Earlier this week as I sat down to write this sermon, I noticed a ladybug crawling up the windowpane in my living room. The golden leaves on the ash tree outside my front door were waving in the fall breeze, and every now and then, I would watch a leaf sail past my window. All of this felt like such a miracle to me, and really it is. The crispness of the wind in the fall, the changing colors of the leaves, and the scurry of insects trying to make their way inside warm houses–all of it is miraculous, but none of it is new. I love the way the author of Ecclesiastes puts it. He writes, “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new’? It has already been, in the ages before us.” For all the troubles in this modern world, we discover in the Bible that none of it is new, and none of it is a surprise to God.

Yet, this week, I find myself surprised at the way two very different passages of Scripture shed light on the same human question: Who’s in charge here? And, a secondary question, “What does this mean for us?”

In the book of Exodus, the people of Israel are at the foot of Mount Sinai. They grow restless while Moses is up on the mountain receiving the law from God, and they take off all of their gold rings and earrings and make a golden calf to worship instead. In the Gospel of Matthew, some leaders hold up a coin and ask, “Should we give money to the Emperor?” Whose riches are these? Who is in charge? And what obligation do we have to follow whomever is in charge?

This week, as we continue our sermon series Power and the Christian Faith, we are reminded that God is the ultimate authority. We also discover that God’s authority is not like the authority of the human leaders in the world. In God’s authority and in God’s kingdom, we are the ones who bear God’s image, not the currency, and not any job or status symbol. In God’s authority and in God’s kingdom, God’s way of ruling is to be with us–right in our midst–not so far removed from us that we don’t stand a chance of being heard or cared about. Let’s take these Scripture passages one at a time and see how these two different texts in two different situations point us to the same truth about God.

Let’s start with the Gospel story. In Matthew 22, Jesus is confronted by some Pharisees and some Herodians. In the Gospels, we learn a lot about the Pharisees, but we may be less familiar with the Herodians. The Herodians, like their name suggests, were supporters of the rule of Herod Antipas. They were more supportive of Hellenistic or Greek culture in general, and this made them unpopular with folks like the Pharisees who were sticklers for Jewish culture and traditions. Even though the Pharisees and the Herodians didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things, they agreed that Jesus was a threat. They teamed up together to ask Jesus a question, in the hopes that their question would get Jesus to say something they could use against him.

There in the temple, they ask Jesus a question about Roman taxation. In “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” Linus says, “There are three things I’ve learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.” But here, the Pharisees and Herodians ask Jesus about politics and its relationship to religion. They ask, “If God is truly King, should we pay taxes to Caesar?”  

Jesus sees their attempt to trick him for what it is, and he calls them out: “Why are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin used for the tax.” They bring him a denarius. It’s interesting to me that there in the temple, the people were so quickly able to produce a Roman tribute penny. This tribute coin–just like the one I showed to the children in the children’s lesson–would have had the face of the emperor on the front–in this case, Emperor Tiberius. On the back of the coin was an image Tiberius’s mother Livia, designed to make her look like the Roman goddess Pax. On one side of the coin, the words “Tiberius Caesar, Son of the Divine Augustus” were engraved. The other side said, “The Great Roman High Priest.” Son of God and High Priest. These were incredibly bold claims to make, and it was expected of people under Roman rule to accept these claims and to honor the emperor as though he was both Son of God and High Priest.

Jesus asks the people, “Whose head is this, and whose title?” Their answer: “The emperor.” And then Jesus does something incredibly wise; he reminds them of their own history when he says, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” You see, back in the 160s BC, the Jewish people were oppressed by the Seleucid Empire. They had been under Seleucid rule for a long time, and at first, the Seleucid leaders let the Jewish people be for the most part. But, around the year 168 BC, things began to change. Antiochus IV, who was the ruler of the Seleucids, went into the temple and looted it. Tensions rose, and eventually, the Jewish people revolted against the empire, led by a man named Mattathias.

In the book of 1 Maccabees, Mattathias gives a speech at the end of his life to encourage the people to keep standing up for their faith and to keep fighting back against the Seleucids. In 1 Maccabees 2:68, he says this, “Pay back the nations in full, and obey the commands of the law.” Prolific author and New Testament theologian N.T. Wright connected this story of the Jewish revolt against the Empire with Jesus’s words about taxes. Mattathias, drawing on the hundreds of years they had been oppressed by the Seleucids, tells the people, “Give to the empire what they deserve, but obey the law and give God what God deserves.” Jesus, knowing this history responds to the question in the temple by telling the people to give the emperor what he deserves–leaving that wide open to interpretation. Sure, give him this coin. His face is on it, after all. But, far more important, we should give to God what is God’s. And what is God’s? What in this world bears the image of God? Genesis tells us human beings are made in God’s image. N.T. Wright says that giving to God what is God’s is “everything to do with being human.”

