Giving to God the things which are God's

Sermon preached at Solihull School Chapel at 6.30pm Coral Evensong
Sunday 19th October 2008, Trinity 22, Proper 24 Year A

Readings: Isaiah 45: 1-7 Matthew 22: 15-22

Lady Nancy Astor once looked Winston Churchill in the eye and said, “If you were my husband, I'd poison your tea.” Churchill looked back at her and said, “Nancy, if I were your husband, I'd drink it.” It was a quite brilliant, if rather hurtful, repost.
I heard another one recently. A man at a diner party in New York was asked what he did for a living. He replied, “Oh I hate it when people ask that. Nowadays I don’t like to admit it … but I’m an investment banker.” There was silence around the dinner table. Then the reply came, “Don’t worry about it! Next week you’ll be able to say that you’re unemployed.”
I think we all admire a good repost. My trouble is that I always think of the good repost five minutes after I needed it. It seems that this is a very common problem. The French apparently have two different words to distinguish the repost you actually made from the repost you would have like to have made if you had had time to think about it.
In our gospel reading today we heard about Jesus giving a quite brilliant response to a very difficult question. In fact it was a trick question, specifically designed to catch Jesus out.
At the time of Jesus, God’s chosen people, the Jews, were living in Judea and Galilee. This was the land that God had promised to their forefather Abraham almost 2000 years earlier. It was good for them to live in this land, but the trouble was that had been conquered by the Romans and they were ruled by the Romans. Cunningly, the Romans had put, a Jewish man, King Herod, in charge, so it was Jews governing Jews, but there was no doubt that the Rome Emperor was ultimately in control. On anything really important the Romans made sure that King Herod did what they told him. Taxes were collected and paid to the Romans. The Roman army of occupation was always there should there be any failure to cooperate with the Roman Empire.
For the Jews, this Roman occupation was a terrible humiliation. They had a very clear religious understanding that they were God’s chosen people; that they were destined to be a great nation and to be owners of this land and to be a nation so blessed that through them all the nations of the world would be blessed (e.g. Gen 12: 2, 13: 15). Being ruled by the Roman did not make them feel like a great nation. Being ruled by the Romans did not feel like a blessing, it felt like a curse. It was a violation of the land that God had promised to them. So the Roman occupation was not just a humiliation, it was also a religious evil, something all good Jews should struggle against.
Jesus was asked, “Is it lawful [under the ancient Jewish religious law] to pay taxes to the [Roman] emperor?” If he said, “Yes” then he would be seen to be denying the Jews understanding of themselves as a great nation, God’s chosen people and as owners of the land. Jesus’ enemies would be able to portray him as a collaborator with the Romans, a traitor, an enemy of God and of God’s people. On the other hand if Jesus said, “No!” then his enemies would be able to portray him as an enemy of the Roman Empire. They would be able to report him to the Roman authorities, who would no doubt punish him very severely for daring to say that taxes should not be paid to Rome.
So what did Jesus do? He asked them to show him the coin with which the taxes are paid. They showed him one of the Roman coins. He asked, “Whose head is this on the coin? Whose title?”
“It’s the Emperor’s” they replied. Jesus said, “Give therefore to the Emperor the things that are the Emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” In other words pay the taxes to the Roman’s but continue to give to God the things that God wants from you.
It is, I think, the most brilliant advice. Usually we have no choice but to give to the authorities the things, like tax, that the authorities want from us. But we should not let this distract us from giving to God the things God wants from us.
So what does God want from us? What does it mean for us to give to God the things that are God’s? Well first of all I think it means giving God credit for, and thanks for all he has given us; for our lives, our families, our world, our houses and schools, all the people around us and all the good things we have. These things do not come to us by accident or by our own hard work (although sometimes we do need to work hard). They come to us by God’s good gift and we need to give thanks for that.
Then we need to give to God proper time and attention. It is all too easy to let a day slip by without saying our prayers, to let a Sunday slip by without going to church. But saying our prayers and coming to church does help us to give attention to God. It does help us to be attentive to the things that really matter. It does help us to know the ways of heaven and to grow towards eternal life.
Then we need to show our love for God in the people who are around us. Jesus said, “What you do to the least of these brothers of mine, you did to me” (Matt 25: 40). So loving the people around us is a good way of loving God. Serving the people around us can be a service to God. Giving time or attention or patience or a welcome or gifts to the people around us is a way of giving these things to God.
And if we can do these things, if we can give thanks to God, if we can set aside time for God and if we can love God in our brothers and sisters, then it seems to me that we are giving to God the things that are rightfully his. And if we give generously to God then God will richly repay us. And the gifts that God gives us are not so much things that pass away like money and health (although he often does give these) but rather things of eternal value; happiness, self-fulfilment and eternal life. Giving to God the things that are God’s is is so, so worth it!