God. For I have told you that there is nothing about that next life that can compare to the greatest joy of this life. The greatest moment of joy and happiness, the greatest sense of intimacy in the marital relationship in this life can't compare to every moment in that life.