The people who went to question Jesus probably had no idea there was an answer to their question other than ‘yes’ or ‘no’. I’m sure they were surprised with the statement, “render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. Those people were in a great position to gain some insights if they truly meant and believed what they said to Jesus –we know you are truthful – you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth – you do not regard a person’s status and you aren’t concerned with others opinions. All that along with Jesus’ answer was capable of bringing insight about Jesus, however we don’t know if that happened.
What do we do? Well, we give to Caesar although we call Caesar the government. Basically we pay taxes even if it is rather grudgingly. We also give much more to our Caesar than our taxes; we give our Caesar the power to make, or not make, many, many decisions that affect our lives and how we live.
When Bill Clinton became president health care was the big issue and 16 years later the issue is still around. Immigration reform has been talked about for a long time and there is no change. Those are but two issues that reflect our (my) values, how we and every one has the right to live. Do we believe everyone has a right to health care? Is it Ok to watch immigrant and refugee families suffer and be split apart as we hold up our law but not their humanity.
Seldom, if ever, do we give our Caesar our opinions and state our values. Minimum wage legislation was formed to guarantee all workers a wage by which they could support themselves and their families. That surely isn’t possible today. We need to decide whether or not, taking someone’s life as a penalty for their action is not really sanctioned murder. It seems that way to me. Our prisons do not give our prisoners an opportunity to change their lives; they just house them for a time.
When the Israelites entered the Promised Land, they each received a parcel of land on which to sustain themselves. Along with that was God’s statement of caring for the widow, the orphan and the stranger in their midst. That everyone had what they needed to sustain their lives was not a matter of charity. It was a matter of strict justice. Jesus carried the same message in his life as the way to live and he also gave the message to His disciples as a way to live.
So, the hard fact---do we really want our Caesar to rule over our value functioning?
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