Title: Jesus and the Tax
Contents
▒▒ Main text: Matthew 17:24-27
In today's text, we can realize that Jesus is God. Jesus already knew everything that had happened to Peter on the outside. Before Peter even talked about taxes, Jesus already knew everything that had happened to him.
Jesus said to Peter, “Hey, go to the Sea of Galilee and throw a fish. And if you look at the mouth of the fish being caught, you will find a shekel worth of money. Take that money and give it as a tax for you and me.” You said. Here is the wonderful providence of God. Someone must be on the road and drop a coin worth a shekel into the Sea of Galilee. And the fish must grab and eat the coin before it falls and gets buried in the mud. This is very difficult. And before the fish swallows the coin in the stomach, the fish must catch on the hook that Peter threw. All these series of events are events that cannot happen without God. All events took place in the providence of God. From this incident, we can know that Jesus is the God who provides all things.
In Luke 5, Peter tells Peter, “Go out into the deep and cast your net.” So I caught a lot of fish. In Mark 11, Jesus said to his disciples, “Go to the village across the street and there is a donkey that no one has ridden yet, so bring the donkey.” There was a donkey that no one really rode on. He said to Peter, “Today before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” At dawn on the same day that Peter denied it three times, Jesus silenced all the animals and made them cry through a rooster.
“Peter, go to the Sea of Galilee and throw your fishing rod. Then a fish that bites a shekel will be caught.” You can see Jesus ruling even the fish in the water. Please remember that the purpose of Jesus' coming to this earth is to help us humans who have lost the authority to rule over all things regain the image of God as the king who rules over all things. So, through today's text, we can see the King, Jesus.
Why couldn't Jesus and Peter pay one shekel, the temple tax? I couldn't because I didn't have money. 2 Corinthians 8:9 says, "Jesus, the Lord of all, and rich, became poor so that you might be rich." Why did Jesus become so poor that he did not have enough money to pay the temple tax? Please remember that He became poor so that we might live so abundantly.
Also, Jesus can see the appearance of serving through the text of the text. When the Early Church was formed, Greek culture and ideology dominated the entire Middle East. However, the characteristic of this Greek thought is the dichotomy. Our body is divided into spirit and flesh, and the spirit is holy and the body is unclean. He divided the whole world into dichotomy between good and evil.
To put it simply, black-and-white logic prevailed. If I am right, you are always wrong, and if you are right, I am always wrong. Therefore, there is no unity in Greek thought, and all of them have to be broken. It was in this climate of thought that the early church was established.
However, the early church was not divided like the Greek ideology, because the Trinity ideology united the churches that could be divided into one. The works of God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit are all different, but they are all working for the will of God. This is the doctrine of the Trinity. The church is to be one in diversity. It emphasizes unity, but refers to unity in diversity, not unconditional unity.
The way we serve the church is different. It's not just my way is right. Although we are all working for the glory of God and our ways of serving are different, we can achieve one unity. Our ways of serving are different, but we can be united for the glory of God. This is not to be served, but to serve. When we all work with one heart to serve the church, our ways of serving are different, but we believe in the unity of the church and how to do things that glorify God.
Peter tells us that the Jesus I serve is the God who rules all things, the God I serve is Jesus the King who rules over all things, and the Jesus I believe in is Jesus who came as a servant to serve us so that we may become holy sons of God I definitely believed it. I believed and obeyed his word. As I obeyed, miracles and signs appeared.
The members of Hanshin Church also believe in our God, the God who provides us with salvation, Jesus who gives us salvation, Jesus who rules over all things, and our Jesus, who came to serve us to save us. I pray in the name of the Lord that miracles and signs will appear in your lives as Peter works miracles by obeying the Lord.
2007-07-13 18:13:32