An Amazing Answer to a Stupid Question

Well, let's take our Bibles this morning and turn to Luke chapter 20.

! Luke chapter 20. We're making our way through this gospel account bit by bit, by Luke, of course, but inspired by the Holy Spirit.

And we have reached Jesus' final week. Actually, we reached that a few Sundays ago. In fact, we're halfway through his final week, his Passion Week.

It's Wednesday. And, you know, sometimes we call that hump day, right? Wednesday, hump day. And so, really, that's true of Jesus' week, actually.

He's on the hump, kind of. He's riding the wave. I mean, literally. The people are all happy with him. They're excited about him. They're believing that he may be the one, may be the Messiah they've been looking for, longing for.

And so, he's very popular at this point. Right midway through his last week, they're singing his praises, right? And now they're kind of following him around and hanging on every word that comes out of his mouth as he teaches there in the temple.

But you and I know, because we've read the rest of it, we know that very soon all of that is going to change. In fact, it's going to change dramatically for Jesus. And a big part of that change, that kind of turning of the tide against him, was orchestrated, of course, by the Jewish leadership.

They're working very hard to change the kind of popular opinion about Jesus or speculation about Jesus at this point. And we saw this last week, didn't we?

In verse 20, it says, They watched him. That means everywhere that he went. They were there. They were watching him. They were scrutinizing him. And also the Bible says there in verse 20 that they sent spies, spies who pretended to be righteous.

So they were kind of wolves in sheep's clothing, weren't they? And kind of mixed in the crowd there. They tried to appear like everyone else, everyone else who was excited about Jesus, interested in Jesus, genuinely, genuinely interested in him.

And so they were spies. And they were there to do what? To seize, hopefully to seize upon his words. That's what verse 20 says. The translations say to catch him in his words.

To see if he will slip up and say something he shouldn't say or something that would cause a problem. In fact, their questions were designed to maybe help him to slip up in his words.

And they would be there to catch him, to seize him in his words. And then, of course, to deliver him, the Bible says there, to the power and the authority of the governor.

That would be Pilate, the Roman. And that was their plan, right? Their plan was to trip Jesus up in his words, to twist them to sound insurrectionists.

At least that was the intent of the question last week, in the passage we looked at last week. And their desire was to get the Romans to arrest him, perhaps even to kill him, and thereby dash the people's hopes and opinions about Jesus as the possible Messiah.

And so it would turn public opinion against him. And so the goal being to get rid of Jesus. Get rid of him. Have him arrested and killed. And the greater goal, of course, for the Jewish leadership was to do that and at the same time to protect their position and power.

That's what they were interested in. Now, our text for this morning is about the Jewish leadership's third and really final question that they pose to Jesus in this chapter, in chapter 20.

Third and final attempt to catch Jesus at his words, in his words. The first time, you remember, when Jesus cleansed the temple and they asked him the question, by what authority do you do these things?

And then the second time was when Jesus was teaching in the temple and they asked him, is it lawful for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not? And now we come to the third and final question.

Now, by the way, every time the questions were asked, each time Jesus answered them, didn't he? And he answered them very smartly, very ingeniously.

And at the same time, he taught some doctrinal truth, and that's going to be the same for this third question, as we shall see this morning. Now, here's the third and final question, and after this, they're not going to ask him any more questions.

They're going to give up on that tactic. They're going to move to another tactic to try to either discredit Jesus or to make him appear to be an insurrectionist and have him arrested and killed, perhaps.

And so that brings us to our text. And if you have found Luke chapter 20, I want to read verses 27 to 40. Then some of the Sadducees, who deny that there is a resurrection, came to him and asked him, saying, Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife, and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.

Now, there were seven brothers, and the first took a wife and died without children, and the second took her as wife and he died childless. Then the third took her and in like manner, the seven also, all of them, all seven of them, and they left no children and died.

Last of all, the woman died also. Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become? For all seven had her as wife.

Jesus answered and said to them, The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are counted worthy to attain that age and the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.

But even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

For he is not the God of the dead, but of the living. For all live to him. Then some of the scribes answered and said, Teacher, you have spoken well.

But after that, they dared not question him any more. Now, when I was growing up, I was always taught that there are no stupid questions.

Have you been taught that? No dumb questions. I mean, that's what all of our teachers have taught us all along the way. They'll say, Remember, class, there are no stupid questions or wrong questions.