Hearing this, is it any wonder the people were left amazed? Even now, as I think about this story again, I’m left speechless myself. If I were to get honest with myself, what would it really look like for me to give to God what is God’s? What would it look like to offer up our whole selves? 

In our passage from Exodus, Moses has gone to the tent of meeting to talk with God. The people are still camped at the foot of Mount Sinai, but God has told them it is time to keep going on their journey toward the promised land. If you remember, the people worshiped the golden calf while Moses was on the mountain, and this action so grieved God that even though God still planned to give the people the promised land, God no longer intended to go with them and dwell right in their midst. God would send an angel, or a pillar of cloud instead. When Moses hears this, he goes out to talk with God, and their conversation is more like a heated discussion than a dainty conversation in prayer.

Moses tells God that if God will not go with the people, there is no point in them going at all. God concedes just a little bit and says God’s presence will go, but God does not say “go with you.” It’s more of a, “I will go ahead of you,” than an “I will go in your midst.” For Moses, this is not enough. What Moses wants is the unique relationship they used to have with God. Moses wants God to be in their midst, Moses wants God to be “God with us.” And so Moses pushes again, “If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people, unless you go with us?” And God agrees. God agrees to be “God with us.” God agrees to be “God in our midst.” And because of that, Moses agrees to continue leading the people toward the promised land.

I have to give Moses a lot of credit. He doesn’t give up and he knows what is most important. He knows that if they are not a people who have a unique relationship with God, there is no point in taking the difficult journey at all. And God puts up with Moses, and in fact is pleased with Moses for asking and asking for God’s presence to be with them. 

I love the way Dennis Olson, professor of Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary, views this chapter of Exodus. He says this chapter gives Moses an expansion of God’s name. At first, when God speaks with Moses, God tells Moses a name that points to the past: “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” Then, God gives Moses a name for God that points to the present and the future – YHWH – a name that means “I am what I am” or “I will be what I will be.” When we get to the ten commandments, we get even more of an expansion on the name of God:  “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” God is your God, and God works to bring us out of the house of slavery. Later in Exodus, we get even more of an expansion on God’s name: “I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt in order that I might live among them.” This is the piece of God Moses is unwilling to let go of–the part that says “in order that I might live among them.” 

In Exodus 33, God agrees with Moses and promises to live among the people once again, and then adds a new piece to Moses’s understanding of God’s name: “I Will Be Gracious to Whom I Will Be Gracious, and I Will Show Mercy on Whom I Will Show Mercy.” Dennis Olson explains it this way, “The balance in God’s deepest character leans toward grace and mercy. God freely extends grace upon whomever God chooses. In this time and place on Mount Sinai, God chooses to love, forgive, and have mercy on the rebellious Israelites.”

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I look at all the hurt in the world. I see all the chaos and the wars, the destruction, and the grief, and a part of me wants to ask, “Who’s in charge here?” In both Jesus’s words about the Roman tax, and in Moses’s conversation with God, I am reminded again that God is the God of the past, the present, and the future. God is our God who leads us out of bondage. God desires to live among us. And God shows mercy and forgiveness and love. Freely. Even when we’ve completely messed up like the people with the golden calf. God’s desire to be the God who dwells with us doesn’t just go away because we forget who we belong to for a moment.

As I reflect on these two passages, I am left with two wonderings (Well, probably more than two, but for the sake of time this morning, let’s focus on two): 

First, if we give to God what is God’s, that’s everything, including all of who we are. I love the way verse 6 of the hymn “Take My Life” says this:
Take my love; my Lord, I pour

at thy feet its treasure store.

Take myself, and I will be

ever, only, all for thee,

ever, only, all for thee.

Doesn’t that just say everything? I wonder what would happen if each of us took time this week to ask ourselves what it might look like for us to give to God what is God’s. I wonder if we might begin to see our whole lives as an offering of praise and gratitude.

So first, by giving to God what is God’s, we give God everything, including our whole selves. And second, God wants to dwell among us, and God wants us to want that too. Right before our passage from Exodus for this morning, the writer of Exodus talks about how Moses spent a lot of time in the tent of meeting talking to God. And then, in verse 11, it says this, “Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend.” Isn’t that beautiful?

Moses so wanted God’s presence to dwell among them that he argued for it. He told God that if they weren’t going to be people who had God with them, there was no reason to keep taking the journey to the promised land. That’s how important God’s presence was to Moses. As we reflect on what it might mean for us to have God’s presence as a priority, I imagine we will each come up with different ways we can express that. One way that came to mind for me was to pursue love and grace in how we live our lives. 

Who in our lives might be in need of the grace and love of God’s presence? Who might God be calling us to forgive, to show mercy to? I believe that by reaching out to others with love and grace and mercy, we are showing with our lives that we are people who long for God to dwell among us. We are praying: God, we want your kingdom to come and your will to be done right here on earth, not just in heaven eons away. Amen.