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Sunnyside Baptist Church Michael Dirrim
Day that you have given. Lord, you are good. All that you do is good. You provide so abundantly for us and are faithful. You are faithful in all things. We pray tonight that you would greatly bless the children and those teaching them to sing praises to you, and I pray that you would be truly glorified by the ordering and combining of their voices, and that they would sing from their hearts to your glory, and we pray for us tonight as we read your word together that you would bless us by giving us a clear view of your son Jesus, and that we would have an amen in our hearts of this word that you have forever forged from heaven, and we pray that you would bless our time of prayer as we intercede for those who are in need, as we come together to join our voices together, and look for your mercies.
Let me pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Luke chapter 20, beginning in verse 27. Then some of the Sadducees, who deny that there is a resurrection, came to him and asked him, saying, Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife, and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.
Now there were seven brothers, and the first took a wife and died without children, and the second took her as wife, and he died childless. Then the third took her, and in like manner the seven also, and they left no children and died.
Last of all, the woman died also. Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become? For all seven had her as a wife. Jesus answered and said to them, The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are counted worthy to attain that age and the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.
But even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For he is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him.
Then some of the scribes answered and said, Teacher, you have spoken well. But after that they dared not question him anymore. And he said to them, How can they say that the Christ is the son of David?
Now David himself said in the book of Psalms, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. Therefore David calls him Lord. How is he then his son? As we read these passages from the Gospel of Luke and indeed when we're in other Gospels, we see how Jesus conducts his teaching ministry.
He does not merely lay out important and vital truths in a linear fashion, giving lists of things to believe in order, alphabetical or otherwise. He also does not engage in what would have been the most widely recognized forms of rhetoric.
Jesus, when he teaches and gives parables, images, asking questions, presenting riddles, and solving them, we find that he conducts his teaching ministry very much in the vein of the wisdom literature.
The parables he tells are likened to those that Solomon tells about the ways of life to his son. The riddles that he answers are those tougher than what Solomon handled. And it's interesting that after several vibrant stories that stick in the mind and tell us very important, and indeed we would say either high or deep theological truths, they stick in our minds and warm our hearts because of the imagery that Jesus uses, the story that he tells, the narratives that he employs.
And then we have the series of people trying to stump him. Let's ask Jesus questions that he can't answer. And of course he perfectly answers them and leaves them speechless. They dare not ask him any further questions.
Remember that their main objective was to discredit Jesus, and here he is making them look like fools. So they realize that the more they challenged him, the more they questioned him in this cynical and trapping way, the more they just ended up discrediting themselves.
So at a certain point they give up and they stop asking questions, which gives Jesus an opportunity to ask them a riddle, which caps off the the series of questions. Let's consider this first one. We've already looked at the the riddle of should we pay taxes to Caesar and discuss the social and political and theological background to that.
And now we have a question from the Sadducees. Someone a long time ago made a very now tired pun about the Sadducees, and to help you remember who they were versus the Pharisees, that the Sadducees didn't believe in the resurrection and that's why they were sad, you see.
And that's been around in every single Bible college and seminary and so on. The Sadducees, and Luke helpfully puts in here that they deny that there is a resurrection, as he is writing for Theophilus and making sure that his patron understands the dynamics of what goes on here.
He doesn't want Theophilus to think that the Sadducees are interested in the resurrection. They're not. They're interested in trying to demonstrate that the resurrection is a totally foolish idea. Does anybody know why the Sadducees rejected the notion of the resurrection, of the physical resurrection?
Why would they reject that? Kind of a strange thing, you know. If you grow up in the church and you've been a Christian for a long time, what a hope-filled thought. What a clarifying thing to think about the resurrection that lies ahead of us.
How foundational to our hope. And to think about those who are apparently religious, who think a lot of Moses, and think a lot of the writings of Moses in the scripture. The Sadducees who populate the chief priests positions, the the priesthood, the Sanhedrin, the ruling council of the Jews, was mostly Sadducees.
So chief priests, the Sanhedrin, these were made up of Sadducees. How could the majority of the Jewish leadership deny the resurrection from the dead? Isn't that terrible? I mean, what about Job? You know, his confidence that he would once again, after his death, see his Redeemer.
He would stand upon the earth. And what are the promises of Daniel? That there would be a resurrection of everyone, some for everlasting life and from some for everlasting judgment. Why should they reject these things?
The Sadducees consider themselves conservatives. Does that surprise you? They consider themselves conservatives and consider that the Pharisees were taking things further and further and they shouldn't.
Isn't that strange? The Sadducees thought they were conservative because they believed that the binding inspired text that really was truly from God was only that which Moses wrote, the Torah, the first five books.
Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. And they thought that everything else that was written, Joshua all the way through Malachi. And of course, they did have a lesser view of the the Apocrypha, the books that were written in the interim between Malachi and their present day.
They considered all of this was simply commentary, just a commentary on Moses. And again, you could see the reasoning of it when you read the historical books, read the prophets, and so on. Do they not simply point back all the time to the promises of the Torah, the law giving of the Torah, the instructions that are given there?
And they said, let's just commentary. That's not authoritative, that's not binding. And they would say about Joshua through Malachi what we might say about commentaries and Bible studies on our shelves.
Helpful, but not binding, not authoritative. So they couldn't find the resurrection in the first five books of the Bible. So they didn't believe in it. And they think that it's a very silly idea, and so they mock it.
Now notice that they quote Moses. And they say, now if a man has a wife and he dies and she bore him no children, Moses says that his brother is to marry her and to produce an heir in his name, that his name is not blotted out from Israel, so that the inheritances are not, they don't go astray.
We have a book in the Bible that's all about this situation. What book in the Bible is that? The book of Ruth. So we have Ruth, her husband, died and she gave him no heir. So Naomi and Ruth go back to Bethlehem and there Boaz meets Ruth.
He wants to marry her, but there's a relative closer who would be designated to marry Ruth and raise up a son to make sure that the line is unbroken. He refuses to do that when he realizes he's willing to take the land that would come with the gig, but he doesn't want Ruth because she's a Moabitess.
And his name is the one that is never mentioned and he gets handed a sandal and that's all right there in Deuteronomy. You don't, if you don't, if you don't do the job you're supposed to do, then you get handed a sandal and that's that.
Now it meant a lot worse than what it sounds like to us, but there's something about the feet and shoes and so on. You remember that time that someone threw a shoe at George Bush, George W., and he had to duck, you know, and the shoe goes flying.
Things are different over in the Middle East. So they reference this intricate law from Deuteronomy and what they're trying to do is trying to say, you know, if we follow Moses, if we follow the scriptures, doesn't that make this notion of resurrection just absolutely ridiculous?
Right? And so what they're trying to show is that this is incompatible. And so they tell this ridiculous story trying to prove their point. Well Jesus answers and says to them in verse 34, the sons of this age marry and are given in marriage with those who are counted worthy to attain of that age and the resurrection from the dead.
Neither marry nor are given in marriage, nor can they die anymore for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God. Meaning as the angels, they don't die, they have everlasting life, but also they are sons of God being sons of the resurrection.
After they die, they live on and they are not given in marriage, nor do they marry, and they don't get married after the resurrection. That's not what happens anymore. There's no more death, there's no more destruction, and so on.
And we recognize from other books of the Bible how marriage is ultimately fulfilled in Christ and his bride, the church. Now he answers, he gives the understanding of what we're supposed to have. He answers their question and affirms marriage for this age, and he affirms the resurrection of the dead, but then he appeals to the Sadducee's own authority, Moses.
Okay, he says, because he knows why they reject the resurrection, because they can't find it in the first five books of the Bible. But then Jesus says, but even Moses, verse 37, even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised.
When he called the Lord, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For he is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him. And when we go back to Exodus chapter 3, this is, we see this is exactly what the Lord says in verse 6 of Exodus 3.
Moreover he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God. He was there looking at the burning bush.
The fire within the burning bush is not consuming the bush, but it's speaking to Moses. This is not to assume that the fire is not a consuming fire. It is, for Moses must take off his feet and take off his sandals, because it's holy ground.
He must be, take off his sandals, again with the sandals, and he must stand there without his sandals on, because it's holy ground. The fire was a consuming fire, but the bush hadn't offended God. Moses had.
Right, there was nothing wrong with the bush. That wasn't being consumed, but the danger was to Moses. Now, after Jesus quotes this and entirely just destroys the entire theological framework of the Sadducees.
I mean, this is a devastating answer. Then some of the scribes, who were, by the way, they were Pharisees. Okay, yeah. Some of the scribes said, teacher, you have spoken well. Because, of course, they affirmed the resurrection, and they just saw their opponents get bested, and so they're like, yeah, go get them.
So, teacher, you have spoken well. But after that, they dare not question him anymore. Right, this is, you can't trip this guy up. You can't, you can't get him in a corner and then make him fail. So, they're not willing to talk about anything anymore, but he said to them, verse 41, how can they say that Christ is the Son of David?
How can they say that the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One, is the Son of David? Of course, that's very well attested to throughout the Old Testament, that the Messiah is the Son of David. Verse 42, now David himself said in the book of Psalms, and here he quotes from Psalm 110, and this was widely acknowledged that Psalm 110 is, it was indeed a messianic psalm.
