Good morning, everybody. I see all your smiling faces this morning. It is refreshing to be with God's people and to come together and encourage each other. I'm glad so many of you are here this morning. Let's read the word of the Lord from Psalm 148. The psalmist writes, praise the Lord. Praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise Him in the heights. Praise Him, all His angels. Praise Him, all His hosts. Praise Him, sun and moon. Praise Him, all you shining stars. Praise Him, you highest heavens and you waters above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the Lord, for He commanded and they were created. And He established them forever and ever. He gave a decree and it shall not pass away. Praise the Lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all deeps. Fire and hail, sun and mist, stormy wind fulfilling His word. Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, beasts and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds, kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth. Young men and ladies together, old men and children, let them praise the name of the Lord, for His name alone is exalted. His majesty is above earth and heaven. He has raised up a horn for His people. Praise for all the saints, for the people of Israel who are near Him. Praise the Lord. Praise God that we are near to Him, that we are near to the heart of God through Christ. This morning, what we need to pray for is to come together and bring our hearts to full glory. Yes, ma'am? Okay, we can definitely do that. Remember, Kevin, this week, he's getting ready to go for some more uh doctor visits and try and find out uh what's going on with the shoulder problem kind of what the options are going to be for uh probably surgical treatment it sounds like so pray that he can get some relief from that because i know shoulder pain is a pretty miserable sort of thing and christy this morning was not feeling well and apparently was not making it um she woke up tolerating she had a really bad what we call prick in her neck just a really bad muscle spasm on one side and Kind of the size and all those kinds of things. She's still hurting pretty bad. I kind of suspect that she might not make it. But we would pray for Christy that she'll be able to get some relief. She's home with the boys right now. I'm not sure what's easier. I might have gotten better at that deal. Bless her heart. What else do we need to pray for? Let's just take our hearts before the Lord. God, you are so good. Your care for us is, it's really astonishing when I think about it. As the scriptures say, you know, what is man that you would think about him? What on earth, God, in me could justify that you would cast your attention away even for a moment? And yet, Lord, we know that you are intimately concerned with our lives. know each situation that we're concerned about, probably the ones that have spoken here this morning and the ones that have not. Father, we pray that you would grant your will. Father, hopefully that's what we pray for. That you would do as you have purposed to do because what you do is always right and it's always just and it's always the best. Father, we pray that you would forgive us We make a mistake of thinking that we are the center of the universe, that we are the purpose of all existence. Father, it's part of our broken nature that we see ourselves in that light. Lord, help us through prayer and worship and hearing of your word, Lord, remind us, Father, that it is you in whom all things rest. That it is you who are the beginning and the end of all things. that is your glory, that is the ultimate purpose of all things. And Father, we pray in accordance with that, that you would do your will. Father, that you would glorify yourself, that you would bless your people. And Father, that if you would do your will, that through our lives and through our ministry together as a church, that you would draw people to yourself and save them in Jesus Christ. That there might be many more to stand with us praying in your name. And anyone else, perhaps we brought a musical instrument. Oh, thank you. This should be good. ♪ Sing them over again to me ♪ ♪ Wonderful words of life ♪ ♪ Let me more of their beauty see ♪ ♪ Wonderful words of life ♪ Words of life and beauty teach me faith and duty. Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life. Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life. Christ, the blessed one, gives to all wonderful words of life. Sinners, to the loving call, wonderful words of life. All so freely given, Moving us to heaven. Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life. Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life. Sweetly echo Wonderful words of life. Offer pardon and peace to all. Wonderful words of life. Jesus, only Savior, sanctified forever. Beautiful words, wonderful words. Wonderful words of mine. Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of mine. All right, your turn. I can't prepare before this morning. When I found myself singing on the way to church, it was maybe 560. 560. He has his own page turner. There is a name I love to hear, I love to sing his word. It sounds like music in my ear, the sweetest name on earth. Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus Because He first loved me And tells me of a Savior's love Who died to set me free Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus Because He first loved me It tells me of my fond past And so I'll look for every day And though I tread the dark, some path Heals sunshine all the way Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus is Tells me how his loving heart can feel my deepest woe. In each sorrow bears a heart that none can bury low. Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus. He shall my secrets be. 573. I'll put it backwards. Written paper. Oh, what a wonderful, wonderful day A day I will never forget After I wandered in darkness away Jesus, my Savior, I met Oh, what a tender, compassionate friend He met the need of my heart I was swelling with joy and telling He made all the darkness depart Heaven came down and glory filled my soul When at the cross the Savior made me whole My sins were washed away And like I was turned today Heaven came down and glory filled my soul Born of the Spirit and brought life from above And dropped down into God's family divine Justified fully through Calvary's love Oh, what sanity is mine And the transaction so quickly was made When as a sinner I came Took out the offer of grace He did proffer He saved me, oh, praise His dear name Heaven came down and glory filled my soul When at the cross the Savior made me whole, made me whole. My sins were washed away, and my life was turned to day. Heaven came down, and glory filled my soul. Now I have a hope that was surely endured, after the passing of time. I have a future in heaven for sure, there in those mansions sublime. And it's because of that wonderful day, when at the cross I believe, which is eternal and blessings infernal from his precious hand I receive. Heaven came down and glory filled my soul The cross, the Savior made me whole, made me whole. My sins were washed away, and my night was turned to day. Heaven came down, and glory filled my soul, filled my soul. When at the cross the Savior made me whole, made me whole My sins were washed away and my life was turned to day Heaven came down with glory filled my soul Thank you, sir. So we are in Jesus' interaction with the Pharisees and the chief priests, and so we're kind of picking up on the tale of that. And again, it's an interaction between Jesus and the religious leaders who are just really eager to somehow discredit and disprove Him. They want nothing in the world more than to find some way to trip Jesus up, to get Him to say something that they believe will prove that He's not who He claims. He's not the Messiah. He's not the Son of God. that he is not even a great prophet where they're trying to find something to get him to say something so they can get him out of the way because frankly Jesus is starting to cause trouble at this point. And all he's doing, like most troublemakers in the history of the church, well I won't say most, but there have certainly been troublemakers in the history of the church who did wrong. But there have also been an awful lot of people in the history of the church who are labeled as troublemakers because They spoke the truth with the word of God. And that was just really inconvenient at the time for someone else and stepped on somebody's toes or got in the way of somebody's money-making opportunity or whatever. And so in the case of these guys, it was more a thing about who's going to be in control, who's going to have power. But they also didn't have a sincere passion. I mean, they, in their own somewhat misguided, misinformed way, were passionate devoted to obedience to God. It's just that they miss the fact that the very part of obedience to God, the person of God himself was standing right there in front of them. They couldn't see because their eyes were blinded. So let's pick up at verse 15. Matthew writes, Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him, Jesus, in his words. And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the word of God truthfully, and that you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances. Tell us then what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not? But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax. And they brought them a denarius, and Jesus said to them, to Caesar the things of those Caesars, and to God the things that are God's. When they heard it, they marveled, and they left it, and they went away. You know, if you've noticed, this is kind of the same tune, different key here. I mean, it's, you know, and one more, it almost starts to become sort of like a a serial drama or serial comedy kind of thing. We've always got the protagonist and the antagonist and they're always trying to find some way to cause trouble. I mean, you know, here's another episode of the Pharisees trying to catch Jesus out, right? They're scheming against him to come up with a plan. They come up with what they think is an unanswerable question, essentially. There used to be an old comedy routine. I think it probably came from Bonneville, I don't know, but there's an old comedy routine where the interviewer, you know, speaks to the, you know, sort of man on the street and is asking him these questions that are, you know, all of them basically unanswerable