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God of the living

Mark 12:18-27
18 Then come unto Him the Sadducees, which say there is no resurrection; and they asked Him, saying,
19 Master, Moses wrote unto us, If a man's brother die, and leave his wife behind him, and leave no children, that his brother should take his wife, and raise up seed unto his brother.
20 Now there were seven brethren: and the first took a wife, and dying left no seed.
21 And the second took her, and died, neither left he any seed: and the third likewise.
22 And the seven had her, and left no seed: last of all the woman died also.
23 In the resurrection therefore, when they shall rise, whose wife shall she be of them? for the seven had her to wife.
24 And Jesus answering said unto them, Do ye not therefore err, because ye know not the scriptures, neither the power of God?
25 For when they shall rise from the dead, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; but are as the angels which are in heaven.
26 And as touching the dead, that they rise: have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?
27 He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living: ye therefore do greatly err."

In today's verses the Sadducees, who denied the resurrection, present a hypothetical based on levirate marriage: a woman marries seven brothers in succession, each dying childless. They ask whose wife she will be in the afterlife, aiming to show the idea of resurrection is absurd.

Jesus answers that in the resurrection people neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like the angels in heaven. Their error, He says, comes from not knowing the Scriptures or the power of God; the resurrected life transcends earthly institutions such as marriage.

To prove the resurrection from the Torah they accepted, Jesus quotes Exodus 3:6. God declares, “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob” long after the patriarchs’ deaths. Because God speaks in the present tense, He is not the God of the dead but of the living, affirming their continued existence and the hope of resurrection.

For reflection:
How does knowing God as the “God of the living” change your view of death and your own mortality?
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