Verses 18-27 “18Then come unto him the Sadducees, which say there is no resurrection; and they asked him, saying,
19Master, 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.
20Now there were seven brethren: and the first took a wife, and dying left no seed.
21And the second took her, and died, neither left he any seed: and the third likewise.
22And the seven had her, and left no seed: last of all the woman died also.
23In the resurrection therefore, when they shall rise, whose wife shall she be of them? for the seven had her to wife.
24And Jesus answering said unto them, Do ye not therefore err, because ye know not the scriptures, neither the power of God?
25For when they shall rise from the dead, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; but are as the angels which are in heaven.
26And 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?
27He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living: ye therefore do greatly err.”
The Sadducees hoped to catch Jesus saying something unpopular by asking a question about a hypothetical, unlikely and dubious circumstance. Jesus’ answer was more than they bargained for. To paraphrase Jesus’ answer: “Your problem is that you are ignorant of the Scriptures and of the power of God. People will not have sexual relations in heaven. God is the God of people that you think are dead and gone forever. You greatly err.”
There is much more in the Bible than we have yet found. Here Jesus and the Holy Spirit tell us that the doctrine of the Resurrection is taught in the Old Testament in a statement in which God describes Himself in the present tense. In Exodus 3:6, God says, “I AM (not “I was”) the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” In other words, those patriarchs who had died were still alive and they will live again upon the earth in resurrection bodies. This teaching was all based upon the tense of the verb “AM,” a little verb of being. Yes, indeed, there is more in the Bible than we think!