questions. And so one of the questions he asked him is, tell me sir, when did you stop being your wife? And of course, If you say yes, then you've admitted that you used to beat your wife. If you say no, then it sounds like you still do. Right? So it's sort of a trap kind of question. That's sort of what they're trying to do here. They're trying to give him a question that either way he answers, he's going to incriminate himself. Either way he answers, he's willing to say something that they can use as ammo to get him out of the way. And so that's what they're hoping for. They want to trap him. Matthew says, that the disciples of the Pharisees, or these people who were following along the heels of the Pharisees in training, if you want to think of it that way, got sent to be the ones who did the dirty work. The Pharisees themselves, the religious leaders themselves, didn't go and engage with Jesus in this instance. They sent someone else. They sent the Plonkys. And it says, sent the disciples, the Pharisees, and the Herodians. And Matthew said that just as if you and I would understand that plainly. Just as it being said, you know, sent the Democrats or the Republicans or the Baptists or the Methodists or whatever, like we would know who the Herodians are. So it helps to stop because the first folks reading this in the first century would have known that in a way that you and I probably don't. The Herodians were a who advocated for the restoration of one of the Herods to the leadership of the kingdom. So Herod was the name of a series of Atlantic kings or Roman governors, however you want to term it. They essentially had a lot of power, but no ultimate power. They had as much power as Rome gave them, in other words. But they were the ultimate authority in local matters. And so they were pretty important in the lives of the people, influenced a lot about the freedom that people had or didn't have, that sort of thing. And so the Herudians believed that it was really important that one of the heroes would come king again and lead the people of Judea. The other thing you need to understand, though, was that they weren't just that. They also represented an entire philosophy that was closer to what we would call the Greek idea of hedonism, of seeking pleasure, not just the kind of thing where pleasure is the ultimate good in the world, but the kind of thing of, you know, eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die kind of thing. It's like, you know, all we've got left is pleasure, and so seek out pleasure at all costs. And they were very permissive, and they were very, their mores and their standards were very different than Pharisees, sort of. keeping the law of God, and making sure that everybody conformed to all the details of God's law, these people were sort of lawless. They were sort of the antinomians, the lawless party of the day, against the Israelians. They were good candidates because they had kind of formed an alliance, I guess, at this point, with the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Pharisees and the Sadducees, by the way, didn't have that much in common in some ways, but they had a lot in common politically. Same thing with the Herodians and the Pharisees. They had a mutual goal, because Jesus was authority on all their sides. They didn't want the same things politically. They didn't want the same things spiritually. But they did want Jesus out of the way. the same politics make strange bedfellows, right? I mean, you know, sometimes folks who would have nothing to do with each other otherwise would come together for a common aim, and that's what's happened here. And so the Herodians and these disciples and the Pharisees go out and speak to Jesus, and they try to trap Him up. These envoys, these Paxes, I guess you could say, the Pharisees, they start out with these It's kind of vile words of flattery when you read this, and it's almost sickening. Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances. Tell us, David, what you think. Now, man, if that's not some brown-nosing, right? I mean, these people are, you know, seriously trying to schmooze, you know, Jesus. They're, you know, doing their best to, you know, come to a very flattering kind of way. I've probably worked with many mere humans. When someone comes to you and says, oh, great teacher, you know, when they refer to me as rabbi, great teacher, respected teacher, we know that you are above the influence of other people. guard black people. And they say, simple question, is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not? Now, it's important to note here that they're not just talking about any and all taxes. They're talking about a specific tax. As best you can tell, there was a what we call poll tax or per capita tax that had been levied by the Romans on the citizens in Judea. And that's essentially a tax just for existing. Because you were a person, you were alive, and you lived in this territory, you paid a tax. It wasn't an income tax, it wasn't a sales tax, it wasn't a tax on your goods or your produce or your whatever. It was just a tax for existing, basically. And we just found that pretty odious. I mean, none of us really love the IRS probably, right? I mean, none of us are thrilled about paying taxes. You