A Sermon for the Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost
The Rev. Patricia A. Gillespie
Isaiah 45:1-7
Psalm 96
1 Thessalonians 1:1-10
Matthew 22:15-22
It's a trick and Jesus knows it.
Why pay taxes to the emperor? It's a no-win question. The Pharisees are trying to force Jesus to deny either the law of his faith or the law of the dreaded Roman oppressors. "You're a good Jew, aren't you?" they ask. "Does a good Jew support our enemies?"
Jesus recognized the plot to trap him and being a good Jew, he responds to the question with another question. "Whose head is this, and whose title?"
So ... whose picture is this?
It is our money.
Susan B. Anthony?
Oh. That's too bad.
I had hoped it might be Cedar Morrigan.
If our money had a picture of our church treasurer on it,
we could say that Jesus told us to give it to the church.
Then the church would have plenty of money for all the things we'd like to do.
It would have been the best stewardship drive ever.
Well, let's try again ... what about this one?
What's this?
It's our new dollar coin.
I don't suppose I could convince you that this is a picture of Cedar?
Or maybe of Elaine or Sarah, the treasurers of our other churches?
Do you know who she is?
It's Sacagawea.
She was a Shoshone girl, born more than 200 years ago, who guided the famous Louis and Clark expedition. Sacagawea, at about the age of 11, was captured by a raiding party from another tribe. Then she was bought (or possibly won in a bet) from that tribe by a French-Canadian trader, who made her his wife.
In 1804, when Sacagawea was about 15 and six months pregnant, her husband was hired by Captains Lewis and Clark, not so much for his own skills but for those of Sacagawea. She helped them get horses and find their way. She taught them how to find food. She kept peace between the explorers and the Native Americans. Sacagawea played a key role in the Lewis and Clark expedition, all the while carrying and caring for her new baby — a working mother.
So what do you suppose it means that a young Native American working mother is going to be on our new money?
If Jesus says about the emperor's picture, "Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor's." The money's got his picture on it. So I guess Jesus means "Give it to him." Then does having an Indian on our money mean we're supposed to spend all our money at casinos? Or give money to working mothers, or to those who take care of others and bring peace?
Jesus isn't talking so much about what to do with our money as he is telling us something about where things belong. A picture on something often tells us to whom it belongs. Some of us today are wearing a kind of picture: a pin with a dove. They are our Spirit of the Heartland ministry team pins. It tells people that the person wearing it belongs to our churches. That they have given themselves in ministry to all of us who are part of the Spirit of the Heartland churches.
The members of our youth group today, helping with the service, have received as a gift from the Church of the Good Samaritan pins with the Episcopal shield on them. The sign or the picture can tell us where someone or something belongs. The Episcopal shield says these people belong to the Episcopal church.
And last week when little Jackson was baptized, we put an invisible sign on him: a cross on his forehead. It tells us and him whose he is. It's a sign like he emperor's picture on the coin.
Remember little Jackson, or the last person you saw baptized.
We couldn't really see the cross on the forehead.
But think: Whose image was there?
His parents'?
Or does he look like his grandfather, who is our acolyte today?
(I think this is the first time I've baptized the grandchild of my acolyte.) Whose image is this?
Remember: "God created humankind in God's image in the image of God God created them male and female God created them." Jackson is God's image.
In whose image, then, were you made? Whose image is stamped on your life like the image on a coin? To whom, then, do you belong? You belong to God.
And Jesus tells us, "Give to God the things that are God's." Give ourselves to God. This is the offering Jesus asks us to make.
Jesus may not be trying to tell us about money and taxes. Or about working mothers or casinos. Jesus is telling us something about God. You are marked with God's image, just like the coin is marked with an image. So, Jesus says, "Give yourself to God."
It might mean being baptized or confirmed. It might mean serving on a ministry team or joining a youth group. Giving ourselves to God can mean giving ourselves to help and love someone else, to someone who is also made in God's image. It's that kind of giving that makes community. It's that kind of giving that makes church.
This is not a trick: We belong to God – our souls and our bodies, our money and our time. Sacagawea and the emperor are also made in God's image. It all belongs to God. And God gives it all to us.
Jesus is saying that we can be like God and be givers too. It's a way to polish up our image so we reflect God's love in the world.