Naturalism vs Supernaturalism (Mark 12:18–27)
Jul 26, 2026 · 34 min · 11 segments
Series: But I say to you...'
- Speakers
- SimonHost
Jul 26, 2026 · 34 min · 11 segments
Series: But I say to you...'
And it's actually a good choice because, as we heard in the reading a moment ago, we read that the Sadducees say there is no resurrection, which is why they were very sad, you see.
LAUGHTER Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I know, I know.
If you've heard that one before, it's an old childhood joke from my Sunday school days.
It's because I actually used it when I preached from this passage not so long ago in October last year when we were looking at Mark chapter 12.
Just as today we have, well, there's Holocaust deniers, there's climate change deniers.
They were resurrection deniers.
Now, that wasn't because they were anti-supernaturalist in our modern sense of that term, as if somehow they didn't believe in God.
Well, they did, like everybody else.
at that time.
I mean, atheism wasn't really a thing at all back then.
It's just that, yes, they didn't believe that God would raise the dead, or indeed that there was any life after physical death itself.
This life is all there is.
And so in many ways, they weren't different, were they, from many folk today who may or may not believe in God or some higher power or or some transcendent spiritual force or something, but basically a pretty materialist in their outlook on life.
That is, this life really is all there is.
Stuff is all there is.
Things you can see, that are real, that you can touch, and that you can have, and so on.
If your religion makes you happier in this miserable world, well, that's fine.
But don't expect that religion somehow will connect with anything real or meaningful at the end of the day.
Because in any case, when you're dead, you're dead and you're not coming back.
Even though we might hope that you'll sort of float around a bit somewhere watching the rest of us.
But nobody really knows.
Well, if that's perhaps something of what you might think or some of your friends think, you and the Sadducees would get on fine over a chat down the pub, except they were rather conservative, so it probably wouldn't have been down the pub.
And it's actually a good choice because, as we heard in the reading a moment ago, we read that the Sadducees say there is no resurrection, which is why they were very sad, you see.
LAUGHTER Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I know, I know.
If you've heard that one before, it's an old childhood joke from my Sunday school days.
It's because I actually used it when I preached from this passage not so long ago in October last year when we were looking at Mark chapter 12.
Just as today we have, well, there's Holocaust deniers, there's climate change deniers.
They were resurrection deniers.
Now, that wasn't because they were anti-supernaturalist in our modern sense of that term, as if somehow they didn't believe in God.
Well, they did, like everybody else.
at that time.
I mean, atheism wasn't really a thing at all back then.
It's just that, yes, they didn't believe that God would raise the dead, or indeed that there was any life after physical death itself.
This life is all there is.
And so in many ways, they weren't different, were they, from many folk today who may or may not believe in God or some higher power or or some transcendent spiritual force or something, but basically a pretty materialist in their outlook on life.
That is, this life really is all there is.
Stuff is all there is.
Things you can see, that are real, that you can touch, and that you can have, and so on.
If your religion makes you happier in this miserable world, well, that's fine.
But don't expect that religion somehow will connect with anything real or meaningful at the end of the day.
Because in any case, when you're dead, you're dead and you're not coming back.
Even though we might hope that you'll sort of float around a bit somewhere watching the rest of us.
But nobody really knows.
Well, if that's perhaps something of what you might think or some of your friends think, you and the Sadducees would get on fine over a chat down the pub, except they were rather conservative, so it probably wouldn't have been down the pub.
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.
