Chetwynd Shared Ministry
October 22, 2017
Scripture: Matthew 22:15-22
Have you ever been at
a party where the conversation takes an uncomfortable turn? Maybe someone brings up politics and the room
becomes suddenly divided. Or maybe
someone is passing on gossip about another person – something embarrassing, something
that was meant to be a secret – and everyone in the room starts squirming.
The rules of society
say that there are certain topics that are not suitable for discussion in
polite company – politics, religion, money.
Well, I don’t think that Jesus got that memo. In todays reading from Matthew’s gospel,
Jesus proves, once again, that he can be the champion of awkward conversations
as he steers a question about money to include religion and politics as well.
For context, this
story comes immediately after the parable that we read together last week. This is all taking place in the last week of
Jesus’ life. He has left the region of
Galilee where he lived and taught, and he has traveled south with his disciples
to the city of Jerusalem. They entered
Jerusalem to shouts of “Hosanna! Save
us!” in the parade that we usually celebrate on Palm Sunday. Then the very next day, Jesus goes to the
temple in Jerusalem, the center-point of his religion, and he begins debating
with the religious leaders who were there.
When we come to
today’s reading, Jesus has told a couple of parables that have made his
listeners very uncomfortable. Parables
that suggested that maybe the religious leaders weren’t quite on track with
God’s vision for the world. And after Jesus
has told these parables, his listeners come forward with questions – questions
to try and trap Jesus; questions to try and trick him into saying something
that would be cause for arrest.
And so we have this
first question: is it lawful to pay
taxes to the emperor, or not?
OK – here come the
politics! Judea was, at that time, under
the rule of the Roman Empire.
Twenty-five some-odd years before this incident, Rome had imposed direct
rule on Judea resulting in fierce resentment from the Jewish people. One of the consequences of this Roman rule
was the imposition of a bunch of new taxes to be paid to Rome and the emperor.
Now Matthew tells us
that the people asking this question of Jesus were the Pharisees and the
Herodians. Here you have two groups of
people who were not normally friendly with each other, collaborating to have
Jesus arrested. A case of “the enemy of
my enemy is my friend.” Pharisees were
devout Jewish people. They would have
been against any tax required by Rome, as they recognized God as their ruler,
not the emperor. But the Herodians were
the supporters of Herod, the king who was a puppet of the Roman Empire. They would have been in favour of taxes being
paid to uphold the empire.
And so we have they
trying to trap Jesus in a Catch-22. If
Jesus says, “yes, it is lawful to pay taxes,” then the Pharisees would have
condemned him as a traitor to God. If
Jesus says, “no, it is not lawful to pay taxes,” then the Herodians could have
had him arrested for treason against Rome.
So we have political
intrigue and entrapment going on. But
Jesus recognizes the situation for what it is, and he wiggles his way out with
a non-answer. He shifts the conversation
from politics to religion. He asks his
questioners to take out a coin, which they do.
He asks them, whose picture is on this coin; and they reply “The
emperor’s.” And Jesus’ solution to their
question sounds simple – “Give back, therefore, to the emperor the things that
are the emperor’s; and to God the things that are God’s.”
Sounds like the
perfect answer, right? They can’t arrest
Jesus for treason because he hasn’t said “don’t pay your taxes”; yet at the
same time, the religious leaders can’t condemn him for blasphemy because he
hasn’t stated his support for the Roman Empire.
Clever Jesus. He seems to come out on top easily in this
battle of wits. In contemporary terms, I
picture this answer followed by a mic drop.
“Give to the emperor what is the emperor’s; give to God what is
God’s. Boom!” Walk away.
But is the answer
really as simple as it seems? I can’t
help but wonder if there isn’t more to Jesus’ answer – more that is
unsaid. How do we know what belongs to
the emperor and what belongs to God? Is
it possible to compartmentalize our lives like this?
