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Feb 16, 2025

Two Sides of the Same Coin

Passage: Mark 12:13-17

Preacher: John Repsold

Series: Mark

Keywords: family, authority, government, taxes, trap, civil disobedience, church & state, gotcha questions

Summary:

This passage is one of the most important teachings of Jesus regarding our responsibility to the government as well as the limits of state authority in the lives of believers. This message addresses some of those issues while looking at the three spheres of authority God has designed in the social/human realm--church, government, family.

Detail:

Two Sides of the Same Coin

Mark 12:13-17

February 16, 2025

Fellowship Question:  What is your favorite tax…and why?

INTRO:  “Gotcha Questions”

What is a ‘gotcha question’?  DEF:  A question asked by a person trying to manipulate, trap our discredit you so that your answer can be used against you. 

Journalists, professors and politicians are usually experts in the field of gotcha questions.  Let me give you a few examples of ‘gotcha questions.’ 

  • When did you stop beating your wife?
  • Why do you like Joe more than me? You spend more time with him than me.
  • Why are you always so offensive?
  • Why are you so prejudice…or do you just hate that group of people?

Today’s Scripture is a study in gotcha questions.  It is also one of the more important passages when it comes to how we are to view and relate to human government and our divine God.  This issue has always been a challenging one for Christ-followers because of human nature and the nature of government.

  • Human nature is pretty consistent when it comes to authority and submission: WE want to be the boss, the final authority.  We don’t like other people telling us what to do.  Often, when they do, we like to rebel against that authority rather than submit to it. 
  • Human government likes to take control, be the authority, amass power, and, in short, tell people what to do.

These two realities collided in Jesus’ life during Passion Week when two very different and usually oppositional groups came to Jesus in an attempt to trap him with a ‘gotcha question.’  Here’s how the scene unfolded.

Mark 12:13-17--13 Later they [the chief priests, teachers of the law and Elders] sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. 14 They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity [unlike us]. You aren’t swayed by others [unlike us], because you pay no attention to who they are [unlike us]; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth [unlike us]. Is it right to pay the imperial tax to Caesar or not? 15 Should we pay or shouldn’t we?”

But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. “Why are you trying to trap me?” he asked. “Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.” 16 They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

17 Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”

And they were amazed at him.

            Every country has its laws that punish certain kids of speech.  For some countries, fomenting revolution through inflammatory speeches is a crime.  For others, “hate speech” is a crime.  For others, speech designed to incite behavior that could get people killed (like yelling “FIRE” in a crowded theater) is punished. 

Governments/government officials who love power and want to quash dissent like to expand the list of punishable speech while government/governors who value the freedom of the individual to speak about whatever they wish, like to limit the government’s power to punish speech. 

            Mark tells us that the two groups that the national leaders had sent to Jesus to try and trap him with questions were, actually, very strange bedfellows.  They were, in fact, staunch enemies.  But the old adage, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” was also coming into play here.  Jesus was the common enemy because he threatened both their power. 

He threatened the Pharisees power because he preached that matters of the heart relating to God were more important than externally monitored and visible legalism.   

He threatened the Herodians because he agreed with John the Baptist that Herod’s immoral divorce from his first wife and incestuous marriage to his brother’s wife was, in fact, sin.  Since Herod Antipas and his crowd of Herodians depended upon the payment of the pole tax referenced in this story, they would have pounced on Jesus had he said they didn’t need to pay this tax.  But the Pharisees would have condemned him if he came out in favor of the tax since the Roman rulers who demanded it also laid claim to titles and authority that belonged only to God.  In their eyes, the emperor who demanded this tribute was a blasphemer. 

So, these two opposing power structures, one religious and one political, figured that to ask Jesus this question would put him in a bind.  They reasoned that he would have to go one way or the other (either pro tax or anti-tax), and in so doing would find himself in hot water with one of the two prevailing powers of the day who could then try and convict him for either answer.  This is what Mark refers to when he says they were sent with this question “to catch him in his words.”  Their intent was not to find the answer.  Neither party was going to actually change their minds depending on Jesus’ answer.  The proof of that is that neither of them did when Jesus actually gave them an answer.  But they figured that one of them would at least get to corner Jesus and destroy him for his answer. 

What they had not counted on was that Jesus could give an answer that would support both positions at the same time.  That possibility never entered their realm of logic. 

APP:  Which should be a lesson to us.  While we may not be trying to trap God in some contest of logic, whenever we are questioning Him about something in life that may not make sense to us, we can be sure that God has answers we never dreamed of…whether He chooses to share them with us or not. 

