Misinterpretations often detach this verse from its context of debating resurrection, viewing it merely as God's ongoing remembrance or covenant faithfulness to deceased patriarchs without implying their continued existence, or as proof of immediate immortality of the soul separate from bodily resurrection, whereas Jesus specifically counters Sadducean skepticism by arguing that God's present tense identification necessitates the patriarchs' living state post-death.
Mark 12:26
King James Version (1769)
26 And as touching the dead, that they rise: have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?
Jesus uses God's self-identification in Exodus as 'the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob' to prove the resurrection of the dead to the Sadducees, who denied it; since God is the God of the living, not the dead, the patriarchs must still live, affirming eternal life beyond physical death and the future resurrection.