Be Considerate Of Others

𝐀𝐔𝐆. 𝟏𝟏, 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟓: 𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐀𝐋 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐓. 𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐄, 𝐕𝐢𝐫𝐠𝐢𝐧

𝐅𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠: 𝐃𝐞𝐮𝐭 𝟏𝟎:𝟏𝟐-𝟐𝟐

𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐏𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐦: 𝐏𝐬𝐚 𝟏𝟒𝟕: 𝟏𝟏𝟐-𝟏𝟓, 𝟏𝟗-𝟐𝟎 “𝐏𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝, 𝐉𝐞𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦.” 𝐆𝐎𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐋: 𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐓 𝟏𝟕:𝟐𝟐-𝟐𝟕

𝑲𝒆𝒚 𝑽𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒆: “𝒔𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒘𝒆 𝒎𝒂𝒚 𝒏𝒐𝒕 𝒐𝒇𝒇𝒆𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒎.” (𝒗.27) 

         If you are with Jesus like his disciples and you hear you friend talking about his impending death, how would you feel? More so if you hear him say he will suffer greatly in the hands of his adversaries. Everybody dies and there’s no question about it.  

         But normally, a person who is about to die don’t really know the time and day of his death as it comes like a thief in the night (𝐋𝐤 𝟏𝟐:𝟒𝟎). What usually happens is that a person only has a premonition of his death and most of the time we are not conscious about it which means that these premonitions are only talked about when the person dies.

         And we come to today’s Gospel reading and we are confronted with an interesting paradox because here we see a King who is so poor that He cannot even pay His temple tax. There are at least four distinct features that we can deduce from this Gospel passage;

1)    𝑻𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒊𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒐𝒏𝒍𝒚 𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒆 – 𝒄𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒊𝒕 𝒂 𝒎𝒊𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒍𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝑪𝒉𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒕 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒎𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒎𝒆𝒆𝒕 𝑯𝒊𝒔 𝒐𝒘𝒏 𝒏𝒆𝒆𝒅𝒔. The temple tax which was only about a half-shekel was paid for by every Jewish male. His humility can be seen and felt because Jesus was so poor that He didn’t have this small amount of money (𝐏𝐡𝐢𝐥 𝟐:𝟓-𝟖).

2)    𝑻𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒎𝒊𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒍𝒆 𝒊𝒔 𝒓𝒆𝒄𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒏𝒍𝒚 𝒊𝒏 𝑴𝒂𝒕𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒘’𝒔 𝒈𝒐𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒍. This is the Gospel of the King and this miracle has something to do with the Kingship of Jesus Christ. As King, Jesus should not be required to pay the temple tax. But since they are not aware of his Kingship at the time, He has no choice but to pay the tax and He proved His Kingship by performing a complicated miracle. A coin was lost at see and a fish had to take it in its mouth and then the fish needed to bite on Peter’s hook. Can anything be more complicated than this. But this is a miracle that only a King can perform.

3)    𝑰𝒕 𝒊𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒐𝒏𝒍𝒚 𝒎𝒊𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒍𝒆 𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒎𝒐𝒏𝒆𝒚. The temple tax was a symbol of the redemption of the Jews from Egyptian slavery. The Jews were redeemed by the blood of the lamb, not by silver and gold but the silver shekel was a token of that redemption (𝟏 𝐏𝐞𝐭 𝟏:𝟏𝟖-𝟏𝟗).

4)    𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒊𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒍𝒆 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒎𝒆𝒅 𝒆𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒄𝒊𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝑷𝒆𝒕𝒆𝒓. Jesus had performed many miracles for Peter – healing his mother-in-law, helping him walk on the sea, saving him when he began to sink, giving him with a huge catch of fish. Even in the book of Acts, Christ had delivered Peter many times. Why then did Christ perform this complicated miracle of the coin in the mouth of the fish? It is for the good of Peter and also for the glory of God (𝟏 𝐏𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟓:𝟕).

         And in today’s Gospel, we see Jesus telling His disciples for the third time about his impending death, but this is also the first time that He revealed to them that He will be resurrected on the third day. But with their minds still fixed on Jesus as the conquering Messiah, His disciples could not as of yet comprehend the greatest event that is to unfold before their very eyes, and they were upset as they could not fully grasp the purpose of His death and the resurrection He was telling them about.