know, we kind of speak out of both sides of our mouth because we enjoy the benefits that taxes provide on the one hand, but on the other hand, we've grown about having to pay them, right? I mean, you know, I always say I grumble and gripe about North Carolina gas taxes because our gas seems to be fairly high because we have a lot of built-in tax. But that tax does go to state road maintenance, and when you cross the line into South Carolina or Tennessee, as your car starts doing this number, you need alignment. I mean, that's a two-sided thing. But by and large, people love taxes, and people in the first century didn't either, particularly a tax that just seemed like it was just because they couldn't. It wasn't based on anything that you accomplished or not accomplished. You didn't get any relief from it if you were poor or anything like that. It's just because you existed. That's why, if you remember when Mary And the reason part of that was to get a census for the purpose of collecting this per capita tax. There didn't have to be more in each family. And they counted the people, and everybody, man, woman, and child, paid this tax annually. And so the Pharisees, like everybody else, kind of bristled and chafed at it. And they thought, well, this would be a good way to be able to kind of trip Jesus up. And you notice here. that they are pointing out something true. I mean, Jesus is not a respectable person when he speaks. I mean, they're not lying when they say that you're not swayed by other people's opinion, Rabbi, because he's not, right? I mean, Jesus seems to speak the truth and let the hearts fall where they may and not really be concerned about trying to please other people. But at the same time, they're kind of over-categorizing that, I guess, or kind of beating him. So Jesus responded, we're called the hypocrites. And he said, bring me the coin you use to pay the tax. And so somebody brings a denarius, a little coin, that was, in the first century, it was recognized as being the standard for a day's wage for an average kind of manual worker, a farm laborer, somebody who worked at a vineyard, somebody who was a carpenter, a potter, a tradesman. Those were the kind of thing. That was about a day's wages. And it said Caesar. At this point, during Jesus' ministry, at this point, it would have been Tiberius Caesar, who was in charge of the Roman Empire. And he says, in his description, it says Tiberius Caesar under it, yes. So he says, give to Caesar the things that are Caesar's. Give to God the things that are God's. And that kind of blows him away. Now, we can be pretty judgmental in a way. The Pharisees, we certainly know that Jesus didn't have anything approaching how to praise for them. But we can think about their position a little bit. In America, it's fair to say that by and large, our government is pretty far from being a Christian institution, I think. But imagine if we, as Christian people, lived under a government that not only allowed to our faith. Here, we've probably been grown about the government, but we didn't have a role in choosing the government, at least to a certain extent. These were people who had government imposed on them, that they hadn't asked for or didn't want. The Roman emperor was just simply there, and they had no choice but to pay this tax involuntarily. They didn't support the Roman emperor, at least verbally, their lack of support for him was because the Roman Empire was a pagan empire. They didn't acknowledge the worship of the works of God. They did not, they worshiped pagan deities, and so they felt it was wrong for them to support this empire, and it was wrong for them to be in control of this empire, and remember that their expectation of the Messiah had to do with a worldly throne and liberate them from the Roman overlords and take control of them and establish a godly Jewish kingdom in this world that was what their expectation Who was the Roman ruler over there? Well, they hung the cross over there. You know, if you don't love whoever's president at any given time, you know, I've had times in history when it's kind of, the words kind of hang in my mouth when I have to say president so and so, but I just don't rule a while about that particular person and their policies and their ideas. And it probably hit him really hard, and he says, so give Caesar what he seizes. Now, if he just responded, yes, it's right to pay tax, then it would have appeared that he was siding with the Romans. And if he'd done that, then they could have used that, the Pharisees, He's on their side. He sides with his government, his pagan, that is not of God, and clearly he cannot be of God himself. And they would use that as an argument in the streets and in the synagogues to try again to tear down support for Jesus' ministry. If he'd spoken out against paying the poll tax, the Pharisees would have had ample evidence to be able to turn him over to the Romans for insurrection. This man publicly said, we don't have to pay tax. Did you hear that? What are you going to do with them now? And they knew what the Romans did with anybody out in the provinces, who sounded like they were going to incite people to rebel against the government or disobey the government. Because remember, we're talking about the province