Trinity 23
Dear friends in Christ. Our text from today’s Gospel brings us to Tuesday of Holy Week, the week in which our Lord would be betrayed, put on trial, condemned to death and die on the cross. A few days before, Jesus entered Jerusalem in the triumph of Palm Sunday. The rest of the week Jesus is preaching—and much of His preaching was very pointed, pointed against the religious leaders of the Jews. And they knew it! Shortly before today’s text St. Matthew records [Mt. 21.45-46]: Now when the chief priests and Pharisees heard His parables, they perceived He was speaking of them. But when they sought to lay hands on Him, they feared the multitudes because they took Him for a prophet. That’s why our text begins: Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle {Jesus] in his words. They were trying to put Jesus in a no win situation with their question: Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?
If Jesus answers that it is lawful to pay taxes to the Roman authorities, then Jesus would be hated by the common people as one who destroys the Law and as an opponent of religious liberty. Not only would they see that Jesus says it’s OK for the government to come and take money out of their pockets via taxes but they also thought that as God’s people they should give their firstfruits and tithes to the Lord and so it would not be right to give taxes to an earthly ruler; by giving taxes to the earthly ruler they would be making the ruler the equal of God.
If Jesus would say that that it is not lawful to pay taxes to the Roman authorities then they could drag him up before the Roman courts on charges of sedition and so He would be put to death as a rebel.
But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said, “Caesar’s.” That coin is a vital part of this account. As we examine our text we will see that by that coin Jesus shows the Jews their hypocrisy and their sin and at the same time that coin points us to a right / proper way of looking at our relationship with God.
1. “Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. They readily had at hand a Roman coin. The religious leaders didn’t say that it would take a while before they could scrounge one up. The Roman coin was in common use. That simple fact means that the Jews already accepted Roman authority over them. In our country, for example, we don’t use the British Pound. Why not? Because we don’t recognize the British government as the one having authority over us. The Jews bringing this common Roman coin to Jesus is Jesus pointing out and denouncing the hypocrisy of the Jews confronting Him—the status quo is that by their actions they already accept Roman rule, Caesar, His coin. They didn’t see their hypocrisy/ sin. They only wanted to try to get Jesus into trouble.
They didn’t get the point Jesus is making. Isn’t that the way sin so often works in our lives? We don’t recognize it. Our sin blinds us—even to the preaching of God’s Law. We very easily see the sin in others but not our own sin. Our sinful heart deceives us—like the Lord says through the prophet [Jer 17.9]: The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? That’s why the Lord has to come to us in His holy word of Law to show us our sin and accuse us of our sin. That was the result of His encounter in our text with the Jews: When they heard it, they marveled. And they left him and went away. The vital thing for us to learn here is to hear and make a point of listening closely to God’s holy Law—He is speaking to us in it, accusing/ showing us our sin so that we can recognize it and repent of it, that is sorrow over it and cling to the forgiveness God gives us in Jesus.
When St. Luke introduces our account, the Holy Spirit tells us something else [Lk 20.20]: So they watched Him, and sent spies who pretended to be righteous, that they might seize on His words, in order to deliver Him to the power and authority of the governor. The point is this: the Jews—Christ’s enemies—could not overcome Jesus so they turned to Rome’s power. In other words, the Jews were in cahoots with the Romans; they used the Romans for their purposes. And Jesus called them on that, too, as He had them bring Him a Roman coin. Not only did they accept Rome’s rule—as evidenced by using their money—but they would work together with the Romans and in just a few days after this event use the Romans to kill Jesus. By asking them to bring Him that coin, Jesus is letting them know that He knows what they are planning; He is foretelling His betrayal, His arrest by the Jews and His crucifixion by the Romans.
And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said, “Caesar’s.” The Jews—who wanted to look so holy/ pious—were collaborating with the Romans. They had in their common usage the coin with a pagan image of Caesar. Not only was it the image of Caesar, but the coin had the inscription: Tiberius Caesar Augustus, Son of Divine Augustus; or put differently—they were using the coin with an image of one claiming to be the son of a god—Son of Divine Augustus.
Do you see what Jesus is doing here? He is preaching Law to these Jews—by using that coin they are not only recognizing Rome’s authority over them, but by that they are engaged in a not very subtle idolatry. Here they have the very God Himself, Jesus, in their midst and what are they doing? They are rejecting Him; they are throwing their lot in with the one on the coin, the one claiming to be, but who isn’t, the son of God. Shortly before this the High Priest, Caiaphas, counselled [Jn. 18.14] the Jews that it was expedient that one man should die for the people rather than the nation go under. On Good Friday these religious leaders would work the people up into a frenzy [Mt. 27.25; Jn 19.15]: His blood be on us and on our children…. Away with Him! Crucify Him! … We have no king but Caesar!
