Have your Bible turned with me to Luke chapter 20. We'll look at Luke chapter 20 this morning and take as our sermon text verses 19 through 26. Luke chapter 20 starting in verse 19. Hear the word of God. The scribes and the chief priest sought to lay hands on him at that very hour, for they perceived that he had told this parable against them, but they feared the people. So they watched him and sent spies who pretended to be sincere that they might catch him in something he said, so as to deliver him up to the authority and jurisdiction of the governor. So they asked him, Teacher, we know that you speak and teach rightly and show no partiality, but truly teach the way of God. Is it lawful for us to give tribute to Caesar or not? But he perceived their craftiness and said to them, Show me a denarius. Whose likeness and inscription does it have? They said, Caesar's. And he said to them, Then render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. And they were not able in the presence of the people to catch him in what he said, but marveling at his answer, they became silent. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father God, we thank you that you give us people to rule over us in every aspect of our life. We have people who are in authority for our good. We thank you for our first experience of having parents We thank you for the authority of husbands in their homes and over their households. We thank you for the authority of teachers and police officers. We thank you for the authority of ministers in the church and the authority of governors and presidents and kings. God, we pray that you would help us to submit to the authority which you yourself have instituted. Make us not a rebellious people, but God, make us a people who gladly submit for your sake to all human institutions and authority. We pray, though, God, that our highest allegiance would remain ever to you and that we would never render unto any human person what belongs to you alone. God, and so rule over us, we pray. And we pray all of this in Christ's name, amen. We come to our text this morning, we find Jesus in the midst of this final week in his earthly ministry. We find him facing intense opposition from the leaders among the people, religious leaders, some of them religious leaders, other of them elders among the people. You have in other tellings of this week and what's going on here, you have, for example, you have Pharisees, priests, scribes, you have also Herodians. You have those who were very loyal to the people of God and to the Scriptures and took a very conservative approach to understanding and to submitting themselves to the rule of God via His word, His law. But you also have some who were compromised. The Herodians had, if we go back to our own early history as a people, you have those who were in opposition to England and who fought on the side of the patriotic cause in America, and you have those who were loyal to England and really fought against their neighbors and their kinsmen in supporting the Hanoveran kings. And so you have this conflict between those who would show loyalty and submission to earthly authorities that others would deem to be beyond the pale. We have this in our own history. We have this certainly going on in the time of Christ. God's people were being ruled over. They could manage some of their own affairs and sort of have a degree of independence to rule themselves internally. But over them were the Romans who exercised a heavy-handed and authoritative rule. And this is where the people who, these leaders among the people who are in opposition to Christ, seek to trip Jesus up and to get him into trouble. And if they themselves fear the people, as we see here in verse 19, in other words, they know that if they arrest Jesus and they seek to punish him, to silence him, perhaps even to punish him in a corporal way, or even to put him to death, that they're gonna have a riot on their hands. The people will not have it, because the people have found Jesus to be a popular teacher, and they're listening to him, and he's got these crowds that are gathering around him. So the plan is beginning to develop, which we will see will unfold, of these enemies, of Christ seeking to put him to death through the means of the Romans. They're going to find a way to lay this on the Romans and make sure the Romans are the ones that are actually doing the execution so that in their minds they can be free from suspicion or free from the guilt of this. At least they won't have to fear the people. So they send spies to Jesus and they're seeking to catch him up in something he said. They're pretending to be sincere, although they're totally hypocritical. And what we see here in verse 20 is they're seeking to deliver him up to the authority and jurisdiction of the governor. So they're going to find some way to make him an enemy, not of them, but of Rome in particular. And so you notice what they say, it's very clever. Teacher, we know that you speak and teach rightly, teach no partiality, but truly teach the way of God. Is it lawful for us to give tribute to Caesar or not? Why is this a clever thing for them to say? Why is this a tricky question for Jesus to navigate this and offer a right answer? Well, many Jewish people saw their subjection to Rome as being, this was a great evil, And this is something they hope to be delivered from, especially when Messiah came. That was gonna be the thing that Messiah, we've just