David Bahn – Reflections

Sometimes the question is so loaded that it is obvious that it is no question at all. Do you think your taxes are too high? Do you think people ought to have the freedom to for a union? Should everyone be required to join the union? The desired answer is obvious. Then there are those questions that are designed to trap: Are you on the side of the teachers or the tax payers in this issue? How do you answer such a question?

On this occasion Jesus not only easily recognized the trap, but he offered an answer that silenced his detractors. He first unmasks their evil intent: “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites?” He then offers an answer with which they cannot argue: Give to God what belongs to Him and to Caesar what belongs to him. If Jesus had said it was OK to pay taxes, he would have been accused of being a government patsy. If he had said it was not OK he would be considered a rebel. Jesus is neither patsy or rebel. But his detractors are hypocrites. They attempt to hide their unbelieving hearts by their outward politeness.

The question about the resurrection is no different. It was an attempt to pit Jesus against one group over the other. But Jesus is on the side of God and the truth. He will stand there now and until the bitter end. The real question for us today is whether we are trying to please one group of people or another, or whether we are shaped by and standing on the truth of God’s word and promise. It may be challenging, but the ground of truth never shifts.

Matthew 22:15-33

Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. ¹⁶And 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. ¹⁷Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” ¹⁸But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? ¹⁹Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. ²⁰And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” ²¹They 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.” ²²When they heard it, they marveled. And they left him and went away.

²³The same day Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, ²⁴saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up children for his brother.’ ²⁵Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no children left his wife to his brother. ²⁶So too the second and third, down to the seventh. ²⁷After them all, the woman died. ²⁸In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be? For they all had her.”

²⁹But Jesus answered them, “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. ³⁰For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. ³¹And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: ³² ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” ³³And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching.