God of the Living, Sons of the Resurrection

[0:00] Luke chapter 20, verse 27 to chapter 21, verse 4. There came to him some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection.

[0:13] And they asked him a question, saying, Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother.

[0:24] Now there were seven brothers. The first took a wife and died without children, and the second and the third took her. And likewise, all seven left no children and died.

[0:36] Afterward, the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as wife. And Jesus said to them, The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage.

[0:52] But those who are considered worthy to attend to that age and to the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage. For they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.

[1:08] But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed in the passage about the bush, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.

[1:19] Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living. For all live to him. Then some of the scribes answered, Teacher, you have spoken well.

[1:33] For they no longer dare to ask him any question. But he said to them, How can they say that the Christ is David's son? For David himself says in the book of Psalms, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

[1:52] David thus calls him Lord. So how is he his son? And in the hearing of all the people, he said to his disciples, Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long rows and love greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows' houses and for pretense make long prayers.

[2:13] They will receive the greater condemnation. Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins.

[2:23] And he said, Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she had to live on.

[2:36] This is God's holy and authoritative word. Jesus has been opposed steadfastly throughout his ministry by the Jewish leaders, as we've been seeing in the Gospel of Luke.

[2:50] The chief antagonists of Jesus have been the Pharisees and the scribes. The Pharisees were those who sought to reform Jewish religious life. Some of them were members of the Jewish clergy, while others were members of the laity.

[3:03] The scribes were the Jewish legal scholars, they were experts of Scripture that lent academic support to the Pharisees' reform agenda.

[3:14] But as Jesus enters the capital, Jerusalem, where the Jewish temple is, the opposition to Jesus escalates. And now, not just the Pharisees and the scribes, but it says in 1947, the chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy Jesus.

[3:35] And since his entry to Jerusalem in chapter 19 and 20, there have been rounds and rounds of stump the teacher. I don't know if you guys have played that. In chapter 20, verse 1 to 8, the chief priests and the scribes with the elders question Jesus' credentials by asking him, tell us by what authority you do these things, or who is it that gave you this authority?

[3:58] Because we surely didn't give you this authority, and we're the gatekeepers of the temple. Let me see your warrant, your permit, your certificate, your diploma. And then in chapter 20, verses 19 to 26, the scribes and the chief priests sent their spies to pose Jesus a difficult political and religious question.

[4:20] Is it lawful for us to give tribute to Caesar or not? This was not a sincere question, but rather intended to trap Jesus, because if Jesus said, yes, it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, he'd be acknowledging Caesar's sovereignty and rule over God's people, and thereby disappoint the Jews who were hoping that Jesus would be the messianic king.

[4:41] If he were to say, no, it is not lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, then the spies would report him to the Roman authorities and have him arrested as a tax evader and a political revolutionary.

[4:52] However, Jesus passed all of these rounds of stump the teacher with flying colors. He silenced all of his critics, demonstrating his wisdom and authority. And here in our passage, chapter 20, verses 27 to 40, we see the final round of stump the teacher, where we are introduced to the Sadducees for the first time.

[5:13] And once again, Jesus will demonstrate his superior authority. And the main point that we learn from this passage is that only those who humbly follow the Lord Jesus will become sons of the resurrection.

[5:27] And Luke communicates this to us by teaching us first about the God of the living, and then about the Lord of David, and then lastly about the sons of the resurrection.

[5:38] So let's first learn about the God of the living from Jesus' encounter with the Sadducees. It says in chapter 20, verse 27, there came to him some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection.

[5:51] The Sadducees were Jewish aristocrats, and they denied the resurrection of the dead. Most other Jews, including Pharisees, believed in the resurrection of the dead, but the Sadducees believed that both body and soul ceased to exist after death.

[6:07] And so they believed in what modern people would call annihilation of the soul. And the Sadducees differ from the Pharisees on a number of other points as well.

[6:20] The Pharisees wanted to reform Jewish religious life. The Sadducees wanted to preserve the status quo. The Pharisees supplemented the written scripture with oral tradition, the teachings that have been passed through orally by the Jewish rabbis.