I guess, probably when I was a kid, they didn't use the word stupid, did they? That was the idea. There are no stupid questions, no dumb questions, right? The only dumb question is the one that you don't ask.

Now, have you ever said that? Ever believed that? I don't really know what that means. The only dumb question is the one you don't ask. Not sure what that means, but you know what I've discovered? There really are dumb questions.

There's such a thing as dumb questions. And over the years, I've had some dumb or stupid questions asked of me. I really have. Questions that don't really deserve an answer. Because actually, the inquirer is not interested in an answer to the question.

And the question is really, more or less, to make some kind of point or to cause some kind of an argument. So there really are stupid questions. And that, I think, is what we have right here in our text.

And so without any more introduction, let's just look at the passage. You may have noticed that there are three kind of key characters in this story that are mentioned. at least in Luke's account of this particular story.

Matthew and Mark also include this in their Gospels. But in Luke's Gospel, there are three primary characters involved in this thing. And the first group would be the Sadducees, right?

And we'll learn more about them as we go along. The Sadducees, and then the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And then third, it ends by mentioning the scribes.

Now that's a different group of people. So we have the Sadducees, the Savior, and the scribes. So taking those three primary characters in the story, let's begin with the Sadducees.

And what I want to call the stupidity of the Sadducees. I got to thinking, you know, and I've mentioned this before, when I was a kid, I was told stupid was a bad word. So if I have some parents in here that are a little concerned about me using that word, I'm sorry.

But really, this is stupid. The stupidity of the Sadducees. And you know, the irony of the story, and I don't know if you've caught on to this as you've read it before and as I read it a moment ago, the irony of this story is that the Sadducees really set out to kind of make Jesus appear to be stupid, to be ignorant in the eyes of the people.

And that was their design here, their desire. But you know, in the end, guess what? It was the Sadducees who came out as the stupid ones, the idiots in the crowd.

In fact, they were so humiliated by Jesus. And we can catch this here from the story, kind of the implication of it. They were so humiliated by Jesus' answer.

And guess what? They didn't ask him any more questions. Okay? They weren't fools. They gave up on that tactic. And not only the Sadducees, but all the others of the Jewish leadership gave up on that tactic.

And so, what happened here? Well, I kind of want to set the stage. I want to bring in a few things that we talked about last week and bring that into our story because this is all one event.

All right? Even though I have taught part of it last week. But still, we're in the same setting. In fact, the very same place. And Jesus is teaching and the spies are there and they first ask one question and now they're asking another question.

So, it's the same kind of event, same place, same set of circumstances. Now, you remember what we looked at last week and I mentioned the Jewish leadership and explained a little bit about the various aspects of the Jewish leadership, different sects within the Jewish leadership, certain political factions and so forth that kind of described those last week.

And really, when you look at it, you could really put it down under three categories of people, of leaders within Israel. You have the Herodians and I mentioned them last week.

Luke does not mention them. We get this from Matthew and Mark. And the Herodians were pro-Herod as the name suggests, of course. And so, therefore, they were pro-Rome and they were pro-Rome for their own personal benefit, of course.

And then you have the chief priests. That's kind of a broad category because it involved a number of different kinds of people and different political factions, but primarily the chief priests were made up of the Sadducees.

All right, well, I've already mentioned the Sadducees and I'll talk again more about them later. And so, the chief priests were primarily the Sadducees. They would be the pro-power group.

The pro-position and power within Israel and that's all they really ever carried about. And then you have the third group would be under the category of scribes.

The scribes. And primarily the scribes were made up of the Pharisees. Now, we know about the Pharisees. And the scribes were primarily Pharisees. These were the pro-Israel group.

Very pro-Jewish nationalism. And so, therefore, what? They would be anti-Rome. I mean, vehemently anti-Rome. So, those are the three groups.

And now, again, Luke only mentions two of these. He doesn't mention the Herodians. And so, we have the chief priests primarily made up of Sadducees. And then we have the scribes primarily made up of Pharisees.

Those two political groups. And as I mentioned last week, these two groups, the Sadducees and Pharisees, were really enemies.

They didn't like one another. They were opponents. They were political and theological opponents. And I explained a little bit about this last week. Now, on the political side, we need to understand that the Sadducees pretty much had the power, power in the temple, over the temple.

