Truth seeking

For Sunday 16 October...18th Sunday After Pentecost...thinking about Mtt 22:15-22

When I was a young man I liked nothing better than  to have a good argument about almost anything. It was hereditary. Both my father and his mother, my grandmother, were rather like this too.  I well remember my mother saying about her mother-in-law "She could argue black was white"
And so could I, and so could Dad. And we sometimes did.
As I have got older I have rather tired of this sort of "death by argument" sort of existence. These two little stories in Matthew 22 perhaps give us an insight into why this might be so.
First, they both have a sense that they are 'tricky'.
That is, although they seem fairly straight forward we soon discover they are not.
"Is it lawful to pay taxes?" Should immediately alert us to this
In our own country as soon as we started calling the process to price carbon not a charge but a "tax" people became wary.
Although we may like the benefits of taxation, none of us likes paying it.
In reality it looks like the questioners are not interested in the answer. They are trying to trap Jesus.
If he say "Yes it is lawful to pay tax" then the people will hate him. If he says "No, it's not lawful!" then he may be hauled before the courts
We may have arguments, we may ask questions.
But there is often a deep seated hidden agenda.
I suspect my grandmother, father and I really liked beating people into submission.
Not so much about the subject, as about power.


The second story is intriguing the 21st century person is left with a sense of the unreality of this question...Who will you be married to after you are dead? It is a a question about a religious divide which we don't fully understand...again 
it is rather like the political arguments of today
no one is being convinced
but that's not what they are trying to do
they are attempting to expose the foolishness of their opposition
rather than get at the truth.
Mostly when I discuss this passage, people look blankly
it is clear WE all think that as interesting as this all might be we have moved on!
Jesus, in entering into the discussion, only seems to make it more ridiculous.
I suspect he is exposing the futility of it all by taking it to the logical extreme.


A reflection
As important as it might be to correct error
we are often self-deceptive about the way we question and debate.
What looks important for Jesus is not the sort of logical niceties
and the technical merits of an argument
but rather the character of relationship
St John says (15:13) Greater love has no one than this, that they lay down their life for their friends
This is one of those cornerstone verses
The gospel in a nutshell
Love is not shown by pointing out the error of their ways
or by winning arguments
But by self-sacrificial service 
This is the message of the Cross.
It's often easier to argue
and may even be abusive.
It is far harder to love