Proper27C, November 10, 2013, Sullivan Park Care Center, by
Sr Annette Fricke, OP
To borrow a quote from the internet,
“Jesus just happened to be a long-haired socialist who condemned the rich,
challenged the religious elite, and told people to pay their taxes.” That
basically sums up what is going on in the gospel according to Luke. One of those groups known to be the religious
elite was the Sadducees. The Sadducees
pictured God and humans as independent and distant, both in this life and the
next. Rewards for righteousness were in this life, and thus they were keen on
wealth and influence as evidence of divine blessing. The problem with this quote is that it says Jesus was, not
is. It denies that Jesus is alive
today. The same goes for that phrase WWJD,
a confusing abbreviation which means “what would Jesus do (?)” rather than
“what is Jesus doing (?)”. I can, however, properly say in the past tense that
the Sadducees were because they did,
in fact, cease to exist by the time of the destruction of the temple in
Jerusalem in 70 AD.
We do not
know much about the Sadducees for two reasons.
They did not write anything down and what we do know comes from their
adversaries. We do know that many of them were from the aristocratic class and
were generally in power alongside the government. The ordinary people did not share their
belief system, but were more likely to side with the Pharisees. An early church
historian, Josephus, confirms that the Sadducees denied the resurrection, the
immortality of the soul, eternal rewards, or the "world to come." The Pharisees did believe in resurrection and
became the forerunners of modern-day Judaism.
Thus, this “debate” of Jesus is with the Sadducees. A very popular joke passed around in the
seminaries to remember what they believed is that they did not believe in the
resurrection, therefore they were sad, (pause) you see?
In reading
the scriptures, tense is very important.
In reading the scriptures, we need to focus on past versus present
tense. This is the point that Jesus is
trying to make with the Sadducees. They
did not see what they supposedly believed.
Yet, as Jesus pointed out, it is right there in plain view. How did they miss it? And how did I miss it. I have also read the scriptures many times,
but this argument of Jesus really makes sense.
God’s name is “I am” and God says also in the present tense, I am the
God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is
all present tense. It is the tense of
the living. Jesus’ point is that even if
we only have before us the first five books of the Old Testament, we have the
confirmation that resurrection is a reality.
If we look back into Luke itself, we see the story of Lazarus in the
bosom of Abraham. I don’t know a better
way of connecting the dots. Luke
narrates clearly for us the relationship of Jesus to God, both the continuation
of God’s teaching from many years ago to the new age of believers in
Jesus. Jesus’ message is so powerful,
that even some of the Sadducees are converted or so it seems from just beyond our
gospel text. The rest of them, not
unlike the Pharisees, wanted to snuff out his life, thinking that was all it
would take to bury him and his teachings forever. Jesus is a radical rabbi that
needs to disappear from the face of the earth, never to be seen or discussed
ever again. Jesus’ teaching does not
agree with that of others, even today.
The taunts
towards Jesus continue throughout the gospel of Luke, only this one is from the
Sadducees. Who is God? God is God of the living, not of the
dead. According to Luke, Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob are living. Pay close
attention to the text: they are not angels, but like angels. Those who talk about their children who died at
a young age becoming angels are contradicted by this gospel text. They do not become angels, but like angels. They are like angels in that they live in the
presence of God through eternity, never dying.
We, like the
Sadducees, will continue to wonder just what the resurrection will look
like. We are given many images, such as
those in the book of Daniel or Revelation, and here in Luke. Although our
questions to Jesus about the resurrection may never be fully answered and we
may be disappointed in our seeking and searching, that things may not be at all
as we imagine or dream, still we trust that what little we know about what
Jesus tells us in these readings will be enough. Isn’t it enough to know that
Jesus will take us home to be with him in everlasting love and joy? Isn’t it enough to know that the love of God
is eternal?
In the words of an early American
hymn: Come, ye sinners, poor and needy, weak and wounded, sick and sore; Jesus
ready stands to save you, full of pity, love and pow'r. I will arise and go to
Jesus; He will embrace me in his arms. In the arms of my dear Savior, Oh, there
are ten thousand charms. Come, ye thirsty, come and welcome, God's free bounty
glorify; True belief and true repentance, ev'ry grace that brings you nigh. Come,
ye weary, heavy laden, lost and ruined by the fall; If you tarry till you're
better, you will never come at all.
We are not perfect and probably never
will be in this life and yet we carry on our lives in faith, faith alone. That is all we have. God’s grace which supports and sustains that
faith is sufficient because God is our redeemer. Because Jesus suffered and died
on the cross, you and I can say with full confidence as in the book of Job, “I
know that my redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth;
and after my skin has thus been destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God.” Because of what Jesus interprets from the
Torah, even before the stories of his own resurrection, you and I are children
of the resurrection. We cannot die
anymore. To God, we are all alive. Those saints that we celebrated last Sunday
are alive in God. It doesn’t matter that
we don’t know the details, that some of us believe differently from others. The details are not important. The important thing is that God does not
abandon us, but continues to love us and embrace us with a love far beyond our
imaginings, even beyond the love experienced in the best of our marriages and
relationships with each other.
And so it is that we are left with a
mystery. Even resurrection itself is
thought of differently by different Christians.
Some say it is only spiritual, not bodily at all. If we are talking about this life, yes; it is
only spiritual. But beyond that, how do
we even go about defining what “only spiritual” really means?
Do you believe that God can change
your life around 180 degrees? That what
you see now can become just the opposite?
Do you believe that all the pain and suffering you have been through in
this life will eventually lead to utter bliss, love and joy of immense quality and
quantity beyond what you could ever possibly imagine? That your longings and yearnings will someday
become a reality, living with God eternally?
Do you believe or reject such a proposition? Do you believe the words formulated by the
Council of Nicaea, “I believe in the resurrection of the dead and the life of
the world to come.”?
Perhaps our best response to that is
that of the hymn, “I will arise and go to Jesus. He will embrace me in his arms.” Amen.
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