Rendering to Caesar, Rendering to God: Mark 12:13-17

Jesus Christ has a way of uniting people. In His band of twelve apostles, people are united together who would normally not have anything to do with each other. Consider Matthew, who had been employed as a tax-collector under the authority of the Roman government, and Simon the Zealot, who had identified himself with a radical sect of Jewish revolutionaries. These two men would have sooner killed one another than to be joined together. But because of Jesus Christ, they have become brothers. But Jesus does not only unite His friends. He unites His enemies as well. The Pharisees were staunch defenders of Jewish tradition and culture. The Herodians, on the other hand, supported Rome and were fully immersed in the culture of Greek and Roman ideals and practices. Each group stood for what the other group despised. The two groups had only one thing in common. They both hated Jesus Christ, and this was enough to bind them together in a common cause. In Mark 3:6, we read that they began early during His public ministry to conspire together as to how they might destroy Him. And in our text today, these two groups have been sent to Jesus by the Sanhedrin, that ruling body of religious leaders in Jerusalem, “in order to trap Him in a statement.” They have not come out of intellectual curiosity or to resolve a spiritual dilemma. They have come on a mission of malice. The Greek word translated “trap” in v13 was often used of catching an animal in a snare or hooking a fish. They seek to lure him in with their question in hopes of springing the snare on Him to discredit Him in the eyes of the people.

They begin with words of sweet but insincere flattery. They call Him “Teacher,” and indeed He is, but these men have no regard for His teachings. They say, “We know you are truthful.” He is, in fact, more than truthful; He claims in John 14:6 to be the embodiment of Truth. But they do not believe anything He says. They say, “You … defer to no one.” In other words, when Jesus speaks, He does not validate His sayings by citing the rabbis and the traditions, but speaks on His own authority. Again, this is true, but His authority is not recognized by these individuals. They say, “You are not partial to any.” Indeed, He is not like a modern politician who tells people what they want to hear so that they will like Him. As they say, He teaches “they way of God in truth.” These are truthful but empty words. They are not representative of what the Pharisees and the Herodians actually believe about Jesus. They seem to only say these things to endear themselves to Jesus. Their words are the sweet-smelling aroma of the bait that has been delicately balanced on the spring of the trap. It’s all a lead-in to their question: “Is it lawful to pay a poll-tax to Caesar, or not? Shall we pay or shall we not pay?”

Now this question is loaded with political dynamite. The Roman Empire had consumed Palestine nearly a century before and had installed Herod the Great as a puppet-king over the region. When he died in 4 BC, his region was dived among his three sons. Herod Philip was given the north-eastern district; Herod Antipas was given the regions of Galilee and Peraea; and Herod Archelaus was given the area of Judea and Samaria. Archelaus was hated by the people. He “interfered with the priesthood, married against Jewish law, and oppressed the Samaritans and Jews through brutal treatment.[1] Finally, the outcry against Archelaus became so great that in 6AD, Augustus Caesar had him deposed and Judea came under the direct rule of Rome as a province. Whereas in the regions of Antipas and Philip, the taxes of the people went to Rome by way of the local government, in Judea, the taxes of the people went directly to the Emperor.

There were three taxes placed on the people: a land tax, amounting to a tenth of the grain and a fifth of the wine and fruit produced annually; an income tax, amounting to one percent of a man’s annual earnings; and a poll tax, or census tax, amounting to one denarius (an average day’s wage) for every man between the ages of 14-65 and every woman between 12-65. “It was the tax which everyone had to pay simply for the privilege of existing.”[2]This did not set well with the people of Judea, and one particularly zealous person named Judas of Galilee began a revolt, promising the people that God would bless them “if they resorted to all the violence they could muster.”[3] Though the Romans squashed this rebellion quickly, the hatred of paying Roman taxes never disappeared. Paying these taxes was a constant reminder that they were under the thumb of Rome.

