Theological Commentary: Click Here
Discipleship Focus: Teacher
- Teacher: One who holds forth the truth and is excited by it. The teacher looks for ways to explain, enlighten, and apply truth. A teacher's authority doesn't come from how smart they are but from the Word of God and the power of a transformed life.
This is a
really neat passage through which we can see the lens of the teacher. After all, this whole chapter is made up of
some of Jesus’ last teachings. What
makes this chapter unique, though, is the variety of contexts in which we see
Jesus teaching in such a short time.
Jesus talks to the crowd, Pharisees, Herodians, Sadducees, scribes, and
His disciples. There is one constant
through all of the teachings: Jesus is focused on God’s truth and not the
approval of mankind.
When
Jesus speaks to the crowd, He teaches them about what happens when people do
not respect the family of the land-owner.
In other words, Jesus is teaching the crowd what God thinks of those
people who do not respect His own Son.
Given that this teaching comes less than a week before Jesus dies at the
hands of the religious leaders, it is poignant indeed. In teaching this, Jesus is seeking truth –
even if it gets Him killed.
When the
Pharisees and Herodians come against Him, we see Jesus once more focus on the
truth. He refuses to be trapped. The Pharisees want Jesus to answer with the
answer that taxes to Rome are unnecessary so that the Herodians would get mad
and there would be justification for His death.
The Herodians wanted Jesus to say that taxes should be respected so that
the Pharisees will get mad and have a reason to incite the crowd against Him as
a lover of Rome. But Jesus seeks
truth. He focuses them on the fact that
the coin is something made by man. So
there is no conflict between loving God and paying worldly taxes.
The
Sadducees come to trap Him. Jesus sniffs
out the truth because He is interested in truth and not pleasing the
Sadducees. He tells them that their
focus is wrong. They want to focus on to
whom the woman belongs in the resurrection – which, for the record, the
Sadducees didn’t even believe in! Jesus’
response indicates that they should believe in the resurrection and they should
understand that what is important is our relationship with God in the life to
come, not our relationship with one another.
Jesus’ interest in the truth trumps the worldly debate of the Pharisees.
With the
scribe and the disciples, we finally see how Jesus’ answer gets Him
respect. However, in both cases we see
that Jesus once more gives the uncomfortable tough answer even if it is
confusing or unpopular. Jesus reminds
the scribe that the greatest commandments are to love God and love
neighbor. In other words, we are
supposed to be third in terms of priorities in our own life. That’s not a popular answer at all, even if
it is right.
When it
comes to the disciples, Jesus teaches that quality is more important than
quantity. Jesus lifts up the widow who
gives next to nothing compared to the wealthy who give much money. We can’t judge people using world terms. we can’t count how much they give, how much
time they spend in the religious institution, the prestige of the lifestyle
that the lead, or how many people have ever heard of them. This unknown widow who has next to nothing is
celebrated by Jesus! Jesus teaches His
disciples that the typical way of evaluating people simply doesn’t work in God’s
kingdom.
Jesus is
after truth. He wants the people who are
following Him to be after truth as well.
That’s what teachers do. They
lift up the truth, even in the face of crucifixion because of it.
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