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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Maybe something like this has happened to you: you are in line at the counter or drive‑thru of a coffee shop (or some other place), and, when you are ready to pay, you find out that the person in front of you has paid for you. In the spirit of the so-called “pay it forward” movement, you and I are not “supposed to” just enjoy the treat but to pay for the order of the person next in line, what is usually called “paying it forward”. The expression “pay it forward” apparently goes back to Lily Hardy Hammond’s 19‑16 book In the Garden of Delight, but the idea of “paying something forward” is said to go back to the ancient Greek dramatist Menander and to come through people such as Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson, and former The Ohio State University football coach Woody Hayes (Wikipedia).
This past week someone whom our congregation’s Titus Fund has helped said something to me about the Bible calling for us to “pay it forward”, but that is not quite what we hear, for example, in today’s Gospel Reading. Today’s Gospel Reading refers to “rendering” (or “paying back”), both to the government and to God, the things that are theirs, such as those things identified by having their respective images and inscriptions. This morning we reflect on the Gospel Reading under the theme “Giving the Image of God”.
Today’s Gospel Reading picks up right where last week’s Gospel Reading left off: on Tuesday of Holy Week, as Jesus continued teaching in the Temple Courts, and now began a series of confrontations with the various factions of the Judaism of His day. As we heard, disciples of the Pharisees, who were ardent nationalists, and Herodians, who were supporters of the Romans, together first falsely flattered Jesus and then tried to entangle Jesus in His talk about paying the Roman poll tax, which was applied to everyone from age 12 or 14 up to age 65 (McNeile cited by Rienecker and Rogers). In this case, presumably if Jesus had said to pay the taxes, then the Pharisees could have said that Jesus was not a supporter of their country’s sovereignty, and, if Jesus had said not to pay the taxes, then the Herodians could have said that Jesus was an insurrectionist, someone who was trying to throw off the government. Instead, Jesus marvelously eludes their effort to entangle Him by saying to “render” to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to “render” to God the things that are God’s, such as those things identified by having their respective images and inscriptions.
Brothers and sisters often can lose sight of just whose toy or book something is, especially when it belongs to the family and an older sibling may have had exclusive use of it for a while before a younger sibling (or siblings) came along. But, adults are little different. We earn money with our jobs or draw out Social Security money, at least some of which we paid in, and we can easily think that all of it, along with the things that we buy, and our bodies themselves are ours. We lose sight of from where things come and to where thing should go. We may complain about taxes by every level of government, while we without expressing appreciation enjoy the benefits of every level of government. We may complain about challenges to our level of giving at church, while we with little thanks rely on the forgiveness of sins dispensed through the church. Money with its images of dead presidents and Washington, D.C., landmarks should go to every level of government, and we ourselves created in the image of God should go to God (Genesis 1:27).
Of course, human kind was created in the image and likeness of God, reflecting His attributes and having our intellect and will rightly disposed toward Him, but we at least partially lost that image of God with our first parents’ fall into sin (see Pieper, I:515-523). Like the disciples of the Pharisees and the Herodians, we might put up an outward appearance of sincerity and piety, but by nature also we are hypocrites, with hearts and inner beings corrupt to the core. What the disciples of the Pharisees and the Herodians said, ironically, is true: Jesus is not swayed by appearances but knows our malice and sinful nature (confer Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 22:15-16, 213). Beyond questions of governmental taxes and church giving, there are countless other ways that we sin, any one of which sins, apart from faith in Jesus Christ, alone merits death here in time and eternal punishment in hell. But, as Jesus called the disciples of the Pharisees and the Herodians to repent of their sin (Roehrs-Franzmann, ad loc Matthew 22:15-40, 35), so God calls us: to turn in sorrow from our sin, to trust God to forgive our sin, and to want to do better than to keep on sinning. When enabled by God we so repent, then God forgives our sin—all our sin, whatever it may be—for the sake Jesus, Who perfectly bears the image of God and, in a sense, again gives us that image, as we are recreated in it.
