GOSPEL, Mark (12, 18-27)
Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark
The Question about the Resurrection
18 Some Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question, saying, 19 “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no child, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 20 There were seven brothers; the first married and, when he died, left no children; 21 and the second married the widow and died, leaving no children; and the third likewise; 22 none of the seven left children. Last of all the woman herself died. 23 In the resurrection whose wife will she be? For the seven had married her.”
24 Jesus said to them, “Is not this the reason you are wrong, that you know neither the scriptures nor 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, have you not read in the book of Moses, in the story about the bush, how God said to him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? 27 He is God not of the dead, but of the living; you are quite wrong.”
The Gospel of the Lord
REFLECTION
It is not the God of the dead, but of the living.
Jesus, divine, becomes human so that the human may become divine. He promised all his disciples a new life indicating the way to the Father saying, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”. (John 11: 25-26)
The Sadducees, unbelievers of the truth of the Resurrection, decided to ridicule his words by presenting Him with an almost absurd case. If a widow had seven husbands in her lifetime, 23 In the resurrection whose wife will she be?”
Faced with this trap, Jesus simply replies, “When they are resurrected, neither men nor women will marry.” “They can no longer die; they are like angels, they are children of God because they participate in the resurrection”.
To confirm the resurrection of the dead, Jesus appeals to the testimony of Scripture in the passage from the burning bush when Yahweh revealed himself to Moses as “the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” (Exodus 3: 6). Hence, Jesus concludes that if the Lord is the God of the patriarchs who have already died, it is because they are alive in his presence, therefore “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living”.
The entire Bible, is a testimony of our relationship with the God of life. Immortality is the highest aspiration of the human being, for this reason, our death is not a final destination. Life, and not Death has the final word. I await the resurrection of the dead.
PRAYER
Guide us, Lord, with your Spirit so that by believing and living in Your Son’s words we may be led to the truth of the resurrection. Amen.