Truth be Told

We find ourselves in Luke’s Gospel,
chapter 20, once again, in this unfolding drama that we so often
call Passion Week. Tempers are running high. Emotions
are running high. The whole relationship that Christ
has there with the Pharisees is going from bad to worse. And we see it take another turn
this morning. If you will, just by way of reminder,
we have seen the triumphal entry. We saw the emotions that ran
so high there. those believers in Christ and
those that were curious, laying their coats, their cloaks in
the road so that Christ wouldn’t have to walk upon the dirty streets. We saw them and heard them singing
their loud hosannas to Christ, welcoming Him, embracing Him
as the would-be Messiah. And we saw almost immediately
things begin to come apart. here in Christ’s final week of
ministry. We saw him enter the temple. We saw him drive out those that
were abusing, misusing the temple. And in the midst of doing that,
Christ confronts his accusers. They want to know on what authority
he is acting. And he calls them to the testimony
of John the Baptist, to his ministry, to his life, And if they would
only acknowledge John the Baptist, then Christ and his authority
would be established in their hearts and minds. But it would
not. They would not answer the question
and therefore Christ would not answer theirs. While Jesus has
their attention, he turns to that parable that we considered
last week, the parable of the vineyard. of a brutal vineyard
that features a vineyard owner essentially renting it out to
those that would grow the grapes. The vineyard owner returning
at some point for a portion of those grapes only to be repeatedly
rebuffed by those to whom he had rented. We saw that this
pointed directly to the Pharisees. This was explicitly stated that
it was rather explicitly about them. They had repeatedly abused
God’s messengers, the pharaohs or the prophets who had come
to them, appealing to them to return to their senses and be
restored to God. But they would not listen. Ultimately,
Christ foretells of his own death there in that parable. by saying
that they took the vineyard owner’s own son and took him outside
of the city and slew him. And so tensions are running high.
We saw at the end of that little section that we considered last
week, the teachers of the law in verse 19 and the chief priest
looked for a way to arrest him immediately. They wanted it to
be done right then and there. And the image that comes to my
mind, and you’ve all seen it, is when two people that claim
they want to fight begin to gesture in this fashion until their willing
accomplices, their friends, grab hold of their arms and they struggle
and fight as if they intend to really duke it out with one another.
That’s the image that comes to mind. You get this image of these
spiritual leaders wanting to get at Christ, perhaps being
restrained by others. They wanted to arrest him immediately
because they knew that he had spoken his parable against them.
There was no doubt in their minds that Christ had laid the fate
of prophets and the fate of Christ at their doorstep. There was
no dissimulation. There was no equivocation. There
was no subtlety about the parable at all. Christ pointed his finger
at them and said, you are the ones who killed the prophets. But Luke’s gospel closes by stating
that they were afraid of the people. Now, we have seen that
statement before. We have seen the Pharisees react
in fear of the people before. In fact, just a few verses prior,
they wanted to arrest Christ. They wanted to do it right then
and there, but they feared the people. They knew that they couldn’t
take this overt action against Christ because of his popularity
with the general masses. But here, the point is almost
completely different. It’s not that they’re willing
to arrest the Lord and yet that they’re unable because of the
fear of the people. In other words, because of the
popularity of Christ. That’s not the point at all.
The point here is they were so taken with his answer. They were
so stunned by the parable. And now they were beginning to
fear their own popularity slipping away with the people. They feared
the people. It wasn’t that they didn’t desire
to arrest Christ. They didn’t desire to have Him
thrown in prison. They did. And it wasn’t that
they had stopped or left off this attempt. They will see it
through to the end. But now they fear their own popularity
is flagging, and that is their big concern. If you would, I
want to go back to Luke’s Gospel, we’ll pick up in verse 19, chapter
20, verse 19 and following. The scribes and the chief priests
tried to lay hands on him that very hour. And they feared the
people, for they understood that he spoke this parable against
them. So they watched him and sent
spies who pretended to be righteous in order that they might catch
him in some statement. so that they could deliver him
to the rule and the authority of the governor. They questioned
him, saying, Teacher, we know that you speak and teach correctly,
and you are not partial to any, but teach the way of God in truth.
Is it lawful for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not? But he detected
their trickery and said to them, Show me a denarius. Whose likeness
and inscription does it have?” They said, “‘Caesar’s.’ And he
said to them, “‘Then render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,
and to God the things that are God’s.’ And they were unable
to catch him in a saying in the presence of the people. And being
amazed at his answer, they became silent.” There’s no doubt that these religious
elite had no idea who it was they were dealing with. They
didn’t know the true nature of this man. They had no idea that
they were wrestling with truth itself. And the truth is going
to win out every time, as we’ll see in a moment. Look back at
the beginning of the passage, if you would, to verse
19. Once again, the scribes and the chief priests tried to lay
hands on in that very hour. And they feared the people, for
they understood that he spoke this parable against them, the
hierarchy, the religious hierarchy recognized undoubtedly that the
parable was against them, as we’ve already said, and they
feared the people because the people held Christ to be a prophet.
No doubt he was popular. And the Hosea is earlier in the
week had proved that. In fact, some time past, they
had already tried to forcibly make Christ the king. So his
popularity was enormous. Matthew adds an interesting point
here. In Matthew’s gospel and all three
synoptic writers record this incident, the Pharisees went
and plotted together. And now you have this sinister
plot beginning to develop. They had already had their consciences
pierced. They had already been provoked
by the words of Christ and the behavior of the people. But now
they begin to plot together. And Matthew’s gospel is interesting
in that it notes they plotted together how they might trap
him in what he said, not whether. Not perhaps that they might trap
him, but they plotted how they might trap him. As you can imagine, this is going
to be extremely difficult when dealing with the Lord of glory,
truth itself. They’re certainly not going to
find any sin in him, but they don’t know that yet. And so what
they’re trying to get him to do is to position himself in
one camp or the other and thereby hand him over to the offended
camp. Luke records that they sent spies,
an interesting word, subversives into the midst. All three gospel
writers color this whole scene similar in similar terms, but
with great subtleties that are important to note. Listen to
this. Both Matthew and Mark say that
they sent their disciples to him, the disciples of the Pharisees,
I mean, and think of it, what better than to send a seminary
student, right? This idealistic young man, this
man that is just steeped in and has no wisdom of life yet, is
just steeped in facts. And they sent these zealous young
men to seize, to lay hold of Christ, to catch Him in His words. Matthew and Mark also include
that they sent their disciples to Him along with the Herodians. And you know what is interesting
about the Scriptures? I mean, isn’t it true you can
read the same passage 20 times and still come back to it years
later and still discover some new nuance of truth? Something
that you either didn’t notice before, and such was the case
for me with the Herodians. I’ve read this passage dozens
and dozens of times. And most times I’ve read it,
I read right past, and the Herodians. But you know what? We need to
pause and we need to look at who the Herodians were to see
just how astounding this is that the Pharisees would side with
the Herodians. The Herodians came about when a man, a ruler
named Archelaus, was basically kicked out. He lost his office.
And the Jews were divided in the sentiment. There was so much
turmoil that Rome essentially came and took over. And that’s
where Herod came in. He was basically a an emissary
of Rome itself. That’s where he had gotten his
commissioning. And it was a very unpopular rule. The Jews hated Herod. Because
he was this half-breed ruler that was basically deferring
to Rome, had Rome’s authority, and basically had forsaken, in
the Jews’ opinion, the God of Israel by siding with this heathen
nation. And yet, as is always the case,
no matter what sphere you’re operating in, when a new ruler
comes in, you’re always going to have those that submit to
the new ruler. Some out of propriety. It’s the
right thing to do. You go back to Romans 13. We’ll
go there in a moment. You go to Romans 13. All authority
is established by God. And you will always have those
that say, you know what? God has placed this one over
me. Or for political motives, they begin to manipulate and
they want to get in good with the new ruler. And so they just
begin to submit and do whatever the new ruler wants. But the bottom line is the Herodians
were just such people. The Herodians were those that
catered to Herod and did whatever Herod wanted and felt like Herod’s
rulership was a blessing to Israel. And they didn’t see a discontinuity
between submitting to Herod and to the Roman government and holding
to their own God. These were true, the original,
if you will, blended worshipers. They felt like there was no problem
to be in the Roman government and submitted to the government
of God. There was no difficulty at all
for the Herodians. And they were hated. These were
hated people by the Pharisees. The Pharisees were the purists. They were the separatists. They
hated the Roman government and they hated everything to do with
it. They hated Caesar. They hated the Roman soldiers.
They hated Herod and they hated all the Herodians that seemed
to just give honor to Herod and to the Roman government. And
so for the Pharisees, to come into alliance with the Herodians
themselves is almost unthinkable. Except that the only thing that
they hated more than the Herodians was Christ Himself. If you want a modern day example
of this kind of thing, and it goes on all the time. We talk
about our hated enemies. whether it’s politically or socially
or whatever. And then if we find a common
enemy, we forget all about our differences in rapid fashion. Of course, the example that comes
to mind is the great abortion debate of our own day. We have
these strong convictions and we have these strong convictions
about what truth is and the means of salvation. But we’ll set all
that aside And we’ll walk hand in hand with Mormons and Catholics
and everyone else in this great battle against abortion. That is similar, but this is
so far worse that the Pharisees would set aside their own hatred
toward the Herodians to walk hand in hand with them in the
pursuit of murder of the Lord of Glory. They took the Herodians
along with them because they wanted the governor to have his
witnesses, his own people. They wanted Herod to have his
own people standing face to face with Christ. So they hoped that Herod would
take him immediately off their hands. They didn’t want to deal
with him. His popularity with the Jewish
people was far too great. And they figured that if he offended
Herod, To offend Herod was to offend Rome. And to offend Rome
was to offend Caesar. And if Christ offended Caesar,
it was over. It was over for the Jews. It
was shrewd. It was extremely devious. Note back in Luke’s Gospel, in
verse 20, there it says again, they sent spies. These Jewish
students, zealots for the truth, partnering with the Herodians,
they go to Christ as spies to seek Him out, pretending to be
righteous. This is one of the most astounding
statements in all of Scripture. Pretending to be righteous. I
mean, and it smacks so much of what we do and how we live. We
pretend to be righteous from time to time, don’t we? Don’t
you dress up and put on a happy face? Well, these are the originators
of this practice. They posed as being scrupulous.
They posed as having convictions and, oh Lord, we’re so torn on
this issue. They came to Christ with some
so-called difficulty of conscience, a matter that they just struggled
with. They wanted the truth on it.
They wanted Christ to shed some light. So that they could live
according, they could either have their conscience liberated
or so that they could have truth established in their midst. Luke
records that their whole motive was in order so that they might
catch him in some statement. You know what this language,
this is the language of hunting. They sprung a trap and they couldn’t
wait for Christ to step in it. They knew that they had him right
here. The whole point was so that they
could deliver him to the rule and the authority of the governor.
They couldn’t wait. They figured that they had him
dead to right, right here. And what unfolds is an amazing
incident of truth. I mean, I believe it to be so.
But the bottom line here is that Scripture records that even Christ’s
enemies were amazed at what transpired. Because they had Him right where
they wanted Him. They had Him cornered. And if He would just
give an answer, either way, He was a dead man. And somehow,
somehow Christ escapes. I want to look at three scenes
in this amazing incident of truth. First of all, truth’s casual
longing. Truth’s casual longing, or if
you will, the truth sought. Look at verse 21. They questioned him saying, this
just begins to sicken you when you begin to hear this. Teacher. And here are these young men,
you know, they’re just willing accomplices. But listen to how
naturally this rolls off their tongue. Teacher, we know that
you speak and teach correctly. And they begin to flatter Christ
almost so carelessly and casually that it just sickens you to hear
it. We know that you speak and teach
correctly. Matthew and Mark both record
this. We know that you are truthful, literally full of truth. You
are truth itself. I mean, this is flattery to such
a such a degree that they thought Christ can’t possibly see through
this. We’ll just lather these words on so thick and so sweet
that Christ won’t possibly see our deceit. The adjective, this little word
is normally used for truthful statements. And the difficulty
is putting it, translating it into English when you’re referring
to a person, because you don’t typically speak as a person being
true, but Christ was true. Christ was truth itself. And
that’s why you have this variety, whatever’s sitting in your lap,
whatever version. New American Standard says you
are truthful. J.B. Phillips says you are an honest
man. There are many, many others. NIV says you are a man of integrity.
