Year C, Proper 27 “Jesus’ Challenge and Response: Words of Hope and Promise”

Luke 20: 27-38 By The Rev. Blake R. Hutson; Sunday Night, November 11, 2007

The theme In Luke chapter 20 is a challenge to Jesus’ Authority and the big question is how will Jesus respond? When he is pressed and put on the spot in front of how people what will he say? What will he do? In the chapter 3 different groups come to him to challenge him. They challenge him about three things—his authority/identity, his politics and finally as we see in this Gospel reading, his theology—his understanding of God who God is, what God will do and more specifically—Jesus theological stance on the resurrection. Now, at this point in Jesus’ life he has come on the scene in first century Israel and made quite an impact. He has done a number of miracles, taught the people, delivered sermons, and as you probably remember, on more than one occasion he has criticized the religious leaders.

So, in Luke 20 the religious leaders begin to push back. Jesus has criticized them, wounded their pride and their ego. So, they begin to challenge him. They want to test—see who he really is, see what he is made of and what type of intellect he has. So what we see in Luke 20 essentially is a series of debates.

Debates are something we are familiar with in America—especially in American politics. In the race for the Presidency, there have already been a number of Republican Debates and Democratic Debates. Of course leading up to the 2008 election which is almost a year away there will be debates between the Republican Candidate, the Democratic Candidate and possibly a third party candidate as well.

Now in a debate when you are asked a question you basically have two options—you either address the question head on and you answer it. Or you skirt around the question and you avoid it.

At the beginning of the chapter this is exactly what Jesus does—he avoids their question (20:1-8). The scribes and elders come to him and ask him: “By what authority do you do these things?” Jesus responds o.k. I’ll answer your question if you’ll answer my question: The work of John the Baptist—was it from heaven (from God) or from human origin? The elders and scribes go back and huddle among themselves—they say among themselves if we say it was from heaven then he will say—“Well, why didn’t you believe him?” but if we say it was from man (i.e., not from God) then the people will be angry with us—they will stone us. The elders go back to him and said they didn’t where John’s ministry came from. Jesus says, well then I won’t tell you by what authority that I am doing these things. This was kind of Round 1 and Jesus avoided their question—the one they originally asked.

Now, as all good debaters know, you can’t do this too often. You can’t continually avoid the question—you can do it occasionally but not all the time. Now the way Jesus did it was clever—and made his accusers look silly. Jesus won Round 1 but you can’t use this tactic all the time.

So jumping ahead a few verses, we come to Round 2 (vs. 20-26). They come to him again and ask: “Teacher is it lawful for us to pay taxes to the emperor?” This time he answers their question. Do you remember what he did? He asked to see a coin and what did he ask? He asked “whose inscription is on it—whose picture, whose name?” (vs. 24) They said, “the emperors.” Jesus response was the familiar saying: “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” Round 2 in Luke 20 goes to Jesus, this time he answered their question.

Now we come to our Gospel Reading—the third round, the third give and take of religious leaders challenging Jesus intellect, his authority and this time—his theological understanding.

We’re told at the outset that a group of Sadducees came to challenge him. The Gospel writer Luke tells us from the very beginning their stance/their position: the Sadducees don’t believe in the resurrection. Believe it or not this distinguished them from other Jewish groups at the time who did actually believe in the resurrection.

So the Sadducees come to him and in their contest/their debate they pose to Jesus a hypothetical question. Hypothetical questions are loosely based on facts. They aren’t ever very likely to occur or be relevant. They are speculative and abstract and frankly, in a debate they are unfair questions. But the Sadducees aren’t going for “fair” they want to test his knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures, his intellect and they want to see where he stands on this issue of the Resurrection.

They set up a hypothetical situation: a brother dies leaving a widow and they have no children. According to the law of Moses, the proper custom was for the next brother in line to marry the widow-when they have children, the children would be named after the brother who died. This was called the Levirate Marriage Law. In the Old Testament it comes up first in Genesis chap. 38. Then again in Deuteronomy 25. A familiar story that deals in great detail with this is the story of Ruth. At the end of the story Boaz exercises his right to marry Ruth because of this custom (3:9, 4:10). If you remember this is what she had wanted all along, so they lived happily ever after.

This law had two purposes—1.) the idea was to have children that wouldn’t belong to the surviving brother. Rather they would be counted as children of the deceased brother. These children would preserve the family name and the memory of the deceased man—so that his family lineage would be preserved and continue. 2.) this law protected the surviving widow because she was given a husband and she would have children and the children would care for and provide for the widow.

So the Sadducees come to Jesus with this hypothetical situation—

Jesus responds and says getting married is something people are concerned about in this life. It’s something we think about and something we are concerned with—even a need that some of us have. But getting married isn’t something that people will be concerned with in the next life. Getting married and being married is something that we are concerned with in this life. But Jesus says, look guys, if you die single, you won’t be looking for a mate in heaven. Moses’ Law won’t apply anymore!

Jesus continues, Those who die in the Lord, are children of God. They are like Angels. They are children of the resurrection. They cannot die and they will not die anymore (v. 36).

Then he draws on the Hebrew Scriptures which they revere. He uses their own ammunition against them. He said, Moses affirmed this when he recorded for us his encounter with God at the Burning Bush (Exodus 3). From the Bush, God spoke and said, I am the God of your father, the God Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God Jacob” (vs. 6). In other words I am the God of your ancestors—not I was their God when they were alive, but I am their God now. Because their spirits are still alive. I was their God when they were alive, I am still their God because they are still alive and I am coming to you now as their God. As Jesus concluded, [God the Father] is not God of the dead, but God of the living; for to the Father [and in the Father] they are all alive” (vs. 38).

This response silenced his critics. They even acknowledged that he had “answered well.” We read that no one else dared to ask him anymore questions(vs. 39-40). Jesus had won the third encounter with those who had challenged his authority. For his original readers, part of Luke’s agenda was to show that Jesus won this third and final encounter with the religious leaders.

But for you and I the significance of this text is less about Jesus winning a debate. It’s more about the message he communicates—It’s about the underlying message behind Jesus’ words. For you and I Jesus’ words were a message of hope concerning those we have lost. Those we love but see no longer. Last week we celebrated All Saint’s Day—a day when we remember and celebrate those saints that have touched our lives in a meaningful way—those saints that have influenced and formed our lives in the faith. One of the underlying messages in this Gospel text is about them. This Gospel text provides us a reminder about those we love who have died in the Lord. Jesus message is that “God is the God of the living” and “and to him and in him, all of them are alive (v. 38)” By God’s grace we have the hope and more than that, the promise of God that we will see them again.

Secondly, this text relates to our lives and it is a message of hope for us. All of us at some point will face our own death. Death will come for all of us. But in this text we are reminded that for you and I, death is not the end—it is not and will not be our end. In grammatical terms, death is not a “period.” It’s not the end of a sentence, not the end of our lives. Rather, for you and I, death is a comma, it is a pause. Death is not a conclusion. Rather it is a transition.. By God’s grace, we hope the hope and the promise eternal life.

So in this text we are reminded that God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. To God and in God, those we love “are still alive.” And in God, you and I have the hope and the promise that we “will still be alive.” Amen.