On Holding Fast
November 9, 2025
Rev. Traceymay Kalvaitis
Psalm 145: 3-5
Great is the LORD and greatly to be praised; his greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall extol your works to another and shall declare your mighty acts. They will recount the glorious splendor of your majesty, and on your wondrous works, I will meditate.
Luke 20: 27-40
Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question,
‘Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; then the second and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.’
Jesus said to them, ‘Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. Indeed they cannot die any more, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.’ Then some of the scribes answered, ‘Teacher, you have spoken well.’ For they no longer dared to ask him another question.
*** Today’s sermon is titled On Holding Fast.
Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in his Letters to a Young Poet, “Things aren’t all so tangible and
sayable as people would usually have us believe; most experiences are unsayable, they happen in a space that no word has ever entered.”
We speak of birth and death, of falling in love…we speak of grief and joy, fulfillment and disappointment and yet the experience of these things is, as Rilke writes, “unsayable.” Most experiences “happen in a space that no word has ever entered.” And yet we humans have an innate need to put words to everything, largely as a means of communicating what is important
to us and what we believe in. Then we align ourselves with those who share our values and beliefs and set to work finding fault with the “others” who do not share the same values and beliefs. Sound familiar?
We see it playing out in our scripture reading for today, where we find Jesus, arriving finally in Jerusalem for the final time and he finds himself caught in the middle of a debate between the Pharisees and the Sadducees about the concept of resurrection. In Jesus’s last days, it is this division between the Sadducees and the Pharisees that will set the stage for his arrest and execution under order of the Roman Empire. The Sadducees and Pharisees are not from different cultures; they are both devoted Jewish interpreters of Hebrew law. The Sadducees interpret Jewish law strictly. They regard only the books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) as sacred scripture, the Torah. The concept of resurrection and the afterlife is not found in the Torah. Only one place in the First Testament scriptures, in the second book of Maccabees, chapter 20, mentions the concept of an afterlife. Sadducees do not believe in angels, resurrection, or the afterlife. Pharisees, on the other hand, include the teachings of the prophets along with the Torah and they would eagerly engage in debate about the idea of resurrection and an afterlife following death; they would readily refer to angels as a state of being we can anticipate after death.
Jesus was a Pharisee, technically, although he was constantly pushing the traditional edges. Consequently, Jesus is perceived as a threat to the Sadducees and they are determined to prove that he is contradicting the teachings found in the Torah. The Sadducees are giving Jesus a question about how marriage is regarded in the afterlife, thinking they will trick him into crossing the lines of the law, but Jesus engages with them with what one biblical scholar
identifies as “intelligence, resolve, dexterity, and grace.” Jesus even uses scriptures from Exodus to prove that God regards all his children as living beings, even if they are no longer on this earth.
In the end, even Jesus’s opponents have to admit that he “spoke well” and “they no longer asked him any questions.” I suspect the author of Luke offers this story not because we need a lesson in the laws of marriage but to illustrate the deep divisions within the religious culture of Jesus’s time and how he navigated them, not with attacks or condemnation, but with a teaching intended to enlighten. Jesus said, “God is not God of the dead, but of the living; for to God all are alive.”
Questions and opinions about the concept of resurrection continue to challenge us. For some, the assurance of resurrection is a great comfort; for others, it is a stumbling block. We can literally observe in the natural world, in real time, how death is but one phase of an ongoing life process that is eternal and unstoppable. And yet it can be difficult to see ourselves as part of the same processes that surround us because we know we are more than just our physical bodies.
My deepest insight concerning the afterlife did not come through the scriptures initially, but
rather through the death of my beloved grandfather. He died suddenly in my arms when I was 23 years old and I will never forget the look on his face, as if he was witnessing something glorious. I have had other experiences at the bedside of the dying since then that have confirmed my belief that there is an existence beyond what we know here. The most recent confirmation was a year and a half ago, as I spent the last five days with my best Friend, Deva, as she crossed the threshold of death. I lost count of the times she would look past me and speak with beings I
could not see but I could certainly sense and, on one occasion, I could smell what I can only describe as metallic and coppery, like a handful of pennies. All of these experiences have combined to allow me to approach the story of Jesus’s death and resurrection with an open heart and mind. It continues to be a process and one that holds great gifts and promises for us, potentially.
In closing, Friends, I remind us that Jesus did not turn away from those who challenged him; he faced them with “intelligence, resolve, dexterity, and grace.” I pray that we, too, following the example of our teacher, can respond to those who hold different beliefs and opinions with intelligence, resolve, dexterity and grace as we hold fast to hope for the future of all humankind. So be it. Amen.
Pastoral Prayer Source of love we call God, I pray your help in steering us towards a better way, whatever that may be. Perhaps one in which we can see one another without labels and the judgment that comes along with labels; perhaps one in which we can both oppose the practice of war and still hold those who have served, and are still serving, in high esteem. I pray that we will pause and reflect as to how we can take steps toward an end to the wars within ourselves, the wars between friends, families, the wars between religions and the wars between nations. We are all suffering in various ways, and there is healing to be found in helping those whose sufferings are greater than our own. For the victims of war everywhere, we pray for you. For the Veterans that are waiting for medical care, counseling and treatment, we pray for you. For the leaders of our local, state and national government, and those that will soon be sworn into office, we pray for you. May the light of peace and the pull of hope and the warmth of compassion guide us today and always. This I pray in the name of Christ. Amen.
Benediction
I leave you now with these words from Philipians 4:6
“Have no anxiety, but in every prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your petitions be made known to God. And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds.”