Mark 12:18-27 So That We Might Live and Be With Him Forever

The Text

¹⁸ Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him and questioned him:

¹⁹ “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife behind but no child, that man should take the wife and raise up offspring for his brother.

²⁰ There were seven brothers. The first married a woman, and dying, left no offspring.

²¹ The second also took her, and he died, leaving no offspring. And the third likewise.

²² None of the seven left offspring. Last of all, the woman died too.

²³ In the resurrection, when they rise, whose wife will she be, since the seven had married her?”

²⁴ Jesus spoke to them, “Isn’t this the reason why you’re mistaken: you don’t know the Scriptures or the power of God?

²⁵ For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like angels in heaven.

²⁶ And as for the dead being raised—haven’t you read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the burning bush, how God said to him: I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob?

²⁷ He is not the God of the dead but of the living. You are badly mistaken.”

The Devotion

If you want to drill down and make this about whether we are still married in heaven with God, then you would be sadly mistaken.

Take a look at the passage once more:

Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him and questioned him:

And.

In the resurrection, when they rise, whose wife will she be, since the seven had married her?”

These Sadducees had no intentions of giving their hearts over to the only God who saves. They spoke to God disbelieving and doubting that God would resurrect his people from the dead:

James 1:5-8 (CSB) Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God—who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly—and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith without doubting. For the doubter is like the surging sea, driven and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord, being double-minded and unstable in all his ways.

How many times we have approached the throne of grace as double-minded hypocrites?

Not as sinners but righteous.

Not as sick but healthy.

Not as poor but wealthy.

When we don't think we need anything from God, how many of us actual go to God.

But what if you knew you were in dire need of what only God can give:

Mercy. Grace. Love. Affection. Wisdom. Intercession. Life. Eternal. Holiness. Righteousness.

We need the kingdom of God.

We need God. We need Christ. We need the Holy Spirit.

Don't believe in the resurrection? Make sense since you need to born again in order to believe and trust God. Then you will know the power of the resurrection because it starts with Jesus Christ who in his resurrection championed over our sin, and all of sin, hell, demons, Satan, and death.

Christ lived because we sinned.

Christ died so that we will live forever.

Christ resurrected so we can be born again.