And so there is this stab in the dark trying to pin down exactly
what they were saying. The bottom line, what they were
saying is you are true. We know you to be true, true
to the core. You are the only right one there
ever was. Icky sweet. The statement implied
that Christ was truth in his very being and in doing so what
they want the people, they want the people around him, the people
that have placed their faith in him and the people that are
finding him interesting. They want everybody to hear. And little do they know that
all of these statements are going to come back to haunt them because
the truth is going to come out. His truth in his being, he can
be relied upon to say what is right every time he won’t ever
bend his statement to fit in with what other people would
like to hear. And that’s the second statement
there. You are not partial to any. It’s an interesting Interesting
turn of a phrase. Matthew and Mark both say you
defer to no one and therefore are not partial to any. But the
key thought here is that you’re not partial. You’re not political. It’s an interesting thing in
leadership, in the ministry. For elders, we are called to
be just. You know, the first time I began
to study the eldership and the qualifications there in Titus
chapter one and in first Timothy three, you read through the list
and it talks about, you know, above reproach and husband of
one wife and all those things. But the easiest one to read right
past is just a man must be just. What does that mean? What it means is we have to be
righteous. It means that we can’t be driven by political wind.
We can’t be driven by political opinion. We can’t wait to see
which way the wind is blowing and then decide on what we say
is right. An elder must be just. He’s got to decide what’s right
and stand on it regardless of what everybody else says. And
if it’s like Jonathan Edwards and he gets kicked out after
27 years, so be it. Christ was the model here. Christ was the model. Christ
wasn’t driven by political wind. Christ didn’t try to influence
political climate. Like so many of our politicians
in this day and age, it’s a constant interplay. They want to find
out what the people think and they’re trying to influence what
the people believe. And it’s this constant interplay
of manipulation. And Christ wanted nothing to
do with any of it. Christ was truth and He stood
before them as truth. The word that is used there refers
to a mask, this pretentiousness. And they say, you don’t look
at people as if they had a mask on, you don’t look at people
as if you have a mask on. The expression itself was a Hebrewism,
a Hebrew way of saying something, a colloquialism, if you will.
And it originally meant to raise the face by favorable address. In other
words, to please somebody by what you said. And so it came
to mean to regard with favor, but not necessarily undue favor,
undeserved favor. But eventually the bad sense
prevailed. And this Hebraism came to mean
currying favor. We know that you don’t curry
favor with anybody is what they said. We know that you’re not
playing to the crowds. We know that you’re not just
speaking to be heard to bring about your own political expediency. In essence, what they said is
no matter who you’re talking to, what you say is the same
and that’s what it should be. That is what truth is. Don’t
you wish there were more people like that? Don’t you wish you
were more like that? Jesus, you don’t allow yourself
to be swayed, whether they’re rich or poor, educated or not
powerful or not. Politically advantageous or not.
