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DON'T BE DEAD WRONG ABOUT LIFE AFTER DEATH.
Nearly every culture has possessed some type of belief in the afterlife.
A nineteenth-century professor at Yale University named James Dwight Dana summed up this hope of abiding life when he said
I do not believe that God would create man and then desert him at the grave.
The Egyptian’s Book of the Dead is full of tales of life after death.
The tomb of Pharaoh Cheops (kee-ops), who died some 5,000 years ago, contained a solar boat that was designed to carry him through the heavens in eternity.
Ancient Greeks were often buried with a coin in their mouths to pay their fare to cross the River Styx into the land of the dead.
Some Native Americans were buried with their bows, arrows and ponies, so they would be ready to hunt when they arrived at the happy hunting ground.
The ancient Vikings believed in a place called Valhalla where they believed they would fight all day.
The dead would be raised and the wounded healed every evening.
Then they would feast and drink the night away, then go out to fight again.
The Muslims look forward to their version of heaven where every sensual, physical pleasure can be indulged throughout eternity.
In our own era, nearly all non-Christian cults and religions hold to some view of life after death.
Even some who have refused to believe on Jesus for salvation have felt the pull of eternity.
Benjamin Franklin, who was, as far as we know, not a believer, had the following words placed on his tombstone.
The body of Benjamin Franklin, printer, Like the cover of an old book, Its contents worn out, An stript of its lettering and gilding Lies here, food for worms!
Yet the work itself shall not be lost, For it will, as he believed, appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by its Author!
The ancient Jews were no exception.
They also believed in life after death.
Their Talmud, which contained their written and oral traditions, was filled with references to life after death.
In today’s text Jesus clarifies some of life’s eternal questions.
He teaches us how not to be DEAD WRONG ABOUT LIFE AFTER DEATH.
Let me set our timeline.
It is Tuesday of Passion week.
It is less than 72 hours until Christ crucifixion on Friday.
Jesus has already endured an onslaught of question from the Pharisees and Herodians.
Now another group of religious Jews called the Sadducees thought they would give it a try to expose Jesus as a fraud by questioning concerning the afterlife.
THE ANTAGONISTS
The Sadducees were a minority sect among the Jews.
They may have been few, but they were the most powerful and influential of all the Jewish sects.
The Sadducees controlled all the buying and selling that went on at the Temple.
Thus, they were angry with Jesus because He had interrupted their business enterprises when He cleansed the Temple, Mark 11:12-19.
The Sadducees also controlled the priesthood.
All the high priests and chief priests were Sadducees.
They also formed a majority of the Sanhedrin, or the Jewish Supreme Court.
They were aristocratic and wealthy.
They were friendly to Rome.
Most of all, they, along with the Pharisees and the Herodians, hated Jesus.
They were disliked by the common Jew.
They were often aloof, thinking they were better than everyone else.
They were rude, insensitive, and very harsh in the judgments they handed down.
They cared nothing for the common man.
They were also disliked because of their theology.
They only accepted the Pentateuch, or the five books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy as authoritative .
They believed that one could not base doctrine on what the prophets or the other Old Testament writers said.
The doctrine that caused them the most trouble with the people was their denial of all things supernatural.
They believed in the existence of God, but they rejected everything else that was of a supernatural nature.
They did not believe in demons, angels, the devil, or in miracles.
They did not believe in Heaven or Hell.
They did not believe in a future judgment.
They did not believe in life after death, nor did they believe in the resurrection of the dead.
They were the extreme fundamentalists of the day.
They refused to accept the authority of anything they could not support by a literal reading of the Law of Moses.
Yet, because they did not believe in life after death, a resurrection or a future judgment, they tended to live for the moment.
They lived their lives for power and profit.
Their philosophy could be described as one of “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.”
By the way, this is the same mentality that grips modern man.
People in our day have rejected the Bible as the standard and rule of life.
Because they have done that, they have no hope of life after death, and they have no hope of resurrection.
They have no fear of a future judgment.
Man doesn’t believe in the existence of evil or Hell.
Man does not believe that he will face God in judgment, so he lives as he pleases (Romans 1:18-31).
But, there is a God.
His Word is still the final authority.
There will be a resurrection.
Man will live somewhere forever.
Man will face God in judgment.
There is a Hell.
Jesus is the only hope of salvation, John 14:6; Acts 4:12.
The only hope the lost soul has of salvation is to come to Jesus Christ by faith and believe the Gospel!
Have you done that?
THEIR ARGUMENT
These men come to Jesus and call Him “Master”.
The word means “teacher” and it was designed to flatter Jesus and cause Him to let down His guard.
It didn’t work!
These men appeal to “Moses”.
He was the great lawgiver.
He was the spokesman for God.
He was universally respected by all the Jews.
They knew of Christ’s respect for the Scriptures, so they approach with what they see as a problem from the Word of God.
These men have constructed a puzzle that they feel Jesus cannot solve.
Their aim is to embarrass Him in front of the people who have gathered in the Temple.
They begin to tell Jesus a story based on the Old Testament law of levirate (lev-er-it) marriage taught in Deut.
25:5-10.
This law made provision for the preservation of families and inheritances.
If a man died, with no living children, his next of kin would marry his widow and raise up a child in the name of the deceased.
This law was what brought about the union between Judah and Tamar, Gen. 38, which ensured Jesus would be born of the tribe of Judah.
It also made possible the marriage of Ruth and Boaz, Ruth 4, which further ensured Jesus would be born of the tribe of Judah.
This was a very important law to the nation of Israel.
It guaranteed that a family’s inheritance would stay in the family.
Based on this law, the Sadducees come to Jesus with a tale of a man and a woman.
The man died without leaving an heir.
The man had seven brothers.
When he died, the next brother took the wife, but he died before producing an heir.
Each of the brothers married the woman in turn and each died before producing an heir.
Finally, the woman herself died.
Their question is, who will she belong to in the resurrection of the dead?
The Jews, who believed in the resurrection, believed that life in eternity would be a continuation of life here on earth.
They believed that a man would have the same family in Heaven that he had here.
Of course, the Sadducees didn’t even believe in a resurrection, they were just trying to embarrass Jesus.
They were probably trying to mock His believe in the resurrection as well.
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