They were the priests, including the high priest. The high priest was a Sadducee. And all of the chief priests and leading priests and those who were in charge of certain aspects of the temple, they were all Sadducees.

And so, they had pretty much the control of the temple. But they also had the power over the Sanhedrin. or some pronounce it Sanhedrin and you've heard of it. That's not another political group.

That is the ruling body, a seven-member kind of ruling body of Israel and kind of like our equivalent of our Congress.

And the Sadducees were the party that had the most votes. They were the majority party within this kind of Congress of Israel.

The Sanhedrin. on the theological side, on the theological side, and this is what comes into play in our text this morning, the Sadducees and the Pharisees were bitter enemies theologically.

And especially when it came to the resurrection. The resurrection. As Luke tells us here, the Sadducees are the ones who deny that there is a resurrection.

They didn't believe in any resurrection. So no future life after death. No hope after death. This life is all there is to it and as someone has said, that's why they were sad, you see.

Okay. So I had to get that little joke out there. Alright. And that's the Sadducees. But they denied the resurrection not based upon some, you know, extra-biblical view that they had or some rationalistic view.

They denied the resurrection based upon their view of scripture. You say, well how could they deny the resurrection based upon scripture? Well the Sadducees only accepted the books of the law or the books of Moses as inspired.

Just the first five books, the Pentateuch. And they didn't regard any of the other Old Testament books, the books of the time, as being authoritative. They had value but only the first five books were important and inspired of God.

And so, in their view, since there is no reference to the resurrection in any of the first five books of the Bible, then they reject that as being true. Now that was their position.

And Luke further tells us in Acts chapter 23 verse 8, because you remember Luke also wrote Acts. He said this about the Sadducees. He said, the Sadducees say there is no resurrection nor an angel nor a spirit.

So there's a little bit more information about their view. And it's all tied in with their view of the resurrection. And so basically he's saying they rejected any existence of an afterlife in an angelic or spiritual state whatsoever.

Alright, so they were very strong in their view against any notion, any possibility of a resurrection. Alright, so that's just kind of foundation. All that to say this, back in verse 22, the passage we studied last week, the question about paying taxes to Caesar was very likely posed by the Pharisees, not the Sadducees.

The Pharisees would ask a question like that. And remember, as we talked about last week, their design was to get Jesus to incriminate himself and to come out as an insurrectionist.

And then the Romans would move in and they would arrest him and possibly kill him. And that was their desire. This question, the question about taxes paid to Rome, that would come from the Pharisees because they were the ones that had a problem with that.

They were the ones, remember, who were pro-Jewish nationalism. They were anti-Rome all the way. So they would be the ones to pose that question.

And now the Sadducees would have never asked that question about taxes. They would never have risked a problem between Jesus and the Romans because it would have affected them.

They would have tried not to cause any kind of insurrectionist. Insurrectionist. They would have avoided that. They would never ask a question like that.

And so after Jesus pretty much destroyed the wicked designs of the Pharisees, I mean he laid them in the dust. Remember we looked at that last week. After the Pharisees had their shot, now the Sadducees are going to take their turn.

And they're not going to ask a question that's going to somehow cause the Romans to come in and be angry and to take care of things. They're going to ask a question that is designed to make Jesus appear stupid.

Ignorant. And so that's their desire. So they come up with this question. Then some of the Sadducees who deny that there is a resurrection, that's just Luke's way of cluing you in on what's coming next.

They came to him and asked him, saying, verse 28, teacher. Now I stop right there because you see they poured on the flattery just like Pharisees did back when they asked their question.

Teacher? And here's their question, or the first part of it. Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies having a wife and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.

So that's the first part of their question. And what are they referring to? They're referring to what the Mosaic law says, in Deuteronomy chapter 25 about the Leverate marriage law.

The Leverate marriage. You may not be familiar with that word. Way back when I taught through the book of Ruth, you might remember we mentioned it there. The Leverate law.

Leverate means brother and so it's talking about brother marriage. And it was a law given by Moses. In fact, we can turn to that scripture. You don't have to turn to it, but if you want to, you can.

Deuteronomy chapter 25 and verses 5 and 6. Let me read it to you. Here's the law concerning Leverate marriage. When brothers live together and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a stranger or strange man.

Her husband's brother shall go into her and take her to himself as wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her. And it shall be that the firstborn son which she bears will succeed to the name of his dead brother that his name may not be blotted out of Israel.

So this was the law. And the law could apply, if we read all of what scripture says about this, the law can apply not just to brothers, but also to near of kin or nearest of kin.

And there could be a leverate marriage to carry on the name and to carry on the property and so forth so that it doesn't end there and that name is blotted out of Israel's history.

So this was the law that God gave down through Moses. I've already mentioned it, but the famous example of this is found in Ruth, right? In Ruth. You remember the story?

Elimelech and Naomi his wife and their two sons, Malon and Kilion, they move out of Israel because of the famine. And he takes his family to Moab and while they're there, his two sons marry a couple of Moabite women.

But then Elimelech dies. And so he has his two sons to carry on his name and to carry on his property, but guess what? They die also. Remember the story? And so they leave no heir, no one to take the inheritance.

No one to bear the name, no one to have the property, Elimelech's property, the family property. And so what happens? Well, Orpah, the wife of Malon, stays there in Moab, but Naomi and who?

Ruth, the wife of Kilion, they move back to Israel. You know the story. So I can make it real short. Boaz, then, the near of kin, the kinsman redeemer, and of course there's a wonderful, wonderful comparison there parallel with our kinsman redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ.

But he then performs the duty of the leverate, or the goel, the redeemer, the kinsman redeemer, and he then marries Ruth, right?

Carries on the name, takes the property, the inheritance, and so forth. All right, now, out of Boaz and Ruth came Obed, and out of Obed came Jesse, and out of Jesse came David, King David, and eventually out of David would come Jesus Christ, the Messiah.

And so God had a purpose, you see, for this law, and this law in the early days of Israel's history. And so getting back to the text, the Sadducees then bring up this law, this law, the law of the leverate.

And they do so really to add some kind of credence to their question. Because from this point on, their question becomes ridiculous.

Stupid. All right, I'm sorry, I've used the word again. Ridiculous. Look at it, verse 29. Now there were seven brothers. All right, so they give the scripture, no one can deny that, the scripture is there, that's the truth, the leverate marriage.

So they give the scripture to add credence to their question and then they go off into this ridiculous scenario. First the scripture, then the scenario. And what's the scenario? Well, there were these seven brothers, and it's fictitious, all right?

This didn't really happen. This is just a story. And the first took a wife and died without children. All right? Pretty common thing, could happen. Just the kind of situation for the leverate law.

And the second, second brother, took her as a wife, according to leverate law, and he died childless. So the second one is died. No children yet. Then the third took her, and though it skips on to the seven, we can say the fourth, and the fifth, and the sixth, and then he says, and in like manner, the seven.

Seven also, all seven of them. They left no children and died. Last of all, the woman died also. All right? So there it is.

Seven brothers married this one woman, and each one of them died having no children. You know what I think?

That's what some of you men are thinking right now. How did those guys die? Okay. How did they die? I mean, they had two things in common. They were brothers, and they married the same woman.

And I think if I had been the third guy, I would have said, forget it. I'm not going to marry her. Be hazardous to my health. But of course, it's just a story. All right? It's fictitious.

Not meant to be true. It's just a scenario. And so the next thing we learn is the point of it. Because it all has a point.

It's not really a question. It's a question designed to make a point. And to also to make Jesus look ignorant. Stupid. Because he wouldn't be able to answer this question.

They're thinking. And so verse 33, therefore, this is what they say, therefore, based upon the scripture, and here's this scenario, plausible, could have happened.

Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become? For all seven had her as wife. All right. Interesting.

And you have to wonder, you know, how many times have they used this story, this analogy, to kind of make their point, and to debunk the doctrine of the resurrection. I think they probably used this many, many times, and nobody could answer it.

So this is kind of their favorite argument, and so they're going to use it on Jesus. But it's a stupid question. It is. You say, well, there are no stupid questions.

Yes, there are. This is one. This is a stupid question. What are they doing? They're poking fun at the doctrine of the resurrection. That's what they're doing. Do you get that?

Do you kind of read between the lines? Do you kind of get behind the question and kind of get into the minds of these Sadducees? They're poking fun at it. With this ridiculous story.

And so they ask a question that apparently no one has before been able to answer. And even the Pharisees and scribes and others have not been able to answer this question.

And here's the bottom line. They think that just merely asking the question is all they have to do. All they have to do is just ask the question and it makes their point and it proves that they're right, that there is no resurrection.