What made this question about paying taxes such an explosive one was that there was no safe answer. If Jesus said that the tax should be paid, then He would lose favor in the eyes of the Jewish people, whose nationalistic zeal was well-represented here by the Pharisees. But if He should say that they should not pay the tax, then certainly He would be viewed as a dangerous revolutionary in the eyes of Rome, whose interests are here being guarded by the Herodians. So, when they said, “You are not partial to any,” they knew that any way He answered this question would show that He is either partial to the Jewish people or partial to the Romans. Either way, the trap would be sprung. He would be rejected or killed by Jews whose passions ran hot on this issue, or He would be put to death by the Romans for inciting a rebellion. It did not matter to the Pharisees, Herodians, or Sanhedrin which outcome was actualized. Eliminating Jesus was all that mattered to them.

Now, how will Jesus respond to the question. Would He dodge the question as modern politicians are fond of doing when faced with divisive questions? Perhaps He may say, “It’s above my pay-grade.” It would be perfectly understandable if He said, “I don’t have to answer that question, because you’re not really looking for an answer, you just want to trap Me.” In fact, He does say, “Why are you testing Me?” The word translated testing there is the same word used of Satan’s temptations of Jesus in the wilderness. He knew that they were not asking out of a genuine desire to know and do God’s will. Mark says that he knew their hypocrisy. The word hypocrisy comes from the Greek theater, where the hypocrite was an actor playing a part, wearing a mask. Jesus knew that their flattery and their question was an insincere ploy to lure Him into their snare. But Jesus didn’t dodge the question. He answered it in a most profound way. In fact, His answer left the people amazed, according to verse 17, because the answer He gave did not spring the trap. Yogi Berra purportedly said, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” Faced with two possible answers, each of which would land Him in deep weeds with one side or the other, Jesus “takes the fork” and affirms the dual responsibility individuals bear in regard to the ruling authorities of nations and the sovereign authority of God. There are at least two clear principles that surface in His words that concern us today in our role as dual citizens of the nation in which we live and the Kingdom of God to which we ultimately belong. It is to these principles we turn our attention now.

I. As citizens of an earthly nation, we have a responsibility to its governing authority.

Coins in ancient days were symbols of power. When a nation was conquered, one of the first acts of the new regime was to issue new currency. As long as the conquered nation used the coin of its overlord nation, they were under the power of that nation. The coin was considered to be the personal property of the King whose image was engraved upon it, giving him the authority to demand its return to him whenever and however he desired.

In Judea, the people used the coins of Rome. Jesus said, “Bring me a denarius to look at.” It is interesting that He did not have one of His own, but the inquisitors produced one for Him to examine. Jesus asked, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” The coins in circulation in those days bore the image of the reigning emperor Tiberius on the front side, with the words “Tiberius Caesar Augustus, Son of the Divine Augustus.” On the reverse side was a depiction of a seated woman, believed by many to be his mother Livia, with the words Pontifex Maximus, meaning “High Priest.”

It isn’t hard to see why the Jewish people despised the poll-tax. It was a constant reminder that they were under Rome’s domination, and the tax they paid served to fund the Roman power they so despised. And the coin itself proclaimed blasphemy, attributing deity to the Emperor and establishing him as the High Priest of his empire. One scholar has referred to the coin as “a portable idol promulgating pagan ideology.”[4] Yet, they seemed to have no objection to using these coins for daily commerce, and accepting the benefits of Roman rule, such as good roads, stable infrastructure, and the enforcement of the Pax Romana, or “The Peace of Rome,” which kept the Empire safe. Roman rule had provided a stability in the world that was seldom seen before their domination, and has been seldom seen since. While they were not a free nation, they had privileges under Rome that they would not enjoy on their own. And these privileges did not come free.

Is it lawful, they asked, meaning, is it in keeping with Jewish law, to pay this tax? Jesus answers, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” Since the coin bore the image of Tiberius, and since Rome had established themselves as the authority of the land and brought the privileges of the empire into being in the region, they should pay the tax. Besides, what God-fearing Jew would want to carry that idolatrous thing around in his pocket anyway? Let Caesar have it. To not pay the tax, in fact, would seem to be a violation of Jewish law, which prohibits stealing, the taking of something without payment. To take the privileges of the state without payment would appear to be a great violation of the Ten Commandments than paying the tax.