It had to do about, had to do with Messiah. And so, in all these different other contexts in the Old Testament, it was clear to the, to the readers and the interpreters that, yes, the Messiah would be a descendant of David.
In fact, he, he would be called the Son of David. And so, they all affirm that over in these passages of the Bible. And then, in this passage of the Bible, in Psalm 110, they say, oh yes, this is a messianic psalm.
This is about the Messiah. And so, Jesus asks them a riddle. How can they say that Christ is the Son of David? David himself says in the book of Psalms, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool.
Therefore David calls him Lord. How is he then his son? So, right when they thought they were going to get away with not asking any more questions of him, he asks a question of them. It's clear, just on the face value, that although the Sadducees and the Pharisees, the scribes, and so on, have a great deal of working knowledge of the Scriptures, of the Bible, they don't really know what it's about, right?
That is not an ancient phenomenon. That can be a present-day phenomenon, okay? What happens time and again, though, the clarifying, unifying aspect about Scripture knowledge and Scripture interpretation and Scripture application is, time and again, Jesus.
He's the light of the world, and so also he's the light of the Word. And if we don't read the Bible according to who he is, his person and work, we're not going to really understand what it's about. So, in Psalm 110, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool.
This is the most quoted verse in the New Testament. Seems pretty important. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. So, David, who occupies the throne of Jerusalem, which belonged to Melchizedek before him, if you recall, is accorded a special opportunity to listen in on the divine conversation, wherein the Lord says to my Lord.
Nobody is higher in rank than David, who sits upon the throne in Jerusalem, except, of course, the one who is above him, and that would be God. So, there's a plurality in the Godhead. The Lord says to my Lord.
The Father says to the Son, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. This is abundantly clear in the New Testament. This is exactly, this is the way that the conversation is expressed.
And so, we know that Christ, the Son of God, has his position at the right hand, and he's there until his ultimate victory. The Lord shall send the rod of your strength out of Zion, rule in the midst of your enemies.
Your people shall be volunteers in the day of your power, and the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning. You have the dew of your youth. The Lord has sworn and will not relent. You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.
The Lord is at your right hand. He shall execute kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge among the nations. He shall fill the palaces with dead bodies. He shall execute the heads of many countries.
He shall drink of the brook by the wayside. Therefore, he shall lift up the head. A psalm which extols the victory and the glory and the honor of Christ. Now, a little bit earlier in this chapter, at the very beginning of the chapter, the chief priests, the scribes, the elders, so we're looking at Sadducees and Pharisees, okay, they question Jesus and say, by what authority are you doing these things?
By what authority are you cleaning out the temple? By what authority, by what right are you confronting us in this way? And they immediately get a couple of parables thrown their way they don't like, or at least one parable, and then they begin to try to discredit him through tricky questions.
But then finally Jesus gets around to answering them by what authority he's doing these things. And he points that out in verse 42 and 43, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies a footstool.
See, Jesus is telling them by what authority he's doing these things because of who he is, because of his right to rule and to reign. And also, he's demonstrating that they don't know how to apply the scriptures.
They don't know how to obey the Lord and do what they're called to do because they don't they don't understand the scriptures. They don't know how to apply the scriptures. The reason why is that they're not reading the text in light of who he is, and that makes all the difference in the world.
So next time we'll hear Jesus handle a couple of matters about the temple because that's still going to be in view. Any questions or thoughts as we close our study? Yes. So they were coming to his baptism.
Were they there to observe? Were they there to get baptized? It may have been a mixed type of approach. It would be probably an exception among them that would want to be baptized as they would see him as a challenge to their authority.
He was basically saying that everybody had a need to repent, even the Jews. The symbol of baptism was established very much so in the minds of the Jews that baptism meant a declaration of conversion. So they knew that's what that meant.
If you were to convert to Judaism, you had to baptize yourself and quote the Shema, Deuteronomy 6 .4. So they understood the symbol of baptism was saying people are converting to the way of the Messiah.
He's about here, okay. So they came to see what's going on and to see whether or not they're going to give approval to this or not, and he just calls them out brood of vipers. And you see that where they would hang their hat when it came to their spiritual condition and their relationship with God.
He says, do not say we have Abraham as our father. He basically says that's no big deal. He says God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. You're not essential. Your connection to Abraham, that's not the thing.
So that's where they would hang their hat on something like that, but they weren't hearing the message of the prophets of old who had called the people of Israel to repent. John the Baptist, the greatest of all those prophets, he's also calling them to repent and they're still not hearing that message.
But after the death and resurrection of Jesus, priests and Pharisees and all kinds of religious Jews did, by the grace of God, repent of their sins and follow Christ. So I think of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, and we read that some of the priests, they too began to follow Christ, and so we see that mercy later on.
Alright, well let's turn our attention to prayer requests tonight.