[6:37] However, the Sadducees denied, rejected oral tradition, and only revered the written scripture. And not even all of the Jewish scriptures, they held the Torah, the law, the first five books of our Old Testament.

[6:54] They held that in the highest esteem. So they were kind of the almost fundamentalistic, most conservative Jewish sect in that time.

[7:04] And not only that, they're kind of rationalistic, they not only denied the resurrection, they also denied the existence of angels, as we see in Luke 20, verse 36, or in the book of Acts as well.

[7:17] And the Sadducees, it says in verse 28, asked Jesus a question, saying, Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother.

[7:30] They're alluding to passages like Deuteronomy chapter 25, which stipulates levirate marriage. The levirate marriage is where if a man dies without a son to carry on his name, it was his brother's duty to produce a son for him by taking his widow as his wife.

[7:53] This was important in Israel, among the Jews in particular, because their inheritance in God's promised land was tied to their genealogy.

[8:04] And so if their descendants ceased, they would effectively be cut off and permanently removed from their inheritance in God's kingdom, in the promised land.

[8:14] And so they practiced levirate marriage. And the Sadducees, their argument here uses that as the premise. And then they construct a hypothetical scenario for Jesus in verses 29 to 33, with having seven brothers and one of them taking a wife, but he dies without children, and then marries the next brother and the next and the next and the next, until all seven have had this woman as their wife, lawfully wedded wife, and have produced no children.

[8:43] Obviously, they've given this question a lot of thought. And to them, this hypothetical scenario reduces the doctrine of the resurrection to absurdity.

[8:55] Because we know from Scripture that marriage is between one man and one woman. It says in Genesis 2, verse 24, Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

[9:10] But this woman was legally married to seven different men during her lifetime. So in the resurrection, then, will God allow her to be married to seven husbands, despite his revealed will, God's revealed will, that marriage be between one man and one woman?

[9:28] That's absurd. At least that's what the Sadducees thought. But they're unaware of their own erroneous assumptions. They assume that legally formed marriages in this life would continue in the afterlife.

[9:43] They assume that there is such a thing as marriage in the first place in heaven, assuming that life in the resurrection is essentially the same as life here on earth, in the present earth.

[9:55] But they were wrong in all of these assumptions. And many people, I think, nowadays are like the Sadducees also. When the teachings of Scripture confound our reason, when it seems difficult to us, doesn't make sense to us, doesn't seem reasonable to us, we, instead of submitting humbly to God's Word, instead we question the truthfulness of God's Word.

[10:22] We question the soundness of God's Word instead of questioning the soundness of our reasoning. And then some people try to finagle God's Word to say what they think it should say, instead of submitting to God's Word and conforming their lives to it.

[10:37] And Jesus exposes this about the Sadducees, their faulty assumptions, in verses 34 and 36. The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage. But those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage.

[10:55] For they cannot die anymore because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. So Jesus' point here is that this life and the resurrection life are not the same.

[11:11] Marriage doesn't even exist in the resurrection because the sons of the resurrection are equal to angels and are sons of God. So notice that he's challenging here.

[11:23] Not only do the Sadducees believe that there is no resurrection, but also do they believe that there are no angels. He's saying that you're wrong on both of those counts. There are angels in heaven, and in fact the sons of the resurrection will be like the angels, and they will neither be married nor be given in marriage.

[11:39] Now this is not saying that we become angels when we die, as some people, I think, wrongly think. It doesn't say that. It says we become like them. We become equal to them. And the phrase, and so because the sons of the resurrection will be like the angels of heaven, there will be no more death.

[12:00] And this is another reason why there is no marriage in heaven. Jesus says in verse 36, that marriage will no longer be necessary, for they cannot die anymore.

[12:12] This reveals that at least one of the purposes of marriage is procreation. Marriage exists in part to perpetuate humanity.

[12:24] It exists to ensure that people who are created in God's image continue to populate the earth and bring glory to Him. But in the absence of death, there is no more need for progeny, for sons, for fathers.

