Seeing the Bigger Picture

11/6/16 (Proper 26/Ordinary 31 C Semi-Continuous)

Haggai 1:15b-2:9; Luke 20:27-38

Seeing the Bigger Picture

It seems we find ourselves facing another challenging and complex set of texts this Sunday - this time of year often begins to feel something like a “greatest hits” album of readings from what some pastors call the “table of contents books” and Jesus’ less popular teachings - you know, the ones some pastors would just as soon skip over as actually preach on.  These last few weeks leading up into Advent put a greater emphasis on looking at Jesus’ teachings on the Kingdom, as well as the words of the prophets to an Israel that has come home from exile and yet is still living under the rule of a foreign power.

But as we listen to Jesus engaging in intricate theological conversations with the Sadducees, it’s easy to find ourselves standing on the outside of the conversation and trying to figure out exactly what is going on and what kind of Kingdom it is that Jesus is talking about.  It helps to get into a little bit of background in this particular situation.  The Sadducees were a Jewish school of religious thought that viewed the Torah, the first five books of the Jewish scriptures known as the Law of Moses, as the only authoritative scripture for the people of Israel.  The historian Josephus describes the Sadducees as believing that there is no fate, that God does not commit evil, that humans have free will and freedom of choice, and that there is no immortal soul, afterlife, or any other kind of reward or penalty after death.  Moses doesn’t talk about an afterlife in the Torah, so there’s no particular reason to give the afterlife much thought or credence.

So when the Sadducees are asking Jesus this peculiar and complicated question about a woman who goes through the legal customs expected of her and her brothers-in-law, they’re really just trying to set Jesus up for failure.  Jesus has been preaching a message about the Kingdom of God, talking about what is still yet to come - for the Sadducees, this is a purely ridiculous notion, and so they ask Jesus this question as a means to point out just how ridiculous Jesus’ message must be.  If there is a resurrection, they figure, then it’s bound to make these complicated marriage laws from the Torah even more complicated once everyone is alive again.

Jesus doesn’t miss a beat, though.  Just as he’s done with every question he’s been asked by the scribes and the Pharisees in this marathon of challenges and responses throughout this whole chapter, Jesus not only answers the question that the Sadducees pose to him, but he answers it in a way that actually addresses the beliefs of the Sadducees and gently corrects those beliefs in the process.  Since the Sadducees only believed in the first five books of the Old Testament, or the Torah, as authoritative scripture, Jesus’ answer from the book of Exodus shows not only that he understands the beliefs of the Sadducees, but that he also respects them enough to answer them on their own terms and to teach them in the process.  But at the same time, Jesus recognizes a trap when he sees it, so he moves beyond the pettiness of the question itself and into the deeper reality of the gospel that he has been preaching throughout his entire earthly ministry.

But here’s the thing: while Jesus’ answer clearly impresses the Sadducees - it doesn’t give us a lot to go on, does it?  Sure, he confirms what he’s said all along and reiterates that there is a resurrection, that those who are raised will be called “Sons of God,” and that life as we know it in the resurrection will be different from anything we may have come to expect… but doesn’t that only leave us with just more questions?  

We put a lot of stock in the resurrection - we preach it boldly and with hopeful confidence.  We witness to it every year at Easter.  Every Sunday as we gather for worship in front of this empty cross, we are reminded of it.  As we come closer and closer to the Advent season, we’re reminded that even as Christ has already been born, Christ is still coming again because of his resurrection and ascension, and every time we take Communion together, we celebrate that very future promise.  And yet the picture that Jesus paints for us of the resurrection isn’t exactly this bright and shining message of hope, is it?  I mean - think about the images that we paint for ourselves when we go through loss, the comfort we find in the belief that there will be a day when we are reunited with the ones we love, that we will see our husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, or children once more.  Jesus tells the Sadducees that “those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.”  He tells the Sadducees that it’s not relevant who the woman calls her husband in the resurrection because those relationships won’t be given the same legal societal status in the new Kingdom.  Does that sound like an image that inspires hope?  Does it confirm the images that we’ve made for ourselves of the resurrection and of heaven?  Or does it only leave us with greater anxiety, more questions, and just an overall sense of uncertainty about everything?

Before we get too worried - I think there is some comfort in this passage.  On the technical side of theology, some scholars suggest that it’s not the relational aspect of marriage that Jesus says won’t exist in the Kingdom, but the patriarchal business aspect of marriage in which women are seen as property that will be eliminated.  Other theologians take this idea a step further, arguing that it’s not that marriage won’t exist or be important as much as that all other relationships will be lifted up and perfected in the Kingdom to the point that they meet the holy ideals of what the marriage relationship always was meant to reflect in the first place.

But beyond even all of these ways of justifying Jesus’ comments, I think the hope lies more in the fact that Jesus is telling the Sadducees that they’re missing the bigger picture.  Jesus tells them that God is not a God of the dead, but a God of the living - that no one who is a child of the resurrection is ever dead to God.  Jesus reaffirms the promise of the resurrection, and no matter what form that resurrection takes, Jesus promises that it is worth putting our faith, hope, and trust in.  We don’t know every detail about the resurrection - we don’t know how we will look, what our experience will be of eternal life.  But we do know that our scriptures are filed with the promise of resurrection and that in both the Old and the New testaments alike, God promises God’s people that there is a kingdom yet to come, a time when death shall be no more, and a time when we will experience the resurrection.  As Frederick Buechner writes, “God makes us no promises about death, God makes us promises about life.”  And we also know that we worship a God who keeps those promises.  So no matter what the fine details are, no matter how different we think that this resurrection will be, we still have this one thing to continue to give us hope and that should inspire us to continue proclaiming the promises of the Gospel to the rest of the world:  God is the God of the living, and there is life eternal in the resurrection. That’s the whole story: God wins.  God’s promises will be and are being kept, even as we sit here today.  Because we proclaim with our very hearts that our God is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, and that this same God is the one who raised Jesus Christ from the dead as further promise of what is yet to come for us.

And perhaps that’s the message we need to latch onto more than anything else at this time and in this place.  It feels so much like we are a people who are surrounded by anxiety, particularly when it comes to looking ahead to our future - with an election only two days away and what feels like the fate of our nation in the balance, a market that is in constant fluctuation and bills that aren’t… it’s important to be reminded of that bigger picture.  It’s so easy for us to get caught up in those small details, to nit pick and worry ourselves about whatever the latest outrage and hot news item happens to be… and yet no matter what happens on November 8th, no matter what direction we go as a nation in the next four years, the message of the Gospel remains consistent: Jesus is Lord.  Rulers and leaders change.  Kingdoms rise and fall.  The temple that the Sadducees gave so much importance was torn asunder.  And yet Jesus is still Lord - his promises are sure, his Kingdom is coming, and in that we will always find our hope, yesterday, today, and forevermore.  To God be the Glory.  Amen.