read in Daniel, this hope that you have all of these kingdoms that are represented by the gold and the silver and the bronze and the iron and clay. And yet there would be this stone that would come and would actually would make an end of these human kingdoms and set up the reign of God, the kingdom of God, which would have no end. And this in the Old Testament is very clearly, it's coming through a particular figure, a man who will, he will be a seed of a woman, he's going to be a son of David, he's going to be someone sent from God. And so there are all these things, even maybe there's a little bit of a tension and a confusion in the Old Testament. Is this gonna be a man or is it gonna be God himself? Because in Isaiah 9, we see that he's actually called you know, wonderful counselor, and he's called everlasting, he's called God himself. And so, is this gonna be a man or God? And this resolves, as we know, in the one who is both God and man, the one who is a son of David, and who is born of woman, and who is the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, people are beginning to think, and we see this in the triumphal entry, that this is the Messiah. He is going to come to make an end of Rome. Now if Jesus comes in and he says, no, we're going to still be in subjection to Rome. Rome's still going to be over us. We're going to submit. We're going to bow the knee to Caesar. This would be unpopular at best for Jesus. And at worst, the people are going to totally dismiss him as the Messiah because this is not what they've been led to believe the Messiah will bring to pass. So there's a tension here because on the one hand, Jesus says pay taxes, he is abandoning this, what they see as his messianic mandate to come and to reign over the people of God, bring the reign of God to bear. And so they see this as maybe treacherous and disloyal to God and his people. On the other hand, if he says, no, we're not paying taxes to Caesar, well, then they've got all they need to take this news to Pontius Pilate and to have Jesus executed and brought up on charges of treason. In fact, just 30 years prior to this, there was a similar revolt where taxes were not paid, and what we see is that the government came down, Rome came down very hard on this rebellion. And it's actually mentioned in earlier in the Gospel of Luke. So you see the predicament that Jesus is in, and really it touches on a predicament that all of us are in. We may not feel quite the same degree of pressure, or this may not seem as pressing on us as it may seem in context as we read of Jesus' predicament here, but we have our own relationship to authority, both to the authority of God and to the authority of man. So we have a human authority and a divine authority to contend with. And we have to navigate that. When are we to be obedient to God over against man and in opposition to man where we would actually have to disobey a command or a human law or mandate in order to obey God? And when are we to obey man? And is that ever legitimate to obey man if that puts us in a position where we're to disobey God? And so all of us are in positions in which we are, some of us are in positions where we're in authority, many of us. of different kinds of authority that we have. And so, you know, you have the authority of a husband. In my prayer, I've touched on this authority of a husband over his family. The husband unilaterally, I mean, he has an authority that no one else in his household shares before God for his family. The husband and wife have authority over the children. You have the authority of ministers. The congregation has authority. to govern its own affairs in certain matters. You have civil authorities, you have authority all over the place. In every domain of life, we are constantly interacting with people who have authority over us or that we have authority over. And so this is built into human society. And so what it just means to be a human being is to be a person who relates to others in terms of authority. Either we're over them or under them, where they're superior or they're inferior in terms of authority. And so this is something we have to make sense of. And frequently, and really in all of those domains, we have to reckon with unpopular authority. because I just had to talk with my children about this every day actually, just about. But recently I was telling one of my children, listen to me, when I tell you to do something, it's almost certainly gonna be an unpopular thing. Because if it was popular and is what you most wanted to do, I wouldn't have to tell you to do it. So there'd be no need to command you to do something if it was your heart's desire. And so the very nature of obedience to authority is, is in many cases, at least, if not all cases, is going to be that the thing that we have to obey is something that we would not maybe otherwise obey. But someone who has been put in charge of us has determined it is for the public welfare, for the good of this household order, or for the benefit of this church that certain things are decided upon. So we have to reckon with unpopular authority. I think about it in recent years. If you're like me, It's become increasingly difficult to have respect and to defer to and honor and to submit to governmental authority. In light of decisions that were made around the time of COVID, you know, in shutting things down and not opening things back up and restricting access to people in hospitals, and