[12:39] Instead, there is one Father in heaven, that's God the Father and all of His children. We find another purpose of marriage in other passages of Scripture, and it says in Ephesians 5, verse 31, that a man and a woman join together in marriage through self-giving love.

[12:55] They point to the real, eternal, spiritual union between Christ and the church. And that reveals God's intention for humanity. God's intention from the beginning of creation was to marry a people that He chose for Himself, to be their eternal bridegroom, and for the church to be His holy bride.

[13:17] And so marriage was created by God to be a picture of that reality, to foreshadow that eternal reality. But in the kingdom of God, the fullness of God's kingdom, in the resurrection, there will no longer be need for these pictures, because the reality will be present.

[13:36] Because our relationship with Christ will have been consummated. There will no longer be any need for brides and grooms, because Christ will be the one bridegroom, and the church will be His bride.

[13:48] So the resurrection, Jesus is saying, is an altogether different age. That's why the Sadducees' objection, their hypothetical scenario, doesn't hold. The woman who had had seven husbands in this life on earth will not have to worry about how many husbands she has.

[14:05] She will have none. She will be part of the church and be the bride of Christ. But notice that Jesus says that not everyone will get to partake in this age and in the resurrection.

[14:17] He says in verse 35, But those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead, only those who are worthy to attain to that age will do so.

[14:32] This actually gives us a clue as to what exactly Jesus means by the resurrection. We know from other passages of Scripture that in fact, all people, including good, those who do good and those who do evil, will be resurrected.

[14:48] For example, John chapter 5, verses 28 to 29 says this, An hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear His voice and come out.

[14:59] Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. So we know from other parts of Scripture that all people will be raised. They'll be resurrected.

[15:10] Evil and good. Good people to the resurrection of life, those who belong to God and those who have done evil and have refused to believe in God, will be raised to the resurrection of judgment. So, but this is different from the kind of resurrection that Jesus is talking about.

[15:26] We know that because in John 5, Jesus mentions people being raised from the tomb. He's talking about the resurrection of the body, which Paul also talks about in 1 Corinthians 15.

[15:37] But before the resurrection of the body, there is for believers what we call the intermediate state. When our souls leave our deceased bodies and we're raised to be with the Lord.

[15:50] That raising, that resurrection, seems to be what Jesus has in mind here. And we see examples of that in 2 Corinthians 5, 6, 8, where Paul says, we know that while we are at home in the body, we are away from the Lord.

[16:03] For we walk by faith and not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So there's that intermediate state before the final resurrection of the body, when believers who have passed are raised to live eternally in their souls with God.

[16:20] That seems to be what Jesus has in mind here. And only those whom God considers worthy will attend to that resurrection. So then, speaking of the resurrection of the soul, in a way, and that's what he spoke of earlier in Luke 16, when a poor man named Lazarus dies and then is carried by the angels to Abraham's side.

[16:44] That's his raise to that life. But the wicked rich man, in contrast, in that same parable, he dies and he was buried and he remains in Hades, in the realm of the dead.

[16:55] He's not escorted by the angels to raise to that resurrection life. And so Jesus is challenging here the Sadducees' belief that death is the end of all existence.

[17:06] There is life after death and only those who are worthy will be raised to heaven. And then having stated his point, Jesus proves it from Scripture in verses 37 to 38.

[17:19] But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed, in the passage about the bush, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him.

[17:35] Jesus could have gone to a number of other more obvious passages that speak of this afterlife, of the resurrection. But Jesus goes here intentionally to Exodus 3, verse 6, because he knows that the Sadducees hold the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, in highest esteem.

[17:54] Jesus knows that this will be the most persuasive for them. And in that passage, Moses encounters God in the burning bush, and God says to Moses, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

[18:13] And this is hundreds of years after Abraham, Isaac, Jacob have all passed away. And yet God says to Moses, in the present tense, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

[18:30] My grandfather passed away almost two decades ago. If one of his former friends were to approach me and introduce himself to me, he would say, I was your grandfather's friend.