Herein is the problem with people who think they are too smart for God.  In their self-perceived wisdom and logic, they think they have boxed God out of being needed in their life.  Or they allow their questions about God to grow them into deeper doubt rather than fuller faith.  In so doing, they set their reason and thinking above the stated truths of God, making an idol of themselves and their wisdom about life. Rather than surrender those doubts to God and let Him give them answers that they never saw possible, they cling to human reason over divine truth. 

 14 They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity….

The word translated “integrity” here means, “a man of the truth,” “a speaker of truth.”  I imagine they said this with a straight face, don’t you?  The problem is, this was a boldfaced lie.  If they were convinced that Jesus actually spoke truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, they would have become his disciples.  They wouldn’t have been trying to destroy him.  They would have embraced HIM as “the way, THE TRUTH, and the life” (Jn. 14:6).  So, this was their first lie. 

            It was followed immediately by a second:  “You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are….”  They didn’t believe this for a minute because they didn’t believe that kind of person existed.  All their actions were calculated based on what others would think and say about them.  They played favorites with the rich and powerful.  They “paid attention” to who somebody was because they wanted to be those “somebodies.”  They are appearing to laud the very thing they detest and avoid like the plague.  Their hypocrisy is stunning. 

            What they are right about is that Jesus is precisely what they are not.  He didn’t modify his speech to fit the crowd.  He wasn’t trying to please anyone but His heavenly Father.  While they properly described Jesus, they improperly assessed themselves. 

            And finally, they don’t believe for a minute their last statement about Jesus, true though it is:  but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.  Again, if they really believed this, they would have become disciples of Jesus.  If they really believed that Jesus taught truth about God, they would have thanked God for his presence rather than wished him dead and gone.  They would have loved what He said about His oneness with the Father rather than cried “blasphemy.”  They would have recognized that the Kingdom of God was at hand and embraced the King Jesus.  Instead, they lied to pacify the crowds following Jesus and enable them to lay a trap for Him. 

APP:  This ought to be a warning to us.  It is very possible for us to appear to be in league with Jesus when our hearts really aren’t.  It’s so easy to sing songs of praise to Him when we’re really upset or angry with Him.  It’s too easy to speak of him as our Lord and Savior without actually living a surrendered life to him or crying out for him to actually save us from specific sins.  We must be wary of words that sound submissive from lives that really aren’t.

            So, now they set the trap:  “Is it right to pay the imperial tax to Caesar or not? 15 Should we pay or shouldn’t we?”  Jesus refuses to leave them in their self-delusion.  He unmasks their two-faced treatment of Him by telling them and everyone listening exactly what is in their hearts. 

But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. “Why are you trying to trap me?” he asked. 

            Ever tried to trap anything?  Through my years, I’ve had a little experience with trapping rodents.  As a kid, on summer days when I was probably bored out of my mind and bother my mother to death, my Mom would set me up with a box, a string and some peanut butter out in the yard.  She’d tell me to go hunt chipmunks.  I wasn’t particularly successful.

            But I did graduate to larger rodents.  As the years have progressed, so have my trapping skills.  I’m now fairly adept at trapping mice, much to their chagrin. I’ve trapped my fair share of skunks too.  Most recently I’ve been engaged in a “squirl relocation program” that has been rather successful in rooting out squirls from our lake place and relocating them about 10 miles away. 

            But as skilled as I am, I’ve never tried to trap God.  Squirl brains are about as far as I can get in fooling creatures.  I’m pretty sure if I tried to trap God, he’d see that one coming, no? This passage supports that theory!

APP:  But it’s surprising how many times I treat God as if I he can be fooled about what’s really going on in my heart. 

  • How often do I live as if He doesn’t see my desire to be involved in some sin?
  • How often do I treat some call or command of God as if it’s negotiable?

I may not be trying to prove God wrong, but my actions may be effectively boxing him in to limit His influence over some area of my life. 

For his answer, Jesus turns to the very item that was used to pay the tax in question, a Roman denarius.  It was probably the one item that Jews used most frequently on a daily basis.

  16 They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

17 Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”

Here’s where it is important to combine a little coinage history with the text. 

“The coin” was a very common silver coin, the denarius. 