He said, Jesus, you are not only
an impartial judge, but you are you are far too keen to not to
rather you are far too keen on the truth to to be deceived by
hypocrisy. That’s what they say. They’re
buttering Christ up to the point that their hope is that he can’t
possibly see through their deceit. Of course, he saw through it
immediately. Matthew and Mark, both, they
put a little subtle twist on it, almost as if to say you don’t
care for people. And it doesn’t mean that Christ
is inconsiderate. What the phrase meant there that
they add is that you’re not driven by public opinion. Tell the truth
regardless of what people think and regardless of what it’s going
to cost, regardless of whether it pleases them, you speak truth. That’s true. And then they go
and add this last little phrase. Not only do you speak and teach
correctly, not only are you not partial to any, but the third
phrase, the third element of this statement, but you teach
the way of God in truth. And here, what they’re talking
about is the gospel, they’re talking about Christ’s ministry,
they’re basically affirming everything he’s ever said. about repentance
and baptism and turning to Christ for faith alone and Christ alone
for salvation. They basically rubber-stamped
His ministry right here. The way, this little word here,
indicates the manner, the way that God wants His people to
think and live. They said, Jesus, You’ve got
it. Your theology, it’s down. It’s perfect. We love Your theology. And you can just imagine the
colloquialism of these young men kind of high-fiving Jesus,
you know, in our day and age. Oh, we dig you, Jesus. They say, you’re a reliable teacher. And you know what? There is something
in this that, as I said, it just sickens you. It is akin, there’s probably
no other scene like this except Judas. One person characterized
it in these terms. He said there is something in
this fawning malice, this treacherous flattery, almost as repulsive
as the kiss of Judas. And it is. Another said it this
way, the falseness of these sappy compliments out of their mouths
marks this as one of the most dastardly attacks on Christ. But you know what? Christ saw
it all coming. He sees these men and he sees
them asking as it were for the truth, pleading for the truth,
knowing all the while they don’t want the truth. They’re playing
him or they’re attempting to. Matthew records that they begin
to ask this question, tell us what you think we’d like to know. We’re here. We’re truth seekers.
You are the truth. You always speak what’s right.
We know you’re a great teacher. You cannot lie. You don’t defer
to anybody. You don’t show any partiality.
You are truth itself. So tell us, by the way, what
do you think? Is it lawful for us to pay taxes
to Caesar or not? This is our dilemma. Our consciences
are torn. But you are truth itself. So
here’s our question. Nobody likes to pay taxes, right? I mean, is there somebody here
that really enjoys paying taxes? But you know, to them, taxes
were exceedingly unpopular. As I said, the Roman government
was viewed as an external, evil, secular oppressor. And then to
add insult to injury, to have to regularly pay this coin, this
tax, the poll tax, Wasn’t exactly what we do now.
We fought in our country for because we had taxation without
representation. Right. Which meant that we had
a voice in the legislation of our government. That’s not what
the Jews had. They couldn’t tell Caesar, by
the way, we’d like to, you know, we’d like to pass a law that
doesn’t such. No, Caesar didn’t ask their opinion about anything.
He just ruled. And the fact that they had to
pay this tax constantly, every male, this coin was hateful to them. They hated
this tax and they hated the coin. They hated the coin with his
image on it. We’ll talk more about that in a moment. But this
tribute tax, this tax was a poll tax that after, as I said, the
Archelaus was deposed and Caesar began to oversee this land by
way of Herod. This tax was paid directly into
Caesar’s treasury. Since the coin bore the image
of Caesar itself and ascribed divinity to him, it was even
more hated by the Jews because to even hold this thing, they
felt was repulsive to them. On this coin, The emperor claimed not only
supreme authority in political matters, but also in spiritual
matters. When he called himself, get this Pontifex Maximus, the
highest priest. It reminded the Jews that they
were a subject nation every time they picked up one of these coins,
and it’s understandable that the payment of this tax was hated
by them. You can understand that. And Jesus says, bring me a coin. The denarius from I told you
about this coin momentarily a moment ago, let me tell you just a little
bit more about it. It had the ruling emperor Tiberius
picture on it, one of the most evil rulers that Rome ever had. On one side of the coin was the
head of the ruler. On the reverse side, he’s shown
seated on a throne, wearing a crown. And he’s clothed as what was
well-known garb of the high priest. In the inscription on the coin
read, Tiberius Caesar Augustus, son of the divine Augustus Pontiff
Maxim, high priest. One of the leaders, rather, of
Galilee, Judas, had denounced the payment of the tribute to
Caesar as treason against Jehovah, and that sentiment ran rampant. to even take up this coin was
considered to be treason. And so, Jesus, He’s stuck. At least in the minds of these
young seminarians, He’s stuck. In the minds of the crafty Herodians
who had sided with the Pharisees, their enemies, He was stuck.