And so just merely asking the question debunks the resurrection as something ridiculous. That's their strategy. That's their point.

They're not really interested in an answer to the question. That's why I call it a stupid question. Because it's not really a question at all. It's a statement designed to make them look so smart.

And to make Jesus look so ignorant. And you know skeptics of Christianity and the Bible, they always use that text.

Ever had it used on you? You know, sometimes they'll just ask a question. You know, some obscure, ridiculous kind of question.

and it's not really an honest inquiry. They don't want an answer. They just want to prove to you that what you believe is ridiculous.

It's stupid. And so they ask a stupid question. And that's what the skeptics of the Word of God will often do. You know, kind of like the question, can God create a rock so big that He Himself cannot pick it up.

Ha, ha, ha, ha. Or the question of the Sadducees. Here's a woman who's been married to seven different men. Who is going to be her husband in heaven?

Ha, ha, ha. That's what you need to understand about this question that they're asking. They're not wanting an answer. They're not really unclear about what they believe and they need Jesus to answer this for them.

And so you see what they're doing. They're trying to make Him look stupid before the people because this is their desire. They're not really all about getting Jesus arrested and killed.

They're not really about that. Although Caiaphas, when they had the little council with one another, they said it might be expedient for us that one man would die for the people.

He was talking about Jesus might be better if He did die. But their main desire was not to have Him arrested and killed. They just wanted Him to look like He didn't know anything, like He was false, fake.

And so the people would reject Him. And so they wanted Him to appear stupid, but instead what happens? Jesus exposes them as the ignorant ones.

So first of all, the stupidity of the Sadducee. second, what I want to call the superiority of the Savior. That's the second principal character.

In fact, He really ought to be mentioned first. But just think about the superiority of the Savior. You put that in contrast to what these Sadducees desired to do and thought they could accomplish.

Jesus is going to outsmart them because He's superior to them. You know, what do you know about Jesus and His method of confronting or answering error?

What do you know about His method to do? How do you think about it? What do you know about how Jesus always kind of confronted error or His critics, every temptation He ever faced?

how did He respond? Every challenge to His authority. What was His approach? How did He justify Himself?

I know you know the answer, but let me go ahead. Every, with every question He received, and we've already looked at a couple of them, haven't we?

With every question, with what did He answer? Alright? Scripture, of course. you knew that. That's always His way.

And really, I say it in that way, I don't mean that, well, that was His way, and maybe others have a different way. There's only one good way. And it's with the Word of God. And our passage this morning offers no exception to that.

Now, we didn't go back and look at the other accounts, Matthew and Mark's, but I really love Matthew's additional information He gives us here about this event.

And this is great. In Matthew chapter 22 and verse 29, this is what Matthew records. Jesus answered and said to them, you are mistaken.

Now, I really like that. I like the King James there. Ye do err, okay, or err, however you want to pronounce it.

I mean, that's pretty strong. What's he saying? Well, the word mistaken comes from a certain Greek word that means to stray, to cause to stray, or to depart, cause to depart from the right way or from the truth.

That's what the word means. And so Jesus is saying to these Sadducees, you have separated yourselves themselves from the truth. From the truth.

And really, not only that, but from the reality of God. The truth about God. I mean, that's what he goes on to say. Listen to it. In Matthew 22, 29, you are mistaken, that you're in error, not, listen to this, not knowing the scriptures.

You don't know the word of God. But it doesn't end with that. He says, nor the power of God. You don't know the scriptures, you don't know the power of God. That is, actually, you don't even know God. I mean, what?

Remember who these guys are. The Sadducees. The high priests. The chief priests. The rulers of the temple.

The experts of God's word and so forth. And Jesus could not have said anything to these guys that would have been more more indicting, but more insulting.

I mean, he's just insulted them. You are ignorant of the scripture. You don't know God's word.

And these are the priests. You get this? wow. What a way to respond to them. You have wandered from the truth.

You've separated yourself from the truth of God's word. You don't even understand scripture. And something else, something even worse, more indicting, you don't know God. Is what he said.

That's basically what he means when he says you not knowing the power of God. You don't even know God. And by the way, he's not just talking about their misapplication of the leverade law given by Moses.

And he also is not just talking about their erroneous conclusions about marriage in heaven and so forth, even though he's going to address that briefly.

