Marriage in Heaven?

I heard Tim Mackie make two points about today's reading that I found helpful.

First, the Sadducees were the religious elite who controlled the chief priest's position in Jerusalem. (They were not natural allies of the Pharisees.) Tim Mackie compared them to Scientologists today: a relatively small group made up of wealthy people.

Second, what about Jesus saying there is no marriage in heaven? That seems sad--does that mean we'll have no families in heaven? Tim Mackie pointed out that we have umbilical cords for the first few months of life, and we absolutely need them. Then, after we are born, we no longer need what seemed so essential to us before. In some way, this is what marriage is like: it's necessary here on earth, but will give way to something better in heaven. I don't really understand that or like it, if I'm being honest, but I at least acknowledge it makes sense, and I need to remember that God's plans are always better for us than anything we could have thought of ourselves.

Today's Scripture:

Matthew 22:23-46

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Giving to Caesar

Jesus is really smart. Like brilliant! Like the smartest-man-who-ever-lived kind of smart. (This is one of the reasons the early church called him Lord.) Most people today wouldn't think of Jesus as being in even the top 10 smartest people who ever lived, but he is.

To cite a tiny example, consider his response to the Pharisees and the Herodians about paying taxes "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's." It is a GENIUS answer, and even his enemies admitted this:

"When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away."

Matthew 22:22

Jesus is brilliant. And there is nothing about your circumstances that bewilder him today--he is completely competent to get you through life, all the way to the other side.

Scripture Passage:

Matthew 22:15-22

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***How to Subscribe***

I’m blogging through the Gospels in 2019. Subscribe here to receive a weekday update on that day’s Gospel reading. (There is also an option to subscribe to non-Gospels posts as well through my plain ole Andrew Forrest Newsletter.)