Well, I am past my one year mark on this blog. I am excited about discovering what God has in store for me as I begin blogging about the passages a second time through. I hope that my writing has improved as I have gone along. I pray that God’s Spirit continues to move in me as I write this. The last few days the Spirit has really moved in my heart as I wrote my blog entries. I pray that He continues to do so and that I can take what the Spirit has been saying to me and put it into practice. Please pray for me on that score.
I have been using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study for almost a year. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I started writing this blog because the only way I can get myself to read the Bible everyday is to pretend that I am teaching someone about what it says to me. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them. I hope that the Spirit is moving in others through these posts as the Spirit has definitely been convicting me.
After land had been allocated to all of the other tribes, the tribe of Levi came to Eleazar and Joshua to remind them that God had said through Moses that they would receive towns and surrounding pasture-lands among the other tribes rather than a separate allotment of land. At this point towns and their surrounding pasture-lands were chosen from the lands of the other tribes to be given to the Levites. The Levites were spread among the other tribes in proportion to the size of the various tribes.
At this point Joshua called together the fighting men from the tribes granted lands east of the Jordan (Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh) and told them that their promise had been fulfilled and sent them home. As they returned home, the men of the tribes with lands east of the Jordan River built an altar on the west bank of the Jordan River. The rest of the tribes gathered for war because of this. They sent a delegation to the tribes east of the Jordan demanding to know why they had built an altar. They told the tribes east of the Jordan that God had commanded them to offer sacrifices at only the one altar and that the whole of the nation of Israel would suffer if those from east of the Jordan violated this command.
When Jesus was teaching in the Temple the chief priests and teachers of religious law came to Him and demanded to know by what authority He did the things which He did (the context suggests that in particular they were asking by what authority He drove the merchants out of the Temple courts)? Jesus replies by first asking them where John the Baptist’s authority to baptize came from, from heaven or from men?
The religious leaders discussed their answer among themselves. They knew that if they answered, “From heaven,” Jesus would ask them why they did not believe him? On the other hand, if they said John’s authority was merely of men, the crowd would likely assault them, since the crowd believed that John was a prophet. Even if the crowd did not react violently, the religious leaders would have lost the respect of the crowd if they declared that John’s authority merely came from men. So, they told Jesus that they did not know.
Jesus then told them that He would not answer their question either. I am pretty sure that the crowd would have interpreted Jesus’ answer as saying that His authority came from the same place as John’s. Jesus was pointing out that we have to make a decision. Either John’s (and His) teachings were merely from men and could be safely ignored, or they were from God and needed to be followed. This is too important a subject to be undecided on. This is still true today.
Jesus then tells the parable of sharecroppers who refuse to give what was due to the representatives of the landowner, even going so far as to kill his son. Jesus tells the crowd that the landowner will return, kill those sharecroppers and find others to tend the vineyards. He then quotes Psalm 118:
has now become the cornerstone.’
That anyone who stumbles over this stone will be broken to pieces and those it falls on will be crushed. I think His meaning was that if we try to build our lives without incorporating Him and His teaching we will constantly stumble over Him and be broken. And if we try to build our lives with Him at some place other than as the foundation, what we have built will come apart and He will “fall” on us, crushing us. Have I rejected the cornerstone? Or have I made it my foundation?
The leaders then sent spies pretending to not be connected to them to ask Jesus a question. They approached Him and, after proclaiming what a wonderful, honest teacher He was, they asked Him if it was right to pay taxes to Caesar or not? They were trying to trap Jesus. If He said that it was wrong to pay taxes to Caesar, they could have Him arrested and executed for sedition. On the other hand, if He said that it was right to pay taxes to Caesar, the people would lose respect for Him. Jesus knew exactly where they were going and asked them to show Him one of the coins used to pay the tax. He then asked them whose image and inscription were stamped on it. To which the questioners replied, “Caesar’s.” Jesus then told them to give to Caesar what was Caesar’s and to God what was God’s. Jesus’ answer was more than just clever. When He asked them whose image and inscription were on the coin, the words He used would have reminded His listeners of the command that they were to make no images of God and that they were to have no other gods. Jesus answer would have served two purposes. The first would have been that even carrying such a coin should be construed as idolatry by the same standard that said that it was wrong to pay taxes to Caesar.
The other purpose was more subtle and has relevance to us today. Jesus was also reminding the people that Caesar was making claims to authority that belonged to God. Caesar claimed to be the source of safety and security. He claimed that everyone owed their life to him. Caesar proclaimed that one’s primary loyalty was to him. All governments throughout history make similar claims, to some degree this is a product of the nature of government. Governments which declare that all of their citizens be part of a particular religion are attempting to get around this by saying that one’s loyalty to God (or gods) is through the government sanctioned “Church”. The Founding Fathers of the U.S. attempted to address this by placing the freedom of religion in the First Amendment to the Constitution. I do not think they were successful, but it was an attempt to address the issue of government putting itself in the place of God. It is important to realize that Jesus’ answer is not about taxes. It is about where our loyalty lies. A simplistic look at Jesus’ answer, which gets most of the point, is that the coin that is used to pay taxes to Caesar has Caesar’s image on it, so it “belongs” to him. But that YOU have God’s image on you, so you belong to God.
The psalmist declares that he will sing of God’s unfailing love and faithfulness. That he will do all in his power to see that everyone knows of God’s wonderful power. I will strive to do the same. I will declare God’s mighty power and is everlasting love. There is no being nor institution which can compare to the power of God. I will praise Him as long as I draw breath.
If we demonstrate good sense, people will respect us. On the other hand those who cannot be relied on are heading for destruction. Those who are wise think and plan before they act. The foolish not only act without examining the consequences, they are often proud of this fact.