[18:45] Right? He wouldn't say, I am your grandfather's friend. If he did, I'd be like, what do you mean? Are we talking about the same grandfather? But God said to Moses, I am the God of your father.

[19:00] He declared himself to be the God of the patriarchs who were long dead, three generations of them. And this is implicit proof of the reality of the resurrection. If they were not living, God would not say this.

[19:13] So Jesus explains in verse 38, Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him. Though Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were dead to Moses, they were alive to God, for their souls were raised to dwell with him.

[19:31] They died without having seen the ultimate promises of God fulfilled. And if they were dead and they ceased to exist, then God would have failed in his promises to them.

[19:43] But he's saying here, he's protecting God's honor. No, God did not fail in his promises. He kept his covenant promises to Abraham, Jacob, and Isaac and Jacob because they are living, they are experiencing the fulfillment of God's promises in life.

[20:00] So the Sadducees were very mistaken. Heaven is a reality. By denying the resurrection and denying existence of life everlasting, they were really cutting the cord of the hope that God offered to his people.

[20:15] Think about it this way. All the disappointments, the dead dreams of your life, all of your mistakes, all your misfortunes in life, all the travails, the tribulations of life, all that the people of this world say about you, all that is written in your obituary, they are not the final word on your life.

[20:46] Because if you belong to Jesus, death is not the final chapter of your life. There is life everlasting. There is resurrection.

[20:58] The God you serve and worship is not the God of the dead. He is the God of the living. That gives us so much hope. This life is not all there is.

[21:12] And after this compelling response, it says in verses 39 and 40 that some of the scribes answered, Teacher, you have spoken well, for they no longer are the ones that asked the question. Notice who the subjects of these verses are.

[21:27] It was not the Sadducees who complimented Jesus for a good answer. They are the ones that asked the question. It is the scribes who, like the Pharisees, believed in the resurrection.

[21:39] They are the ones that are complimenting Jesus. So they are kind of, they are a little bit giddy that Jesus just kind of trounced these rivals of theirs, theological rivals of theirs. Oh, Jesus, for the first time you are saying something I like.

[21:51] You just silenced my rivals. And so they think they have scored a victory against the Sadducees. And it says in verse 40, generally, that they, probably referring to all the different factions that have come to question Jesus up to this point, that includes the chiefs, the Jewish nationalists, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, all of them have failed to stump Jesus.

[22:13] And now they all no longer dare to ask him questions, any question. So Luke's point in this narrative is clear. Who is the authoritative teacher of God's truth?

[22:28] Not the Pharisees, not the Sadducees, not the scribes, not the chief priests, not the elders. Jesus, he is the true divine representative.

[22:39] He possesses God's wisdom and authority. And he's the one that you all should listen to and follow. That's Luke's point. God of the living.

[22:51] And then now the narrative at this point shifts naturally to the identity of Jesus. If he is so authoritative, who is this person? So we get to the Lord of David in verse 41 to 44 of chapter 20.

[23:05] Jesus addresses the people around him in verses 41 to 44. How can they say that the Christ is David's son? For David himself says in the book of Psalms, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

[23:26] David thus calls him Lord. So how is he his son? It was widely known among the Jews that the Messianic king would come to save God's people and that he would come from the line of David, King David, because that was prophesied in 2 Samuel chapter 7 verses 12 to 14.

[23:47] And Luke himself acknowledges this because he said in chapter 1 verse 27 that he explicitly mentioned that Jesus' genealogy through his father Joseph goes to King David.

[23:59] And he said, and the angel Gabriel who came to announce Jesus' birth and his conception in Mary's womb in chapter 1 verses 31 to 33 said this, he will be great and will be called the son of the Most High and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and of his kingdom there will be no end.

[24:22] So this was explicitly promised in the angel's announcements in Luke chapter 1. You're denying the fact that he is the son of David.

[24:33] He is the promised son of David. He's the messianic king but he's trying to make the point that he is much more than that. He's no mere mortal king.

[24:43] He's not merely a biological descendant of David. He is the son of the Most High God. That's what he's trying to prove here by quoting from Psalm 110 Psalm 110 verse 1 which is explicitly ascribed to David.