Contrary to our rugged American ideals, the Bible does not endorse revolution. In Romans 13:1, the Apostle Paul said, “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities.” He goes says in verse 2 of that chapter that “whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God.” And he goes on in verses 6 and 7 to speak of paying taxes, saying, “Render to all what is due them,” including taxes. Likewise, Peter says in 1 Peter 2:13-14, “Submit yourselves for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right.” Now, we are inclined to say, “That’s all well and good, but what do we do when we don’t agree with the government?” I will remind you that the government of which these Apostles wrote, and of which the Lord Jesus speaks here, deified their emperor, outlawed Christianity, and put Christ, Paul and Peter, and countless other followers of Christ to death in brutal and torturous ways. Yet, they did not call upon the people of God to revolt and take up arms. To the contrary, they said, “Submit to them.”

In 2000, Donia and I were on a mission trip in Ukraine. During some down time one day, several of us were sitting around chatting, and one of the folks began to tell jokes about President Clinton. We all laughed and more jokes were told, and this went on for a few minutes. Little did we know that one of the Ukrainian Christians sitting nearby overheard every word that was being said, and she jumped to her feet and began to rebuke us in broken English about our conversation. She cited Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 and admonished us that we should respect our leaders even when we don’t agree with them, and then she asked us how many times we had prayed for our President, rather than telling jokes about his immorality. There was a very uncomfortable silence that came over the room. And the looks in every one of our eyes surely confessed that we were in the wrong.

We must render to the governing authorities what is due them, including respect, submission, and even taxes. None of us seem to mind having roads to drive on, a publicly provided water and sewer system, police, fire, and military protection. Many in our midst gladly accept the benefits of Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment, disability, and retirement income provided through Social Security. So, we have no right, and certainly no biblical justification to object to paying taxes. Accepting the privileges requires that we also accept the responsibilities. The government prints the money we use to buy the necessities and luxuries of life. And if we feel that the taxes are excessive, we even have a privilege that the people of Jesus’ day did not – we can elect new rulers whom we believe will govern more justly. But, if Caesar demands the tax, then the tax is to be paid. If it produces hardship, we can trust the faithful provision of God to overcome the hardship for us. And so the first principle we draw from the text here is this: as citizens of an earthly nation, we have a responsibility to its governing authority.

But Jesus didn’t stop there. Had He stopped there, He would have fallen into the trap set for Him by the Herodians and the Pharisees. He would have been discredited in the eyes of the Jewish people as being a puppet of Rome. But what He said next is of even greater importance. The second principle in the passage is this:

II. As human beings, our ultimate responsibility is to God

“Render … to God the things that are God’s.” How do we know what things are God’s? Well, how did we discover what things are Caesar’s? The coin belongs to Caesar because it bears Caesar’s image. What bears God’s image? I remind you of these words found in Genesis 1:26-27: ^“Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” Human beings bear the image of God, and therefore belong to God. For this reason, our ultimate responsibility in life is to Him. The Church Father Tertullian said some 1700 years ago, “Render unto Caesar, the image of Caesar, which is on the money, and unto God, the image of God, which is in man; so that thou givest unto Caesar money, unto God thine own self.”[5]

Every aspect of our lives falls under the ownership of God by virtue of our being made in His image. God is deserving of our love, our allegiance, our faith, our obedience, our praise and worship, our gratitude, and He has a right to Lordship over all that is ours. Unfortunately, when we use the word stewardship, we tend to automatically think of money. And money is a part of our lives, but Christian stewardship involves more than just our money. It involves every aspect of life. When we say that we are stewards, we mean that God is the owner and we are the managers. Everything we are and everything we have belongs to Him. He has given it to us to use for Him. And as we use our lives and the things of life He has entrusted to us for Him, we render it back unto Him to whom it is due. If Caesar wants his coins back, let him have them. But give to God the things which are rightfully His – namely our lives and all that our lives entail.

