The Pharisees tried to trap Jesus into saying
something that would either violate Jewish law and anger the Sanhedrin or would
alarm the Roman authorities and cause a brutal response against him. Either
situation would have served their purposes.
They asked a simple sounding but highly loaded
question. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar?
Jesus took a coin and asked whose image was on it. His
answer was that Caesar has his place and God has his place. The authorities
should be honored and obeyed, even those authorities with whom we personally disagree.
Caesar’s image (Man) is on the coin; we are made in God’s image.
This passage means many things, many deep things, but
it has temporal meaning also. Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s would mean that
we are expected to be good peaceful citizens who fulfil their civic
responsibilities and who avail themselves of their civic privileges. Paul exercised
his right as a Roman citizen to appeal his sentence directly to Caesar.
This blog post is for every Christian in whatever political
system they find themselves to be, but, right now, it is especially relevant to
Christians in the United States of America. The election for President of the
United States will be held on Tuesday 5 November 2024.
This particular election is being hotly contested and
polling data shows that it is so close that it is statistically impossible to
predict which candidate will win.
A very disturbing truth is that, apparently, many
American Christians find both of the major candidates to be objectionable and
have decided not to vote. I would urge them to listen to Jesus and to Paul the
Apostle in Romans 13:1-7. Paul said this, and meant it, about a
government which ultimately executed him. This was not blind obedience to a government
but was a statement that government authority is to be considered to be
legitimate.
The only valid reason to disobey the government is if,
in order to obey the government, we would have to dishonor our ultimate allegiance
to the Lord. Not liking the candidate choices available to us in an election
does not seem to rise to that level.
Genesis 1:27; Matthew 22:15-22; Mark 12:17; Luke 20:25; Acts 25:6-12.
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