Mark 12:16-17

GOD AND CAESAR

‘Whose is this image and superscription?… Render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.’

Mark 12:16

These words contain a peculiarly characteristic example of our Saviour’s mode of teaching, and a profound evangelical principle, applicable to all religious study and instruction. The question was put to Him, not sincerely, but ‘to catch Him in His words’; and therefore, in one sense, the answer was no answer at all. He took them in their own craftiness. He dealt with them, as God always deals with insincere inquirers, with one-sided and unfair search after truth—He silenced, without instructing them.

I. By a wider application of our Lord’s words we are taught—

(a) Render to those old heathen, of whom we read, the praise and honour which is really theirs, according to their good works.

(b) Render their due to all whom we condemn, or who condemn us, in the thousand varieties of opinion which intersect the nations and churches of Christendom.

(c) Render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s.’ The words surely may be extended to mean that we are to render to fact, to truth, to reason, those things which, by a sort of imperial sway, they require at our hands; to render to art, to nature, to science the conclusions which they have fairly won; bearing, as they do, that image and superscription of Himself, which God hath planted on their front, and which none can see and doubt.

(d) Render to prudence, to wisdom, to common sense their due by religious obedience. How many of our controversies need these, more than anything else, for their remedy! Common sense is more than a mere worldly virtue: it is a Christian, nay (with all reverence be it spoken), it is a truly Christlike grace. Mark how He practised it on this occasion—He Who, amidst His other names, is called ‘Wisdom,’ ‘the eternal Wisdom’ of God.

Dean Stanley.

Illustration

‘The Cæsar of those days was the Emperor Tiberius, a monster of wickedness in human nature, a corrupt world’s more corrupt sovereign, of whom Milton has written in the truth of history:—

“This Emperor hath no son, and now is old,

Old, and lascivious; and from Rome retired

To Capreæ, an island small but strong,

On the Campanian coast, with purpose there

His horrid lusts in private to enjoy;

Committing to a wicked favourite

All public cares, and yet of him suspicious;

Hated of all, and hating.”

Such was the world’s Cæsar when Christ spake among the Jews, “Render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s.” How truly does this word show us what our Lord afterwards declared before Cæsar’s officer, “ My kingdom is not of this world.”

(SECOND OUTLINE)

THE WORLD AND CHRIST

I. Let the world have its own.—Let him who is ostensibly at the head of this world have his due, for even an unjust government must be obeyed so long as it is a government. ‘The powers that be are ordained of God’ (Cf. Romans 13:1), and to resist the power is to resist the ordinance of God. Here is that great principle of justice which enforces upon each one of us his duty towards man. This principle covers all the commandments with respect to our neighbour. No debt is to be unpaid except, indeed, that one which St. Paul mentions as to be ever in payment, and which consequently is never paid out—the debt of love—that is, man’s debt to God paid over to his fellow-man.

II. Let Christ have His own.—Shall we bring the world’s sins, the world’s hypocrisies, the world’s vices before the Saviour? Shall we offer unto our loving God the unholy offering of a false worship, a mere lip service? These belong to the world, and let the world have them. They are not yours; you have no right to them; for you are Christians, Christ’s people, Christ’s loved ones. Give unto Him His own.

(a) Give unto Him a full obedience, an obedience which will keep all His sayings.

(b) Give unto Him a larger faith, a faith which believes Him as much in His ordinances as in His words.

(c) Give unto Him a dutiful submission, a submission which, childlike, saith always, ‘Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth.’

Render unto Christ, and through Christ unto God, your spirits, souls, and bodies.

Illustration

‘Sibelius quotes a passage from Augustine on the Psalms, which is worth reading as an illustration of the subject now before us. “Julian was an unbelieving emperor. He was an apostate, a wicked man, and an idolater. And yet Christian men served as soldiers under this unbelieving emperor. When the cause of Christ was concerned they acknowledged no commander but Him that was in heaven. When the emperor wished them to worship idols or burn incense to them, they preferred honouring God before him. But when he said, ‘Draw out in order of battle: march against that nation,’ they obeyed him. They drew a distinction between their eternal Master and their temporal master; and yet were submissive to their temporal master for their eternal Master’s sake.” ’