Temple Tax

After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma temple tax came to Peter and asked, “Doesn’t your teacher pay the temple tax?”
“Yes, he does,” he replied.
When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. “What do you think, Simon?” he asked. “From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own children or from others?”
“From others,” Peter answered.
“Then the children are exempt,” Jesus said to him. “But so that we may not cause offense, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”
Matthew 17:24-27

We learn some things when Jesus was approached about giving the temple tax. This wasn’t a tax given to the Romans to fund the empire. This was an annual tax worth about two days wages that was meant for the upkeep of the temple. Every Jewish male twenty years of age and older was required to pay this tax. The religious establishment in Jerusalem was in charge of collecting it. The Pharisees and Sadducees were behind this tax.

Jesus, the Son of God, peppers Peter with questions about kings taxing their own sons. Jesus’s point here is that this tax was mean for the house of God, and if they had known that Jesus was the Son of God, they would have never required Him to pay this tax. Kings don’t tax their own sons.

Yet, Jesus says that He’ll pay the tax anyway. His reasoning for doing so was so that they wouldn’t “cause offense.” This is so interesting because, in other places in the Gospels, Jesus couldn’t care less about offending the Pharisees. We see one such scenario in Matthew 15:

Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
Matthew 15:10-14

When it comes to speaking and teaching the truth, Jesus doesn’t mind offending the Pharisees. He even increases the offense by calling them “blind guides.” Yet, when it comes to something like paying a tax, it’s as if Jesus wants to avoid being offensive. There is a sense here that Jesus is more than willing to offend for the sake of God’s truth but isn’t interested in offending just for the sake of being spiteful. He’s not into offending for the sake of offending. There needs to be more purpose in it.

The church would do well to learn this lesson. Some churches are deathly afraid of offending anyone. Other churches think that it is a sign of spiritual maturity to perpetually offend everyone. Neither approach is healthy.

Finally, notice how God resources Jesus so that He could pay the tax for Himself and Peter. Peter didn’t go to the marketplace and sell something. Jesus chose a very peculiar and supernatural way of getting the resources of heaven. We are reminded, as we picture Peter pulling a valuable coin out of a fish’s mouth, that God often provides in unexpected and unusual ways.

God is not bound by our rules of supply and demand. God is not limited by our economic principles. All the resources of heaven are at God’s fingertips and He can release them however He chooses. The Kingdom of God doesn’t play by our rules. The Kingdom is not interested in our limitations. God, as a loving Father, hears about our rationalism and empiricism and laughs, as if to say, “Aw, isn’t that cute.”

When we ask God to be our Provider, we need to be ready for Him to surprise us with unexpected and supernatural sources of provision. It is important to crunch the numbers and try to be responsible, but we also need to remember that God is never limited by our spreadsheets and budgets. He is not limited by our cautious imaginations. God, the Creator, loves to provide for us, and He loves to do it in creative and interesting ways that we’d never expect.

If it’s You…

When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear.
But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”
“Come,” he said.
Matthew 14:26-29

The disciples didn’t know it was Jesus at first. They saw something miraculous happening, a man walking on water, but they weren’t sure it was from the Lord. They weren’t sure it was Jesus. At first, they thought it might be a ghost.

Jesus reassures them that it is, in fact, Him. But they still aren’t convinced. They feel like they need some kind of proof that it’s Jesus. Peter starts with, “Lord, if it’s you…” Peter wants verification that the miraculous thing they are witnessing is Jesus and not something else.

Peter reasons that if it is really Jesus, he would be able to come to Jesus on the water. In other words, Jesus kept empowering His disciples to do what He was doing. So it makes sense that if Jesus is the one walking on water, He could also empower His disciples to do it. But if it’s just a ghost, then Peter would never be able to walk on the water.

Jesus agrees.

Jesus invites Peter to come to Him on the water. This is Jesus’s evidence that it is, in fact, Him. The disciples could have just taken Jesus at His word. But if they want evidence that Jesus is the one doing the miracle, they’ll have to take a risk and step out in faith.

All of this still applies today. So many people see a miraculous thing and wonder if it’s really Jesus. Even after Jesus shows up in miraculous ways, people still doubt it is Him. They don’t take Him at His word, so they ask for evidence. Yet, the only evidence that Jesus is willing to give comes after a step of faith. He essentially says, “Believe what I am saying is true, take a risk to try it yourself, and then you will know it is me.”

This isn’t exactly the scientific method we western Christians are used to. We wrongly assume proof will come before faith. Jesus says that it doesn’t work that way in the Kingdom. If you want proof, Jesus is glad to give it. But it will only come after a step of faith.

We say we’ll come to Him on the water if He proves to us that it is Him. He says you’ll only know it’s me after you come to me on the water. We ask Jesus to bow down to our doubts to help us believe. He refuses. He tells us to have our doubts bow down to Him in order for our faith to arise.

We actually shouldn’t be surprised by this. This is exactly what God did with Moses. God showed up to Moses in a burning bush in order to send him to rescue the Hebrew people from slavery in Egypt. But Moses doubted that he was the man for the job. Moses said, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?“(Exodus 3:11).

Notice how God responds.

And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”
Exodus 3:12

Did you get that? The sign that it is God who sent Moses is that, once all the people of Israel are out of Egypt, they will worship God on that mountain. In other words, the evidence that it is, in fact, God sending Moses will only come after Moses listens to God and takes the risk to obey. We want the sign to be before we obey. God says that He’ll confirm His word with evidence but only after we obey, only after we take that step of faith.

Have you ever prayed that prayer that starts with, “God, if it’s really you….” I know I have! But we have to understand what comes next. God is okay with us asking this question, but don’t be surprised when God’s evidence that it is really Him comes after a step of faith, after an obedient action, after a risk. We so often want to obey out of certainty rather than from a place of faith.

I have found in my own life that God has given me proof after proof, evidence after evidence that it is Him! But this evidence came after I was willing to get out of the boat and take a risk to believe.

Where is God calling you to take that risk, that step of faith?