So we see from these two principles that our responsibility to God and our responsibility to the state are not mutually exclusive. We honor the state and submit to the state, not necessarily because the state is honorable or worthy, but because we have been commanded to by our Lord. And we honor God above all else, because He alone is worthy of our greatest allegiance. But the question arises, what do we do when the demands of state clash with the demands of God? We must confess that these occasions would be rare. Most of us have never been ordered by the government to do something that God has forbidden, or forbidden by the government from doing what God has commanded. But some perhaps have. Political correctness and religious pluralism are becoming part of the fabric of America, and the day may soon be coming when we can no longer speak out publicly for Christ and declare Him as the exclusive way of redemption for humanity. The day may be coming, and seems to be rapidly approaching, when the proclamation of biblical morality will be considered a hate-crime. Will we be silent because the government has ordered us to be? More severely, Christians at other times and places have been ordered by the government to renounce Christ as Lord and to worship the idols of the nation. This was the case in Rome, and has been so in other eras and lands as well. Does the Christian resort to idolatry in obedience to the government? Does the Christian abandon allegiance to Christ because the laws of the land command him to do so? By no means. When Jesus says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” He means to give him his due, but no more. The people of Jesus’ day were to pay the tax, but to reject Caesar’s blasphemous claim to be a god.

We read in the Old Testament how Daniel distinguished himself as a faithful servant of a pagan king in a foreign land, but when he was forbidden to pray to anyone except the king, what did Daniel do? The Bible says in Daniel 6:10 that he entered his house and prayed on his knees three times a day before an open window to his God, just as he had been doing all along. For this, he was cast into the den of lions, but he did not protest. He knew the laws of the land; he knew the consequences of violating those laws; but he knew the ways of God were more important. Similarly, in Daniel 3, when Nebuchadnezzar demanded that everyone worship the golden image he had erected, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego (who had been highly favored by the king) refused to do so. When the king confronted them about their refusal to bow to the image and threatened them with the punishment of the fiery furnace, they said, “our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up." We find in Acts 4:18 that Peter and John were ordered by the ruling council in Jerusalem to speak no more in the name in the name of Jesus. They responded, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; for we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard.” And in the very next chapter, we find the apostles being questioned again about violating their gag-order, but again they responded in Acts 5:29, “We must obey God rather than men.” And the Bible says that even though they were threatened with death, “every day, in the temple and from house to house, they kept right on teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.” So, there comes a point when the laws of man and the commands of God clash, and when they do, it is with God that our ultimate responsibility rests. But these are rare exceptions found in Scripture and history. Overwhelmingly, the biblical admonition to Christians is to submit to earthly authorities as a testimony to the presence of Christ in our lives.

And so we have these two great principles from the mouth of Jesus: render to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar; but render to God that which belongs to Him. You have been created in the image of God, but by nature and by practice, every human being has rebelled against the sovereign authority of God in sin. The image of God in humanity has been distorted by sin, but it has not been destroyed. As His image bearers, we owe Him our lives. And out of His love for us, He has made a way for us to be reconciled to Him. In the person of Jesus Christ, God has come to live for us, and to die for us, bearing our sins in His death on the cross. He died for you and He died for me, that we might return to God and render unto Him that which He is due. And the risen Lord Jesus stands today with arms outstretched to receive all who will come to Him by repentance and faith and surrender themselves to Him as Savior and Lord. Because of His shed blood, our sins can be forgiven and we can live a life that brings Him honor and glory – a life that will endure for eternity in His presence.

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[1] “Archelaus” in Trent Butler ed., Holman Bible Dictionary (Nashville: Holman, 1991), 93.

[2] William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series: The Gospel of Mark [Rev. ed.] (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975), 285.

[3] Barclay, 285.

[4] David Garland, NIV Application Commentary: Mark (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), 462.

[5] Cited in Garland, 463.