of Palestine, Judea. It's out there, away from Rome, pretty far disconnected. There's Roman occupation. There are soldiers. There are some political officials. But the truth is, The Romans in the region were vastly outnumbered by the Roman Empire. Had the Jewish people wanted to, and certainly there were times when they did, they could rise up against the Romans and be a powerful force. And the Romans knew that their rule over them was largely by fear. It was largely by intimidation. And these people started backtalking. These people started to say, well, maybe we don't have to pay taxes. Maybe we could just not do it. What would happen then? The Romans were, we're able to take a pretty good wall of mobilized troops from Italy all the way into this region to get people there in Judea to be able to squash a rebellion. And chances are, a lot of damage could be done in the meantime. So they were very fearful of any kind of uprising, any kind of dissent. He was fine, he don't pay the tax. And they could turn him over to the Roman government, they could hang him or crucify him and he'd be out of the world. At the same time, if he publicly sided with the Romans, the local people would say, he's not the Messiah because he sides with those pagans. He doesn't believe the things we believe. But when he says, give Caesar what Caesar required, give God what God required. That's not a contradiction of the Roman Edict about taxation. It's not a contradiction of any of God's laws either. He basically has answered their unanswerable question with an unanswerable question. He's given them a catch-22 for their catch-22, if you will. And in the same way, you can see the scripture shows us that we should do what's required of us by government. I believe the principle we can take is strictly that we should do what government requires, up to the point where it requires us to do something that is in conflict with God's commandments. Now, is government in this nation or any other nation entirely Christian, entirely God-fearing, entirely scriptural? No. Do we have a reason to expect it? Again, I think no, based on scripture. Government is a necessary evil. and to exact worldly justice. But government is not supposed to be the source of our righteousness. Government is not in charge of establishing righteousness, because law can never do that, right? We're told that again and again, right? Paul tells us that in Romans. He really tells us law can never be able to create righteousness in any way. That has to be something that's done by God in the Holy Spirit. When my heart's converted, come to love the things of God instead of the things of this world, then I'll have righteousness. But if we didn't have holy government, we'd have what? Arguably, a pretty bad situation. I mean, it's not great with government, don't get me wrong. I mean, you know, there are times I wonder if we could, you know, try the other way and say, but, frankly, it isn't as We pray for them and we obey them up to the point where it doesn't conflict with what God's command is. So God doesn't forbid us from paying taxes. The government compels us to do so. It's right and just for us to do what the government says. Now, if we believe taxes are unjust, there's not a thing in the world wrong about saying that. You have free speech and you have a right to tell people that. You have a right to vote for people. government in whatever way you are legally allowed to as a citizen. But your obedience to government is a biblical principle. Remember though, Jesus tells his disciples that we're to be obedient to government. Why? So we'll be left in peace. So we'll be able to worship in freedom. Essentially not Obey the government because the government is right. Obey the government because the government is righteous and godly, but obey the government so that the government will not prevent you from carrying out the commandments of God. Obey the government so that you can have enough law and order that you can be able to come together and worship God, that you can be able to glorify God in your lives, that you can be able to live quiet lives of peace, love other people in the name of Christ in ways that glorify God. That's our responsibility before government. Instead of conflating worldly government with the Kingdom of God, which is the idea of a theocracy, which is something that I just don't see as correctly. Is it wrong for us to hope for more Christian hope so government can start going up? We all hope for the in charge, people are in places where they can make policies that forbid things that God has forbidden, that promote things that God promotes. But at the same time, we're responsible to do what government says so long as it doesn't conflict with God's commandments. There's a big difference in withholding my obedience to government proposed I can't worship God. Disobeying government because it tells me I have to do something that God has clearly set for me. Now when it comes to that point, I hope you know without a doubt what's the right thing to do. And I believe God will definitely, I've seen so many cases of God will protect and provide for people who rightly and justly disobey the commands of government when they conflict with God's given will. You know, I don't think government