“CHRIST IS YOUR DENARIUS”
Saint Matthew 22. 15-22
Twenty-Third Sunday after Trinity: 26 October Anno Domini 2008
Fr Watson SSP
The Pharisees plotted to trap Jesus. Pharisees were hypocrites of the worst kind; they didn't believe that Jesus was the Christ of God, but they did believe that their own good works made them acceptable to God. They were wrong on both counts.
The Pharisees were sinners in the things they thought in their hearts and also in the actions they took and the words they uttered. You all sin as much as the Pharisees. You too are hypocritical and sometimes you too think your so-called good deeds count for something in the eyes of God. Sometimes you even try to entangle Jesus Himself. You attempt to "trip up" His Word every time you try and make the Words of God say something they don't say, or when you deny the clear meaning of what they do say.
The Pharisees were hoping that the Nazarene would come out and say clearly that Judeans, loyal Jews, were not to pay tribute money to an occupying Roman force made up of filthy Gentiles. The Pharisees were hoping that whatever else Jesus was, at least He was a home-grown Hebrew patriot that also chaffed under the indignity of an occupying government from Italy. If the Lord spoke against taxes they would have their proof that He was an insurrectionist, rebel, "terrist" enemy of Caesar.
Jesus was a rabbi, that is, He was a teacher of Religious truth. But He was and is more than a teacher, He is Truth itself. Pilate did not see this, did not believe this, neither did the Pharisees. That which is not true is false. Because truth is good, that which attacks truth, or seeks to entangle it, is evil. The Kingdom of Light has nothing in common with the anarchy of darkness.
But not well what the Lord does in this trial-He speaks with precision and clarity. There are two realms in which all men find themselves, two kingdoms, if you will. You inhabit God's Kingdom of Grace if Faith has been worked in you by the Word of Christ and the enabling of the Holy Spirit. If one has resisted the Word of the Lord and hard-heartedly rejected the Savior's love then that person is not in God's Kingdom of Grace. The other realm, of which all men belong, believer and heathen alike, is the so -called left-handed Kingdom of the world. In the Kingdom of the World Grace does not rule, faith in the Trinity is moot, and the only the rules matter, only the law of the leaders (whomever they may be) count for anything. The Kingdom of the world, wherever it finds itself (Palestine, Europe, England or America) can be governed by Republic, Monarch, Mob or High Council, it matters not. Jesus is not endorsing rule by dictatorial Caesars, Kaisers, and Tsars, rather He is simply acknowledging the reality that in this sinful and broken world, all people, Christians and non-Christians are going to find themselves governed by powers that have ruling power. This authority is to be obeyed by Jesus' followers in so far as it can be obeyed without disobeying God.
Can taxes, tribute, be collected by the rulers of a territory without violating God's law? Christ answers yes in today's text, at least to the degree that the coinage was made by the Romans, brought to Jerusalem by the Romans, and carried the picture and words of the Roman Chieftain on their very faces. The money was minted and imported by Rome so Rome owned it, for whatever that meant in the eternal equation of damnation and salvation-which is absolutely zero.
The Good News for you dear friends is Jesus in the flesh and blood. The Evangel is the God/Man being present in this text: loving you, speaking to you, forgiving you, telling you not only what He did for you on the Cross, but also giving you the results of that cosmic victory. The Good News in these brief 8 verses is not so much what is explicit but what is implicit. Jesus does not give you a Saint Paul two-part systematic sermon but rather speaks truth as the Way, the Truth and the Life. If the denarius belongs to the Emperor of Rome because He made it and it's his property, then Praise the Lord, you are worth more than all the denarii in the universe. The King of all Creation created you, you belong to God. You belong to the Holy Trinity not as chattel or property but as blood kin. You are blessed children of the heavenly Father. How do I know that? Whose picture do you bear? Whose inscription is written upon you? What is your Name? You are clothed in the Robes of Jesus' own Righteousness, placed upon you in your "Christening" at Holy Baptism. You have the Sign of the Crucifix spiritually burnt into your body and your name is Christian-little Christ.
If the Roman denarius of 30 A.D. was made out of gold or silver it at least had the intrinsic value of those precious metals, a far cry from the sad, bogus affair of American "fiat" (that is, fake) currency. But you my Saints, you are redeemed, paid for, not with gold or silver but with the Son's Holy precious Blood, His pure and sinless Body, and His bitter suffering and death. You are now worth, that is your value in the eyes of the Father is, the very Body and Blood of His Only-Begotten from all eternity. That is how much you are worth; that is Good News indeed.
All that you owed to God Jesus paid. The debt you owed your Creator to love Him perfectly, above all else with no divided loyalties, Jesus paid for. The bill you continually run up, the daily tab you incur, for not loving your neighbor perfectly, Jesus took care of. His name is inscribed on you in love and tenderness only because your name, your sin, was punctured, whipped, and hammered into Him in hatred and mockery. You are safe in His forgiving hands forever because you were first inscribed on His palms (tokens of what would one day happen at Calvary) and in His immaculate heart, the true "Book of Life" before the world was even spoken into creation.
Give whatever temporary Caesar that springs up in this fading world whatever denarius he craves, all the while knowing that the real value, the real treasure to God is you and that your ultimate Treasure, Clothing, Food, Drink, Smile, Embrace, Love and Family is as close as Christ Jesus; as Close as this Sermon and this Eucharist.
In the Name of The Father and of + The Son and of The Holy Ghost