Mark 12:1-27

Then Jesus began to speak to them in parables: “There once was a man who planted a vineyard and put a secure fence around it. He dug a pit for its winepress and erected a watch tower. Then he leased it to tenant-farmers and traveled abroad. When the time of harvest came, he sent one of his servants to the tenants to collect the landowners’ share of the harvest. But the tenants seized him and beat him and sent him back empty-handed. So the owner sent another servant to them. And that one they shamefully humiliated and beat over the head. So he sent another servant, and they brutally killed him. Many more servants were sent, and they were all severely beaten or killed. The owner had only one person left to send—his only son, whom he dearly loved. So he sent him to them, saying, ‘Surely they will restrain themselves and respect my son.’ But the tenants saw their chance and said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come! Let’s kill him, and then we’ll inherit it all!’ So they violently seized him, killed him, and threw his body over the fence! So what do you think the owner of the vineyard will do? He will come and put to death those tenants and give his vineyard to others. Haven’t you read what the psalmist said? The stone the builders examined and rejected has become the cornerstone, the most important stone of all? This was the Lord’s plan— and he is wonderful for our eyes to behold!” Now, the chief priests, religious scholars, and leaders realized that Jesus’ parable was aimed at them. They had hoped to arrest him then and there, but they feared the reaction of the crowd, so they left him alone and went away. Then they sent a delegation of Pharisees, together with some staunch supporters of Herod, to entrap Jesus with his own words. So they approached him and said, “Teacher, we know that you’re an honest man of integrity and you teach us the truth of God’s ways. We can clearly see that you’re not one who speaks only to win the people’s favor, because you speak the truth without regard to the consequences. So tell us, then, what you think. Is it proper for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” Jesus saw through their hypocrisy and said to them, “Why are you testing me? Show me one of the Roman coins.” They brought him a silver coin used to pay the tax. “Now, tell me,” Jesus said, “whose head is on this coin and whose inscription is stamped on it?” “Caesar’s,” they replied. Jesus said, “Precisely. The coin bears the image of the emperor Caesar, so you should pay the emperor his portion. But because you bear the image of God, you must give to God all that belongs to him.” And they were utterly stunned by Jesus’ words. Some of the Sadducees, a religious group that denied there was a resurrection of the dead, came to ask Jesus this question: “Teacher, the law of Moses teaches that if a man dies before he has children, his brother should marry the widow and raise up children for his brother’s family line. Now, there was a family with seven brothers. The oldest got married but soon died, and he had no children. The second brother married his oldest brother’s widow, and he also died without any children, and the third also. This repeated down to the seventh brother, none of whom had children. Finally, the woman died. So here’s our dilemma: Which of the seven brothers will be the woman’s husband when she’s resurrected from the dead, since they all were once married to her?” Jesus answered them, “You are mistaken because your hearts are not filled with the revelation of the Scriptures or the power of God. For when they rise from the dead, men and women will not marry, just like the angels of heaven don’t marry. Now, concerning the resurrection, haven’t you read in the Torah what God said to Moses at the burning bush? ‘I AM the living God, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is not God of the dead, but of the living, and you are all badly mistaken!”

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