A Message from Pastor Kaji

This week, we’re back in the Gospels, listening to Jesus. 

Bible Nerd Notes:

Our text comes from Matthew. Pro tip: when you read a passage in the Gospels, it’s always helpful to place it on Jesus’ timeline. Every Gospel starts with a beginning. For John, that’s Creation: “In the beginning was the Word…” For Matthew and Luke, that beginning includes Jesus’ birth. For Mark, the story begins with John the Baptist preparing the way. That’s all chapters one. 

For this whole church year, we’re (mostly) in Matthew, which ends with Jesus’ resurrection in chapter 28 and his Great Commission: “Go ye, therefore, and make disciples of all nations…” So, in the schema of Jesus’ life, chapter 22 comes a good ways into his life. By now, things are getting pretty tense, and Jesus has made some enemies. That tension shows up here, in our text.

Some Sadducees come to Jesus with a question about resurrection. You’ll want to know: the Sadducees were a Jewish group closely associated with priestly leadership, Temple authority, and elite power. They gave particular authority to the written Torah, and, as a whole, they didn’t believe in resurrection. So when they ask Jesus a question about resurrection, Matthew is telling us: something else is going on.

This is also where we need to read with care.

Too often, people used groups like the Sadducees and Pharisees as foils. That has done real harm. It feeds antisemitism and distorts Jesus’ Jewishness. (For further reading on this, look into Dr. Amy-Jill Levine’s scholarship.) In short, remember: Jesus is Jewish. The debates in this text are happening within a Jewish world full of scripture, argument, interpretation, conviction, and hope. 

This Sunday, we will listen carefully, read responsibly, and stay close to Jesus, who always has a Word for us!

Questions for reflection/journaling:

• What helps me stay open when a conversation gets tense?
• When have I changed my mind about something important?
• What does it mean to listen for God when people disagree?

I can’t wait to see you in church!

Pax Christi,

Pastor Kaji

SCRIPTURE
Matthew 22:23-33 (Year A, p. 310)

23 The same day [that Jesus taught about taxes] some Sadducees came to him, saying there is no resurrection; and they questioned him, saying, 24 “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies without having children, his brother shall marry the [widow] woman, and raise up offspring for his brother.’ 25 Now there were seven brothers among us; the first married, and without having offspring, leaving the woman to his brother. 26 The same for the second, and the third, to the seventh. 27 After everything the woman died. 28 In the resurrection, then, for which of the seven will she be wife? For they all had her.”
29 Jesus answered them, “You all 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, rather they are like angels in heaven. 31 And about the resurrection of the dead, have you all not read what was said to you by God, 32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is God not of the dead, but of the living.” 33 And when the crowd heard it, they were astounded at his teaching.