ORDER MY STEPS IN THY WORD

God’s Order for Quality BelieversClimbing High to Seek Truthare sincerely interested in learning can learn fromJesus’ response.who collects taxes an extortioner. This is as truetoday as it was in the days of Jesus Christ.Some of these wicked hypocrites temptingI’ve explained this sidelight information aboutJesus were Herodians, Judeans who supportedpublicans in the first century in order for us toRoman rule. Among them were probably appreciate the great significance found in the acpublicanswho were exacting more taxes than thecount of Zacchaeus and Jesus in Luke 19. Welaw called for. Jesus knew who they were andneed to understand the social implications of taxcaught them off guard with his wise response.collecting and tax collectors.Verses 19-21:Shew me the tribute money. And theybrought unto him a penny.And he saith unto them, Whose is this imageand superscription?They say unto him, Caesar’s. Then saith heunto them, Render therefore unto Caesarthe things which are Caesar’s; and unto Godthe things that are God’s.For any nation there has to be some type oftaxation. It is our responsibility as citizens andChristians to give to Caesar the things that areCaesar’s and to God the things that are God’s,and we must recognize the difference.Just because tax collecting may be considereda vulgar occupation associated with extortion inan abusive system, that doesn’t make everybodyVerse 2 of Luke 19 tells us that Zacchaeus was“chief among the publicans, and he was rich.”Now people have read these two statements as ifthey were directly related. Some conclude thatthe reason Zacchaeus was rich was that he was apublican who collected more than was required,that he was extorting money from people. Butdoes God’s Word say that? No, it doesn’t. Itsimply states that Zacchaeus was chief among thepublicans and that he was rich. It doesn’t say hecheated to get rich. This may have been a practiceby other publicans, but it doesn’t say thatZacchaeus did it. We have no right to read intothis statement in Luke that Zacchaeus obtainedhis wealth dishonestly.Publicans were tax collectors, just as somepeople today are farmers or plumbers or politiciansor teachers. Just because a person is a richplumber doesn’t indicate that he is a corrupt210211