The Rev. Kristin Krantz
St. James’, Mt. Airy
10/18/2020
Pentecost 20A/Proper 24
Exodus 33:12-23
Psalm 99
1 Thessalonians 1:1-10
Matthew 22:15-22
Gracious God, take our minds and think through them; take our hands and work through them;
take our hearts and set them on fire. Amen.
Invariably every three years when this gospel comes up in the lectionary it’s stewardship season, and with its talk of rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and what is God’s to God, and so it lends itself to a “sermon on the amount.”
But in this topsy-turvy year we’re pushing back stewardship a bit and launching our conversation about Faith-Filled Generosity next week, and without that stewardship lens in place I was surprised this week at how much the reading opened up in other ways.
Take for example the way it lends itself to a sermon on politics. Not partisanship – but politics – as Jesus engages in a what amounts to a political debate. How could this story inform our thinking just over 2 weeks from the election?
Or, we could dig deeper into Jesus’ Houdini-like ability to slip out of the traps that keep getting set for him, instead turning the words of his adversaries against them and charting a third way. What could we learn about power and conflict from this story?
But this week what stood out to me, and what I think maybe we all need to hear right now, was the lesson about the incarnation.
It starts with one of the opening comments the Pharisees made to Jesus in verse 16, saying to him that he did not regard people with partiality. A literal translation of this phrase in the Greek is “you do not regard the face of anyone,” which was a common metaphor for showing partiality.[1]
It’s a clever bit of writing, as it ironically anticipates Jesus’ question about the face of Caesar on the Roman denarius.
But even more than that, it sets up his pronouncement to give the emperor his due, and by the same token to do the same for God. Give to the emperor the things that bear his image – and then remember, what bears God’s image?[2]
You do, every human beings does. Jesus points us to that incarnational truth, that we are called to see the face of God in each other and indeed ourselves.
Our whole lives, then, should be “given” to God in the sense of participating in God’s mission of doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with the Giver of all good things.[3]
When we give ourselves to God in this way, our lives are radically reoriented towards God, and with God, at our very center. And suddenly that old hymn comes to life – they will know we are Christians by our love. Because that is what justice, kindness, and mercy look like in action – they look like love.
The incarnation isn’t just some theological topic to be discussed, it is the center of our faith, that God so loved us that God came to be with us in the person of Jesus Christ.
And here, in this story as Jesus debates with the powers that be, as the clock is ticking down until those same powers conspire to execute him, Jesus once again left us a path to follow – the way of love.
Our reading from Paul’s letter to the church in Thessalonica illustrates this way of love thusly: “We always give thanks to God for all of you and mention you in our prayers, constantly remembering before God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Let our work of faith, our labor of love, and our steadfastness of hope be signs to the world that we have given our whole selves to God. Let us live incarnationally. And let us follow in Jesus’ footsteps loving our neighbor as ourselves. Amen.
[1] Feasting on the Word, Year A, Volume 4, Exegetical Perspective.
[2] SaltProject Lectionary Commentary for the Twentieth Week after Pentecost.
[3] SaltProject Lectionary Commentary for the Twentieth Week after Pentecost.