[25:01] David's the author of the psalm. And yet this king of Israel prophetically describes an enthronement scene where a king is being enthroned by God.

[25:12] It says the Lord and this is the proper name of God Yehovah the Lord says to my Lord this is referring to a human king sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

[25:27] this is a picture of God appointing someone who will rule over his people as his representative and this king will reign until God himself reduces all of his enemies to become his footstool.

[25:44] Now with that background in mind Jesus' logic is fairly straightforward. If David the king perhaps the greatest king in Israel's history the forefather of the Messiah if he calls this messianic king Lord Master then he must be greater than David.

[26:06] He must be more than a simple earthly king because if he's simply a human royal descendant of David David would never humble and lower himself to calling his predecessor Lord.

[26:23] Jesus is not just another David he is the greater David the ultimate David the ultimate messianic king that all the kings of Israel had pointed to and foreshadowed he's the fulfillment of all of the the royal promises the prophecies of that that God had given and throughout chapters 19 to 20 the factions questioning and challenging Jesus have all referred to Jesus as teacher but Jesus is not a teacher like them he's not just one of many Jewish rabbis he's the teacher the teacher of God's way and in chapter 19 verse 38 Jesus' own disciples hail Jesus as king but Jesus is not like the Israelite kings of old he is the king of kings he is the lord of David himself more authoritative than them more powerful than them more faithful than them my question to you is do you have a proper understanding of who

[27:29] Jesus is and have you pledged your ultimate allegiance to him he claims to be the lord of all have you submitted to him all of his enemies all who oppose him resist him will be in due time subdued and reduced to his footstool so have you submitted to him or are you resisting him it might seem to you like there are people who in your lives are more powerful and important than god than christ in your life think about that for a moment who are some of those people maybe it's your parent a president a boss a bully a spouse a professor it might feel more urgent for you to please them rather than please the lord jesus but luke assures us in this passage that a day is coming when it will be made plain to all that jesus is lord and it is in your best interest to submit to him now pledge your allegiance to him now and he's full of glory and grace no man deserves the allegiance that jesus calls for no man deserves the glory that he deserves he's worthy of all the praise that we can give him he's worthy of our very lives because he's the lord of david and having seen the god of the living and the lord of david we now come to the sons of the resurrection in the rest of the passage jesus said earlier in chapter 20 verses 35 to 36 that those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither married nor are given in marriage for they cannot die anymore because they are equal to angels and are sons of

[29:34] God being sons of the resurrection that begs the question how can we attain to the resurrection what kind of people are the sons of the resurrection and jesus addresses that very question in chapter 20 verse 45 to chapter 21 verse 4 first he tells us what kind of people are not worthy to attain to the resurrection from the dead and then he tells us secondly what kind of people are worthy to attain to the resurrection and less people wrongly conclude remember that the scribes were congratulating patting jesus on the back for silencing the sadducees jesus wants to make sure that he doesn't get associated with the sadducees and so look at what he does here in chapter verses 45 to 47 and in the hearing of all the people he said to his disciples within earshot of the scribes beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes love greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts who devour widows houses and for pretense make long prayers they will receive the greater condemnation

[30:47] Jesus take no prayers first Jesus denounces the scribes because they like to walk around in long robes this is not because short robes are more ethical than long robes the scribes wore long fancy flowing robes that were a symbol of status for them they like to show off their academic and religious credentials by the way they dress to tell the watching world hey we're kind of important Jesus condemns that practice second describes loved greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts describes like the Pharisees who were denounced for this very same reason in Luke 11 43 they competed for the most respected positions I think I've told this story to some of you before in 2010 I volunteered to serve at the third

[31:49] Lausanne congress for world evangelization and it was in Cape Town South Africa and there were 4,000 Christian leaders from 198 countries attending really anyone you would say would be in the who's who among Christians were there now and one evening however at the conference there was a bit of a stir because there was a bishop who refused to sit down because he was given an ordinary chair like the rest of the conference attendees mind you there were archbishops that were sitting on the same chairs he demanded a special chair that befitted his exalted status as a bishop it was a disgraceful expression of human pride that directly contradicts the spirit of Jesus his teaching and that's what these scribes were like they wanted the best seats in the synagogues places of honor at feats and there's a word play here that is not apparent in the

