MBC 9/18/2016 Pastor Doug Thompson Jesus on Life After Death ( One Bride for Seven Brothers )

Transcription

1 1 P age MBC 9/18/2016 Pastor Doug Thompson Jesus on Life After Death ( One Bride for Seven Brothers ) It s good to be back in the pulpit this morning, but you all have heard some great preaching the last three weeks. Amen? So turn with me to Matthew s Gospel, and we are going to pick up right where we left off. Matthew 22: The same day Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, 24 saying, Teacher, Moses said, If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. 25 Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no offspring left his wife to his brother. 26 So too the second and third, down to the seventh. 27 After them all, the woman died. 28 In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her. 29 But Jesus answered them, You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. 30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. 31 And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: 32 I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead, but of the living. 33 And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching. Prayer: Father, as we look into Your living, powerful Word this morning, use it to strengthen our faith. You know how distracted we are by our problems and the pain of living in this world. And we are also distracted by the pleasures of this world. These things keep our thoughts earthbound; stuck on things that are temporal and fleeting rather than the things that are eternal and lasting. So use Your Word to fix our minds and our thoughts and our hearts on the things above. On all that Christ is for us, all that He has promised to us, and all His sufficiency for all our deficiencies. That s how our faith will be strengthened. Use Your Word to strengthen our faith. We ask it in the precious name of Jesus. Intro: Is there life after death? What question could be more important? Most people hope that there is life after death, but the truth is, many folks try not to think about it. You might be trying to do that right now. But there will come a time for all of us, when we are faced with the death of someone close to us, someone we love, and at those times, it becomes the most important question in the world: Is there life after death? And how can we know for sure? According to atheists and secular humanists, there is nothing after death. When you die, you cease to exist. End of story. Fertilizer for worms. The Humanist Manifesto written back in 1973 says this As far as we know, the total personality is a function of the biological organism transacting in a social and cultural context. There is no credible evidence that life survives the death of the body. No life, no consciousness. No more you. I read an article by an

2 2 P age atheist entitled, Why you want a physicist to speak at your funeral. It s meant to uplift other atheists when death happens You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives... You can hope your family will... be comforted to know your energy is still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you re just less orderly. Amen. Other people just make stuff up to find some comfort when they face death. Our former Governor, Arnold Schwarzeneggar s former wife, Maria Schriver, wrote a children s book called What s Heaven? to explain the afterlife to children. She says that Heaven is a beautiful place up in the sky, where no one is sick, where no one is mean or unhappy. It's a place beyond the moon, the stars, and the clouds... Heaven isn't a place you can see... It's somewhere you believe in." And then she just makes up a bunch of stuff to help children feel better about death. She explains that everyone goes to heaven if they re good, but that s not true. She says that the spirits of people who have died are all around us, that we can talk to these people the Bible doesn t teach that. And She says in her book that animals go to animal heaven which is separated from regular heaven by a white picket fence. That s all? I want a wall between me and all the cats we ve gone through. If Donald Trump can build that wall he s got my vote! But I read many reviews from moms who had read her book, and raved about it. Whether or not it was true didn t matter. One mom said, It brought comfort to my child at the death of his grandfather, and that s all that matters. When you find comfort in a lie, that s called delusion. But you are holding truth in your hands this morning in God s Word. And in this passage, Jesus, the God-Man, tells us the truth about life after death, not based upon scientific theories or imagination, but based upon the sure Word of God. The same Jesus who said John 11:25 I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, John 5:24 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

3 3 P age John 6:40 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. And this is the same Jesus who actually, physically rose from the dead, never to die again, and appeared to over 500 witnesses. And He is alive and is the Savior and Lord of His people this morning Amen? Now that s comforting! And it s not based on speculation or imagination, but on the sure Word of God from the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ. You re going to see this morning how Jesus proved the resurrection from the dead from Scripture. Let s first look at I. The question from the Sadducees (vv.23-28). Matthew 22:23 23 The same day Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, The same day is the same day that the Pharisees came to Jesus asking about paying their taxes to Caesar. This was another test by a very different group. The Sadducees were about as different from the Pharisees as you could get, and to understand what they are asking Jesus, we need to understand who they were A. Who were the Sadducees? The Sadducees were the wealthy, aristocratic ruling class among the Jews. If the Pharisees were blue collar, the Sadducees were white collar. They were cultured, and in love with Greek culture and philosophy. And they were supportive of Roman power so you can imagine how that put them at odds with most Jews. But they loved power and money and even though they were a small minority, they held the majority in the Sanhedrin, and they controlled the priesthood. The chief priests and the high priests were all Sadducees. So they controlled all the concessions at the Temple which brought in a fortune. It was the Sadducees who were infuriated when Jesus cleansed the Temple: He was messing with their money machine. The Pharisees were much more popular with the people, but the Sadducees had the power. As far as their theology, they only believed that God had inspired the Pentateuch, the first five books of the OT keep this in mind. All the rest of the OT, the history, Wisdom literature, and the prophets, were all commentary, but not inspired. But they were basically secular pragmatists. They didn t believe in the supernatural, angels, or the resurrection. They were basically Deists: God doesn t intervene in human affairs and this world is determined by the free will choices of man for good or evil. Pretty depressing, huh? To the Sadducees, all there was, was this present life. There was no afterlife. None. So there was also no future punishments or justice and no future rewards. They would

