The text this morning is from the Gospel according to Matthew, the 22nd chapter:
Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone’s opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances. Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” 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.” Then he said to them, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” When they heard it, they marveled. And they left him and went away.Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
What does your god demand of you? Does he demand your money? Obedience? Does he demand your time? Your prayers? Does he demand your interest? Your excitement? What does your god demand of you? Does he demand your attention? Does he demand your addiction? Does he demand your sin? Does he demand your corruption? Your degradation?
What does your god demand of you? That’s really what Jesus is talking about at the end of the passage for this day. What does your god demand of you? But He’s not, and I’m not asking, what does God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit demand, what does God, the only true God in the world demand, what does God, the creator of heaven and earth demand, but the question asks what does your god demand. You see, we have our gods, and they often beat out the one, true God for primacy in our hearts.
Our gods are idols of our own creation, or they are gods that suck us in, playing on our fears and emotions, or they are gods that others trick us into appeasing. We all have these gods. John Calvin once said something along the lines of our hearts are little idol factories, churching out a new god to replace itself all the time. We all have these gods.
We’ve been studying a little bit of the time of the Reformation lately. The pope was such a god as this. In fact, in the Roman church, even still today, their theology teaches that, in order to be saved, you must submit to the Bishop of Rome, the pope. Think about that. In order to gain the eternal reward promised to you by Christ in your Baptism, you have to submit to the Roman pope. Their theology has set the office of the pope up as a mini-god.
Or maybe your god is influence. You’re always worrying about how to get more. You like it when people look up to you, you want people to respect you, you try to think of ways to get people on your side. Then you start working behind the scenes to drive things your way. You gossip and slander, bending the truth about others, in order to bring people to your side against whatever you perceive as a threat.
Or maybe your god is your patriotism. You can’t imagine that this isn’t God’s chosen country to bring His light to the world. You’re American, do or die, and it doesn’t matter what else happens. It doesn’t matter that we subsidize the murder of the unborn, it doesn’t matter that we murder civilians in other countries, it doesn’t matter that we’re 19 trillion dollars in debt, it doesn’t matter that our schools are both not educating our children for life and indoctrinating them with amorality. You support the country, you wave that flag, because, man, you’re proud to be an American.
Or maybe your god is your ethnic persuasion. Your identity is tied up completely in the way that you look, in the color of your skin, against what other people look like, sound like, act like. You are more interested in judging people and promoting your agenda than you are in seeing the value that they have because each and every person is made to bear the image of God Himself.
You see, you could have any god. It could be these, or power, sex, entertainment, security, even you yourself. Really, our sinful hearts are tempted to make anything into an idol. And that is what Caesar is and was. Caesar actually had an entire cult that grew up around that office. Remember that the Caesar is a position in the Roman Empire; it isn’t necessarily a hereditary office, it wasn’t always in the family, but it depended on the person and the confirmation by the Roman Senate.
Yet, people still looked at the occupier of the office as a type of god. They worshipped him through his service to the Empire. The Imperial Cult is hard to describe, yet the truth is that the Caesar demanded certain things from his citizens, even citizens of the nations he conquered. He demanded their obedience, he demanded their worship, he demanded their service, their honor, their might, their money.
The god of Caesar demanded much of the people underneath him, even to the point of martyring many Christians in the first and second centuries because they would not offer their pinch of incense in worship of the emperor. That is why the Pharisees thought they could trick Jesus. Bringing the Herodians, those people who wanted to keep Herod, another puppet of Caesar, in power, they thought they could maybe trick Jesus so that He would commit treason against Rome, or blasphemy against God and Israel.
It really should have been either one, yet Jesus gave the only answer they didn’t expect. He told them to give to Caesar the things that are his and to God the things that are His. Now, as Christians, we certainly understand that all things are the Lord’s, even those things that Caesar would think are his. But, that’s not what Jesus is saying. He’s not saying, give Caesar your money and God everything else.
He’s saying, what does your God demand of you? If Caesar demands taxes then pay taxes. If he demands obedience to him, give him obedience. Give him everything unless it contradicts God’s Word. Remember that every authority is owed our obedience. We all learned that in the fourth commandment, to honor your father and mother. We honor our government officials, the police, the people who spend their lives in service to others through leadership because it is ultimately God who put them in that position, whether they choose to serve faithfully or evilly.
