The Day is coming

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE

THE DAY IS COMING

Luke 20:27-38

27 Some of the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus with a question. 28 "Teacher," they said, "Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the widow and have children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers. The first one married a woman and died childless. 30 The second 31 and then the third married her, and in the same way the seven died, leaving no children. 32 Finally, the woman died too. 33 Now then, at the resurrection whose wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?" 34 Jesus replied, "The people of this age marry and are given in marriage. 35 But those who are considered worthy of taking part in that age and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, 36 and they can no longer die; for they are like the angels. They are God's children, since they are children of the resurrection. 37 But in the account of the bush, even Moses showed that the dead rise, for he calls the Lord 'the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.'   38 He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive." 

NIV

Certainly we could spend a great deal of time exploring the history of the Sadducees. Much has been written concerning their doctrinal beliefs which one of them as we see here is not believing in the resurrection. If there is no resurrection then the only life a person has is the one in the present age. This leads to looking at this life as a god in itself rather than seeing God as who he is. The Sadducees were trying to trick Jesus with a question about the resurrection which they did not even believe in. He knew their hearts and his answer was in accordance with the fact of a resurrection. Indeed in this life we do marry and it is for the reason which God gave to Adam and Eve, to populate the earth. The population is constantly losing ground because of the death of the body and so we must continue to marry to keep the earth populated. That only makes sense. But in the age to come, after the resurrection we will be immortal. There will be no longer a need to repopulate because of the decrease of people through death. Jesus assures them and through his words to them we can also be assured there is a resurrection. Because they used the law that was given through Moses, Jesus uses the account of the burning bush to show them that God said he was the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. In the present age, when God spoke to Moses these three man had been dead for many years, but because God said he was their God, present tense, these man were still alive with God. Although it was true their bodies were in the grave, their spirits, their souls were in the presence of God. This certainly agrees with the teaching of being absence from the body is to be present with the Lord. Jesus also teaches here that someday the bodies will be resurrected from the grave just as he did. This is the joy of our hope, to be with God after this age is over. This teaching also refutes the belief of one religion in this age, which performs marriage ceremonies for the age to come. There is no need for procreation in heaven as there will be no death, we will be immortal. Although we experience love, passion, and yes, even lust in this age as we are in the body which God designed with these emotions in order to bring forth more humans as he commanded Adam and Eve to do, we will not experience those emotions in heaven. We will still love each other but in a far greater sense than what we experience in the flesh. But we still see here that we should be living with the sense of the resurrection and the fact that someday we will be in the presence of God in heaven or paradise or the new city of Jerusalem. This should give us a reason to live in accordance to his pleasure rather than ours. Will we ever be free, completely free from sinning, which would be in accordance with his pleasure? It is doubtful as long as we are in this flesh. The teaching of being free of sin because the old man is dead, and we have become a new man, born again, and therefore we are free from the bondage of sin, and yes free from the law is true. Although it is also true that because we are in Christ, God sees us as free of sin, we are still in the flesh and it is corruptible. No, we should not simply go about sinning so we can take advantage of his grace, but we are going to sin because we are in the flesh. Yet the day is coming when we will leave this flesh and we then will be completely free of all sin, and we will enjoy being in his presence, yet there will be another day when, by the power of God, our bodies will be raised and we will encounter something wonderful which no one really knows what it will be like except God. So we can rest easy, for we are the children of God, we have a day of resurrection ahead.  The day is coming.