4 4 P age have loved John Lennon s song: Imagine there s no heaven, it s easy if you try, no hell below us above us, only sky. This explains why they were ready to collaborate with Rome when the Pharisees and most Jews wanted to overthrow Rome: to the Sadducees, you do whatever it takes to have your best life now. If this life is all you ve got, then live for pleasure and use people to get that pleasure; They were materialistic, cruel and heartless. Josephus said that the Pharisees were lenient, but the Sadducees were savage in their dealings with the people. And this is interesting: Because the Sadducees whole base of power, money, and influence lie in the Temple, when the Romans wiped out Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 A.D., the Sadducees disappeared from history. But what really defined the Sadducees was their denial of any afterlife. Josephus said heir whole belief system was summed up in this statement: The soul perishes with the body. The best way to start an argument with a Sadducee in that day was to bring up the resurrection. Paul did just that in Acts 23 when he was on trial before the Sanhedrin and just lobbed a little theological hand grenade into the crowd Acts 23:6 8 6 Now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. It is with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial. 7 And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. 8 For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all. So do you see what a threat Jesus was to the Sadducees? Earlier that same day He had driven their moneychangers out of the Temple, He constantly talked about eternal life and the resurrection. He had even raised Lazarus from the dead just a few days before this conversation. How in the world did they deal with that!? So when they ask Jesus this question, it s out of their hatred for Jesus. And it s simply a ploy to make His teachings on the resurrection look utterly ridiculous. Let s look at it B. One bride for seven brothers. Matthew 22:24 28 Teacher, Moses said, If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. 25 Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no offspring left his wife to his brother. 26 So too the second and third, down to the seventh. 27 After them all, the woman died. 28 In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her. They call Jesus Teacher, but it s just flattery. They re nothing but scoffers, trying to make Him look stupid. Now their question is based on a passage in Dt. 25 which says

5 5 P age that if an Israelite dies, his widow is to marry one of his brothers. The purpose was to keep the property and inheritance in the family. We find this in the book of Ruth when Boaz married Ruth after her husband died, because he was the closest willing relative but it happened rarely. So they take this biblical law called levirate marriage, and they take it to the extreme: Seven brothers first brother dies, his widow marries the next brother. He dies, the next brother takes over, same thing, and on and on through all seven brothers. I think if I was the fourth brother, I would be leaving town! I mean what is with this woman? There must be rat poison in her pantry! But it all leads up to their ridiculous conclusion: finally the woman dies, and in the resurrection which they didn t even believe in who will be married to her? She can t have 7 husbands for the rest of eternity. No woman would want that! They think they ve just made the resurrection look ludicrous. And Jesus along with it. And I love Jesus answer. Look at it II. The answer from Jesus (vv.29-32). Matthew 22:29 29 But Jesus answered them, You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. Isn t this why we are always wrong? Because we don t know God s Word, or we don t believe God s power? Think about that: Isn t this at the root of all of your problems and mine? I m not talking about your circumstances illness, or not enough money, or losing your home in a fire but if you are worried or angry, or responding to these things in a sinful way when you give in to temptation, and follow your own flesh instead of Christ it s because you don t know God s Word, or you don t believe God s power. And we have to know God s Word to believe in God s power! Knowing the Scriptures and believing God s power are cause and effect. The word Jesus used for wrong is a word which means to wander away. This is why you have wandered off in your walk with God. This is why you are drifting: you aren t in God s Word, so you don t trust in His power. Please listen to Jesus this morning. Underline v.29 in your Bible or highlight it on your phone or ipad. It s profound. Then Jesus goes on to refute their sarcastic, insincere question and show them how ignorant they are of their own Scriptures, and the power of God to raise the dead. B. The explanation concerning marriage. Matthew 22:30 30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.