there's all kinds of things that became deeply unpopular with many people. And really, no matter what the government decided, there are some people who thought the government didn't go far enough. There are people who thought that the government went too far. And so we all have opinions on this. And so we have to think carefully about human authority. Well, there's two points here that I want to bring out. And really, we'll just focus on Jesus' response in verse 25. By the way, this is actually, I think, clever on Jesus' part. He doesn't get enough credit for for some of these things that are a little, they're subtle, but really ingenious. Jesus says, perceiving their craftiness, He said to them, show me a denarius. Well, what He's asking here is He's saying, show me a Roman coin. By the way, it wasn't like for us, it's just money. It's just United States money. I've got some money from other countries, but it's useless because no one will take it around here. So I just, you know, I just keep it to show the kids. And maybe if I go back to one of these countries, I got some Ecuadorian dollars. I got to make sure I pull them out and bring it with me next week. But for them, there wasn't just one type of money. There was the Roman coin, the denarius. There were other coins from other parts of the Mediterranean world. The Jews had their own money. And so as an act of sort of civil disobedience or an act of protest, the Jews could have refused to carry Roman money. Now, they had to pay their tribute that is mentioned here, which is one denarius for each adult per year. It wasn't a very burdensome tribute, but it was, you know, symbolic of Roman tyranny, and so they didn't like this. They had to pay that in Roman coinage, but they did not have to pay for anything else in Roman coinage. But Jesus asked here, show me a denarius. I think this is pretty clever. In other words, what he's saying to these scribes and chief priests and these spies that they've sent is, reach into your own pocket and tell me, do you have a Roman coin in your pocket? And of course, they're able to produce the Roman coin. Saying that for all this talk, for all this trying to make me unpopular with the people because I'm unwilling to revolt against Rome, are you yourself not in subjection to Rome? Do you not have a denarius in your own pocket? So he, I think they're in a very, again, this is very subtle, I think he's calling out their hypocrisy. But then he says in verse 25, render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's. So two points I want to make here this morning in the time that we have remaining. The first is this, the legitimacy of human authority. Jesus does begin by saying, render to Caesar's. It's a command that we have from the Savior to render to human authority what belongs to them by right. You know, this is just a fact of human life that God has delegated authority in all the ways that we've already mentioned, including governmental authority. If you flip with me to Romans chapter 13, we have a classic expression of this we all need to be familiar with as we think about our responsibility to be in subjection to governing authority. And, you know, especially, by the way, slight digression, especially come November, if whoever we would like to see come into office as President of the United States does not win, then we will have to consider this as being deeply unpopular to honor and to obey governing authority who we didn't vote for, you know, not my President. That was the kind of saying that people were using a few years ago when whoever they voted for was not elected. It's not, this isn't my president. Well, it is your president. And the reality is that even if you didn't vote for them, and even if you don't like them, and even if you think they're evil, and they may be evil. I think that, you know, that we have many leaders that are evil and that shouldn't be leaders, but they are in God's providence. Well, how do we respond? It becomes even more important to wrestle with texts like Romans chapter 13. in verses one and two. We read this, let every person be subject to the governing authorities. Now we might have all kinds of excuses why, well, normally, ordinarily, when all things are, all things being equal and if everything is going as it ought to go, then I'll subject myself to governing authority. But that's not what Paul is saying. He's writing this whenever the governing authority is evil, is worse than our authorities as evil as they may at times be. We have people who are, for example, in early church history, these Romans, I mean, they persecute. You think about Ignatius was thrown to the lions in the Colosseum. Polycarp, an 86-year-old man, refused to submit himself. In other words, he refused to deny his God, and he was burned alive. And so you have you have people like this who have to pay the ultimate price. Paul is well aware of the persecution that has happened, that will happen, and yet he says, let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God. No authority except from God. And those that exist have been instituted by God. We're talking about people who declare themselves to be God. Paul knows that Tiberius, for example, has called himself son of God. And on this coin, this denarius, on the backside of it is his own mother who is depicted in terms of being a goddess. and the goddess of peace, and so there's like a suggestion that his own mother is a goddess, so he is himself related, he is divine, and it's very common for kings and emperors to perpetuate this mythology that they have, you know, they're sort of semi-divine, they're a demigod, they have one or both of their parents are gods, This kind of blasphemy is very common. It is the case, as Paul writes this in Romans 13, and yet he says that those that exist have been instituted by the very God that they blaspheme. And so then he goes on in verse 2 to say, Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed. Do you think that God does not know who you're submitting to or what kind of evils and blasphemies they perpetuate? He knows full well, better than you, the evil in their hearts. and their record of wrongdoing and so forth, and yet he's telling us as our basic disposition ought to be not rebellion, but ought to be submission. Bill and Abby aren't here. They're traveling right now. But as a Texan, Bill's got that spirit of Texas in him. And I really admire that. Bill's not a rebellious guy. I'm not trying to use him as a negative example. But this is part of just the American spirit. And you see this especially, I think, in Texas, especially these days, is just this American spirit of self-sufficiency, and independency and maybe a touch of rebelliousness. And that's gotten us where we are as a nation. And it's a part of our history. It's a part of our national character. And we can wrestle with that and we can think about to what degree that's appropriate and what degree it's not appropriate, but the bottom line is that we should not be known for and characterized in general across all of our relationship with authority as being rebellious. If we are, there's something wrong. It cannot be the case, it's not going to be the case that you are legitimately obeying God rather than man in terms of your parents, and your husband, and your pastor, and your governors, and your boss. If in every domain you have a spirit of rebelliousness, then the indication there is that there's a problem of recognition of God-given authority, not recognizing God-given authority. So I want you to ask yourself, is your life characterized by a pattern of glad submission to the proper human authorities that God has placed in your life? Again, this ought to be the basic disposition. We ought to think in our minds, God forbid that I have to disobey those who He has placed in authority over me. And it may come down to that, and there's a place for that, and we'll come to that in a moment. God forbid it. I don't want to have to do that. My strong preference would be to obey those that God has put in authority over me. Now, that is something that really and truly is a fruit of the Spirit in essence. It is a product of God's grace in the heart overcoming human pride because naturally, and you look no further than young children who have to be disciplined for their waywardness because there's pride in the heart, there's rebellion and disobedience in the heart that has to be dealt with. In fact, this is really the meaning of the commandment for children to obey their parents. It's a part of the Ten Commandments that we've recited here this morning early in our service. It's not just a commandment for children, but it begins with children. That is where all of us begin our education and submission to authority and recognizing that there are legitimate authorities is when children recognize my parents are in authority over me and I must obey them and honor them. But from there, it never ends. Once we come out of the house, we still have people who are in authority. That's the school of submission to human authority, is children with parents. And we graduate, but we never move on from this need to submit. So is your life characterized by a pattern of glad submission to the proper human authorities that God has placed in your life? If for you to respect authority, you're only willing to respect authority when it meets your approval, then that's not submission. And that is disobedience to God. Or if you seek to honor and respect only those who rule or lead in a way that you approve of and that you respect, then that really isn't true submission. If you only give obedience to those who command things that you think are right, then you're not obeying them, you're obeying yourself. So we need to really think carefully of the excuses that we make and our attitudes and our dispositions towards authority. First, Peter says in 1 Peter 2, 13 through 15, be subject for the Lord's sake. This is an act of our Christian obedience. It's an act of love to God. and obedience to him and seeking to bring glory to him. We do this for the Lord's sake. Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution. So this isn't just, you know, the president or isn't just a police force or governors or something like this. It's every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good for this is the will of God. I think that there are many rules that may seem very petty to many of us, and it reveals the heart whether or not we think it's important. One that comes to mind is for employees, you go to a bathroom or you go to a restroom in a fast food restaurant, and there's always a sign that says for employees, well, I mean, another digression, you should all wash your hands when you leave the restroom, by the way. The sign isn't really just for employees, but there's a sign there that says that employees must wash their hands. This is a rule for this business. Well, there are little petty rules and laws like that. There are guidelines that we're expected to abide by. And in the pride of our hearts and our desire to be not under authority, but in authority, not to be under someone else's control, but to be in ourselves in control of our life and circumstances, if we say, well, I'll obey the things that would really get me, you know, in trouble, you know, a fireable offense or something that would get me arrested or that would, you know, something of this nature. If we only limit our obedience to those things, we still have a problem. So I just hope that you see the legitimacy here of human authority. Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's. Secondly, let's consider the limitation of human authority. So you ought to submit to and obey human authority in all things except And this is worth remembering. When human authority commands what God forbids or forbids what God commands. And so we give people the benefit of the doubt. We think that the rules are stupid and they're foolish and there are too many regulations and rules and these things are petty and we don't want to obey them and no one's going to find out if we disobey them. And we're just going to take a stand anyway against this sort of petty tyranny. Be in subjection. Obey all of it, because this is God's will for you, except when a human authority commands what God forbids or forbids what God commands. I think about the example that we have in Acts 4, verses 19 and 20. Peter and John are commanded to cease and desist. They're preaching, and they're preaching the gospel. And the leaders, again, who oppose Jesus here in Luke 20, are opposing his disciples and his apostles, and they stop preaching about Christ. And Peter and John answered them, whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard. So you have both of these ideas here, I believe. One is they're recognizing that their highest authority is God, and they have to obey Him. And if these leaders among the people are commanding them to do something that God forbids, or in this case, if they're forbidding them from doing something that God has commanded, then they say, you know, cannot but speak of what we've seen and heard. We must obey God rather than men. But there's also a recognition here of, but God has given you authority, and so you've got to decide what to do with us. So as we disobey, we have to be willing to suffer the consequences of that, and that may be up to and including death. We may have to give our lives. And we're called to submit to human authorities, let them decide, even if they do wicked, God will avenge. God will make these things right. We entrust ourselves to God, who will judge the living and the dead. But we must obey God rather than men and leave it up to human authorities to work out their own decisions about this. And so human authority is legitimate, but it's limited. We obey and we're subject to, we honor and obey human authority in all things except where this puts us in disobedience to God by doing the things that God forbids that we do or commanding or forbidding us from doing the things that God commands. So as I think about this idea of submission to human authority, And ultimately, submitting ourselves to human authority is submission to God. Whenever we must disobey human authority, we are submitting ourselves to God. It all comes down to a heart of submission to the authority of God. And I just wonder this morning, what you imagine your greatest problem is, many people feel that their greatest problem has more to do with the restrictions and limitations that's placed on them by others. And so they actually see the problem is that, and I know that just from talking to some of you, the problems that you have and that you face seem to stem from the people that are in authority over you, whether in your work or whether in your household or whether in church or wherever you are. You think, well, if it weren't for these limitations and restrictions, then everything would be good. Teenagers can at times chafe under the authority of their parents. long to be out on their own, where they're free to make their own decisions. Employees are frustrated by unreasonable or incompetent employers. But we need to remember, as far as the Bible is concerned, our greatest problem is actually lawless disobedience. It is sin, which is lawlessness. It isn't that you've broken man's laws, but you've broken God's laws. And we're being called in Scripture to submit ourselves to the Lord. And ultimately, that is That is the main application here this morning, is that you and I must render unto God what is God's. And what does belong to God? He may have delegated some authority to human actors whom he has instituted to reign and to rule in these different domains, but ultimately all things belong to God. And when Jesus says here, whose likeness and inscription is on the denarius, they say Caesar's, There is an implication here, there is something that to the Jewish mind would have been recalled, that is Genesis 1 and 2, where God placed his image on no coin, but on us, those who have been made by his hands, his creatures made in his image. We bear the image of God. and therefore we belong to Him. And so we must in all of our life, in all things whatsoever we do, whether we eat or drink, whatever we do, do it all to the glory of God in submission to His authority. And I would call you to submit to the Lord this morning. Let's go to Him in prayer.