In the name of God ☩ Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Here in the United States, we have a complicated history with paying taxes. Taxes really were at the core of what led this nation to declare independence from England. The Stamp Act of 1765 and the Boston Tea Party are but two examples of the ways in which taxation led to the American Revolution. After all, “taxation without representation” was the rallying cry in the colonies. Though most of us want to have good roads and schools and want social services to be provided to those in need, far fewer of us actually enjoy paying taxes. There’s the issue of not always supporting every cause our tax dollars are spent on. We have loopholes that some people use to pay less than what most people would call their “fair share,” and with tax reform on the Congressional docket, the questions of what is necessary and what is just will be a topic of public discourse. And our current tax code is about 3,000 pages long. Yes, in every way, taxes are a complicated issue.
That was just as true in Jesus’ day as it is today. Even those who don’t know much about the Bible probably know the phrase from the King James translation: “Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.” There are three ways that we might understand that statement.
The first is to read Jesus’ statement as saying that the world is divided into different spheres, each of which makes demands on us. So, some people say that we have a duty to God and a duty to country. I hope that it’s obvious that this view is deficient. For one, it completely misses the point, but moreover, such a reading would go against the rest of the Bible. Throughout Scripture, we read that a relationship with God transforms our entire lives, not just parts of it. Furthermore, we have many examples of the fact that God is to be the top priority in our lives, so the idea that Jesus would say that obedience to another authority is required, and especially to Caesar, is preposterous. It simply doesn’t work to read Jesus’ words about rendering as quarantining our faith from other aspects of our lives.
The second way of interpreting this passage is to read it as Jesus turning the tables. Jesus says “Well, it looks like that coin belongs to Caesar, so go ahead and give it to him. But don’t forget that everything belongs to God.” Jesus takes the trap that was set for him and turns it on his opponents. Jesus, of course, has Genesis in mind when he makes his rebuttal. He remembers that “So God created humanity in his image, in the image of God he created them.” The coin might bear Caesar’s image, but all of humanity bears God’s image on it, including Caesar. This interpretation has been favored by our Christian tradition for centuries. We are all given so many things by God: life, love, and opportunities. As we often say in the church – all things come of thee, O Lord. This teaching of Jesus reminds us of the truth of that – all belongs to God.
The third way of interpreting this passage pays close attention to the details in the way in which Matthew presents the story. First of all, Matthew mentions that the people who are questioning Jesus are comprised of Pharisees and Herodians. Pharisees are a group we often hear about when it comes to confrontations with Jesus. Pharisees are the religious leaders of their day, as they controlled the Temple. Herodians though aren’t discussed often in the Bible, in fact, this is one of only three times they are ever mentioned, and historians don’t have much to add. But based on their name, we can assume they are supporters of Herod, who was the ruler under Caesar who oversaw the occupation of Israel.
The Jewish people didn’t generally like their Roman occupiers. This was their land, the Holy Land given to them by God, and these Romans had invaded their land, made them pay taxes to the Emperor, and introduced idolatry into their religion. So not only did the people not like giving up their income to Rome, but Rome was against everything they stood for as Jews.
But Jesus was a problem for the Pharisees. In teaching about God’s transformative justice and mercy, he was undermining their ability to control the narrative. Jesus was leading a reformation and rejuvenation of the faith that would diminish the power of the Pharisees. They were looking for ways to solve this Jesus problem. So they were willing to compromise their faith by working with the Herodians to try to trap Jesus. Either Jesus will have to go against the government and say that paying the tax isn’t required, or he will have to go against God and say that it’s okay to acquiesce to the Emperor who called himself God.
What makes this so insidious is the coin that is at the center of the story. Jesus asks for a coin, and notice that he has to ask for one because he wasn’t carrying one, which tells us something about where Jesus comes down on this issue. The coin has Caesar's image on it. This violates the commandment about not having any graven images and not having any gods before the Lord. The Pharisees have completely sold themselves out by collaborating with the Herodians.
