Mark's Gospel, chapter 12 and
verse 13. And they send unto him certain
of the Pharisees and of the Herodians to catch him in his words. And when they were come, they
say unto him, Master, we know that thou art true and carest
for no man. For thou regardest not the person
of men, but teachest the way of God in truth. Is it lawful
to give tribute to Caesar or not? Shall we give or shall we
not give? But he, knowing their hypocrisy,
said unto them, Why tempt ye me? Bring me a penny, that I
may see it. And they brought it, and he saith
unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? And they
say unto him, Caesar's. And Jesus answering said unto
them, Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God
the things that are God's. And they marvelled at him. Amen, may the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word also. From this incident in the temple
Towards the end of the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, remember
we're in the last week now, it's just a couple of days until the
Lord will be arrested and taken to the judgment hall and then
taken to the cross. It's only a couple of days from
now until then. In the temple where this incident
happened, the Lord Jesus Christ was clearly teaching us that
there are things which particularly and uniquely belong to God. Things that his people owe to
him and things that we must not neglect to observe or to render
to him. And that surely is the important
lesson from this encounter between the Lord and the Pharisees and
Herodians. These men from these two separate
parties likely represented quite different religious traditions
amongst the Jews. And from what we know, there
was little love lost between these different schools of thought. And yet we find often that the
scribes and the priests and the Sadducees and the Pharisees and
the Herodians and the Sanhedrin, they are all willing to set aside
their differences in order to come and attack the Lord Jesus
Christ. this is a lesson worth learning.
It will save us disappointment and discouragement in our Christian
life. If we learn this lesson, ultimately
Christ's gospel of grace must stand alone against the combined
forces of work religion. No matter what denomination that
religion tries or endeavours to represent. If it is only a
matter of the extent to which the works of men and women are
pleasing to God for justification, sanctification, a good conscience
or God's approval, sooner or later they will all find common
cause against grace and against the imputed righteousness of
God. Works righteousness and imputed
righteousness are incompatible. Law and grace can never mix. Now, as we have seen, this is
not the first group to try to snare the Lord Jesus Christ in
questions of religion or authority or politics. Nor indeed will
it be the last. But again the wisdom of the Saviour
shines through the misguided plots of these hypocrites and
gainsayers. And it is, as we thought a little
bit in our introduction to today's service yesterday in that sheet,
it is amazing to see the wisdom of the Lord's answers against
these people. These men came with a question
regarding the paying of taxes. And the Lord says to them, upon
that matter, show me a coin, whose is the superscription,
whose is the image? Then render unto Caesar the things
that are Caesar's. And by that comment, the Lord
Jesus Christ was showing us, as the Apostle Paul later taught,
that the powers that be, the powers of our age, the powers
in our nations, the powers of politics, the powers that be
are ordained by God, and we as believers are subject to them. That's something that is important
to know, to notice and to remember. There are too many militant Christians
today, campaigning for one moral issue or another, trying, as
it were, to build Christ's kingdom on earth, when the scripture
clearly teaches that Christ's kingdom is spiritual. It is a
God built kingdom. It is eternal in the heavens. People of one quote or another
have been trying to construct a prototype of the kingdom of
heaven on earth for thousands of years and it always ends in
tears. It always ends in hypocritical
self-righteousness. Don't do that. But enough of Caesar. Caesar
was a worm. Caesar was a maggot. Caesar was
mere dust as has been every other king or queen or prime minister
or president or ruler that the world has ever known. Caesar
was raised up and appointed by God. Daniel tells us, the Most High
ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he
will, and setteth up over it the basest of men. Caesar was just a base man. Daniel knew it, and we should
know it too. Much more important, much more
important than the Lord's phrase, render unto Caesar the things
that are Caesar's, are the second part of his, or is the second
part of his saying. His words, render to God the
things that are God's. That little phrase will take
our attention for the rest of our time today. and by the Lord's
grace may we glean some spiritual wisdom from our Saviour's words
upon this matter. I've got three headings that
I want us to take, three things that we ought to render to God
because they properly and indeed exclusively belong to Him. These three are worship, love,
and faith. And we're going to speak about
each of these three in turn. So first of all, then, worship. We should all render to God worship. Now, by, let's just, let's just
think about this for a moment. Because by worship, I mean giving
honour, glory, reverence and obedience with fear to God. What I don't mean is singing
and praying and coming together for fellowship services. People
do that all the time. And I don't for a moment believe
that what most people call worship and what goes on under the name
of Christian worship for most people is anything of the kind. I mean by worship, honouring
God in our lives, glorifying him in our testimony, reverencing
him in our heart and in our mind, in our thoughts, in our actions,
in our words, fearing him in his divine majesty and serving
him obediently in all his will. That's true worship. This we
owe to God and nothing less. That's true worship. It is what
the holy angels do in the presence of God. And all failure to do
that is a slight against Him and a despising of Him. The Lord Jesus said, thou shalt
worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve. He was quoting Deuteronomy chapter
six and verse 13, where Moses had written, thou shalt fear
the Lord thy God and serve him. So that true worship is godly
fear and service. And David the psalmist says in
