To Whom Do You Belong?

The Gospel writers tell us about a number of instances where Christ encounters the political and religious elite of His day and how those encounters went.  This passage is from Matthew 22.

Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words.  They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians.  "Teacher," they said, "we know you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren't swayed by men, because you pay no attention to who they are.  Tell us then, what is your opinion?  Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?"  

But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, "You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me?  Show me the coin used for paying the tax."  They brought him a denarius, and he asked them, "Whose portrait is this?  And whose inscription?"  

"Caesar's," they replied.

Then he said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's."

When they heard this they were amazed.  So they left him and went away.    (Matt.  22: 15 - 22).

We read this and think, "Wow!  That is so smart, so slick, so clever!  Jesus should have been a lawyer!"  But Christ wasn't trying to be clever.  He was just pointing out a fact.  The Greek word used here that is translated "portrait" in the NIV Bible, is "eikon," which can be translated, "portrait, likeness, or image."  It is probably best translated, "image."  "Whose image is this?" To capture what Christ is saying here, think about a passage in the Bible that uses the word "image" several times.  Look at the first chapter of Genesis.  

"Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image...' 

So God created man in His own image,

In the image of God he created him; ' "  (Gen 1:  26 and 27).

Now go back to the passage from Matthew.  Christ takes the coin from them and asks, "Whose image is on the coin?"   

"Caesar's," they answer.

"Then the coin belongs to Caesar."  

"But you," he is implying, "you bear God's image.  You belong to God."

The Pharisees missed that.  But we shouldn't.  

We bare God's image.  We belong to God.