6 6 P age The Sadducees were wrong because they were so earthbound in their thinking. They didn t allow for the power of God to do far beyond what they could imagine. Now I want us to look very carefully at all that Jesus is teaching us here. First, He speaks of the resurrection in the resurrection. He s not talking about the act of the resurrection, but the state of life after the resurrection occurs, and we need to be clear on this: When a believer dies, he or she doesn t get a new body yet. Death is the separation of the body and the soul the inner and outer man. For the child of God, his or her soul goes immediately to be with the Lord. Paul promised us that in 2 Corinthians 5:8 8 Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. The body stays here, but our soul is immediately in the presence of Christ. When a Christian dies, it s like falling asleep and waking up in the arms of Jesus! That s what our Lord told that believing thief on the cross Today, you will be with me in Paradise. But just our souls, not our bodies. We call this the intermediate state. It s not our final state. And this is news to many Christians. When your believing loved one passes, they are not dancing on the streets of gold. They don t have a new set of teeth! They are disembodied spirits. I ll never forget once when we had a service here for a dear older saint. And we had her casket here. When I asked the adult daughter of this woman if she had seen her mom yet, she looked really confused. She said, What do you mean, my mom s not in that casket, she went to heaven. She literally thought that her mom s body wasn t in the casket but had been taken up to heaven. I had to gently explain that mom was in heaven alright, but she left her body here on earth, until the resurrection. When does that happen? When Jesus returns, that s when we get our new resurrection bodies. There were some folks in the church at Thessalonica who were worried that their dear departed loved ones would miss out when Jesus returns, but Paul said, No, they will be coming back, with Him! 1 Thessalonians 4: For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again (bodily), even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. (Jesus will return with the souls of departed believers) 15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep [in the resurrection of our bodies]. 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. (He means that the bodies of those Jesus is bringing with Him will be raised up to be joined to their souls.) 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, [those alive when Christ returns will not die but be glorified on their way up!] and so we will always be with the Lord.

7 7 P age When Jesus returns, all the souls of believers of ages past will be reunited with their bodies. And we will spend eternity in glorified physical bodies on the new heaven and earth! We won t be wispy spirits! And we won t spend eternity in heaven: we spend it on the earth, a new, glorified earth, in bodies like the one that Jesus had after He rose from the dead the one that appeared to His Disciples and could eat fish with them. Remember He said, A spirit doesn t flesh and bones like I have! And Jesus still has that glorified body. And He will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body, by the power that enables Him even to subject all things to Himself (Phil.1:27). This is the resurrected state Jesus is talking about. Now does that sound crazy? Unbelievable? If it does, you are doubting the power of God! If God can create an entire universe out of nothing, if He can weave together a little baby in its mother s womb, then He can put back together a person who has been dead for hundreds of years. Sometimes Christians wonder about cremation like that s going to make things harder for God at the resurrection? Revelation says that the sea will give up its dead: can you imagine what happens to a body that s been in the ocean for a few years? As a young pastor, I did a burial at sea for one of our church members. We took Randy off the coast of Malibu and sprinkled his ashes off the side of a yacht. And believe me, Randy went everywhere! And after all these years, Randy has gone global! That won t be a problem at the resurrection because of the power of God! But it s what Jesus says about marriage and the resurrection that is so fascinating. And maybe distressing, at first. Matthew 22:30 30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. When Jesus mentions the angels, it s another dig at the Sadducees since they didn t believe in angels. But what did Jesus mean we He said that in the resurrection, we are like angels? He didn t mean that we become angels! You ve heard people say, Oh my dear mother is my guardian angel now! No. But believers become like angels in that we will be deathless, sinless can you even imagine!? and like the angels, we won t be married, there will be no more procreation. And if you re not real happy in your current marriage, you might be thinking, Hallelujah, come quickly Lord Jesus! But personally, I can t imagine not being married to my wife. And I can t imagine being happy in heaven if I m not married to Janice. But I m wrong because I don t understand the Scriptures or the power of God. Marriage was given by God as a gift to His creatures, for their happiness and companionship as we pass through this world. But it s a temporary gift, just for this life. And God meant for marriage to be a picture of something permanent and infinitely more glorious, which is the eternal love relationship between Christ and His church.

