From Mark 12:18-27 / A “Tense” Situation – As for the question put to Jesus in this way, J. C. Ryle rightly notes: “let us remember that an infidel will always try to press us with the difficulties and abstruse things of religion, and especially with those which are connected with the world to come.”¹ People often try to skirt the great questions about their souls and their standing before God, by bringing up arcane and foolish issues, rather than taking the plain teaching of Scripture at face value. As with Jesus’ example, there is no need to go very far with such things. But note secondly how Jesus relies on the Scripture to the degree, that even the very tense used in Exodus 3 regarding Abraham – that God says “I am the God of Abraham”, not “I was” can be appealed to as authoritative. How do we know we can trust our Bibles? Because Jesus did. But that means we’ll really have to study it very carefully, not casually or haphazardly. If they could misconstrue a passage so easily – so can we. But the Word itself, is always reliable.

1 Ryle, J. C. Expository Thoughts on Mark. William Hunt, 1859, pp. 256–57.