If the coin in the
story seems to belong to the emperor because it had a picture of the emperor on
it, how can we tell what belongs to God?
Where can we see the picture or image of God?
Finally – there’s a
question that we might be able to start to answer. If we turn back to the beginning of the
bible, to the very first chapter of Genesis, the opening chapter of the Hebrew
scriptures, the only scriptures that Jesus would have known, we read a story
about God creating. I want to read
Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s telling of this story because it is so beautiful, and
because the pictures are beautiful too, I’m going to move forward so that
everyone can see them.
(read: Let
There Be Light[i])
In the words of the
author of Genesis, “God created humankind in his image; in the image of God he
created them; male and female he created them.”
This means that every single one of us here is created in the image of
God. Every single person on this planet
– it doesn’t matter your gender or your age or your religion or your sexual
orientation or your race or your language – every single person on this planet
bears the image of God.
And I wonder if maybe
we can take it one step further. As the
Genesis story tells us, God created the rest of creation – earth and sea and
sky, plants and animals. And I wonder
then if all of creation maybe bears the signature of its creator. A bit like you can hear the composer’s voice
in a composition, or you can see an artist’s style come through in a
painting. Can we see the image, the
signature, the reflection of God – maybe not directly, but indirectly – on
everything that God has created?
Jesus said, “Give back
to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and give back to God the
things that are God’s.” I then ask – is
there anything that is not God’s? If we
are to give back to God the things that are God’s, does this mean that we
should be giving everything to God?
Even that coin that
Jesus asked his questioners to produce – it had a picture of the Roman Emperor
on it. But that emperor is a person in
the image of God. Therefore, the coin
actually has an image of an image of God.
Follow my logic? Therefore, even
the Roman coin belongs to God by Jesus’ reasoning.
I think that there are
some pretty profound implications on our lives if we follow this
reasoning. Everything – all of creation
– belongs to God. As Desmond Tutu
phrased it in the book, people are supposed to, “enjoy the earth and take care
of it.” All of creation comes from God,
belongs to God, and bears God’s signature as the artist, so we ought to respect
all of creation accordingly.
And everything that we
might think that we own actually belongs to God. Look at your money (pull out Loonie) – look at this dollar coin – a picture of Queen
Elizabeth on one side – a picture of a person who bears the image of God – a
picture of a loon on the other side – another part of God’s creation. How I choose to spend this dollar coin
matters. Am I going to spend it in a way
that shows that I know it belongs to God, or in a way that ignores God?
And what about our
gifts and talents that we have been given by God – whether your gift is
teaching or music or baking or hospitality or leadership – all of these gifts belong
to God. Am I going to use my gifts and
talents in a ways that serve God and God’s plan for the world, or in ways that
ignore God?
And finally,
ourselves. You are created in the image
of God. You bear God’s image. And so does every other person on the planet.
And so does the way I treat myself – my
whole self, body mind and spirit, reflect the image of God within me? Does the way I treat other people reflect the
image of God within each of us; or does it ignore God?
And so it comes down
to the fact that every single thing that we do; every single decision that we
make, matters. If we believe that
everything and everyone – all of creation – bears the image of God, then how we
interact with everything and everyone is a reflection of how we interact with
God.
Give to the emperor
what is the emperor’s; and give to God what is God’s. Everything bears the image of God; and
everything belongs to God. How will we
live this out in our lives?
Let us pray:
Holy God –
we see your image wherever we turn –
on every person and on
every thing.
Your signature is on
all of creation,
like the signature of an artist.
Enable us, by the Holy
Spirit, to live our lives
in a way that honours you;
in a way that shows
that all creation
belongs to you,
and we are called
to be caretakers.
We pray this in the
name of Jesus Christ,
our teacher, and our Lord.
Amen.
[i] Desmond Tutu, Let There Be Light, illustrated by Nancy Tillman (Grand Rapids:
Zondervan, 2013).
(The church hall, set up for a potluck after worship today)
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