Because if Jesus answers, it’s lawful. The Pharisees at once
know immediately his popularity with the people is going to be
undermined. That he’s going to be alienating all of these devout
and patriotic Jews and the Herodians would lift up a hefty cheer because
he sided with them. If he said it’s lawful, he’s
got trouble. But if he says it’s not lawful,
he’s got trouble. Because immediately he’ll please
the Pharisees here. But the Herodians could at once
hand him over as a traitor to Herod and to Caesar. And in a
sense, Jesus is in a no win situation. He’s caught between the proverbial
rock and a hard place. But the truth is going to be
told. The truth is going to come out. They asked for a truth.
They asked for truth in a casual longing. And now they’re going
to get it in an eventual revelation. And here you have the truth presented.
Look at verse 23. But he detected their trickery. They didn’t have anything on
Christ. They didn’t pull the wool over his eyes. They didn’t
sandbag him. He saw it coming all the way
along and all three of the gospel writers characterized it just
a bit differently. Matthew says Jesus perceived
their malice. He knew that they had hatred
in their heart and he knew that nobody, none of these crowd were
going to come to him with such flattering words. He saw their
hearts and they didn’t count on that. Matthew also records that Jesus
asks, point blank, why are you testing me, you hypocrites? You
bunch of phonies that you want to come and call me truth itself. Talk about how good I teach and
how rightly I judge. Why are you testing me, you hypocrites? Mark records a similar sentiment. In verse 15, Mark says, “…but
he, knowing their hypocrisy…” And see, that’s the thing that
his enemies never counted on. They never counted on Christ
knowing their inward thoughts. They never counted on Christ
knowing their hearts and their motives. Why are you testing me? The word
here for trickery always, always had a bad meaning. Paul uses
it in the sense of craftiness. In both 1 Corinthians 3.19 and
2 Corinthians 4.2, craftiness, that devious manipulation of
situations and conversation. In 2 Corinthians 11.3, I’m afraid
that as the serpent was deceived by Eve by his craftiness. This kind of craftiness is evil
to the core. And Jesus saw it immediately
for what it was. They didn’t have him. They didn’t have him
cornered. Jesus just says, show me a denarius,
bring me one of these coins. Matthew says, record, show me
the coin used for the pole attack. They all point to the same coin. And in Mark’s account, it seems
that it’s interesting little And this is a very interesting
vignette in Mark’s gospel, because it seems like they had to go
out and find one of these secular coins. And so it implies that
either the Pharisees searched their pockets and said, oh, we
don’t carry one of those. Let’s go find one. We’ll be back
in a moment. Or at least they’re going through the motion to suggest
the idea that they don’t use these coins. But I can promise
you, if a Pharisee happened If there was one left in the
change thing of the payphone down at the local market, they’d
take it out. They use these coins readily. That’s why they had money changers. And so you can imagine the mad
scramble to find one of these little pennies. They have Jesus
right where they want Him. And you can imagine those arrogant
accusers standing there as they sent a couple of boys to fetch
a coin. As they stand there with glee,
rubbing their hands together, they can’t wait for the coin
to be brought back because they’ve got Christ right where they want
Him. He wants to see a coin? We’ll show him a coin. And then
he’s got to answer the question. And when he does, he’s a dead
man. small little silver coin minted
by the Roman government was the standard pay for a day’s wage.
And it was the standard tax that was expected of all the males. And you can imagine the excitement
as those who had gone out finally were able to exchange by whatever
means they had or dig down in their own pocket and produce
one of these coins. And they turned about on their
heels and they headed back to Christ knowing they had him.
Or did he? Jesus simply asks as soon as
the coin is produced, whose likeness and inscription does it have?
