“After Resurrection”
November 9, 2025
Rev. Rebecca Migliore
I believe this reading has two levels. One is very obvious. And one less so. So let’s start with the obnoxious hypothetical that the Sadducees throw at Jesus. The writer makes sure that we understand this is not a “real” question, not asked in wanting a true answer. The Sadducees do not believe in resurrection (and Jesus has been talking about being killed and rising on the third day—the very definition of resurrection.) So they make up this truly horrifying example to try to show how silly it is to believe in resurrection.
The example goes this way. A woman is married to a man, let’s call him Man1, but he dies before she has any children. As a widow, she is very vulnerable, as we have talked about in the past. But from the point of view of the family in this era, the tragedy is that Man1, doesn’t have any children, no one to carry on his name or to remember him. And so, there was what was called Levirate marriage, where a brother (Man2) married the woman, and if she had a child, it would be considered Man1’s child. Now in this almost slapstick illustration, the woman is passed like a ping-pong ball from Man1 to Man2 to Man3 to Man4 to Man5 to Man6 to Man7. And there are no children from any of these unions. Everyone dies in the story. “So,” ask the Sadducees, “whose wife is she in the resurrection?”
I can imagine Jesus just shaking his head. You don’t get it at all, he answers. This world and the next are very different. In this world, we give and take in marriage. In the next world, we aren’t going to be focused on who belongs to who—in other words, no one will “care” who this poor woman is supposedly “wife” to. She will stand as her own person before God.
Then Jesus pivots and says, What you really want to discuss is whether there is a resurrection at all. And for that I’m going to direct you back to the Torah. Back to one of the most fundamental stories of the people of God—the story of Moses and the burning bush. We all remember that story, right? Moses, out in the wilderness, confronted by a bush that burns but is not consumed. When the bush identifies itself, the bush says, “I am the God of your ancestors: the God of Abraham and Sarah, the God of Isaac and Rebecca, the God of Jacob and Leah and Rachel. I am who I am.”
Jesus looks at the Sadducees and says, Now we all agree that God is God of the living not of the dead. In this world, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Leah and Rachel are dead and buried. But in God’s world, they are not dead, they are living, they are alive. God names God’s Self as God of our ancestors. They are there in God’s presence. They are alive in God’s house. Therefore, God has told us, there is resurrection.
Now, this argument of Jesus has not put an end to the questions and speculation about resurrection. But I think we sometimes get caught up in the illustration, in the fanciful construction of the questioners, and miss out on the somewhat hidden, underlying message. Jesus is totally sure there is resurrection. And, in fact, we, as followers of Jesus, grapple with the story of Easter morning, where Jesus is indeed Risen from the dead. Jesus has provided resurrection its most famous example. We are living after Resurrection. What does that mean for us?
I found the following example from Rev. Kendra A. Mohn (on the website workingpreacher.org) to be very helpful. Many of us remember the world of TV before streaming (even before Tivo and DVRs). You had to be in front of the TV on a specific night, at a specific time, to see the show that you wanted. That was why one network called it “Must See TV.”
But that’s not the reality anymore. With recording devices and better yet, streaming channels, you can often see the show you want to see, whenever you want. You can binge a whole season. You can easily find and watch past episodes, old movies, unheard of tv from all over the world. Those who never had to wait a week for the conclusion of a 2 part episode, those who never had to be content with what others decided you could watch, those who were never around for the “before” streaming, can’t really understand what we are talking about. And to be honest, “after” streaming, those “old days” are becoming a faint, quaint, memory.
Rev. Mohn suggests that this type of life-altering event is an albeit imperfect example of the “before and after” mentality. Of course, before and after resurrection is a little different. None of us has yet experienced resurrection physically. But our world has. We live in a world where, if you believe, there is no doubt—resurrection exists. Resurrection is. Jesus even imagines these people who live after resurrection. He says they are like angels. They are children of God. Children of the resurrection.
We have been listening to all that Jesus has been saying. We remember Jesus telling us to be like children, if we wish to enter the kingdom of God. Has Jesus been trying to imprint on our minds with all he has been talking about, all the lessons, all the parables, all the late night chat sessions, all his imagery of the kingdom of God—was that all what it is like to live “after resurrection?”
And what is the difference—before and after? After resurrection, what does that mean? Does it mean no fear of death? Does it mean an ability to imagine a world different from what this world often is? Does it fade the boundaries of male and female, of Samaritan and Jew, of rich and poor? Does it insist we all stand before the throne in our beautiful singularity, our beloved singularity? Is this “after resurrection” the kind of mind warp that insists on a different way of living, a different type of life?
That would have profound implications for how we live in this world. Is that why Jesus’s message from the very beginning is that “the kingdom of God has come near?”
What does that look like? To live authentically. To love constantly. To not give up hope. To raise our voices for the scales of justice to be balanced. To lift up the tiny moments when righteousness triumphs (and in some eras, they are certainly tiny!) To revel in the power of movements, and celebrate when there are small victories. To not back down. To keep on trying. It’s a lot easier to say that when you have had some good news. But the message is the same, even if there was no news we wished to hear.
After Resurrection is how we are called to live. After Resurrection is who we are. And yes, we have to constantly listen to the story year after year. And we have to try again to wrap our heads around what resurrection means. And true, we are quickly approaching the time of year when we will begin the story again, and be talking about Jesus as a baby. But every Sunday is supposed to be a way of jolting us awake, if we have gotten tired or sleepy, or downcast. The Lord’s Day is about Resurrection. The Lord’s Day is about reminding us who is in charge. The Lord’s Day is a time for gathering together, especially at the feast table, and getting filled up for the fray that is life in this world.
Jesus didn’t pull back from interaction. Other than times of prayer, he didn’t hide away in some palace or some cave. He strode right into—all those conversations, he moved towards all those people in need, he was willing to patiently go over what he had explained before—to all of us who follow.
We are the latest generation. We were not the first, we will not be the last. But we are directed to be like angels to those around us, we can claim our new identity, children of God. We can act knowing the reality, even if we can only glimpse it. That is what it means to be after Resurrection. That is what we are called to do. Alleluia/A.