Not really talking about that. He's referring directly to their denial of the doctrine of the resurrection. You don't know scripture. You don't even know God.

Listen, those who deny the resurrection, Jesus' resurrection and all other resurrections, those who deny it don't know scripture and they don't know God.

You can't deny the resurrection and be saved. I'm sorry. It is a core doctrine of the faith. There is no way to eliminate that.

Everything else falls apart when you take the resurrection out, by the way. you can't have Christianity without the resurrection. There is no way to have it.

It is not true biblical Christianity if you deny the resurrection of Jesus' resurrection first of all and then every believer in him, their resurrection.

Paul makes that clear in 1 Corinthians 15. And, you know, how did Jesus respond? Let me tell you how the theological liberals would respond to what the Sadducees said or what they believed.

They would respond this way, well, you know, guys, the resurrection really isn't that important. I mean, I believe it, but, you know, it's one of the lesser doctrines.

And if you don't believe in the resurrection, that's okay, as long as you believe in Christ. I'm serious, that's how liberals responded. Resurrection is not that important. It's not crucial.

So long as you believe in the cross. That's what they say today. You just believe in the cross, and even that belief is something quite different with most of them. Basically, they believe you just, the important thing is how you live.

Just live righteous. Live biblical lives. How you live is what's important. Love God. Love your fellow man. Live according to the example of Christ.

Jesus is much more than an example. He is our atonement for sin. And he lives through the resurrection.

And Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15, 16, I mentioned 1 Corinthians 15, listen to this, for if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Jesus is not alive.

He's still in that grave. He did not rise. That's logical argument. And if Christ is not risen, guess what? Your faith is worthless.

What Paul said. Futile. You're still in your sin. That's pretty serious, isn't it? In fact, Paul says, if in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.

Most to be pitied. I've heard preachers say over the years, you know, even if Jesus didn't rise from the dead, I'd still believe in him and serve him. No, you wouldn't. Why would you?

You're to be pitied if you do. Ridiculous. If in this life only. If in this life only your hope is in Christ. Now, our hope is in Christ in this life, but not only.

But if it's just in this life only, then you are to be pitied above all people. But then Paul says, and I'm glad he did, he said, but now Christ is risen from the dead and has become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep, who have died.

For since by man came death, that is, through Adam, came death, by man, and in the text it's a capital M, man, we're talking about the Lord Jesus, also came the resurrection of the dead, for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.

That's clear. There's no way to read it any other way. The resurrection, without it, there is no Christianity. Without it, or to deny it, is to be outside the faith.

All right, so how did Jesus answer this stupid, ignorant question? That's what we want to see. Well, what does he do? He gives them the truth. First logically, and then scripturally.

Gives them the truth. He answers this thing about marriage and heaven first, but really what he wants to get to is the truth of the resurrection. That's the whole point of this. All right, so verse 34, Jesus answered and said to them, the sons of this age, now pay attention to the wording.

The sons of this age, what age is that? The one in which we live. It's here in this world. Those who live in this world. The sons of this age, marry and are given in marriage.

Right? That's the way it works. I mean, that's the normal for this age. That's God's plan for this age. And the implication is being not just marriage, but to have children and populate the planet.

That's God's plan. be fruitful and multiply. That's what he commanded Adam and Eve. So that's God's plan for this age.

But then he says, but those who are counted worthy to attain that age, that age, not this age, that age, what age is that?

It's the age to come. And how does one enter that age? Through the resurrection. He says, that age and the resurrection of the dead.

And what does he say about that age? They neither marry nor are given in marriage. That's what he said. That is, they don't marry.

They don't have the kind of marriage relationship, physical relationship that goes along with marriage, that's intended for marriage. they don't have children and reproduce and so forth in that age.

I don't know what the Mormons do with this. I'm sure they have some answer for this. You know, they teach that Mormon men will spend eternity on their planets, their planet, having intercourse with their many, many wives and producing thousands of spirit children.

Did you know that's what they believe? And I don't know what the Muslims do with this. They teach that Muslim martyrs will go to heaven and have 72 virgins and other things associated with that.

But what does Jesus teach? He teaches that marriage is for this age, for this age. not that age, the age to come.

So, marriage and, you know, and reproduction and childbirth and all of that, that's for this age. And why? Well, he tells us that too.

Verse 36, Nor can they die anymore. No one dies in that age. There's no death in that age. Unlike this age, in that age, there will be no death.

