Tag Conflict

Whose Side Are You On?

Steve Beckham Leave a comment

Matthew 22:15-22

Whose side are you on?

Do you lean right, or do you lean left?

Do you favor autocracy or democracy?

Are you a Republican or a Democrat?  

Do you favor the Freedom Caucus or the Moderates?  

Are you aligned with the Progressives or the Conservatives?

Are you Pro-Life or Pro-Choice?

Do you support the separation of Church and State or are you a Christian Nationalist?

I don’t know about you, but these kinds of questions make me wary.  These are loaded questions.  Binary questions.  Sorting questions.  These are questions with an agenda.  These are questions that are designed to make you reveal if you are friend or foe.  

Right now, the big sorting question in much of our country is are you pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian.  Are you sympathetic to the people of Israel who have suffered so much pain and loss, so much death and destruction from the sudden and vicious attack by Hamas?  Or are you sympathetic to the six million Palestinian refugees of Gaza who have lived for decades under the oppressive thumb of Israel and are now being bombed into submission?

Whose side are you on?

Loaded questions.  Gotcha questions.  These binary questions are designed to sort you into one camp or another and they are as old and merciless as politics.  

In today’s gospel lesson, we get a terrific example of a political sorting question calculated to get Jesus in trouble one way or another. The really fascinating thing about it is that two political factions who usually wanted nothing to do with each other came together to ask this question.  That’s how much they wanted Jesus out of the way.  That’s how much they wanted to discredit him.

After buttering him up with a comment about his impeccable impartiality they drop their bomb, their loaded question:  “Is it proper to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”  

The particular tax they’re asking about is the poll tax, a tax of one denarius per year levied on every adult man and woman in the empire.  This tax had been instituted by Tiberius not long before Jesus was born as part of his overall reform of Rome’s taxation system and its specific purpose was to pay for the occupation and administration of Rome’s conquered territories.

The Herodians were big supporters Herod Antipas and Herod Antipas was a big supporter of Rome, so the Herodians were all in favor of the tax as a way to help pay for what they saw as the many benefits of being part of the empire—decent roads, improved trade, aqueducts, heavy-handed law and order, and so on.  

The Pharisees, on the other hand, were not supporters of their Roman overlords and not at all happy about the tax that paid for these conquerors to dominate them and every aspect of their lives in their own homeland.  One of the things that they found particularly objectionable, though, was Roman money.  

Roman currency was not just money, it was also a reminder that Rome had complete control of the economy.  It was also political propaganda. On one side of the Roman denarius was a portrait of the emperor, Tiberius, so every coin was a reminder of who was in charge.  The other side of the coin depicted a seated woman in the role of Pax, the goddess of peace, a reminder that Rome kept the peace.  

To devout Jews like the Pharisees, the images stamped on these coins represented a kind of idolatry.  But worse than the images was the inscription on the coins: Tiberius Caesar, Son of the Divine Augustus, Pontifex Maximus.  

The coin proclaimed not only that the emperor was the son of a god, but also the high priest of the empire’s religions.  All of the empire’s religions.  Including theirs.

When the Pharisees and the Herodians team up to ask Jesus their loaded question, they think they have him trapped.  If he says, “No, it’s not right to pay this tax,” he’ll make the Pharisees and a lot of others in the crowd happy, but he’ll be guilty of sedition against Rome and the Herodians won’t waste a minute bringing it to Pilate’s attention.  If he says, “Yes, it’s perfectly fine to pay the tax,” then he’ll disappoint the crowd and give the Pharisees ammunition to discredit him.  

But instead of falling into their binary yes or no trap, Jesus exposes it.  He makes it clear that he is aware of their bad intentions.  He makes the crowd aware that there is no sincerity or honesty in their tricky question.  And just as they tried to entrap him with a question, he snares them and reveals their malice and antagonism with a question:  “Why are you trying to trap me, you hypocrites?”  

Jesus could expound on the theme of hypocrisy and attempted entrapment, but like all good rabbis, he knows a teaching moment when he sees one.  “Show me the coin used for the tax,” he says.  It seems clear that he doesn’t have one.  That’s an important detail that should not be overlooked. 

Jesus does not have the coin.  But someone does.  Someone, maybe one of the Herodians, hands him the silver denarius, and Jesus, holding it up for all to see, asks, “Whose head is this, and whose title?”  “Caesar’s,” they reply.  

I imagine this was a tense moment.  I can imagine him holding that coin in his hand, evaluating the stamped metal portrait in his palm for a long moment before he hands the coin back to whomever gave it to him and says, “Then give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

When they heard this, the text says, they were astonished, so  they left him and went away.

What exactly was Jesus saying?  What does it mean to give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s?  On the face of it, it sounds simple.  On the face of it, it sounds like another simple binary division, like we can divide life into two compartments: on one side of the line are the things that belong to God, spiritual things, and on the other side of the line are secular things.  Like government.  Or economics.

It seems simple, but it’s not.  It is, in fact, immensely complicated.

“Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” doesn’t sidestep the tricky tax question.  Instead, it requires us to do some serious thinking.  Philosophical thinking.  Theological thinking.  And practical thinking.  It requires us to live with difficult questions and never settle for pat answers.

What really belongs to Caesar?  Does his own likeness?   Genesis tells us that we were created in the image and likeness of God, so in that sense, isn’t Caesar’s own likeness something that, in the end, belongs to God?  Does the silver in the coin that bears his picture belong to Caesar?  He may be in possession of it or exercise some control over its distribution, but isn’t God the one who brought both the silver and the man depicted into being?  Long after Caesar has been gathered to his ancestors, the silver will pass to other hands and be melted down for other uses and only God will know where it is.  When all is said and done, doesn’t everything belong to God in whom we live and move and have our being?

“Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” also has a practical side.  The coin that’s used to pay the tax in question is a perfect symbol of empire’s dominance.  

With the emperor’s likeness it proclaims his singular sovereignty.  With its depiction of the goddess Pax, it proclaims the empire’s definition of peace, a peace obtained and maintained by violence and force.  With its inscription that asserts the divinity of the emperor and affirms him as Pontifex Maximus, it declares the empire’s control of religion.  And the fact that this silver denarius is the standard day’s wage throughout the empire makes it the symbol of the empire’s vast economic power.  It is, in and of itself, a statement.  It says, “If you’re going to participate in the economy, you are participating in empire.  If you buy or sell anything, you are participating in empire.  When you go to the market to buy olives and flour and oil and fruit and lentils, the basic necessities of life, you are going to have to compromise your religious principles because you are going to use the empire’s coin to do it.”

And this is where it is important to remember that Jesus did not have the coin.

Jesus did not have the coin.  

What side are you on?  In a world that confronts us with so many binary choices, how do you decide where to stand?  Is there a side where you can stand like Rabbi Jesus, a side where you can not carry the coin of someone else’s dominance?  

In this time of yet another tragic war when the world seems to be insisting that we make another binary choice of Israel over Palestine or Palestine over Israel, is there a side that does not make us buy in to one dominance over another?

Yes, there is.  And Rabbi Irwin Keller describes it movingly in his poem, Taking Sides.

Today I Am taking sides.

I am taking the side of Peace.

Peace, which I will not abandon
even when its voice is drowned out
by hurt and hatred,
bitterness of loss,
cries of right and wrong.

I am taking the side of Peace
whose name has barely been spoken
in this winnerless war.

I will hold Peace in my arms,
and share my body’s breath,
lest Peace be added
to the body count.

I will call for de-escalation
even when I want nothing more 
than to get even.
I will do it
in the service of Peace.

I will make a clearing
in the overgrown 
thicket of cause and effect
so Peace can breathe 
for a minute
and reach for the sky.

I will do what I must
to save the life of Peace.
I will breathe through tears.
I will swallow pride.
I will bite my tongue.
I will offer love
without testing for deservingness.

So don’t ask me to wave a flag today
unless it is the flag of Peace.
Don’t ask me to sing an anthem
unless it is a song of Peace.
Don’t ask me to take sides
unless it is the side of Peace.[1]

© Irwin Keller, Oct. 17, 2023

[1] https://www.irwinkeller.com/itzikswell/taking-sides?fbclid=IwAR36yqnCTwLI015qTgRrPYpZT9OKwHkBdnHrW2H5lWbLnUeNlYn9nGUqalA

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Steve Beckham 1 Comment

Mark 9:2-9; Matthew 17:1-9; Luke 9:28-36

Have you ever sung in a choir or played in an orchestra?  If you have, you’ve probably had a moment when you realized that you were, for all intents and purposes, part of one large instrument.  Your voice in the choir was like one pipe in an organ.  You were part of one large, organic instrument comprised of many voices, all being played by the director or conductor.  It’s a wonderful experience to be part of something like that, to know that you’re part of something large and beautiful and organic which, if it’s done right, can, in its magical way, completely transport people.  It’s a humbling feeling to know that you are helping to bring this powerful yet ephemeral thing into the world, a thing composed only of sound, a thing that was not in the world before the conductor raised his baton and will vanish when he cuts off the last note and its echoes die in the hall. 

It’s an amazing experience.  And it all works beautifully as long as everyone learns their part.  And they all follow the conductor.  And they all play or sing the same piece.  All it takes for things to start to unravel, though, is for someone to decide they’re not happy with the conductor.  Little rebellions lead to great ones.  It can start with something as minor as the woodwinds rushing the conductor’s beat.  It could end with the disgruntled first trumpet player playing Trumpet Voluntary in the middle of Mozart’s Requiem. 

That seems to be Peter’s problem when Jesus tells him what lies ahead for them in Jerusalem.  He’s not happy with the conductor.  He has been traveling with Jesus for a while now.  He has watched him feed multitudes of people.  He has seen him walk on the sea.  He has watched Jesus cast out demons and heal people.  So when Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter naturally replies, “You are the Messiah!”  It seems like the obvious answer.  After all, who else could do all those things?  But Jesus is cautious with Peter’s answer.  In all three synoptic gospels he sternly orders his disciples not to tell people that he is the Messiah.  “No Messiah talk.  Are we clear?”

That didn’t sit well with Peter.  And then Jesus starts to tell his disciples and everybody else that he’s going to go to Jerusalem to speak truth to power at the corner of Religion and Politics.  He tells them that the Powers That Be are going to reject him, and abuse him.  He tells them that they will crucify him.  And on the third day he will rise again.  

No one wants to hear that.  That’s crazy talk. Peter cannot bring himself to sing along with that chorus.  He will not.  He takes Jesus aside and rebukes him.  

Think about that a minute.  Peter rebukes Jesus.  And apparently the other disciples are kind of half-way behind Peter on this one.  Both Mark and Matthew write that Jesus turned and rebuked Peter saying, “Get behind me, Satan! You’re not setting your mind on divine things but on human things.”

Jesus has a few more things to say to his disciples and the crowd about what it takes to be a disciple—namely, a willingness to take up the cross.  But Peter and the disciples are silent.

Peter rebukes Jesus.  Jesus rebukes Peter.

And then silence.  Six days of silence.

It’s easy to miss that.  Things move fast in the gospels.  Jesus moves quickly from one thing to the next.  The phrase “and immediately” occurs frequently in Mark’s gospel.  But not here.  

Six days later.  Six days of tension between Jesus and Peter?  Six days of anxiety for the disciples?  The gospels don’t say.  The gospels are silent.  And maybe Jesus and the disciples were, too.

