Tuesday, December 20, 2022

 

Tuesday, December 20, 2022


Psalms 114; 115

Isaiah 19:16-20:6

Mark 12:13-27


Observance: Fourth Tuesday in Advent


“Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”


Politics is a funny business. So many serious-looking men and women with serious looks on their faces making serious statements. Once every few years, a whole load of opinions come out of the woodwork and battle it out in an attempt to convince everyone that only one opinion is the correct one. It is a bit of fun to get swept up in the carnival, but like most things, too much can be bad for our health.


Some people try to enforce their political opinion as it being God’s will: this is where the Pharisees were coming from. They wanted Jesus to affirm their politics, that the Roman Empire was bad for the people. The Herodians, on the other hand, wanted Jesus to affirm their position, that the Roman Empire was good for business. But we read that they are working together, because ultimately they just want this Jesus fellow to pick one side so that He can be arrested by the other. Such is the true face of those who claim God to be on their side of politics.


Jesus transcends this political divide. In the NRSV, He is recorded as asking about the “face” on the coin, while in the NIV translation, He asks whose “image” the coin bears. The word in the Greek is closely related to the same word Paul uses when he writes about Jesus being the “image” of the invisible God, and how our pilgrimage transforms us into the “image” of Christ. Most interestingly is how closely related this word is to an appearance in the Greek translation of the Old Testament (which would have been the Old Testament Jesus quoted from). We humans are made in the “image” of God just as the coin bears the “image” of Caesar.


Ultimately, Jesus wants our politics to hold a cosmic perspective. Our guiding rule should be to remember that even Caesar is made in the image of God; that even Caesar bears God’s image and therefore everything Caesar owns originally came from, and will go back to, God. Caesar’s responsibility is, therefore, to follow God’s law. Often, governments will not follow God’s law. But this doesn’t change our ultimate political opinion: that God is in control, and He loves us very much, and knows what is best for us.




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