Luke 20:25-33: a reflection

25He said to them, “Then give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” 26They weren’t able to trap him in his words before the people. They marveled at his answer and were silent. 27Some of the Sadducees came to him, those who deny that there is a resurrection. 28They asked him, “Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man’s brother dies having a wife, and he is childless, his brother should take the wife and raise up children for his brother. 29There were therefore seven brothers. The first took a wife, and died childless. 30The second took her as wife, and he died childless. 31The third took her, and likewise the seven all left no children, and died. 32Afterward the woman also died. 33Therefore in the resurrection whose wife of them will she be? For the seven had her as a wife.”

When his opponents try to trap Jesus over taxes, he gives an answer that silences them: give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's. The coin bears Caesar's image, so let it go back to Caesar. But the deeper question hangs in the air: what bears God's image? You do. If the coin belongs to Caesar because it carries his likeness, then you, made in God's image, belong to God. The call is to give him not merely your taxes but yourself.

Then the Sadducees, who denied any resurrection, pose a riddle meant to make the idea look absurd: a woman married in turn to seven brothers, whose wife will she be when they rise? Their trick assumes that the life to come is just a continuation of this one. It is not. They have misunderstood both Scripture and the reality of resurrection, imagining eternity as merely more of the same rather than something gloriously new and different.

Two truths meet here for you. First, you bear God's image, and so you owe him yourself, your whole life, not just a religious portion. Give to God what is God's. Second, do not shrink the hope of resurrection to a mere extension of present arrangements; it is a new and greater life that the Sadducees could not imagine. Live now as one who belongs wholly to God and who is destined for a resurrection life far richer than this world can picture.

Lord, the coin bore Caesar's image, but I bear yours, and so I owe you not just a portion but myself. Take my whole life as what rightly belongs to you. And lift my hope beyond this present world to the resurrection life you have promised, greater than I can imagine. Let me live as one who is wholly yours and destined for your new creation. Amen.