Finally, Jesus decides that Peter needs a “come to Jesus” meeting.  Or a come withJesus moment.  So he asks Peter, James and John to come with him up the mountain.

And there on the mountain they see him transfigured—shining white and radiant, light within and light without,  they see who their teacher really is inside his humanity.  They see Moses and Elijah, the law-bringer and the great prophet, the two most important figures in the history of their people appear with Jesus and converse with him.  

Peter, whose default mode seems to be talk-first-think-later, babbles out, “Lord, it’s a good thing that we’re here!  Let’s make three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah…”  The gospels tell us he didn’t know what he was saying because he was terrified.  Well you would be, wouldn’t you.  

And then all of a sudden there is a cloud throwing a shadow over them.  All the brightness is dimmed.  And a voice comes out of the cloud and says, “This is my Son, the Beloved.  Listen to him.”

And as suddenly as it all started, it’s over.  There’s no one there but Jesus.  And as they head back down the mountain he tells them not to tell anyone about what they’ve seen until “after the Son of Man has risen from the dead.”

It took a lot to get through to Peter.  It took six days of silence and a hike up the mountain.  It took seeing Jesus talking with Moses and Elijah as he was shining like the sun.  It took hearing the voice of God speaking to him from a cloud saying, “This is my Son.  The Beloved.  Listen to him!” 

That’s what it took to get Peter to play the same tune and follow the conductor.

Is that what it takes for us?

There have always been people who try to bend Jesus to their agenda instead of bending themselves to the way of Jesus.  There have always been people who call themselves Christian who don’t seem to listen much to Jesus.

For a long time now we have seen a strain of pseudo-Christianity in this country and around the world that has little to do with the teaching of Jesus as we encounter him in the gospels.  It is based on triumphalism and a theology of glory.  It worships and celebrates power and ignores the call to enter the into world’s trials and suffering as Christ entered into our trials and suffering.  It walks hand-in-hand with nationalism and, often, racism.  It sees baptism as a get out of hell free card and not as a way of life in the beloved community.  It has co-opted the name Christian and Christian language and symbols, but it has not learned to do justice, to love kindness or to walk humbly with God—to love the neighbor as oneself. 

So many, like Peter, want a militant messiah.  But that’s not the way God does things.  That’s not the way of Jesus.

Six days before their trip up the mountain, after Peter rebuked Jesus and Jesus rebuked him back, Jesus had this to say to the crowd that had been gathered around them:  “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.  For what will it profit you to gain the whole world and forfeit your life?  Indeed, what can they give in return for your life?”

Jesus was not giving a recruitment speech designed to conjure the rewards and glories of conquest and victory.  He was issuing a realist’s invitation to a subversive movement where participation could have deadly consequences.  He was calling them, and is calling us still, to confront the powers and systems that diminish and oppress and marginalize and antagonize and lie to people wherever we find those powers and systems.  Following Jesus can be dangerous.  Listening to him can put you at odds with family and friends.  It can complicate your life.  But your life will be meaningful. 

Jesus wanted to make it clear that he was not a white-horse-sword-in-hand messiah. He wanted his disciples and everyone else to understand that his way of confronting injustice and oppression was to free people from its weight, heal their wounds, and then simply stand in front of the things that assailed them and speak the truth.  That was the music he was bringing.  That was the song he wanted the world to sing with him.  Peter didn’t like that song at all.  He wanted the White Horse and Sword Cantata.  

So six days later, Jesus took him up the mountain to show him who he was really arguing with. So Peter could see him shine like the sun.  And so he could hear the voice.

Sometimes we all need to be reminded that Jesus leads and we follow, that he’s the conductor and we’re the players in the orchestra and singers in the choir.  Sometimes we all need to go up the mountain to be reminded of who Jesus is inside his humanity.  Sometimes we all need to be reminded of those words from the cloud: “This is my Son.  The Beloved.  Listen to him.”  

Especially those last words.  

“Listen to him.”