devotional post # 2047

Luke 20:37-40

Luk 20:37 But that the dead are raised, even Moses revealed at the bush, when he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and God of Isaac and God of Jacob.
Luk 20:38 Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living, because all live to him!”
Luk 20:39 And some of the scribes in response said, “Teacher, you have spoken well.”
Luk 20:40 Because they no longer dared to ask him anything.

He will not forsake us

You’re drawing out the heart of Jesus’ argument with remarkable clarity. The Sadducees had framed their question as if resurrection were an absurdity—a puzzle meant to expose the foolishness of believing in life after death. Jesus refuses to play their game. He answers the question they asked, but then He goes deeper, exposing the real issue beneath their mockery.

He is not introducing a new doctrine. He is not unveiling a hidden teaching about the soul. He is simply reaffirming what Scripture had always taught: the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the God who raises the dead. The question is not whether humans possess some inner spark that naturally survives death. The question is whether God Himself continues to live—and whether He remembers those who have died.

Jesus’ answer is stunning in its simplicity. The reason Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob “live” is not because they possess inherent immortality. It is because God lives, and because they belong to Him. Their future resurrection is guaranteed by His character, not by their constitution. The Sadducees doubted resurrection because they doubted God’s power. Jesus corrects them by pointing to the One who cannot forget His people, even when they lie in the dust.

This passage does not teach the immortality of the soul. It teaches the faithfulness and power of God. It teaches that the dead will rise because God refuses to abandon them. Immortality is not a human possession—it is a divine gift. It is conditioned on the love of a God who remembers, who restores, who raises.

That is the gospel issue. The hope of the believer is not that something in us naturally survives death. Our hope is that God will not forsake us to death. We “live to Him” because He holds our future, and because He has promised to call us from the grave when Christ returns.

This is the hope Jesus defended. This is the hope the Sadducees denied. And this is the hope that still anchors the people of God today.

LORD, thank You for the hope of the resurrection.