Sermon, November 10, 2019

EXPECT THE HIGHER LIFE

Job 19: 25-27a

The early Christian church formulated creeds which are statements by which as Christian believers we affirm our faith.  Two of these Creeds with which most of us would be familiar are the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed.  in them we find these declarations:

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of. sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. (The Apostles Creed)

I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come (The Nicene Creed).

Christians believe that there is a resurrection.

Our Gospel reading tells that Jesus was approached by a group of Sadducees, members of a Jewish religious sect, who held positions of authority in their society and were usually well off.

The Sadducees did not believe in angels, demons, heaven, hell, and resurrection.  They believed that with the dying of the body, the soul died.  And that was the end.

However, they believed strongly in ritual purity, and pursued the observance of the rituals so that they would not be disqualified from “leading the temple services that generated income.”

There was another group of religious persons known as the Pharisees.  They believed in the resurrection and even that children could be born after the resurrection.

The Sadducees put a question to Jesus: what happens if a man dies leaving a wife with no children. 

They based their question on what Moses is recorded to have said in Deuteronomy 25:5 “If brothers are living together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry outside the family. Her husband’s brother shall take her and marry her and fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her.

They said to Jesus, the man had seven brothers, married her in tier turn as brother after brother died, but none of them had any children with the woman.

The question was, at the resurrection whose wife would she be, of the seven.

This may seem to be a reasonable question.  However, remember that these were people who did not believe that there was life after death.  So, we could say that it was a trick question.  It was really asking Jesus whether he believed in the resurrection.  It was designed to belittle and embarrass or even ridicule, Jesus, while making themselves appear to have more knowledge than our Lord.

In replying to them, Jesus said, I quote, “The people of this age marry and are given in marriage. 35 But those who are considered worthy of taking part in the age to come and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, 36 and they can no longer die; for they are like the angels. They are God’s children, since they are children of the resurrection

He is pointing out to the Sadducees that they were wrong in their belief, that the resurrection is a reality and that even Moses to whom they referred, showed that there is life after death when in the burning bush experience, he referred to God as the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob.  Then Jesus drove home the final proverbial nail, when He declared “God is not the God of the Dead, but of the living.  For to him all are alive.”

Neither the Sadducees, nor the Pharisees really understood that, life as we know it, and relationships as we understand them, (marriage and bearing children) would not go on then as now.

There are things in life that we do not fully understand now, and will not, until the time when they are fully revealed by God.  People often ask why things happen to us even when we do our best to live as God would have us live. There are many unknowns, mysteries surrounding life, and what happens after death.  Will there be a resurrection?   What will it be like?  Will there be the same body in which we now live?   While we may not have all the answers, we believe that the resurrection will take place, based on our knowledge of scripture, and that Jesus rose from the dead on that first Easter morn. 

The Sadducees did not understand and did not to want to understand because they felt that they already had all knowledge of things pertaining to God.

Jesus made it clear that the religious establishment of His day “knew neither the scriptures nor the power of God.   What they failed to understand was fact that he was and is the living God and the God of the living.”

We are called to have confidence in God through our Lord Jesus Christ that his plan and purpose for each of our lives is perfect.  Because of our faith we can confidently live our lives in a manner consistent with our sure belief in God’s promises to and for  us, even when we do not understand everything about those promises, his plans and his ways, or when everybody and everything life itself , seem to be working against us. 

St. Paul writes in his letter to the church at Corinth (2 Corinthians 5: 6-8) Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7 For we live by faith, not by sight. 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

 There are times when we might be tempted to throw up our hands in despair.  Times when we are not sure what this life holds for us.  As  I said earlier times when everything and everybody appear to be working against us, creating doubt in our  minds about whether God is real, whether he really cares about us given what we have to endure, and ultimately doubts about life now and life in the hereafter.  However, in the end, our faith must prevail as did Job’s faith.

Who was Job and can any of us say we have had the experiences of Job? 

Here was man who had things going for him.  Job was a wealthy, family man. 

 Job 1:2-3 describes his wealth in these words: “He had seven sons and three daughters, and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.” 

What was even more important was that Job was a man who feared and worshipped God, who referred to Job as His Servant.  Even Satan, the adversary, acknowledged Jobs faith in God.

The story is generally known that after God gave Satan permission to afflict Job, he lost all he had, his family, his servants, his possessions, his wealth.

That kind of loss would drive some to turn away from God, feeling as we sometimes hear, that God does not care or even is not real.

As in the case of Job, there may be those around us who may want us to turn away from God, even to curse God, as Job was encouraged to do.

The question is, what happens to our faith, our confidence, our trust in God.  What do we think about what the future holds for us when these things happen to us?

Consider the parents who lose children in senseless acts of gun violence, innocent children kidnapped and killed, women who are assaulted, raped and in some cases have their lives brought to a brutal end;  consider those who have worked hard over many years to make a living only to have someone break in to steal, to destroy and even kill.  Consider too, the families who must deal with these traumatic events.

These things can shake one’s faith in the present and raise questions about the future.  If God cannot protect us now, how can He guarantee the future.

But Job, despite his great pain, his losses, his distress, despite being encouraged to curse God and die.  Although he was unable to prevent the attacks and the effects, he maintained his faith in God.  In our reading Job had many questions and expressed his feelings.  Then, after expressing that he wished that someone would record his words, he made the famous and well know declaration: I know that my redeemer lives and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. 

He said, my redeemer lives.  We too must have the assurance that our redeemer, Jesus Christ, lives even now in our hearts.  Then he goes to the future and says: in the end I will see him stand upon the earth.   That was his expressed belief in the resurrection.  Further, he said that after his skin had been destroyed, I myself will see him with my own eyes, affirming his belief in a new life.

That gives hope and should strengthen our faith where there is any semblance of doubt that we have a Redeemer in this life, one whom we will see with our own eyes in the life to come. 

Even in the darkest hours of life let us not lose sight of the goal before us, the higher life to come. 

Unlike the Sadducees, we do believe in the Resurrection when the old will pass away and all things will become new. 

AMEN