The disciples of the Pharisees and the Herodians asked Jesus a law question: is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not, and Jesus gave them a law answer: render to Caesar and to God. The primary focus in the Gospel Reading, at least on the surface, is on what we should or should not do, not on what God has done for us, although that is arguably there also, for example, in Jesus’s mention of the things that are God’s that have been graciously given to us, even if only as a trust for our uses according to His purposes. At the top of the list of the things that God has graciously given us are the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation that we receive through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ, true God and true man, Who died on the cross for us, in part as a result of a false report to Pontius Pilate of what Jesus said in today’s Gospel Reading (Luke 20:22; 23:2).
By Divine inspiration, St. Paul writes to the Colossians about how Jesus is the image of God the Father, equal to Him, and how in Jesus we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (Colossians 1:13-15), and likewise St. Paul writes to the Corinthians about how Christ is the image of God, from whom shines the light of the Gospel (2 Corinthians 4:4). Unlike the first Adam from the dust of the earth, Jesus Christ, the second Adam was a life-giving spirit from heaven, and in Him, St. Paul says, we bear the image of both man and God (1 Corinthians 15:45-49). In a sense, “Christ is given us as the image of God by which we may know what God wills and does” (Kittel, TDNT 2:395-396). In Christ we put on a new redeemed and sanctified nature, renewed after the image of God (Colossians 3:10), through His Word and Sacraments.
First, at the Baptismal Font, we are recreated in the image of God, as God Himself inscribes His Name on us. In Holy Baptism we are born from above by water and the Spirit and so enabled to enter the Kingdom of God (John 3:3, 5). Then, individual Holy Absolution returns us to our baptismal grace as those whom God has sent with His Spirit and authority forgive the sins we know and feel in our hearts, which we privately confess to them (John 20:21-23). And finally, in the Sacrament of the Altar, we eat the true Body of our Lord Jesus Christ under the bread, and we drink His true Blood under the wine, for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. Here, in the words of a psalmist, we lift up the cup of salvation and call on the Name of the Lord—what that psalmist says we should “render” to the Lord for all His benefits to us (Psalm 116:12-13). God was and is under no obligation to give us anything, but He nevertheless did and does so through His Word and Sacraments out of His love, mercy, and grace. In turn, we are moved by God to fulfill the obligation that our Gospel‑created and empowered new nature willingly and joyfully keeps, giving back to Him in our offerings to and all that we do for the church, as well as by paying our taxes (confer Romans 13:7; 1 Peter 2:17), supporting our families, and helping our neighbors in need.
Congress is wrestling with a new tax plan and budget for the next year, as our congregation is wrestling with giving projections and its budget for the next year. In keeping with both Jesus and St. Paul, who spoke and wrote under rulers that were far more heinous, the Rev. Dr. Luther correctly writes that our obedience to the government does not depend on its quality, whether it has its office and rules justly or unjustly, or even taxes intolerably (1526 Sermon on Mt 22:15‑22, cited by Plass, #1803, 591). We obey the government in all things, perhaps someday even paying taxes on usually-exempt church properties (Luther, To the Council of the City of Stettin [1523], AE 49:26), unless the government commands something contrary to God’s Word (Acts 5:29; confer 4:19). God uses governments today, as He used the pagan government of Cyrus in today’s Old Testament Reading (Isaiah 45:1-7), for the benefit of His Church. And, God uses our offerings of our first fruits, as He used the Thessalonians gifts to support the believers elsewhere in today’s Epistle Reading (1 Thessalonians 1:1-10), for the benefit of His Church in this and every place.
Ultimately, the Triune God’s giving us His image originally in creation and again in redemption and sanctification, moves us to give back to Him and so, in a sense, we do “pay it forward” to others. Of course, our giving back (or “paying forward”) has to be rightly ordered—we can hardly give everything we have even to the church, much less to a homeless person we might encounter—and with daily repentance and faith we live in God’s forgiveness—for our failures to give back rightly, as for all our sin. As we sang in the Introit (Psalm 121:1-4, 7-8; antiphon v.5), the Lord is our keeper: He keeps us from all evil; He keeps our lives; He keeps our goings out and our comings in, from this forth and forevermore.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +