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3. Today's "Moment with Mark" (74)

• Today's "Moment with Mark" (74)

  3 February, 2013

  Jesus saw through their hypocrisy and said, "Whom are you trying to fool with your trick questions. Show me a Roman coin, and I'll tell you."  When they handed it to him, he asked, "Whose picture and title are stamped on it?""Caesar's," they replied.  "Well, then," Jesus said, "give to Caesar what belongs to him. But everything that belongs to God must be given to God." (Mark 12:15-17 NLT)

  The question about paying taxes, like most of the questions from the leaders of the religious establishment of the day, was designed to trap Jesus in whatever answer He gave - so they thought.  If He agreed with paying taxes to Rome, He was a traitor to His own people. If He opposed paying those taxes, He could immediately be charged with disloyalty towards Caesar and arrested for treason. Either way, He was trapped. Or was He?

  His answer was brilliant. Not just 'smart'  or 'clever' but filled with practical truth and profound insight.  So He took the coin and asked them a question: "Whose picture and title are stamped on it"? In other words, who has rightful claim to ownership?

  This question goes much further than at first meets the eye. As we think about the word "image" there comes to mind a greater truth than the issue of taxes.

  As human beings, we stand apart from the rest of creation. Not only did God create us last as the crown of His creation.   He made us in His image. That image sets us apart from the animal kingdom. In so many ways our uniqueness in the creation event is stamped indelibly on our existence.

  Because we bear the stamp of the image of God, this ought to mean that we are "off  limits" to any other pretenders to the Throne of your heart and mine. But the stamp of God upon our lives is the primary target of Satan. He is passionately, intentionally committed to destroy this created order.

  So, with the stamp of  God's likeness being increasingly renewed in our lives through conversion and the activity of the Holy Spirit, let's go out into the rest of your life.