What We Owe to God
Video: https://youtu.be/vgHpHpXrvu0
Last week we were challenged by Jesus to see how he is overturning the world like the tables in the temple and how he is trying to overturn what seems natural to us, like the fig tree or the mountain. Today, Jesus is going to show us that we actually owe this to him. We owe God everything. We owe him everything we ever work for, we owe him ourselves, we owe him our commitment, we owe him our love. Yet the sad reality is that most of the time we think we deserve more rather than recognizing that God deserves more. We have been privileged, but unwilling to recognize that we never earned that privilege. As a free gift from God, our privilege comes with a duty.
So let’s jump to our passages. We have 4 big sections. The parable about the tenants, the Pharisees challenging Jesus about taxes, the Sadducees challenging Jesus about marriage in the resurrection, and finally the two most important commandments.
In the parable of the tenants, we get a very simple situation. Here is a man who built up his land and did everything he needed to produce grapes and wine, except then he hired workers. He seems to be quite fair in that he only asks for a share of the produce. Yet, the workers don’t share any of it with the owner. In fact, they go too far as they beat up and even kill those whom the landowner has sent. Can you imagine this in today’s world? It is like someone who works at a grocery store till pocketing everything that comes in and then beating up the manager when he only asks for some of it. This is practically unimaginable in today’s world, there is little doubt that justice would be done. Yet the interesting thing is that we have done that with God. He created this world, he shaped it to produce, he gave us all of our gifts and capacity, he ordered us and this world to create more than we need; so why don’t we give back, why don’t we respect him more, why don’t we turn to him in thanks? Everything comes from him and so we owe him at least that.
In both of our examples though the owner of the vineyard and the manager of the grocery store are being very gracious. They are giving the workers autonomy and trust. They could take all of the earnings and pay what they think is fair, which is the usual practice in our workplaces, but instead, they trust the workers to give to the owners what they think is fair. God does the same with us, he trusts us and gives us the autonomy to decide how we are going to use everything he has given us, how we might pay him back.
But God’s gracious gifts do not end there. The people that go to collect are the prophets and teachers, trying to redirect our path, to show us the graceful giver and what we owe. This is itself a gift as the prophets of old were continually trying to lead Israel away from a destructive path and end that they already deserved. Finally, the owner sends his Son. What is the owner hoping to accomplish by sending his son? Respect. At this point, it doesn’t even seem to be about what they owe, what the owner and what God wants first and foremost is a restored relationship with him. Yet, what is our response? We only want to take more, more that we never earned. God has been immensely patient and gracious in giving, but as slow to anger as God is, there is a limit, the call of justice demands it. So, because we have rejected all of God’s gracious offers, again and again, we are held accountable and get what we deserve.
Yet God’s gifts and graciousness don’t end, because he takes the very one we have rejected and he turns Him into a new foundation. He builds for us a house with Christ as the center, so that we might enter in and find a new home, where these tenants don’t have their way. That is meant to be the church, the community, and the body of Christ.
In the next two stories, we get the Pharisees and the Sadducees challenging Jesus’ authority. They are literally beginning to play out those ungrateful tenants and yet Jesus continually challenges them to see what they owe.
The Pharisees challenge Jesus about taxes, asking is it right to pay taxes to Rome? This is a trap. If Jesus says yes, Jesus betrays his people as Rome is the foreign oppressor that has taken away their freedom. A yes would also put into question what we owe to the temple and God - our tithe. If Jesus was to say no, he could be immediately charged with distention and rebellion, he would have also been challenging the authority that God had given Rome at that time. To the Pharisees, this was an impossible question, they wanted to use it to overthrow Jesus and God but there is no contradiction in God or Jesus, even if we don’t understand it at first.
Jesus gets them to put out a coin and asks whose image is on it. It was Caesar’s image, for us, it would be the queen or usually government leaders. He says then give to them what is theirs, but give to God what is God. The simple question that follows is, “What is God’s?” Well, everything. He is the creator, the sustainer, the owner, we are barely even renters or workers. But the duty goes further because it is not just that everything is God’s, but just like the coin has the image of Caesar what has the image of God? Each of us does. We have each been created in the likeness of God and so we are forever marked by our creator as his, purposed to be in relationship with Him like a parent and child and yet more.
The Sadducees challenge Jesus with a story about a woman who ends up marrying seven brothers and never having children dies herself. Who will she be married to in the resurrection? This woman married the 7 brothers because of an important Old Testament rule that was created to protect property, rights, and the inheritance of God, but the Sadduccees use it to challenge Jesus on the resurrection, ultimately because they want to be right.
Jesus tells them it is because of their ignorance of Scripture that they don’t understand. I have to admit, oftentimes I feel ignorant when reading this passage because Jesus goes on to tell them that people won’t be given in marriage in the resurrection instead they will be like angels. I have less problem believing in the resurrection, but believing that marriage won’t exist is a little harder for me. Obviously, I have a very worldly reason for believing this, but it is more than that because Jesus Himself only a few chapters earlier really defended marriage and upheld it. Throughout the Old Testament marriage is paralleled and made to represent our relationship with God and so because of the theological comparison, both relationships are built up in our understanding.
One of the main things that Jesus is showing us is that we will be in a way married to God, we will be like the angels utterly committed to giving ourselves to Him as He gives Himself to us as Jesus will do on the cross. This is our duty and what we actually need. We have been given everything, made in His image, cared for, loved and how do we respond. Well, we should try to respond by being as committed to God as He is to us, even if we can never give back or pay back what we have been given. This relationship with God should be our primary relationship even now, which I will get to soon because . . .
We still wrestle with the idea of marriage in the resurrection. The next section about the two greatest commandments should help us clarify that a little because Jesus shows us that a natural consequence of us loving God with all that we are is that we love one another as we love ourselves. This along with God’s desire for us to live in unity, peace, love, intimacy, edifying and so much more tells us that our marriage and love for God will be poured out in our other relationships as our love for God should pour out on others today. I can’t tell you what my marriage to Mary Anne or any marriage will look like in the resurrection, but I can tell you that they will be transformed by our relationship with God and that somehow it will be filled with even more love and intimacy than we can imagine.
So lastly, we get to the two most important commandments. We know now that we owe God everything as He has graciously given us again and again, we owe him ourselves, we owe him our commitment. So to love him with all of our heart, our mind, our soul and strength, seems like the natural response. God’s command is not just a command, but it should be what we want, it should be a natural consequence of understanding and seeing what is right there in front of us. Then the natural consequence of loving God in such a way is to love what God loves, which is . . . us. We are all created in His image, we are all created to be His children, we are all given everything by a gracious and loving God. We haven’t earned it and so we should share it. This love, this relationship is at the very core of our faith and it is the core of why we live. Shouldn’t we want to have a stronger relationship with the one who keeps giving? Shouldn’t we want to give back? Shouldn’t we want to commit to the one who has never given up on us? Should we want to love the one who loves us, even when we don’t deserve it? We owe more than we can ever give and yet what he wants more than anything is us.