Psalm 96 and verse 9, O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Fear before him all the earth. So when the Lord Jesus Christ
tells us to render unto God the things that are God's, he means
that we are to give God all honour, all glory, all reverence, and
complete obedient service with fear. The trouble is that none of us
can do that. Not one of us has truly worshipped
for one second of one minute of one hour in our whole lives. We are too full of sin to even
conceive of true worship. Certainly God deserves our honour
and glory and reverence and obedient service with fear, but he has
never yet had it. We're too busy honouring ourselves,
trying to impress people around about us, serving our own interests
to properly serve God. Well, so much for worship. What
about love? Here's our second point. What
about love? Can I render to God the love that he is due? Paul
says that love is fulfilling of the law. If I love God, will
that satisfy all of these demands that I cannot otherwise meet? There was a lawyer once spoke
to the Lord Jesus Christ and he asked the Lord what was the
greatest commandment. And the Saviour replied, he replied
in Matthew chapter 22 and verse 37. Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind. And again he was quoting Moses
in Deuteronomy chapter 6 and verse 5. And Moses went on to
write in chapter 11 verse 1. Therefore thou shalt love the
Lord thy God and keep his charge and his statutes and his judgments
and his commandments always. Oh, I wish that I could love
the Lord. When I see what He has done for
me, when I understand a little of what redemption cost, and
what Christ endured, and what the cross entailed, I find so
much to elicit admiration, gratitude, praise and love. And yet again I confess I find
limits to my love. I confess I do not love the Lord
my God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all
my might. Would that I could but there
is still too much of me in my heart, in my soul, in my affections. I find I can neither worship
nor love God aright. I cannot render to God the things
that are God's. Worship, love, what about faith? Well, once again, I find that
all my faith is tinged with unbelief. All my confidence is touched
with doubt. All my hope is tainted by fear. I find myself like the father
of the child who cried out with tears, Lord, I believe, help
thou mine unbelief, because everything that I believe is touched with
unbelief. But here I find a glimmer of
hope. For while my own faith is weak
and feeble, the Apostle Paul speaks to us of another faith. Christ's faith. Christ's faith
given as a gift. Christ's faith provided bountifully. and supplied freely by God's
grace. Paul says that faith is a gift
from God. Paul says, the life which I now
live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. who loved me and gave himself
for me. Paul's life was lived by the
faith of the Son of God. Not his own faith, but the faith
of the Son of God. And furthermore, he speaks of
a righteousness which is outwith the righteousness of the law
by which those given the faith of Jesus Christ also obtain every
other blessing. And that those people who have
the faith of Jesus Christ fulfill every requirement and render
every duty to God. This is quite staggering, this
is quite amazing. This righteousness is the righteousness
of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all
them that believe. The Apostle Paul is writing to
the Galatians here and Paul says that this faith of Christ brings
justification with God. brings a holiness from God, a
perfection and a righteousness from God. In Galatians chapter
2 and verse 16 he says, knowing that a man is not justified by
the works of the law but by the faith of Jesus Christ. Even we
have believed in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by
the faith of Christ and not by the works of the law. for by
the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Do you see
what that means? Do you see what Paul is telling
us here? Paul is telling us that all we
owe to God, all that we should render to God, because these
are the things of God, and all that we can't fulfil, worship,
love, Even faith is freely provided by the Lord Jesus Christ. Even
the very enabling faith that we have to reach out to God to
receive God's goodness is His gift to us in Christ. And Paul continues, the life
which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son
of God who loved me and gave himself for me. My worship, so often hobbled
by the weakness of this flesh and the misplaced passions of
my heart, is not what God looks at. Nothing in the flesh of men
and women and boys and girls is without sin. But the honour
and the glory and the reverence and the obedience with fear offered
up to his Father by our Lord Jesus Christ is acceptable and
well-pleasing in the sight of God on my behalf. And that true worship I offer
by the faith of Jesus Christ. I do love God because he first
loved me. But my love for God is weak and
intermittent. But Christ's love of the Father
and the Father's love of His Son is perfect and holy and true. And that is the love that I share
in. That is the love which Christ
has given. That is the love which in Christ
I offer to God. so that God does not require
from me anything at all that he has not already provided for
me in the Lord Jesus Christ. When the Lord says, render unto
God the things that are God's, I can render him God-honouring
worship. perfect love, complete confidence
and trust because I do so by faith, the faith of Christ, the
faith given to me by God's grace. And though my praise is often
flawed, by faith I worship God constantly in the beauty of holiness. And while my love is often weak,
by faith I love the Lord who first loved me with all my heart,
with all my soul, with all my strength, with all my might,
and my neighbour as myself. And while my faith in my flesh
still ebbs and flows, It is Christ's faith in me as God's gift, constant
as a rock, that provides acceptable and well-pleasing faith to my
God. He who gives grace to his people
also supplies faith to receive it and imputes righteousness
to justify, sanctify and glorify his redeemed. David says in Psalm
84 verse 11, For the Lord God is a sun and shield. The Lord
will give grace and glory. No good thing will he withhold
from them that walk uprightly. And what he gives in his grace,
we render to him as belonging to him, and we return it with
praise, with worship, with love, with faith, with gratitude. Amen.