Sermons from Mission Hills UCC San Diego, California Rev. Dr. David Bahr [email protected] November 6, 2022 “Perpetually Free” Luke 20: 27-30 –Common English Bible 27 Some Sadducees, who deny that there’s a resurrection, came to Jesus and asked, 28 “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies leaving a widow but no children, the brother must marry the widow and raise up children for his brother.[a] 29 Now there were seven brothers. The first man married a woman and then died childless. 30 The second 31 and then the third brother married her. Eventually all seven married her, and they all died without leaving any children. 32 Finally, the woman died too. 33 In the resurrection, whose wife will she be? All seven were married to her.” 34 Jesus said to them, “People who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage. 35 But those who are considered worthy to participate in that age, that is, in the age of the resurrection from the dead, won’t marry nor will they be given in marriage. 36 They can no longer die, because they are like angels and are God’s children since they share in the resurrection. 37 Even Moses demonstrated that the dead are raised—in the passage about the burning bush, when he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.[b] 38 God isn’t the God of the dead but of the living. To God they are all alive.” Did anyone come to church today in a black car? Good thing we don’t live in Denver. It’s illegal to drive a black car in Denver on Sunday. Or at least, at some point in the past, a law was written and passed that is still on the books. Every locale or state has a version of their own absurd laws. Some are strangely specific, like, in South Dakota it’s illegal to sleep in a cheese factory overnight. In Salt Lake City, you’re not allowed to carry your violin in a paper bag. In some cases, you can guess what prompted the law: Like, in Louisiana, it’s against the law to have a pizza delivered to an unsuspecting neighbor. But what happened to explain why there is a law in Iowa that a one-handed piano player must perform for free?[1] But my favorite: In Massachusetts, it’s illegal to try and “stop a child from playfully jumping over puddles of water.” Some laws are funny, but many others still on the books are disturbing. For example, it’s illegal for a woman to cut her hair without her husband’s permission in Michigan. Obviously, it’s no longer enforced, but it’s one of a million examples of legislated patriarchy. From biblical times forward, men have written laws to tell women what they are allowed or not allowed to do, often making women the butt of their jokes along the way, like the Sadducees who thought it was funny to imagine a woman forced to endure the death of a spouse seven times. The Bible has plenty of laws or rules we might think are absurd, or at least, outdated. Some about hygiene. Some were dietary laws. Some laws helped to shape a common identity. And some laws sought to protect vulnerable citizens, like widows and orphans and immigrants. That could make sense in our passage today: If a man dies and leaves a wife but no child, his brother is obligated to marry the widow. Except that as scholars note, the purpose of this particular obscure law quoted from Deuteronomy was not to protect the woman but a way to raise up children for the eldest brother – in essence, giving him eternal life.[2] It had much more to do in protecting the patriarchy than any vulnerable person. Then the Sadducees posed the absurd extension of this law, “Tell us, Teacher: There were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; then the second and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman died. In the resurrection, whose wife will she be?” With their legally conceivable but callously absurd scenario, they weren’t asking a question in order to gain knowledge or better understanding. The Sadducees were attempting to trick Jesus or entrap him, but he had already proved adept at resisting their traps. For example, he had just brilliantly answered the question about paying taxes. He risked upsetting either the Roman authorities or the religious leaders. Instead Jesus said, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, give to God what is God’s.” Everyone stood silenced with their mouths open. That’s when they came back with the woman and those seven deceased brothers – whose wife will she be? Jesus was just as wise and calm. Avoiding their question, Jesus talks about the purpose of marriage which, he said, in this life is temporal and fleeting, to propagate the race and provide companionship. But in the age to come, there is no longer any need for that. The question of marriage in eternity is moot. They have better things to think about. And hint, hint, Sadducees, you should have better things to think about too. Instead of debating or defending the idea of resurrection to people who don’t believe in it, Jesus simply described “an age to come in which people are not dead.” The Sadducees referenced Moses so Jesus turned it back on them. At the burning bush, Moses called God the “God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” It only makes sense, Jesus told them, that since God is not the God of a bunch of dead people, to God, these people are not dead. They are still alive. And with that, once again, Jesus stumped the religious authorities who vowed to never ask him another question. It may seem like Jesus was just splitting legal hairs, but he raised a very important question to many of us. It’s a sincere question, especially on All Saints Day. What happens to the people we love when they die? Are they OK? More than anything, I just want to know, are they happy? My nephew Ryan David was killed in a tragic farm accident when he was 2 years old. The pastor at Ryan’s funeral explained that “God took him because he wanted another flower in his garden.” I wanted to scream and get up and walk out. Instead, one of my sisters and I held our breath and held each other’s hands so hard we could have broken each other’s fingers. We were supposedly “comforted” with the idea that “his soul was too pure for this world.” Setting that aside, however, I wonder, is Ryan perpetually two years old, never progressing beyond a sandbox? On earth, Ryan would now be 37 years old. Is he forever unmarried? On the other hand, my dad lived a long life. He was a good but not perfect man, who worked very hard to take care of his family. He was active in his community and cared deeply for his church. He died at age 88. Is he living perpetually with a bad hip or did he revert back to a handsome young farmer? When my mom died about 10 years later, we comforted each other with visions of them reunited, sharing ice cream cones like the first time they met at a Sunday School picnic. But come to think of it, what if my mom had remarried after he died? Or what if they had divorced during one of the more difficult periods in the middle of their marriage? What would such a heavenly reunion look like? Could be kind of messy. From Jesus’ description of marriage in the coming age, such things won’t matter. For some that’s a relief, free from a repeat of painful relationships, and for others perhaps a source of grief, who do not wish to be “free.” The Sadducees believed in the original understanding of Sheol – the dead are dead. That’s it. Jesus proclaims to them, however, life continues, but free from the constraints that exist in this life. That’s great, although to be honest, it’s also a little sad if some of the “constraints” were things, especially people, we loved. Just remember, in the resurrection, the woman will be free from being told to marry any one of the seven dead brothers. That’s good news for her and good news for us because to God, our ancestors are not dead. They are still alive, free. They are free, like angels. Most days I don’t care if there is an afterlife or a heaven or not. I often think heaven is a distraction – promising it to some, denying it to others. Or it’s an excuse to let injustice continue because they will get theirs in heaven. We should live in the present, not for the future. But there are days when it’s not a distraction, when I need it to be very real. I remember a conversation with a woman whose husband died. She was a scientist and content that life ended when we die. She hadn’t believed in heaven when he was alive and didn’t think she needed one now. She thought it was mere sentimentality. But one day she told me she needed to picture him somewhere; that to imagine him simply not existing anymore wasn’t working. I asked her when he was the most content and at ease. It was when he was standing in the Gulf of Mexico wearing waders and fishing. Now he’s in heaven and she’s at peace. For the Sadducees, life ended. That was that. I can almost imagine them scolding a child for playfully jumping over puddles of water. Instead, Jesus points to a God whose faithfulness to us and to our loved ones stretches beyond time on earth, a God of infinity, in whom we all live and move and have our being, but not limited to just now, forevermore. Are our departed loved ones OK? Are they happy? What I know is that they are perpetually free. [1] http://ijr.com/2014/12/222618-50-state-laws/ [2] The New Interpreters Study Bible
1 Comment
Karen
11/6/2022 01:12:49 pm
Thank you for indulging my thought, my prayer and vision that now my dearly departed mother and her recently departed sister will spend eternity free together.
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