Luke 20:6-41

⁶And if we say it was just human, everybody will stone us for they're sure John was a prophet.”

⁷So they answered, “We don't know where it came from.”

⁸Jesus replied, “Then I won't tell you by whose authority I do what I do.”

⁹Then he began to tell the people a story: “Once there was a man who planted a vineyard, leased it to some farmers, and went to live in another country for a long while.

¹⁰At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenant farmers to collect his share of the crop, but the farmers beat the servant and sent him away with nothing.

¹¹So the owner sent another servant, but they beat him too and treated him shamefully, and sent him away with nothing.

¹²So he sent a third servant, but they wounded him and threw him out.

¹³The owner of the vineyard asked himself, ‘What shall I do? I know, I'll send my son whom I love. Perhaps they will respect him.’

¹⁴But when they saw him coming, the farmers said to themselves, ‘This is the owner's heir. Let's kill him! That way we can take his inheritance.’

¹⁵They threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. Now what will the owner of the vineyard do to them?

¹⁶He will come and kill these farmers and let others have the vineyard.” When they heard the story, they said, “May this never happen!”

¹⁷But Jesus looked at them and said, “Then why is it written in the Scriptures, ‘The stone the builders rejected has now become the chief cornerstone’?

¹⁸Anyone who falls on that stone will be broken in pieces; anyone it falls upon will be crushed.”

¹⁹Immediately the religious teachers and the chief priests wanted to arrest him because they realized that the story Jesus told was aimed at them, but they were afraid of what the people would do.

²⁰Watching for an opportunity they sent spies who pretended to be sincere. They tried to catch Jesus out in something he said so they could hand him over to the power and authority of the governor.

²¹They said, “Teacher, we know that you speak and teach what is good and right, and that you're not swayed by the opinions of others. You truly teach the way of God.

²²So should we pay taxes to Caesar or not?”

²³But Jesus saw through their trickery, and said to them,

²⁴“Show me a coin—a denarius. Whose image and inscription is on it?” “Caesar's,” they answered.

²⁵“Then give back to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give back to God what belongs to God,” he told them.

²⁶They weren't able to trap him by what he told the people. They were stunned at his reply, and fell silent.

²⁷Then some of the Sadducees, who deny the resurrection, came to Jesus with this question:

²⁸“Teacher,” they began, “Moses gave us a law that if a married man dies leaving a wife without children, then his brother should marry the widow and have children for his dead brother.

²⁹Once there were seven brothers. The first had a wife, and died without having children.

³⁰The second

³¹and then the third brother also married her. In the end all seven brothers married her, and then died without having children.

³²Finally the wife died too.

³³Now whose wife will she be in the resurrection, since all seven brothers had married her?”

³⁴“Here in this age people marry and are given in marriage,” Jesus explained.

³⁵“But those who are considered worthy to share in the age to come and the resurrection from the dead don't marry or are given in marriage.

³⁶They can't die any longer; they're like the angels and are children of God since they're children of the resurrection.

³⁷But on the question of whether the dead are raised, even Moses proved this when he wrote about the burning bush, when he calls the Lord, ‘the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’

³⁸He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him they all are alive.”

³⁹Some of the religious teachers responded, “That was a good answer, Teacher.”

⁴⁰After this no one dared to ask him any more questions.

⁴¹Then Jesus asked them, “Why is it said that Christ is the son of David?