Matthew 22:23-33 Too Many Weddings
Format for Your Devotions
Instructions: Do not read my example devotion until you have completed your own devotional time in the scriptures. Reading my thoughts first may limit your own understanding. Let the Holy Spirit speak to you alone before looking to see what anyone else has to say, whether it is me, a Bible commentary, or a friend. Let God speak to you before you let another person speak to you. I have provided a format, but modify it to fit your needs. For example, I usually combine my application and prayer together talking to God about the application to my own life. You can go through this devotion process mentally, speaking out loud, or in writing as you wish. Don’t worry if you are not following this process exactly. Sometimes, I add extra information and sometimes I emphasize one part more than others. However, you should always think about what you learn about God from this passage.
Step 1: Pray–Ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance first of all and that God may reveal the lessons that He wants you to have that day. Request that God protect you from Satan’s distractions (and the devil will try to distract you whether it is pinching the baby or putting you to sleep). Ask to see God more clearly as you read and think about the passage.
Step 2: Read the passage–Read to get an overview of the information first. Then start looking at specific parts after the first reading. You may read a larger or smaller section than I have here because you do not have to follow my organization at all.
Step 3: Understand the passage–You can summarize, ask and answer your own questions about the passage, visualize the story, analyze the characters, and relate this passage to other scriptures and personal experiences.
Step 4: What does this reveal about God?–What do you learn about the Father, Son, and/or Holy Spirit from this passage?
Step 5: Apply this to your own life.
Step 6: Prayer
My Example Devotion: July 19, 2019 Matthew 22:23-33
Note 1: In the devotion examples, I leave my questions and thought processes in the text because I am trying to demonstrate that a devotional time is a dialogue with God about what you are reading from His word. As such, any questions or ideas that you have should be explored by talking it out with God. These example devotions are not my attempts to teach you what the meaning of a particular scripture is. They are an attempt to teach you the process of devotions, which is a combination of prayer and Bible study where you explore ideas with God as you read His word.
The same day Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother.’ Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no offspring left his wife to his brother. So too the second and third, down to the seventh. After them all, the woman died. In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her.” But Jesus answered them, “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching.
Note 2: This is an actual devotion. It is fine for you to disagree with me about Ellen G. White’s prophetic role. These were just my thoughts as I meditated upon the scriptures based on my own life experience and walk with Jesus in 2019. This is not an attempt to convince you to believe as I do about Ellen White. If it were, I would have presented a lot of evidence.
(Understanding the Text) The question that the Sadducees asked was about Levirate marriage. They made a point that Moses said it because they only accepted the Pentateuch as scripture from God. They rejected the prophets. I guess they were like a lot of people today who only want the Bible and reject Ellen White. There was nothing wrong with the Pentateuch. It is inspired by God. There is nothing wrong with the Bible. It is inspired by God. However, in rejecting the prophets, the Sadducees were rejecting light given to them by God. They were choosing to only follow part of the guidance that God had given them. In the process, they left themselves open to adding their own worldly ideas to the scriptures. The same is true for those who reject Ellen White. From my observations, they don’t achieve a better spiritual life because of their choice. Instead, they seem to be more vulnerable to worldly ideas and attitudes of harshness. When we reject part of the light that God has given us, it leaves us open to attack in the areas where the revelation was meant to defend us.
The Sadducees believed in the Pentateuch because they were priests for the most part, and their base of power and authority rested upon the first five books of the Bible. They could not reject them without losing their influence and position in life. It was in their self-interest to “believe” in them, but the prophets exhorted people to treat each other well and several specifically criticized the priests for abuses of their power and not doing their job right. As such, the priests would not be too thrilled to be scolded and condemned. Probably, the Sadducees received their heritage of disbelief from the very priests that Malachi had condemned many years before. Their forefathers’ rejection of the last Old Testament prophet Malachi and other previous prophets was passed down as cynical skepticism through the generations.
(Revelation of God) Jesus took this chance to not only deal with the question, but also to try to wake up the Sadducees and the people who might be leaning towards them, so He went on the attack in His answer. The first thing out of His mouth was that they were wrong because they were ignorant of the scriptures and the power of God. In limiting themselves to the Pentateuch, they were also choosing to be ignorant of God’s revelations which could have guided their understanding of Moses’ writings. Instead, they read through the Pentateuch and came up with fallacies, one of which was that there was no resurrection. Their question was to try to show that the resurrection did not make sense because of situations like levirate marriage. Jesus told them that God had the power to resurrect the dead and deal with messy situations. He told them that some things would be different in the resurrection, which went against their desires to keep everything the way it was in Moses’ time rather than to progress. I guess in a way they were like some of the Adventists who revere the pioneers and don’t think that we need to progress beyond their understanding of scripture.4
(Application / Prayer) Jesus went on to show the Sadducees’ ignorance of the scriptures by proving the resurrection from the books that they accepted. He was showing them that the books that they claimed to know and follow condemned them for their lack of understanding. If we reject part of the light that God presents to us and claim to wholly follow the other light, we are deceiving ourselves. God does not present light that is unnecessary. We need it to guide us forward. Our understanding deepens as we receive more light. It is like saying that we are going to live with one arm tied behind our back. It does not free us to do more. It limits us from using the parts of our body that are still free. I pray never to reject Your light.