What does God demand of you? Certainly, He demands that we honor those in authority. He demands that we honor Him. That we listen to His Word. That we don’t commit adultery or murder or lie or covet. God demands much. And He gives us much even without meeting His demands.
The demands of God are His Law, and we each fail with it. Every breaking of one of the Ten Commandments is a breaking of the entire Law. We kill ourselves trying to keep the Law, and then the Law kills us. That’s the way of the world, isn’t it? We work and work and work, and yet it really doesn’t matter. Things happen, things don’t. Tragedies occur, they don’t. People die, some live. Money’s made, money’s lost. As much as we try to work, try to be good, try to be obedient, it all ends up kinda letting us down.
Life always will, though. You can have a good life, but there will always be disappointments, disasters, and defeats. That’s because, while we are still in this life, there is always sin crouching at the door. And because we, and all people, continue to sin, and we sin because we are sinners, there is no other choice, evil things will continue until Christ returns for His final judgment. You can pay your taxes, you can listen to the police, you can go to the Church gladly and joyfully to hear God’s Word, but the reality is that you cannot meet God’s demands all the time and in every way, and so you, and me, and all people, will die.
So, what hope is there for us? I mean, if we want Caesar off our back, we give him the taxes. That’s what he wants, that’s what we owe him, because we want to obey him, and Caesar doesn’t come after us. But if you have no hop of obeying God perfectly, where is your hope?
It is in Jesus Christ Himself. God indeed demands perfect obedience to His Word. You must obey. Yet, God also knows that we cannot. So, in sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to this place, God made a way for you. God made a way through the Son taking on human flesh, living a perfect life, dying sacrificially for you, and being raised from the dead. This is how you have hope.
Through the life, death, and resurrection of the Christ, God declares not that you have done everything perfectly, but declares that it is as if you did everything perfectly. He makes you righteous and holy by counting all of Christ’s righteous and holy good works toward your merit. And since Christ was without sin, He was perfectly obedient, you have every good work you will ever need. You need nothing else if you have Christ.
How do you give to God what is God’s? Well, what does He demand of you? The Law? Certainly. Yet, Christ obeyed this for you, not so that you’re free to go and do whatever you want, but so that you don’t need to fear when you keep it imperfectly.
It’s like this. You find yourself in a grocery store. An older woman drops everything she’s carrying. What do you do? Well, if you’re like most people, you’ll get down and help her pick everything up. You should. That’s the right thing to do. But what if you miss an item, something she needed, and you both walk away never realizing it. Is that a sin? Well, maybe not, I don’t really know, but you didn’t do a perfect job. You left it unfinished, not because of your intent, but because it happened. Sin is like that. It taints everything that we do so that if do things, think things, say things, it’s always imperfect, incomplete, unfinished. It’s sinful. It removes you from obedience.
Yet, if you are in Christ, if you have been declared righteous through His blessed sacrifice for you, then you will not have to worry about fearing His condemnation for that sin. If you were under the Law only, I imagine that you might be paralyzed with fear for getting something wrong. You’d never want to do anything for fear of doing the wrong thing. Yet, in Christ, you can bend down to help that old woman, not fearing that you’re going to do it wrong, not fearing that you might have missed something, that you might mess something up. You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you, for you need have no fear of God.
We should not actively try to disobey the Law of God; we should actively try to keep it all. We should want to act, think, and speak as holy as Christ has declared us to be. Yet, when we fail, we still give to God what is His. We give Him our sins in our confession. We give Him His praise in our prayers and hymns. We give Him His glory as He serves us in Word and Sacrament. We give to God what He demands of us in Christ: to believe in Him. The amazing thing is that God provides even that for us, He gives to us faith to trust in Him. That faith clings to Him and holds Him dear.
Our gods will always print their likeness on what it is they want. The pope becomes the celebrity figure because he wants you to see him and submit. The money prints itself into your wallet and demands its increase. Caesar demands your gold and prints his likeness on it so that it can only go back to him. Yet God imprints His image, His likeness, on your heart. He wants you for Himself, and you, by faith, want Him. And you have Him, for you indeed have Christ, His life, His death, His resurrection, and you should marvel at that. You are God’s, for you are made His likeness. Give to Him yourself, in Word and Sacrament, and marvel that He loves you. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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