Reflection for November 21, Saturday the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (M): Luke 20:27-40

Gospel: Luke 20:27-40

Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to Jesus, saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us, If someone’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother. 

Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. Then the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her.” 

Jesus said to them, “The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. they can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise. 

That the dead will rise even Moses made known in the passage about the bush, when he called ‘Lord’ the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; and he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.” Some of the scribes said in reply, “Teacher, you have answered well.” And they no longer dared to ask him anything.

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Reflection:

Do you believe that there is life after death? The Sadducees an organization within the Jewish faith did not believe in the resurrection. The Sadducees gave Jesus a story about a woman who married seven brothers. By asking whose wife will she be in the resurrection they were actually mocking Jesus teachings on the resurrection. 

Some people have a limited understanding of the vastness of life that they thought that it is only up to the point of death, after that no more. But if there’s no life after death what then is the use of living a worthy life in this world?   

There is a resurrection! And we begin to sow the seeds of resurrection the moment we decide to walk away from all of our sins. And when we die we will have an up close and personal encounter with this resurrection. Therefore, eternal life or resurrection will come to those who lived their lives pleasing to the eyes of God. 

In the gospel Jesus tells us all the reality of afterlife, of heaven, of everlasting life and of angels. However, not all will have the privilege of being there. For it is only reserve for those who are considered worthy. Worthy based on the merciful eyes of God not based on our own subjective and judgmental eyes. – Marino J. Dasmarinas