Episode Transcript
[00:00:24] Speaker A: Hello, I'm Josh.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: And I'm Gabriel.
[00:00:26] Speaker A: And today on reading the Gospel. We are studying the event teachings about the resurrection. This is found in Matthew, chapter 22, verses 23 through 33. It's also found in Mark, chapter twelve, verses 18 through 27. And Luke, chapter 20, verses 27 through 38. Follow along with us in the book of Matthew, chapter 22, beginning with verse 23.
[00:00:55] Speaker B: The same day, Sadducees came to Jesus. Who say that there is no resurrection. And they ask him a question, saying, teacher, Moses said, if a man dies having no children. His brother must marry the widow. And raise up offspring for his brother.
Now, there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died having no offspring left. So too, the second and third, down to the 7th.
After them all. The woman died in the resurrection. Therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her.
[00:01:40] Speaker A: But Jesus answered them. You were wrong, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of goddess. For in the resurrection, they neither marry nor are given in marriage. But are like the angels in heaven.
As for the resurrection of the dead. Have you not read what is said to you by God? 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. And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching.
So I think this section here quite often gets titled on marriage in heaven. But that's not really what this is about. The Sadducees coming to try to trick Jesus. The Pharisees had just failed to do it, as we saw in the last event. And now the Sadducees are stepping up to the plate.
Give me a brief description. Who are the sadducees? Again, what do they believe?
[00:02:38] Speaker B: So Sadducees are a religious party in the time of Jesus Christ.
Compared with the Pharisees. Who are more practical and interested in the practical living of their faith. Cedduces are more educated. They are the intellectual, religious intellectual of the time.
And also, they did not embrace the whole Old Testament. They believed only in the five books of Moses.
And because in the five books of Moses, the word resurrection is not present. They believe that there is no resurrection. There is no afterlife. There are no spirits, no angel, no work of the Holy Spirit.
[00:03:24] Speaker A: Yeah. And so they're coming to Jesus with probably the same question they asked the Pharisees. Right as they're having debates, trying to prove each other right or wrong. I'm sure they asked the Pharisees, hey, if you believe in the resurrection, what happens in this case?
[00:03:42] Speaker B: And this was not just a regular debate. It is days before the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. They came with a very clear purpose, to tempt him, to entangle him into his own words, to be able to accuse him. Yeah.
[00:03:58] Speaker A: And so they're asking this question, who's this woman going to be married to? And I think every one of us who are married, we wonder what it will be like in heaven. We want to be there with our spouse. Hopefully, we want to be there with our spouse through eternity, but what will it be like?
And honestly, Jesus doesn't go in and say, this is what's going to happen. He just says, we'll be like angels. You're asking the wrong question.
So this is more on this question of the resurrection. And it's interesting. In Jesus answer, he goes to the Torah to answer their question.
[00:04:37] Speaker B: And he's quoting from the book of Exodus, chapter three, when God went to Moses and he used these words, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, twice.
What is very interesting here is Jesus answer is not primarily about resurrection, but it is primarily about scriptures.
And in verse 29, Jesus answered, you are wrong. This is English standard version, or you are in error. As other translations.
There is a greek word that is translated as wandering, like getting astray.
It is like going somewhere, you have no map and you get lost.
This is what is Jesus communicating to the statuses.
You got lost for two reasons, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God.
[00:05:44] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:45] Speaker B: And for me, this is the core of the story, because Jesus Christ steers to this direction.
For the Sadducees, the purpose of the conversation was to be about resurrection. And Jesus had a quick answer. For them, you'll be like angels. But for Jesus, the core of this conversation is to draw their attention away from their intellectual reading of the Bible, just to find ideas, to find reasons or arguments for their debate.
And I find very interesting this verse, verse 31, and for the resurrection of the dead. Have you not read what was said or spoken to you by God?
And Jesus Christ is quoting what the Lord said to Moses, but said, this was spoken to you. That means the Sadducees were reading the scripture without listening to the word of God. And for me, that is fundamental.
[00:06:51] Speaker A: And I have to confess, I've done this in other areas where, you know, I like to think that I try to grasp all sides of the argument. I listen to both sides of the news. I try to find out, you know, theories that I don't agree with. I still try to study them to make sure I understand.
But I'm not trying to convert myself to them. I want a knowledge of what someone believes that believes different than me. But I'm not trying to believe that thing myself. And this is what I see the Pharisees doing. They're studying the rest of the Bible.
Not to find Jesus in it, yes, but to find faults, to find flaws, to find reason.
[00:07:37] Speaker B: Arguments.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: Arguments to win their battles.
And even, I think, in their scriptures, you know, they're not studying their scripture necessarily to find God. They're studying their scriptures to support their arguments, to build up and to debate. And I like to think no one wins in a debate.