         But while they may have expressed disappointment that Jesus is not the king they expected him to be who is going to set up a political kingdom and, though they had difficulty understanding his disciples nevertheless believed in Jesus in such a way that they stayed with him for three years, witnessed the miracles he did, heard his teachings.

         And this should also be the same with us. With the faith that we received in our baptism, Jesus is expecting us to draw on this gift of faith to move ourselves into at least try to grasp even a fraction of what Jesus is telling us.

         In this Gospel, Jesus also presents to us the standard that will guide our actions and relationships with the authorities and with one another. Here we also see Our Lord putting himself at the level of the ordinary citizen that though he is God he did not deem equality with God as something to be grasped at.

         In those days, all Jewish males from age 20 and above are required to pay a Temple Tax to support the high cost of maintaining the Temple in Jerusalem. There were morning and evening sacrifices of a year-old lamb that were offered daily at the temple, the wine, flour and oil, the incense that is kept burning all day and, even the robes and garments worn by the priests and the High Priest are sourced from the Temple Tax and these expenditures are by no less cheap.

         But also in those days, the royal family are not required to pay these taxes and while he did not yet fully understand, Peter the ever-impulsive emerging leader of the Church Jesus will establish answered in a positive way when asked whether he and Jesus described here as Teacher have paid their Temple Tax.

         It presupposes that if the royalty in those days need not pay the Temple Tax, then Jesus who is the King is also not required to pay taxes. Because he is the Son of God, then all the more that Jesus should not be required to pay the Temple Tax because technically he was exempt from such taxation. But this is where Jesus laid down the parameters of how it is to become a good citizen.

         Jesus told Peter they should voluntarily pay the tax to avoid offending the religious leaders and the tax collectors and this provided his disciples with a panorama of how they should live. The coin in the mouth of the fish is merely a metaphor because what Jesus did was that in order for Peter to get the money to pay the tax, he has to work on it and the use of the fish with the shekel in it is more in keeping with Peter’s profession as a fisherman.

         While we as Christians are practically free with regards to our relationship with God and we are not bound by the legalism that may pervade in the society we are in, we are reminded by Jesus that we are not supposed to use this freedom to offend other people.

         In other words, Jesus is telling us to bend over backwards in times when we are confronted with people who do not understand our being free from the law especially on matters pertaining to our faith. What Jesus is emphasizing here is that while our loyalty may be to God, we still need to cooperate with the temporal authorities of our time and be good responsible citizens.

         In fact, this is the underlying principle that guides Ambassadors who are sent to a foreign country by their government. While they are required to observe, honor and respect the laws of the host countries, ambassadors are also guided by the laws of his own country and that they must act with proper decorum in the country they are being sent to.

         St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians (𝟐 𝐂𝐨𝐫 𝟓:𝟐𝟎) says “𝐰𝐞 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭’𝐬 𝐚𝐦𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐝𝐨𝐫𝐬, 𝐚𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐆𝐨𝐝 𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐮𝐬.” Do we consider ourselves as Ambassadors for Christ? Because if we do, then we must move and act in a way that we don’t offend those to whom we bring God’s message.

         We as Christians are being sent into the world. But how we draw others to Christ depends on the way we conduct ourselves. In our zealousness to proclaim the gospel, do we offend the sensibilities of others? Do we inculturate God’s message with the culture and traditions of the place where we operate as God’s messengers?

         Have we become overbearing in the profession of our faith because of our awareness of our worth and value to God? Do we impose our will, our whims and caprices on those we minister to or do we lead them to subordinate their will to God’s Will? Are we leading others to embrace a culture of doing everything for God and expect a reward? Or do we lead others to a life in God and with God and let the love of God flow through them? The choice to become good citizens lies in our hands. (𝘌𝘥 𝘔𝘢𝘭𝘢𝘺 – 𝘈𝘶𝘨. 11. 2025)