PRAYER:(Psalm 121) LORD, help me to focus my attention on the needs of others. You have me. My help comes from You, the Maker of Heaven and earth. You will not let my foot slip-You, whom watches over me will not slumber nor sleep. You will keep me from all harm-You watch over my life; You watch over my coming and going both now and forever more. So let me take my mind, attention and focus off of me and place it on someone else in need. You have placed us on this earth to be a blessing to one another. Help me stop thinking of how I can be blessed and change my thinking into "how can I bless others." You have given me the tools and means to be there for another person. Let me be their humble servant for whatever their specific need is. Let's start today, but help me to remain dedicated to and grow in this godly way of life forever more. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.
MARRIAGE AT THE RESURRECTION:
23 That same day the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to (Jesus) with a question. 24 "Teacher," they said, "Moses told us that if a man dies without having children, his brother must marry the widow and have children for him. 25 Now there were seven brothers among us. The first one married and died, and since he had no children, he left his wife to his brother. 26 The same thing happened to the second and third brother, right on down to the seventh. 27 "No then, at the resurrection, whose wife will she be of the seven, since all of them were married to her?"
29 Jesus replied, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures, or the power of God. 30 At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like angels in heaven. 31 But about the resurrection of the dead-have you not read what God said to you, 32 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? He is not the God of the dead but of the living."
33 When the crowds heard this, they were astonished at his teaching.
After the Pharisees and supporters of Herod had failed to trap Jesus, the Sadducees smugly stepped in to try. They did not believe in the resurrection because the Pentateuch (Genesis-Deuteronomy) has no direct teaching on it. The Pharisees had never been able to come up with a convincing argument from the Pentateuch for the resurrection, and the Sadducees thought they had trapped Jesus for sure. But Jesus was ready to show them otherwise.
The law said that if bothers living together, if one of them died without having a son, the man's brother had a responsibility to marry and care for the widow (Deuteronomy 25:5,6). This law protected women who were left alone, because in that culture they usually had no other means to support themselves. Because the Sadducees accepted only the Pentateuch as God's divine Word, Jesus answered them from the book of Exodus (3:6). God would not have said, "I am the God of your ancestors-the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" if God thought of them as dead. If you noticed, God used "am" and not "was"-present tense. From God's perspective, they are alive, Jesus' use of the present tense pointed to the resurrection and the eternal life that all believers enjoy in Him.
The Sadducees asked Jesus what marriage would be like in heaven. Jesus said it was more important to understand God's Word and His power than know what heaven will be like. In every generation and culture, ideas of eternal life tend to be based on images and experiences of present life. Jesus answered that these faulty ideas are caused by ignorance of God's Word. We must not make up our own ideas about eternity and heaven by thinking of it and God in human terms. We should concentrate more on our relationship with God than about what heaven will even look like. Eventually we will find out, and it will be far beyond our greatest expectations.
STOP THINKING ABOUT GOD IN HUMAN TERMS
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