[32:56] English translation the Greek word for best seats is literally first seats and the Greek word for places of honor is literally first places so there's a reputation of the word first here the scribes are people who are consumed with being first they don't want to be second and so they loved greetings in the marketplace Jesus is not condemning normal day-to-day pleasantries he's referencing the formal elaborate greetings that Jews used whenever they came across important and respected personages describes vast in those formal flattering greetings of the people oh peerless scholar of the law the doctor of theology the champion of piety you wise one how generous and merciful you are to grace me with your presence they're engaging in this kind of popularity contrast and

[33:59] Jesus rebukes them for this and not only this it says in verse 47 that they devoured widows houses and for pretense make long prayers widows the widows and to provide for them and in that time were unable to get jobs for themselves provide for themselves they were some of the most impoverished and vulnerable members of this Jewish society and yet these scribes had the nerve to take advantage of these widows they devoured their houses we don't know how they did this but whether they took advantage of these widows hospitality or whether they took their house as a pledge for a debt that they knew that these widows couldn't repay so they could use that to enrich themselves they did these things because they didn't actually care about people they only cared about what they could do for them they only cared about the praise that they money that they can give to them and for this

[35:04] Jesus says in verse 47 they will receive the greater condemnation let's humble ourselves now and honestly examine our lives in light of this teaching are you consumed like these scribes by desire to be first in your life do you want to be seen by others as important successful godly do we like to pray long flowery prayers to impress people rather than focusing on talking to God do we despise humble service in the background and seek only the prominent positions on the stage do we insist that all the post nominal letters be attached to our names to indicate our academic degree accreditation office military declaration honor or religious ordination do we seek the approval of men or the approval of

[36:12] God are we really living for God's glory or are we living for our own glory are we putting God first or are we putting ourselves first in life there's a Christian multimedia campaign that John Buckley told me about called I Am Second where they interview famous Christians like Olympic gymnast Shawn Johnson or the reality TV show stars Chip and Joanna Gaines from Fixer Upper or the Robertsons from Duck Dynasty they share their personal testimonies in these video interviews of how Jesus saved them and transformed them and then they conclude the video interviews by looking into the camera and saying my name is so and so and I am second implying Jesus is first that's true for every Christian Jesus is God we are not Jesus is

[37:13] Lord we are servants Jesus is King we are his subjects to be a Christian is to be second and after the negative example of the scribes Jesus gives a positive example in chapter 21 verses 1-4 he says Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins Jesus contrasts the rich who are putting their lavish gifts into the offering box with a poor widow who puts in two small copper coins a copper coin is worth about 1 128th of a denarius which is in this day and age the daily wage of a common laborer so let's say an average laborer in Cambridge makes $16 an hour in an 8 hour day that's 128 dollars that's the daily wage a denarius now divide that by 128 that's $1 so a copper coin is about a dollar this poor widow is literally putting in $2 into the temple treasury there's not much you can do with $2 and that must have been embarrassing because as you can tell from this narrative this was all public this was all done in the public maybe there was an announcement oh this poor widow gives $2 oh this rich gentleman gives $5,000 and yet even though the rich were putting in comparatively enormous sums of money

[38:57] Jesus says in verses 3 to 4 truly I tell you this poor widow has put in more than all of them for they all contributed out of their abundance but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on the phrase literally is she put in all the life what she put in represented her entire life her very livelihood while this poor widow gave much less in terms of monetary value she gave much more than these rich people in terms of personal cost to herself the rich gave out of their abundance they gave out of their excess their leftovers but this widow gave out of her poverty for her it was not excess it was sacrifice and she of all people could have justified not giving anything