8 8 P age So get what this means: In the resurrection, your relationship with Jesus Christ will be complete the Bride will be eternally united with the Bridegroom, Jesus, and you will live in perfect love and perfect joy with Christ, and with every other believer for the rest of eternity. Marriage will be gone, but not love, and you will love your former spouse perfectly, the way you will love every other believer. Nothing will be subtracted, only gained. And we can t even imagine that now but we need to believe the Scriptures and the power of God. You say, But I thought I would be reunited with my loved ones. If they knew Christ and you know Christ, you will! But you will also be united with all other saints from all of history i.e., you will be as close to Paul, and David, Martin Luther, Elizabeth Elliot as the saved members of your own family! Because we will all be the family of God then. And do you see that for single folks, in the resurrection, they won t be at any disadvantage at all. Their single life on earth was like a vapor, but their eternal relationship will be forever. We have to believe Jesus here. And we have to trust Jesus. It s going to be a billion times better than we can imagine. John Piper wrote this Very soon the shadow will give way to Reality. The partial will pass into the Perfect. The foretaste will lead to the Banquet. The troubled path will end in Paradise. A hundred candle-lit evenings will come to their consummation in the marriage supper of the Lamb. And this momentary marriage will be swallowed up by Life. Christ will be all and in all. And the purpose of marriage will be complete. B. The explanation concerning the resurrection. Matthew 22: And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: 32 I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead, but of the living. Where is Jesus getting His scriptural proof for the resurrection? From Exodus 3:6 i.e., from one of the only five books they claimed to trust! They would never in a million years have conceded that the Five books of Moses taught the resurrection from the dead, but Jesus said that it did. And for a brief moment, the Pharisees in the crowd were fist-pumping and pulling for Jesus! For years this had been a running debate between these two rival groups. The Sadducees denied that Moses taught resurrection, and the Pharisees did their best to prove otherwise. One passage they tried to use was Deuteronomy 31:16. Let me just read it 16 And the LORD said to Moses, Behold, you are about to lie down with your fathers. Then this people will rise... This people will rise!

9 9 P age And that was their proof text for the resurrection in the Pentateuch. But it wasn t very convincing when you read it in context Then this people will rise and go whoring after the foreign gods among them in the land that they are entering... Doesn t exactly sound like the resurrection Jesus was talking about! But Jesus said, The resurrection is true, and it s in your Pentateuch Look at Jesus proof text here Matthew 22:32 32 [God said] I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead, but of the living. This comes from Exodus 3:6, when God is speaking to Moses from the burning bush, 500 years after the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but He was still their God, which meant that they were still alive in their spirits. He didn t say, I was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, He said, I AM, their God! And Jesus said, He isn t the God of dust, but He is the God of the living, and the implication is, and they will be raised. Think about this: God made these men certain promises matter of fact, you and I are heirs of those same promises in Christ and if we ceased to exist at death God couldn t fulfill His promises to us. God would be a liar. Look with me at Hebrews 11: These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. 14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city. There has to be a resurrection and there has to be a new heaven and new earth or God would be untrue to His promises to His people. But God is true, and His word is sure. If you are one His children, through faith in Christ, death will not separate you not for one millisecond from Him. When you leave this world, you go immediately into His presence where there is fullness of joy, and on that day when Christ returns to earth, you will get your new, glorified body and spend eternity with Christ in the new creation. That s a promise from Jesus. C. Three things Jesus believed about Scripture. Do you see that Jesus answered life s most important question, Is there life after death, not from philosophy, or science, or folk tales but from the sure Word of God? Quickly, I want you to see three things Jesus believed about Scripture 1.) He believed in dual authorship.

10 10 P age Matthew 22:31 31 And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: Moses wrote Exodus, but Jesus knew that Moses was writing the exact words of God. If an unbeliever ever says to you, Oh the Bible is just a book written by men, you should respond, Of course it was written by men it was written by monkeys! (OK, don t say that.) but God moved those men to write exactly the words He intended 2 Peter 1:21 21 For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. 2.) He believed that God is still speaking in His Word. At the end of v.31, it literally says, what was said to you by the God who is speaking, present tense = God was speaking to Moses, God was still speaking to the crowd listening to Jesus, God is still speaking to all of us in this room, in this same Word, this morning! 3.) He believed in the verbal plenary inspiration of Scripture. Not only did Jesus answer the Pharisees question from the WOG and from the Pentateuch, but His argument hung on one specific word, the present verb for I am. God didn t say, I was the God of Abraham, but I am. When I say that Jesus believed in the verbal plenary inspiration of Scripture, the verbal means He believed that every word of Scripture is God-breathed. The plenary means that every part of Scripture From Genesis to revelation, is God-breathed. The Word of God, perfect, complete, and without error, every jot and tittle. And God still speaks through His Word. He is speaking this morning! And this Word of God answers our question: There is life after death John 5: Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice 29 and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. The Word of God also teaches that not everyone will be resurrected to everlasting life with God on a renewed earth with all other believers. Some will be raised only to be cast into hell. Horrible, horrible thought. How you can you know where you will spend eternity? Romans 10:9 f you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.