Sermon: The Image of God

           “Jesus. Parking Lot. 11am.”

—this was the message on a church sign, where the sign guy was just done…
but when you think about it, it almost sounds like someone is challenging Jesus to a fight
—“Tony. Monkey bars. After school!”

          Challenging Jesus to a fight… that isn’t too far from the scene Matthew paints for us today.
We find him in that period between Palm Sunday and Good Friday,
continually confronted at the temple by the religious and political authorities of his day
—the Temple Elite, the Pharisees, their radicalized followers, and the Herodians, and eventually the Sadducees. All there itching for a fight.

          Jesus is squished between the radicalized disciples of the Pharisees
—likely a few knifemen among them,
and the Herodians, who sought the status quo over all else.
He is between anti-Roman zealots and well-heeled royal collaborators.

          They raise a gotcha question: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”

          Or to put it another way, “Hey Jesus! Are you a washed-up sell-out, or a dangerous revolutionary?”

          Jesus responds to this no win question with a very revealing question of his own, followed by an equally enticing answer
—a riddle to ponder that reveals our own compromised loyalties,
as well as the depths of our dignity and worth…

Let us pray

 

          Jesus’ essentially asks, “What’s in your wallet?”

          In their answer, the questioners give up their game, reveal that they,
unlike the crowd and Jesus Christ,
have pockets lined with Roman coin.
And more than that, they admit to the crowd that they are in the bag for the emperor
—after all they took a graven image into the temple square,
which hardly squares with the ways of God…

          Yes, this coin not only points to their social status, but also to their loyalty.

          Don’t believe that coins point to loyalty? try buying a sick of gum with Canadian quarters…
the queen doesn’t rule here, and neither did the emperor in the temple.

 

          Then, comes Jesus answer, “give to the emperor what is the emperor’s and to God what is God’s.” It painfully draws out all kinds of questions about loyalty. He’s asking:

“How far are you really going to go for this guy? This far off emperor?
Okay, Rome allows you to control the temple…
What about your heart, do you only follow it as far as the Emperor allows?
How about your soul?
How about your very self?”

 

          Because here’s the thing
—the image of God, the things of God, are etched into your very being.
You’ve read Genesis, right? You are made in God’s image…

          This means:
-you are coins of the Kingdom, your lives pointing to God’s reign among us.
-you are God’s dear people, graciously engraved with God’s love and care and very self, pointing to the goodness of God’s creation!
-your actions matter, your lives matter!
- your dignity and self-worth are NEVER in question, they’ve been there from the very beginning, since that moment when God declared you very good.

          Beloved friends, you matter so deeply to God!

          I know the fatigue of this year has warn us all down (some of you all, like that sign guy, have had a really rough week and are just done!) and it has battered us badly, but believe me, you belong to God, matter to God, are made in God’s image. A+A