3796 — Not the God of the Dead
Please explain the scripture, "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." Matt. 22:32. M. E. G. This scripture is sometimes used to prove the immortality of the soul, or the conscious state of the dead, but it proves neither. Our God is not asked the question, Do the dead live? He is not asked if the soul is conscious between death and the resurrection. That is not the question that is before Him at all. The question is, What will be in the resurrection? Whose wife will the woman be there? Those who pervert the text would make of our Lord a marvelous logician! They would have Him start out to prove a resurrection, and end by proving that there is no need of one. Our Lord did not reason thus. His answer is, "But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." Mark, in giving the same conversation, says, "But as touching the dead, that they are raised; have ye not read?" etc. And Luke says: "Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For He is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto Him." That is, in God's purpose they live. They are sleeping in the dust, but in the infinite purpose of God they will live again, and therefore He calls Himself the God of those devoted men, because in His purpose they do live. In other words, He calls things that are not as tho they were. Rom. 4:17.