Sermon Tone Analysis

By Rev. Glenn Pease

One of the greatest romance stories of all history is that of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning.

Elizabeth was a normal active girl up to age 15, but then life ceiling tumbled in for her.

She became an invalid, who for the next 20 years was confined to bed in a darkened room.

She was a prisoner of pain and loneliness.

Her mother died when she was 22, and she was left in the hands of a cruely stern father.

Later, her favorite brother was taken by a drowning accident.

Few people have ever written of the depths of despair as she did.

In spite of her tragic and lonely life, she managed to write poetry of such quality that it was published.

She made a name for herself among the world of poets.

In 1845, after her 38th birthday, a poet six years younger than her, by the name of Robert Browning, wrote to her, and asked if he could visit.

Her spirit was willing, but her flesh was weak, and she was reluctant to let any man see her frail and tortured body.

He was insistent, however, and so the day came when he entered her darkened room.

The light of love altered the darkness of her life almost instantly.

They began to write letters to each other, and her health took a sudden positive turn.

She wrote later that love drew her gently back from the gates of death.

Her father fought this love, and forced them to carry on their friendship in secrecy.

After a year of this, with a friends help, she stole away, and was married to Robert Browning.

Her father never forgave her, and they never met again.

Her wedded life was a taste of heaven.

Love lifted her from 20 years in bed to a life of adventure with her husband.

They went to Italy, and together wrote great poetry.

She bore Robert a son, and she became famous for the poetry her love inspired.

One day she handed him a little pile of poems and said, "Read these, if you don't like them tear them up."

These were the now famous Sonnets From the Portuguese.

It is said of them, "No purer expression of a heart on fire with love has ever been written."

The most famous of all is this one which introduces us to our subject.

How do I love thee?

Let me count the ways.

I love thee to depths and bredth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of being and ideal grace.

I love thee to the level of every day's

Most quite need, by sun and candle light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints.

I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

The question is, was her hope of a better love after death a vain hope?

Is this merely poetic dreaming, with no foundation in fact?

Does love last forever?

Does death become the dividing line that divorces all true lovers?

These are not minor questions, but ones which all loving mates ask at some time or another.

It is fascinating to study the marriages of great men of God, and see how the hope of reunion with their mates is such a vital force in their lives.

When William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, stood at the side of his wife's grave, he spoke these words, "I have never turned from her these 40 years for any journeying on my mission of mercy, but I longed to get back, and have counted the weeks, days, and hours which should take me again to her side."

After some other words concerning his sorrow he said, "When I have served my Christ and my generation according to the will of God, ....then I trust that she will bid me welcome to the skies."

Jonathan Edwards, one of the greatest preachers and theologians America has ever produced, did not die speaking of books and theology, but rather, of his dear wife, Sarah.

His final words were, "Give my kindest love to my dear wife, and tell her that the uncommon union which has so long subsisted between us has been of such a nature as I trust is spiritual and therefore will continue forever."

The fascinating book, The Courtship Of Mr. Lincoln, ends with these hopeful words of Mary Todd, that great president's devoted wife--"The only consolation left me, is the certainty, that each day brings me nearer my loved and lost....I shall not much longer be separated from my idolized husband, who has only gone before and I am certain is fondly watching and waiting for our reunion, nevermore to be separated."

We could go on and on quoting the hopes of lovers through the ages, both great and small.

It is a universal conviction that what the Song of Solomon says about love, is true.

In 8:6 it says, "Love is strong as death," and in verse 7 is says, "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it."

The context makes it clear that this is the love of a man and woman.

All else may be washed away in the flood, but love endures forever.

Christina Rossetti expressed the universal hope of lovers in poetry-

O my love, my dove, lift up your eyes

Toward the eastern gates like an opening rose.

You and I who parted will meet in Paradise

Pass within and sing when the gates unclose.

This life is but the passage of a day,

This life is but a pang and all is over,

But in the life to come which fades not away

Every love shall abide and every lover.

This universal hope would, no doubt, be unquestioned by Christians were it not for the interference of the skeptical Sadducees, who asked Jesus the difficult question we read in our text of Matt.22:23-33.

The Sadducees were a sect of the Jews started in 250 B.C. by Sadok, a president of the Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Judaism.

They did not believe in any resurrection at all.

They knew they couldn't convince those who believed in a restored paradise to give up the idea as nonsense, so they tried the next best thing.

They tried to make the idea look so complicated and ridiculous that men would have to laugh at it.

Ridicule has always been a powerful tool in theological debate, and the Sadducees were skilled at it.

They had, no doubt, watched many a pious Pharisee squirm as they presented this problem, which seems to throw a monkey wrench into the machinery of marriage forever.

The Pharisees were the largest of the Jewish sects and they did believe in the resurrection.

Keep in mind, the motive behind this question is not the desire to find truth, but to make the hope of the resurrection look foolish.

How amusing the whole thing was to them.

How delighted they must have been to have thought of this example.

Imagine one wife bewildered as to which of her seven husbands she should choose in the day of resurrection.

How hilarious to imagine the other six walking away rejected to enjoy paradise alone.

Their sides must have ached from the laughter, as they reviewed their question, and it's implications.

Trying to hold back the smile, and look solemn, the Sadducee hit Jesus with this question, "Now then, at the resurrection, whose wife will she be of the seven, since all of them were married to her?"

At first glance, the answer of Jesus seems to shatter the hopes of lovers through the ages.

In verse 30 Jesus says, "At the resurrection people will neither marry or be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven."

It would appear that the Sadducees came off with a considerable victory here.

Even if they did not destroy the hope of the resurrection, they appear to have robbed it of one of it's greatest joys.

This passage had disturbed many who fear that Jesus is saying, husbands and wives will not be united in eternity, and all the hopes of eternal love are mere human sentiments, and of no interest to God in His eternal plan.

Such fears are unfounded, however, if we see that Jesus is only concerned about destroying the Sadducees basis for ridicule.

Jesus is not eliminating reunion and love, but only those aspects of earthly marriage which would make it as complicated and ridiculous as the Sadducees suggest.

The Sadducees have painted a picture of heaven that is filled with conflict that is worse than what we see in time.

The seven husbands in time were had one at a time, and so there was no conflict.

But now, in the resurrection, they are all there at once, and they will be fighting over which one is to have this woman as their wife for eternity.

This picture is based on the assumption that in our resurrection bodies we will still have sexual needs, and that no man is going to want to be without a sexual partner for all eternity.

Thus, heaven will be filled with civil wars, with millions of men fighting to possess a woman who was also married to another man in time.

If nothing is different from time, between the sexes, then you can see the mess there will be in heaven .

But the answer of Jesus eliminates the problems the Sadducees foresee, that make heaven such a mess.

Jesus says people will be like angels in heaven.

What does this mean?

It means the whole issue of sex is taken away.