A denarius:

  • about a day’s wage (probably the equivalent of a couple hundred dollars for most people today).
  • Was equivalent to the Greek drachma, weighing about 60 grains.  
  • Every day people used this coinage to transact business.
  • Nobody seemed to be terribly bothered carrying it around with them, handling it, doing business with it. So, someone from the crowd easily produced what would become the answering object lesson.
  • It was stamped on both sides. You can see it on the front of today’s bulletin. 
  • Obverse side: the Latin letters TICAESARDVIVI AVGRAVGVSTVS translated “Tiberius Caesar Augustus Son of the Divine Augustus”
  • Reverse side: Latin PONTIF MAXIM translated “HIGH PRIEST”

Whether the coin dated from the reign of Agustus or of Tiberius, the emperor’s image was stamped on it and the coin was ascribing glory to him.  The one on your bulletin is from the reign of Tiberius where he is seated on a throne (reverse side) and wears a diadem on his head, being clothed as a high priest. 

            So, from a Jewish theological standpoint, what is wrong with this coin?    

  • It makes the Roman emperor God.
  • It calls for him to be worshiped
  • It makes him the intercessor, representative and priest of God.

Mark tells us that Jesus asked two questions:

  • Whose image is this?
  • Whose inscription?

The answer to both is, “Caesar's”, right? 

Q:  Wasn’t there some sort of law in the Decalogue against making “graven images” to represent God?  (2nd Commandment, Ex. 20:4)

Q:  Wasn’t there also a command to worship Jehovah alone? (“No other gods”, 1st Commandment, Ex. 20:3.)

None of those questioning Jesus should have been okay with any inscription attributing deity to any human being.  And when the stamped image of Ceasar was put on the coin with that inscription, they shouldn’t have been okay with that either. 

            This is a classic example of how comfortable we as God-fearing people can become with cultural accommodations to even our core religious beliefs.  For any good Jew to claim ownership of this coin was to, in some way, disobey the first two core commands of God given to his people.  Suppose it was a Pharisee or teacher of the law whose coin Jesus was using to illustrate his answer.  After it was over, Jesus probably said, “Whose coin is this?”  Whoever answered “mine” was admitting that they were accommodating their life to the pagan demands of Rome rather than the divine demands of God. 

            Jesus’ answer “render to Caesar what is Caesar’s” was a way of saying, “If you don’t buy into the idolatry of the day, then why are you having a problem paying the tax of the day?”  Any consistent, obedient Jew would have been glad to get rid of something in their possession that was such a blatant declaration of falsehood.  Had it been an ancient painting in their home rather than a coin in their pocket, real Jews would have gladly parted with it if Rome had come asking them to hand it over.

            I don’t want to carry this too far.  But it is noteworthy that we never have a record of Jesus having money on his person.  In fact, when questioned about paying the Temple tax, neither Peter nor Jesus had it on them.  So, Peter was told to “go fish” (Mt. 17:24-27).  The first fish he caught would have a 4-drachma (or 4 shekel) coin in its mouth, exactly the amount needed to pay for both Jesus’ and Peter’s Temple tax (using Tyrian shekel, minted in Tyre originally, discontinued but during Jesus’ day permitted by Rome to be used for the Temple tax, due to its higher silver quality.) 

But one of the disciples is mentioned as having money on him most of the time:  Judas Iscariot (Jn. 13:29), “as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it,” (John 12:6—Mary anoints Jesus in Bethany and Judas I. is highly critical of that use of the very expensive perfume). 

            I’m not saying that God had forbidden the use of coinage or even these coins.  But what is clear is that people’s attachment to money was an indicator of how much they had surrendered to the world and godless culture instead of to God. 

APP:  money has a terrible power to entangle our hearts and lives with this godless world.  The only way we get free of that power is through the practice of generosity/giving it away.  Even the paying of taxes breaks its power.  So, perhaps we should change the way we think about taxes.  We are free to advocate and vote for lower taxes in our system.  But what we are not free to do is fail to pay the taxes imposed on us by this world’s rulers.  When we do that, we are robbing Caesar of what is rightly “his.” 

Principle #1:  Give to the government what rightfully belongs to the government. 

Principle # 2:  Give to God what rightfully belongs to God.

Stated negatively we could also say, “Don’t give to government what rightly belongs only to God.” 

But that leads us to another couple of questions:

  • What rightfully belongs to government?
  • What does NOT belong to government and should only be reserved for God.

Those two questions lead us into the ever-important discussion of the relationship of the church and state, of God and government, and of submission to government verses, say, civil disobedience towards government. 

            According to the Bible, God has delegated certain authority to several distinct spheres of authority. 