Jesus was rejected and hated Rome was accepted. The sin of idolatry triumphed and led to its ultimate end: the rejection and getting rid of the true God. By having them bring this coin, and having them look at the image and inscription on it of one claiming to be a true god, Jesus was trying to get the leaders of the people here to recognize their sin—in particular their sin of idolatry. They were serving some other god—be it their position, their wealth, their honor before the people, their earthly/ political ideas of a Savior, etc.—and rejecting the true God. When they literally had before them the very God Himself, Jesus, and the coin—and all that it meant and represented—they chose the coin; another god.
Jesus is standing before us today: let each of us search out our own heart and life for anything, anything, that we put on par with or even above the true God. What do we look to/ set our hearts on? Is it money? Is it what I spend my money on instead of giving some back to the Lord? Is it what I do or where I am instead of being in God’s house, hearing His word, receiving His body and blood for the forgiveness of sin? Is it something like politics that under the guise of caring for our nation is something seemingly good? Is it my personal comfort and ease?
Dear Christian, listen to God’s voice in His holy Law calling us to examine our hearts and to repentance—just like Jesus was doing to the people as He had them bring Him the coin. The 1st Commandment is very clear: fearing, loving and trusting in the holy Triune God above all things—no matter what. Where we see that we fall short—and we will—let us recognize our sin, sorrow over it, and in faith go to the Lord to receive His forgiveness to us in Christ.
2. Our text is not only a call to repentance of sins against the 1st Commandment but it is also a lovely reminder to us as to who we are as Christians. That we see also in Jesus’ words: “Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” But here let us see ourselves as the coin. A coin has an image on it. When God first created humanity —Adam and Eve—He created them in His image; it was a spiritual likeness. It meant a perfect, blissful knowledge of God, a perfect righteousness and true holiness of life; it meant knowing the will of the Lord and doing it. But by the fall into sin of our first parents, Adam and Eve, they and all their descendants—you and me—lost that image of God—that perfect knowledge and love of the Lord.
Much like an old coin that has been around many years, passing through many hands and vending machines, the image fades so you may hardly be able to recognize it. When we come/ are born into this world that image of God is gone. We are born sinners and enemies of God. But, dear Christian, what has God done for us? He has restored His image in us by bringing us to faith. For most of us, that happened when we were baptized as babies and God, in baptism, gave us the gift of faith. Now as Christians, we know God rightly: as our dear loving God and Savior; our hearts are filled with joy and happiness in Him and His good and gracious gifts to us; led and empowered by His Holy Spirit we strive, out of love and thanksgiving, to do His will and walk in the paths of righteousness. But because we still have our old sinful nature the image of God will never be perfect for us. We will still sin; we will have our weaknesses; we will never know and love God perfectly. But, still, dear Christian, like a coin, God has in baptism again stamped His image on us. We are God’s coin; His image has been stamped on us. As Christians, we know the One Whose image we bear. Not only is His image stamped on us but He dwells within His dear Christians. That’s why, led and empowered by His Holy Spirit, we fight against sin and strive to do His holy will. Will we always be successful in our fight against sin and temptation? Hardly! Often that image of God is so worn down by our sin that it is hardly visible. So does God then cast us aside to be melted down in the fires of hell? No! He reclaims us and stamps His image on us once again in the holy absolution—forgiving us our sin and giving us/ clothing us with the righteousness of Christ, who comes to us and gives us His very body and blood, joining us with Himself.
When Jesus here says “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” the greater “rendering” is what we give God. Our lives are not divided into two realms/ domains: the sacred and the secular, where we can compartmentalize our lives. Instead, what belongs to and to God the things that are God’s? Everything! As Christians we recognize that everything we are and have belong to God—even the highest things: our heart, faith, love, hope, confidence, prayer, praise, etc. Even, for example, the obedience we render to Caesar/ the state is because we recognize that it is God’s representative; it’s there by God’s authority. Like Luther explains with the 4th Commandment: because we fear, love and trust in God above all things, that’s why we then honor, serve, love and cherish not only parents but all in authority over us, like government.
Show me the coin for the tax… Whose likeness and inscription is this? What glorious words of our Lord. They not only warn us to watch our hearts and lives to be on guard against sin, which is so insidious that we are often blind to it—especially the sin of idolatry; but they also remind us that by His grace we are God’s coins, bearing His image, and in love and thanksgiving for His grace to us, empowered by Him, we give ourselves totally to Him. INJ AMIHb