[40:01] I hardly could have enough to live on God will understand if I don't give anything but she didn't she gave what was precious to her this is why we don't publish offerings the amounts given by members like some churches do this is why we don't pass the offering basket during the service because what matters more to God is not how much you give but how you give you giving out of love for him are you sacrificing giving sacrificially to him I hear sometimes in churches that people come and rich people will come and give tens of thousands of dollars to the church and then they'll ask for a post of leadership and people give them that it's a disgrace you cannot buy church office you cannot buy power in the church

[41:20] God is not God God owns it all he's the sovereign lord of creation you think he needs your money he doesn't need your money our church does not need your money God provides for us God is the source of all that we have all that you have is God what I care about as your pastor is that you give with this heart of the widow because you love God because you want to worship him because you want to serve him that you gladly give so let me ask you do you give your finances to God like this poor widow or do you say to yourself let me ask you about your time do you say to yourself well when I'm less busy then I'll go to church service when I'm less busy then I'll be part of a community group when I'm less busy then

[42:21] I will pray then I will read the Bible is God consigned to the leftovers of your life or is God first in your life do you sacrifice for God have you done anything for God that has been costly to you I hope so only those who humbly follow Christ as the first priority in their lives will become sons of the resurrection to Jesus it's this poor widow not the scribes the Pharisees the elders and the chief priests and the Sadducees that represents the sons of the resurrection you want to know who these sons worthy children of the resurrection are look at this poor widow is what Jesus is telling these people in the eyes of men these prominent religious leaders appear to enjoy God's favor they appear to be blessed by God because they had material wealth and this widow in contrast seemed undeserving of

[43:25] God's favor after all what has she done for God oh she has given these meager two copper coins and yet it is this widow whom God considers worthy to attain to the age and to the resurrection from the dead though in this life this widow bears the pains and sufferings of shame of widowhood but in the resurrection there will be no marriage and she will never be widowed she will be forever wed to her Lord Jesus as her bridegroom she will be married she will be provided for she will experience eternal glory to her life this on earth is sad and difficult that's the hope that God gives to his people in this passage Luke has repeatedly emphasized the poor as recipients of God's grace throughout his gospel in Luke chapter 4 18 and chapter 7 verse 22 he wrote that

[44:27] Jesus came to proclaim good news to the poor in Luke chapter 6 verse 20 Jesus said blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom of God in the parable of the great banquet in chapter 14 verses 12 to 24 it was the poor that were invited from the streets into the banquet to partake in the eternal glories of God in the parable of the rich man and the poor Lazarus in Luke 16 it was poor Lazarus that and not the rich man that went to heaven and enjoyed God's blessings the poor throughout the gospel of Luke represent not strictly those who are materially poor but more broadly those who are spiritually poor those who humbly recognize that they have nothing to offer to God those who understand that they are undeserving of God's salvation people who are not self sufficient people who are not independent but dependent on

[45:30] God this poor widow surely felt that she hadn't given anything to God that would earn for her eternal glory and salvation she probably thought herself less deserving in fact than those rich people that went before her even in her sacrificial giving she had to entrust herself depend on God because she would not know where her meal would come from it's such people who humbly follow Christ as their first priority in life that become sons of the resurrection this is because it says in 2nd Corinthians chapter 8 verse 9 for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though he was rich yet for your sake he became poor so that you by his poverty might become rich in this world in our society the rich get everything they want they're the ones that get admitted to priority they're the ones that get into positions of power but in the kingdom of

[46:43] God it doesn't work like that because Jesus who was rich didn't say only the rich will enter but because Jesus who was rich said I will become poor for the sake of people who cannot afford to enter the kingdom of God because Jesus said it's my kingdom is not for the righteous but it's for sinners who recognize that they are undeserving of salvation but they cling to me and say Lord help me Lord save me I want to save those people that's why Jesus came and he died on the cross for our sins that's how the kingdom of God works and that's why it's the poor it's those who humble themselves and cling to Jesus that's why they are the sons of the resurrection take a moment now to please reflect on that next这是 that that beautiful thing we we

[47:55] Katie thinking about the thing that we aren't right we know to see Oh we want information to