You know, I've never seen a debate happen where one of the parties says, man, your points are so good. I agree with you. I'm changing my whole opinion.
Everyone walks away, oh, this person won. That person won. But no one's changed sides, no one's changed their opinion.
[00:08:20] Speaker B: There is no repentance at the end of a debate. There is no broken heart.
Because the debate is an exchange of ideas, will not touch the heart. Arguments are important. I don't want to discount them. They are very, very important.
But to stay at that level without knowing the person, this is what I see here. I connect this story with what Jesus said in John 539, search the scripture. And he was talking about the Old Testament because they talk about me. That means when we read the Bible, we have to read with a purpose, to know God.
Like in one of these debates that you just mentioned.
I'm listening to your arguments and I'm trying to find counterargument in a debate. My purpose is not to know you, to better understand who you are, to see what God has done amazingly, powerfully in your life.
That is the disadvantage of a debate. And maybe this is not the best way to communicate the gospel through debates.
[00:09:26] Speaker A: Yeah. And so when we come to the scriptures, our goal is not to come to grab ammunition. Because when I go to the Quran or another religious work outside of the christian sphere, I don't go trying to find spiritual insight there. You know, it's more trying to find why holes and things like that. And so that's not our goal when we come to the Bible.
And if we do that, we can get caught up like the pharisees and the sadducees and get caught up on these little things. But if we come to the scriptures to find Jesus, the scriptures are active, they're living. They're sharper than a two edged sword. They speak to us on a daily basis.
This is what I love. I think this is partly why we started this podcast, to get people in this habit of reading their Bible personally, daily, because we can read the exact same verses and come up with two different messages, because God is speaking to us individually for that day, for what we're going through.
[00:10:37] Speaker B: The next question is, what are you going to do with what God tells you?
When you hear God speak to you, what do you do with that information? How do you translate it into a practical living?
[00:10:49] Speaker A: And I think let's back up one step, because how do we hear God's voice? Because I think so often I try to teach the youth, the teens, hey, just read one verse a day, open your Bible, read one verse a day, just be in the Bible. But sometimes we're in and out of it so fast we don't have time to listen and to hear God. I think that's the first step before we deal with what do we do.
[00:11:18] Speaker B: When we hear in this world where everyone is in a hurry with so many voices and noises around us? It's very important to slow down, to disconnect, to unplug, and to dwell in the scripture until God speaks to you. Little by little, the verse will, if we allow the power of God, the Holy Spirit, to reach our hearts, little by little our lives will open up and the Lord will be able to reveal something that is either inappropriate or out of sync with the word of God.
And that is when God will speak to us. Sometimes through a word in the verse, sometimes through a prompt of the mind, other times through the moral conscience that will show us a disconnect between his will and our life.
And sometimes God will speak through a friend, through a Bible study, a sermon, or a podcast like ours.
[00:12:31] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, we never know. I had a great example of this with one of my kids, went to bed and he was scared.
And I sat down and talked with him about how God doesn't give us a spirit of fear.
And the next night for our devotion, as we were having worship, it just happened to be on that exact same verse. And he called it out. He's like, see, this would have been great last night. And God spoke to him through that, and he got so excited as he was hearing it and hearing it explained to him. And for me it was a joy seeing that in someone else's life that God has given us this wonderful book that speaks directly to us in different ways.
[00:13:17] Speaker B: And we have to store those words into our hearts, as psalm 119 says, because at the right moment, the Holy Spirit will remind us those words.
[00:13:30] Speaker A: And then we need to do, you know, if God's asking us to do something, we need to follow through. We need to surrender to him. We need to say, yes, God, I'll follow you or God, change me. I'm struggling with this. Help me. We need to move forward with the issues he reveals to us. So many times I've seen people get stuck. God has asked them to tackle an area in their life and they're not willing to.
And so they will flounder on trying to find more light, new light, somewhere else. Like, God, give me something else. Let me work on something else, instead.
[00:14:06] Speaker B: Of applying what they knew, what God told them to do. Because only when we apply the word of God, that is when we experience its power.
[00:14:16] Speaker A: Yeah. And so the application, getting back to your original question, the way we apply the word of God is by letting God live in our lives. And the Bible says he who began a good work in us will be faithful to complete it. Let's pray.
Father God, I pray that we are not like the Sadducees studying the scripture not to find you, but to find knowledge.
I pray, Father, that you will change our hearts as we go to the scriptures. We search the scriptures for you and that we sit and listen, and then once we hear, we apply it to our lives.
And Father, that if we struggle, we don't give up and walk away or look for new light. But we have honest conversations with you and we get to a place where we can surrender all.
I pray that you change us so that we can be ready on that day when the dead in Christ are raised up and we meet the Lord in the air. In Jesus name, amen.
[00:15:23] Speaker B: Amen.
