"God is not God of the dead but of the living!"

Here is one of Marc Chagall's paintings of Moses before the Burning Bush (Exodus 3:1-17) Jesus references this scene in the Gospel account below where Sadducees try to trip him up.  We see Moses kneeling before the flaming bush which is not consumed by the fire. He has taken off his shoes and holds his right hand before his heart. His face emits rays of light. The flock of sheep he tended graze on the hillside behind him. 

To the left we see God's People being led out of slavery through the divided Red Sea. We see Moses' face at the head of the procession and the tablets of stone containing God's Law. But above the burning bush, we see a happy, open-armed angel standing in for God who is un-depictable. He appears in circles of colored light; his wings reflect the flame of the fiery bush beneath him. Is that a red scarf he holds in his hands?

God's self-gift is for all of creation, and so there are mountains on the left, a sky full of birds and trees on the right. See, Chagall even includes the fish in the lower left corner. We might now read the Gospel account of Jesus setting right the tricky Sadducees.

Next Sadducees came to him. (It is they who say that there is no resurrection.) Their question was this: 'Master, Moses laid it down for us that if there are brothers, and one dies leaving a wife but no child, then the next should marry the widow and carry on his brother's family. Now there were seven brothers. The first took a wife and died without issue. Then the second married her, and he too died without issue. So did the third. Eventually the seven of them died, all without issue. Finally the woman died. At the resurrection, when they come back to life, whose wife will she be, since all seven had married her?' Jesus said to them, 'You are mistaken, and surely this is the reason: you do not know either the scriptures or the power of God. When they rise from the dead, men and women do not marry; they are like angels in heaven. 

'Now about the resurrection of the dead, have you never read in the Book of Moses, in the story of the burning bush, how God spoke to him and said, "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob"? God is not God of the dead but of the living. You are greatly mistaken.' (Mark 12: 16-27)

Notice the section starts with the word, next. Testy religious men have lined up to have a go at Jesus. Back in chapter 11:27, it's the chief priests, scribes and elders who approach Jesus to question him about his credentials. Then in chapter 12:13, Pharisees and Herodians gang up with their tricky question about paying Caesar's taxes. These Sadducees seem to be hanging out in the wings just in case the Pharisees don't succeed. How tiresome!

They've all got their angle. Sadducees were experts in temple rubrics: that all the ceremonies were "valid" and executed properly. They accepted only the first five books of the Bible, called the Pentateuch. That's why we're told they were not much interested in the notion of resurrection - evidently nothing about it appears in those five books. And so they concoct and propose to Jesus this ridiculous story, hoping to walk away, whispering to one another, "Now we've got him."

Their proposal makes for silly religion, and we can feel Jesus' annoyance when at the end he tells them, "You are greatly mistaken."  Fair question: might Jesus address those words today to religionists with their concerns? And religionists are not just bishops and pastors, but skulk around in many places. The Christian blogger world is full of them.

But what really seems to get Jesus worked up here is that these men are cynics. A cynic is someone who can't be pleased - everything presses down. How depressing and fearsome! Their religious imagination is so tiny - as if heaven is a calculation or book of rules to be followed, "At the resurrection (we can see them smirking) when they come back to life, whose wife will she be, since all seven had married her?"

These men have lost the wonder, the awesomeness, the beauty, the delight of religion. No laughter allowed in their brand.  Maybe we could say, they've lost the magic, the way someone might speak of the explosion of love in a relationship.

But Jesus is smart, quoting God speaking to Moses from the Burning Bush. Jesus is aware that Moses is the only personage they'll understand and accept. "I am the God of Abraham, the God of  Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Jesus follows up: "God is not God of the dead but of the living."  

"God of the living!" 

O Jesus,
that we would understand
 the depth and breadth of your announcement. 

Give us hearts that little by little

 are enlarged by your all encompassing love - 

love for every thing

  and every person in heaven and on earth. 

The Death of Moses - And God's Idea Of Religion

This is Marc Chagall's etching with watercolor titled: The Death of Moses.  In Deuteronomy 32:51 God tells Moses that even after leading the Chosen People through the Sinai desert for forty years, Moses would not enter the promised land with them.

"Because you did not make my holiness clear to the Israelites." Yikes! It is said that the largest Christian denomination is Roman Catholics, and the second largest is fallen away Catholics. Have the priests failed to make God's holiness clear to the people?

We're told more in Deuteronomy chapter 34. God is called Yahweh.

Then leaving the Plains of Moab, Moses went up Mount Nebo...and Yahweh showed Moses the whole country: Gilead as far as Dan, the whole of Naphtali, the country of Ephraim and Manasseh, the whole country of Judah as far as the Western Sea, the Negeb and the region of the Valley of Jericho, city of palm trees...And Yahweh said to Moses, "This is the country which I promised on oath to give to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying: I shall give it to your descendents. I have allowed you to see it  for yourself, but you will not cross into it." There in the country of Moab, Moses servant of Yahweh died as God decreed...He buried him in the valley in the country of Moab...Since then, there has never been such a prophet in Israel as Moses, the man whom Yahweh knew face to face.

Apparently resigned to it all, in Chagall's etching, Moses appears to be getting ready for a good nights sleep. He has put down his wonder-working staff; his unveiled face still emitting rays of light.  Moses waves to God who seems to be pushing away the clouds, opening a path of light for his servant, who looks to God face to face.

But we notice too that it seems God personally buried Moses in the valley. I'd suggest God buried Moses in a secret place because God knows how idolatrous human beings are. God knew that if Moses' grave were known, we'd forget everything he taught us; we'd build a great shrine with a decorated tomb, summoning people from all around the world to make expensive pilgrimages to it, to buy souvenirs, to stay in the five star hotels, dining in the fine restaurants that spring up around shrines. No, God left Moses' body hidden in the wilderness. 

The God of the Jews and Christians isn't a shrine-god or real estate god.

"It is mercy I desire, not sacrifice." Hosea 6:6; Matthew 9:13

"My sacrifice O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, O God, will not despise." Psalm 51:17

True religion happens in the wilderness: the wilderness of my inner life. In the wilderness (desert) there is nothing to hold onto, no one to impress, nothing that will save me. I'm utterly vulnerable in the wilderness; face to face with my own unvarnished self. In the inner wilderness I have no cloak of prestige to wear, no masks, no facade. I stand alone before God, who sees me and loves me just as I am.

The only thing we find in the desert is sand. Moses' burial in the desert-sand teaches me: when I crouch down and write the story of my past, with all the wounds, the mistakes, the sins, the twists and turns that may have taken me faraway, when I leave and glance back over my shoulder, I notice the wind has blown it all away. God is like that. 

I want to accept this desert-y spiritual place and not run to some other kind of religion that distracts, 'saves' or is more comfortable and easier. Oh God, thank you for burying Moses in a secret place of sand and wind.