Unlike this age, in the age to come, there will be no need for reproduction. Nobody has to be replaced. And that's why he says, for they, those resurrected to life, are equal or like the angels.

Now, by the way, that doesn't mean we become angels. Okay? We're going to sprout wings and fly around or whatever. He just simply means we will be like the angels in this way only.

In what way is that? Angels don't die. They don't die. They were created, but they don't die. Their numbers are fixed. And when we all get to heaven, the population of heaven will be fixed.

We'll be like the angels. And so we don't marry, we don't procreate, and so forth. Now, notice what he says next. Those who are counted worthy, that means saved by grace, by the way, to attain that age, the resurrection from the dead, what are they?

They are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. This really is great. Really great. There's no need for marriage.

No need for that relationship there. Because we have a greater relationship. A greater relationship. We have a relationship with God and with Christ, our true bridegroom there in heaven.

And so when we have that greater relationship, greatest of all relationships, there will be no more need for the lesser relationship. That means we won't be friends with people we've known here.

I'm not saying that. I'm talking about this idea of a marriage, this kind of unity. It will be with Christ. And then Jesus says in verse 37, but.

That's an important conjunction. But, that means the crucial issue here is not about marriage in heaven.

See, everybody wants to focus on that part of the passage. That's not really the crucial issue. The crucial issue here is your denial of the resurrection.

That's the crucial issue and so he refers them to scripture. And remember the Sadducees, they only accept the first five books of the Bible and so what does Jesus do? He picks a verse out of one of those books.

I mean, he's a genius. Well, he's the Lord. And so he picks a passage out of Exodus chapter 3 verse 6. Now, the Sadducees maintain that the doctrine of the resurrection is not taught in the Pentateuch, in the first five books, but Jesus says, au contraire.

And verse 37, he says, but even Moses showed in the burning bush passage. Remember that passage? I'm thinking he's, you know, looking at that, you remember that burning bush passage in Exodus?

Remember, that's one of the five books of the Pentateuch. It's inspired and authoritative. You remember that passage? That's what he's, kind of what he's saying. when he called the Lord, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

And that's what God said in Exodus 3, 6. I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

Not I was their God. I am their God. And so the Hebrew words and grammar really point to two realities.

I am and they are. That is, I am their God because they are alive through the resurrection.

That's what he's saying. Not I was their God because they were alive. I am their God because they are alive. And Jesus makes it clear in verse 38.

He says, for he is not the God of the dead but of the living. For all these live to him.

They're alive right now. To him. For him. He's their God. They have been raised from the dead. You see the superiority of the Savior in answer to this stupid question.

What an amazing answer to a really stupid question. one more very quickly and we'll be finished. What I want to call the sensibility of the scribes.

They had a little sense. Now here we're not talking about the Sadducees. We're talking about primarily the Pharisees. And so who were the scribes? They're the lawyers. They're the interpreters of God's law, the Mosaic law, and they were primarily Pharisees and they believed in the resurrection.

Pharisees did. And I would imagine that they liked Jesus' answer to this question. To the question of the Sadducees. They liked it. That didn't mean they became his friend.

Or they now are going to believe in him. Not at all. But they liked the answer. In fact, I'm sure that they would then continue to use that answer. They had had the question posed. I really can't imagine that when the Sadducees asked the question, they started to ask this question that the Pharisees and the crowd were just rolling their eyes.

Here it goes again. This stupid question. So they liked it. So verse 29 says, Then some of the scribes answered and said, Teacher, Bravo!

Or, you have spoken well. They congratulated. And so they all did the sensible thing. they dared not question him anymore.

This isn't working. In fact, it's becoming counterproductive. It's making us seem stupid before the people. And so they would not use that tactic anymore.

They actually changed their tactics and from now on, what are they going to do? They're going to lie about it. And that is the way of all anti-Christ.

All who are anti-Christ and anti-Christian. Then and now. And so the lesson for us is always, if we always use the scriptures, the word of God, as our response.

We always use the script, not rationalism, reasoning, scientific facts to try to support scripture, though it's alright to look to those things, but if we always just tell them this is what God's word says, then there really is no weapon against it that can be used against it.

And really all that is left for our detractors is to lie about and to misrepresent what we believe and what we teach.

And that's what they do. And that puts us in good company because that's what they did with our Lord and Savior. Thank you.