does or ever will or will to do the will of God, but I do believe that the government exists by the will of God for the benefit of God's people and other people. This common grace that we talk about, this goodness that God gives, not just to his people who are saved, but to the entire world. The Lord sends rain just in the engines. He provides, government provides protection for people He provides government so that there can be peace and law and order so that people can be able to come together and worship him like we're doing right now. He also provides peace and law and order so that other people might have the opportunity to be able to join in that. Give what the world requires, but don't expect the world to do you a favor. Obey government, in other words, government for your righteousness. Pay what you have to, the government and taxes, but they're only to Jesus. The truth, and righteousness, and ultimate justice. It's pretty good. Father, help us to trust you with all of this. The very heart of our conflict with worldly government, and we have a lot of it, in this day and age, God, it seems like so often, didn't. God, when my trust is in you, my heart doesn't pander to those things. Yeah, I feel dismayed when I see the world around me doing evil things. But God, I also have confidence that you are sovereign over every one of those things. And that you, God, have set all things in order. and that at your return, Lord Jesus, you will go out with just and rightful punishment, and get sin and unrighteousness, and you will reward and gather those who belong to you, who are redeemed and forgiven because of your shed blood. Lord, in the meantime, help us to be good citizens in the sense that we are law-abiding, that we, to the best of our abilities, do the things that government requires. And when we disagree with policies, we disagree with things, then we seek to influence those in any way that we can. And we do that prayerfully, and we do that thoughtfully. Lord, give us a faith that is so rooted in your sovereign nature that we won't panic, we won't despair, and we'll see the righteous things around us. And God, our prayer is that through the witness of your people that you would draw many more to yourself, that the number of your true church would swell, that there would be more and more of you to gather together to join Christ, to stand before your throne and praise you shoulder to shoulder with him. God, we long for that day. We long for a day when worldly government is no longer needed. We long for a day when all the institutions of this world that are keeping law and order will not be needed because there will be nothing but justice and righteousness and a love for doing your will. Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly and establish your kingdom. Thank you, God, that you already are doing that in our midst, that we are part of what you are doing in this world. Help us follow you. I am weak but thou art strong Jesus, keep me from all wrong I'll be satisfied as long As I walk, let me walk close to Thee Daily walking close to Thee Let it be, dear Lord, let it be Through this world of toils and snares If I falter, Lord, who cares? Who with me my burden shares? None but Thee, dear Lord, none but Thee. Just a closer walk with Thee. Granted, Jesus is my plea. Daily walking close to Thee, Let it be, dear Lord, let it be When my feeble life is o'er Time for me will be no more Guide me gently, safely, Lord To Thy kingdom's shore, to Thy shore Just a closer walk with Thee Grant it, Jesus, is my plea Daily walking close to Thee Let it be, dear Lord, let it be Just a closer walk with Thee Granted, Jesus is my need Daily walking close to Thee Let it be, dear Lord, let it be. Daily walking close to thee. Let it be, dear Lord, let it be. We're talking about this matter of balancing obedience to God and obedience to government. Obviously, that's a thinking matter. It's also a creating matter. It's one of those things where I think you have to seek God's guidance in individual circumstances and situations. But there's not a blanket kind of rule we can make that says, OK, what level is my participation in government? What level of my, you know, giving what the government asks or doing what the government says amounts to sponsoring or being implicit in things the government does that are ungodly. And I think that's something we have to see individually. It's something that we have to, it feels good to talk about and debate and sit together, but hopefully the Holy Spirit guides us in those things. Our confessional papers were from the Baptist Catechism of 1689, which says in question eight, what is God? The response said this, God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in his being. His wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. Are there more gods than one? There is but one only, the living and true God. How many people, how many persons are there in the Godhead? There are three persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These three are one God, the same in essence, equal in power, and glory. Thank you for being here today. God bless you, and I pray that you have a day of peace to be able to enjoy a beautiful day and people that you love in your life. Thank you for doing that.