Father, we are back into a hybrid schedule with some of the schools in our district due to COVID outbreaks. I would ask for Your watchcare over all involved. Wrap Your arms around us. Amen.
Luke 20:27-40 (<<click here to read the passage)
Remember those fun word problems in math class? Here’s a good one.
A boy has 45 watermelons in the desert. He needs to get them across to the Oasis fair, 15 miles away. He can only carry 15 watermelons at a time, and he eats one watermelon every mile he walks, including walking back to where he started from. He can also leave watermelons at any mile he has walked, but no fractions of a mile. How many watermelons can he possibly take to the fair?
(I’ll put one answer at the bottom if you want to try and work it out yourself. I had to ask the master of math who is home for a few weeks to figure it out for me!)
Reading today’s passage made me think that the Sadducees could not have asked a more convoluted question of Jesus! It didn’t involve watermelons but a woman who unsuccessfully attempted to provide a child in a succession of marriages to seven brothers, with the final question being whose wife she would be in the resurrection.
From the get-go, the Sadducees were on the losing team. An old joke comes to mind. Why were they called Sadducees? They held that there is no resurrection from the dead. v27, that’s why they were “sad you see”. It’s old and corny but if there is no resurrection then that means this life is all there is. And no matter how good some have it in this life, it would be very sad indeed if that is all we have to look forward to.
Jesus answered the unimportant question they asked…
“Marriage is for people here on earth. But in the age to come, those worthy of being raised from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage.” v34-35 NLT
…but He also answered the important question that needed to be answered.
My study Bible* tells me that the Sadducees were a group of conservative religious leaders who honored only the Pentateuch – that is Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy – as Scripture. The Pentateuch is attributed to Moses and they based the entirety of their beliefs on those five books (which by the way is what the word Pentateuch means – five books). They could find no mention of a resurrection in those books.
“But now, as to whether the dead will be raised—even Moses proved this when he wrote about the burning bush. Long after Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had died, he referred to the Lord[b] as ‘the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ So he is the God of the living, not the dead, for they are all alive to him.” v37-38 NLT
Often in life, we try to make more of something that is necessary. And as human beings, our minds get stuck on things that we assume to be true when in reality, they are not. God is truly the source of true wisdom and we are encouraged to go to Him if we lack the wisdom we need.
If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. James 1:5 NLT
(Massey figured out that one possible answer is 6 –there a few different ways to figure it out.)
*Life Application Study Bible New Living Translation
Nov 12th,2020, Thurs, 5:00 pm
