Pilgrim Uniting Church, Adelaide SA SUN 18-OCT-2020 - 11 AM Sermon Rev Dr Greg Elsdon Pentecost 20 – A party of anti-Roman Pharisees and pro-Roman Herodiams decided to work together in their efforts to get rid of Jesus by discrediting him in the eyes of a crowd of onlookers. So they concocted a trick question – was it legal to pay taxes to the Roman emperor, or not? It was a question with many layers of meaning, both political and religious, and any Yes or No answer was going to make him appear to be aligned with one party or the other. But he wriggled out of giving a yes/no answer when he asked to see a Roman coin. Roman taxes had to be paid with Roman coins, stamped with the emperor's image and title. Because in Roman eyes the emperor had been declared to be one of the gods, a financial transaction using Roman coinage was also seen as a religious activity. In his reply, Jesus was telling his questioners to give to Caesar, the emperor, that which was in the image of Caesar, and to God that which was in the image of God. We are the ones who have been created in the image of God, even if some of us are a bit tarnished and distorted. We are the image bearers of our creator, and what we render to Caesar should always take second place to what we render to God. Matthew 22: 15-22 Playing Time   –   15:29