  • Family: God has delegated to every family certain privileges and responsibilities such as procreation, health, provision, nurture, education and spiritual instruction (Genesis 1:26-28; Deuteronomy 6:4-9; Ephesians 5:22-6:4; 1 Timothy 5:8).  Neither the state nor the church hold these privileges and responsibilities.
  • State: God has given the government the privilege and ministry of protection, economic order, civic order, justice, and defense (Exodus 18, 2 Samuel 23:1-6, Psalm 72, Romans 13:1-7, 1 Peter 2:13-17).  Neither the family nor the church has authority over these responsibilities. 
  • Church: God has given the church the privilege and responsibility of doctrine, practice, and governance (Matthew 16:18, 1 Timothy, Titus).  Neither the family nor the state has authority over these things.

It is important to note that these spheres have some overlapping concern. The government has concern and authority over a family in matters of crimes. If a parent physically abuses a child, the state has authority to uphold justice and intervene and even punish. The same could be said in the church. The church shares concern over the emotional and spiritual well-being of the victim of abuse. In these cases, there would be cooperation of all three spheres.

            Where things get tricky is when one “branch” of authority tries to exercise authority over another “branch” in things not delegated to that sphere. 

ILL: 

  • When “the church” or “religion” seeks to use the state to compel everyone to worship a certain way, practice religion a certain way or believe a certain way, the church is out of bounds. The church certainly has compelling concerns about worship, religious practices and religious beliefs that may cause its members to advocate for freedoms friendly to those concerns.  But the church should never seek to compel non-church people to do so.
  • When the family off-loads its responsibility to provide food, shelter, education, moral and religious instruction to the state and demands that the state provide those things, that family has both abdicated and surrendered its divine sphere of authority and responsibility.
  • When the state/government fails to protect its citizens, fails to establish biblical justice and just laws and instead begins to tell the church or the family/individuals what they must do in their spheres of authority (belief, doctrine, practice, family structure and responsibility, etc.), that branch of authority doesn’t understand the limits of its God-given authority.

When Jesus responded to the question about taxes using the Roman coin, he was clearly saying, “This money may well belong to the Romans.  So paying taxes is your responsibility.  BUT, this worship, this deification doesn’t belong to Rome.  It belongs only and rightfully to God.  That you do not have to (nor should you) give to Caesar.” 

            Other passages of Scripture help us more exactly discern where these lines of authority begin and end.  Here are a handful that should govern any decisions the individual, family or church have to make regarding the demands of “Caesar”/government.

  • Acts 5:29
  • 1 Timothy 2:1-2
  • Daniel 1, 3, 6
  • Romans 13:1-7
  • 1 Peter 2:13-17

We don’t have time to examine each of them so let me make just a couple of general observations that should flow from these passages and Jesus’ teaching in our text today.

  • Submission to government in the biblical issues of government should be our general attitude, rule and first desire.
  • Government mandates/laws/requirements/authorities are legitimate as long as they…
    1. reward good, as defined by God, and
    2. punish evil, as defined by God.
  • When government does not do this, Christians are obligated to obey God rather than government, i.e. engage in non-violent civil disobedience.
  • When we engage in non-violent civil disobedience, we must be willing to accept the punishment.

These four principles can help us decide virtually any situation we are faced with in terms of demands from coercive government. 

EX:

  • Hiding Jews in the Holocaust.
  • Disobeying some of the WA Governor’s Emergency Power dictates during covid (to stop worship, social distance, not share meals, not share the Lord’s Supper, not use our homes for meetings, etc.)
  • Regulations on prayer (England), sharing the Gospel, worship, biblical doctrine and teachings, etc.
  • Public education: subjecting children to immoral, godless, contra-biblical educational indoctrination and danger, i.e. trans-gender, LGBTQI+++, marriage perversions, ???
  • Immigration, legal and illegal.
  • ???

Again, let me remind you that, if/when you engage in civil disobedience, you must be willing to submit to the (unjust) punishment for doing so (“suffer for good” a la I Peter 3:17, 4:19)

QUESTIONS???

CONCLUSION:

  • Where am I tempted to disobey government when God has called me to obey, i.e. “render to Caesar what is his”? (Taxes, traffic laws, respect, etc.)
  • Where am I disobeying the sphere of family authority where God wants me to obey, i.e. disobeying or dishonoring parents or spouse?
  • How am I rejecting church authority where God is calling me to obey, i.e. rejecting sound doctrine, sound teaching, wise elders? (Being my own authority and last word/judge, separating myself from fellowship for the wrong reasons,
  • Rejecting Jesus’ authority/lordship in your life?

BENEDICTION

I Peter 2:20-25--But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. 21 To this you were called, 

because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.

22 “He committed no sin,
    and no deceit was found in his mouth.”

23 When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. 24 “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” 25 For “you were like sheep going astray,” but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

Hebrews 13:20-21

20 Now may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, 21 equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.