When the Pharisees and Herodians approach Jesus and set the trap, they say “for you do not regard people with partiality.” That’s not a literal translation though – what the Greek actually says is “you do not look at people’s faces.” It means that Jesus spoke the truth, regardless of whom he was speaking with. He doesn’t look at your face to see how he should change his response, he just tells it like it is. We lose this in the English, but in the Greek of Matthew’s writing, Jesus’ response goes right to the heart of this when Jesus calls them “hypocrites.” In Greek, “hypocrite” was the word used for a stage-actor, someone who wore a mask so that you couldn’t see their true face. The insinuation is that Jesus is accused of not looking at faces, but he tells the Pharisees “Not only do I look at faces, but I see that yours are fake.”
So the third way that we can interpret this story is as a mirror. Jesus comes to us and says to each of us – Give to God what is God’s. Jesus doesn’t tidy up the problem of taxes for us, because this story is about so much more than taxes. Jesus doesn’t give us a rule by which we can say “Okay, I’ve paid by 25% in taxes, and I’ve given by 10% to the church, so the rest is all mine.” That would be tidying up the question of taxes. Instead, what Jesus leaves us with is a test. Jesus tells us to take off the masks of how we want to be seen, put away the disguises, stop the charades. What things have we associated with that corrupt our faith? When do we push aside our faith and say “this is more about politics than religion?” If you thought taxes were complicated, what Jesus asks us takes it to the next level.
It’s a searing question that we are left with – are we giving to God the things that belong to God? This is why stewardship is so important – we are asked, once a year at the minimum, to sit down and consider how much we are giving to God. While it’s not generally fun to fill out your tax return, it’s not that hard to do. But rendering to God our lives, that’s a big ask.
A few months after our youngest daughter was born, my wife went back to work part-time. That’s what we planned for. But after a year, the plan was for her to return to full-time work. But the company she worked for wasn’t able to get her back to a full-time caseload. She’s just started a full-time job with a new company, but for most of this year, things have been tight financially. We made it through, that’s what savings accounts and rainy day funds are for, and I’m grateful that we had that buffer. Now I’m not at all sharing this with you to make you think that I need a raise. Rather, I think it’s important that you know how your priest approaches stewardship, and struggles with it as well.
When things were tight, I felt the financial stress. It made me want to pull back on giving. But I didn’t because I knew that if I let fear control my financial decisions that I’d have a really hard time wrestling that control back. I know that if I start giving to my fears more than I give to God that I’m going in the wrong direction. Each year, about this time of year, we sit down and we figure what 10% of our income will be for the next year. We pledge about half of that number to St. Luke’s and the other 5% we give to other charities that we believe are doing the work of the Gospel – organizations like Rowan Helping Ministries, Episcopal Relief and Development, and the seminary that I attended.
Rendering to God is hard, I know that and I struggle with it. When I think about how much we give each year, I think of the vacations that it would fund, I think of the student loan debt that could be paid down, I think of the gadgets I could buy. But by pledging and giving 10% of our income and by making some sacrifices to do so, I am reminded that all I have comes from God, and if I try to hang onto more than I really need, I’m putting on a mask that prevents me from coming face to face with God. I know that if I don’t exercise my control over money by giving it away that my money will have control over me. And I know that Jesus was right when he said earlier in Matthew that we cannot serve two masters, we cannot serve God and wealth.
Sometimes I do think about what some of that money that I give away could be spent on. I know that Scripture says that we should be “cheerful givers,” but I’ll confess that sometimes I’m more of a “reluctant giver.” But I know that I need to give. I need that boundary around money so that I’m not tempted to start worshiping it more than I do God.
And I trust that Jesus was right when he said that we ought to give to God what is made in God’s image. God sees past the masks that I put on – past the ways that I can rationalize giving less, past the ways that I want to present myself, past the fears that I have. God sees me as a child who is lovingly made in God’s image. The more we orient ourselves to this love out of which we are created, the more deeply we will know this love. None of us are perfect, giving all of our selves to God is always going to be a struggle. But it’s a struggle worth having as it draws us deeper into God’s love and peace. This week, old Jesus’ words up as a mirror – “Give to God the things that are God’s.”