Whose coin is it? And they said Caesars. This coin, obviously, as I’ve
already pointed out, had Caesar’s head on it. It had that obnoxious
title on it. And Jesus simply says, then render
to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things
that are God’s. This was an answer the Jews didn’t
count on. And you could immediately hear them begin to stammer and
stumble. The problem that they had was
that their error lay in supposing that Caesar and God were mutually
exclusive dominions and that you couldn’t possibly give honor
to an earthly king if you intended to honor an eternal king. They
didn’t consider that duty to Caesar was part of their duty
to God. You know, Christians, especially Christians in our
day and age, struggle with that same question. We don’t see how
honoring our government, honoring our local officials, living according
to the laws of the land, even laws that we disagree with, we
don’t see how that can be honoring to God. But as I said, Romans
13 points out that all authorities established by God and the rule
of thumb. When you take into account all
the biblical data is simple. We are. Unless the government
forbids us to do that which God commands, obey. We’re to obey
unless they tell us to do something God has forbidden. Or forbids
us to do something that God commands. It’s a simple equation. Only the Jews didn’t count on
that. They figured that this was an
evil regime, an evil government to which they could never submit
and to which holding one of these coins was not only blasphemous,
but it was idolatrous. And Jesus just turns the tables
on them and says, give the coin to Caesar. But while you’re doing that,
give the things that you owe to God to God. Honoring God didn’t
necessarily mean dishonoring the emperor. The problem was they were forgetting
all about the orderly society that Rome had produced, the roads,
the police protection, the court system. And Jesus says it’s right
for you to pay for that. It’s not a sin. It’s not against
God’s law for you to participate in that. It’s good and right
and you must. But Jesus was also stressing
the fact that all the service that you owe to God, all the
things that you owe to God The honor that you owe him, the glory
that you owe him, the worship that is due his name. The righteousness that is supposed
to mark your life, that too should be given. And brought before
a holy God. And they had failed their miserably,
they wanted to quibble about a coin when really what was in
focus was their very lives. They wanted to quibble about
whether it was right to give what they perceived to be an
idolatrous penny, when in essence, their whole lives were idolatrous
because they had made self their God. I told you there were three little
scenes in this amazing incident of truth. Not only its casual
longing and its eventual revelation, Jesus revealed the truth. How
could he not? He was truth. He is truth. And when they begin to interact
with Him, they had no idea who they were actually dealing with. The third little episode is the
painful consequence of truth. The truth hurts. Verse 26 says,
they were unable to catch Him in a saying in the presence of
the people. The whole thing blew up in their face. In one moment,
they had Christ right where they wanted Him. And they could just
as soon see the Romans putting Him on the cross. He’ll get there. The Romans will
take Him there. And the Jews will gladly help
them. But at least here, they were unable to catch Him. It’s
ironic that in His final days, claim that is levied against
him was that Christ refused to render to Caesar. But here in
this moment, they were unable to catch him. And it says that
and being amazed at his answer, they became silent. And that’s
a difficult thing to do to a young seminary crowd. They stunned
them or Christ stunned them with his answer. They could do nothing
with it. Because they had forgotten that
Christ was truth itself. They didn’t realize how true
their words were, that Christ teaches and speaks correctly,
that He is not partial to any and that He teaches the way of
God and truth. They didn’t have Christ right
where they wanted Him. He had them right where He wanted
them. And I believe that this was a merciful call if to no
other than to these Herodians and to these young seminarians,
a plea. A plea to yield before truth. To yield to Christ. To submit their lives to him
who knows the thoughts and intentions of every heart. Let’s examine
our own hearts. Our merciful Savior, we pause before you and we are
humbled because we see in these young men, these spies, young
zealots, partnering with their hated enemies. We see in them
so much of ourselves. We see so often that we We are
driven by public opinion and we are blown about by the wind
as it were. Father, we rejoice that you sent
to us truth, you revealed to us Christ. And Lord, it’s so
tempting for us to get caught up in this season. To think that
it’s just for this season that we focus upon Christ, but we
know that you are truth. Every day of the year and every
day of the year for us. It is Christmas. Lord, we thank
you for revealing yourself to us. We thank you for showing
us how false our own thoughts were. And calling us to submit
to the true one. To Christ Jesus, our Lord. Lord, we thank you and praise
you. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen. It’s one of those things.