Part One
Luke – Wide Open Doors!
Have you ever known and observed certain people in your family, church or work situations who remain silent in a gathering of those who are in debate? They are silent because they are listening with focused minds. They are not listening with minds that are thinking of how they will join into the discussion. They are truly just listening. They see the issues of both sides. Their minds think beyond the issues before speaking.
Then a solution that no one else thought of begins to take shape in their minds. They see what no one else sees. When people like the silent listeners speak, people lean in to hear what they have to say because it is amazing that the silent are speaking at all. As they speak debaters hear wisdom, a new perspective, insight, and understanding. It causes those in debate and in the crowd to stay silent long enough for the “ah-ha” moment to hit them. Their insightful words amaze everyone.
Jesus is God’s Son. Jesus is Truth. Jesus listens, knows the hearts of everyone and speaks wisdom beyond the minds of mankind because His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. He is God. But we learn from Him that true wisdom is fed by love, mercy and grace. Watch as Jesus provides answers to those sent to trap him in his words in this passage and in the passages that follow tomorrow.
Luke 20, New Living Translation
Taxes for Caesar
20 Watching for their opportunity, the leaders sent spies pretending to be honest men. They tried to get Jesus to say something that could be reported to the Roman governor so he would arrest Jesus. 21 “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you speak and teach what is right and are not influenced by what others think. You teach the way of God truthfully. 22 Now tell us—is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”23 He saw through their trickery and said, 24 “Show me a Roman coin. Whose picture and title are stamped on it?”
“Caesar’s,” they replied.
25 “Well then,” he said, “give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give to God what belongs to God.”
26 So they failed to trap him by what he said in front of the people. Instead, they were amazed by his answer, and they became silent.
WHAT DO WE LEARN?
Jesus knew that the men who questioned Him were spies sent by the Pharisees and the Herodians (Mark 12:13), but He patiently listened and replied. These two groups were usually fighting each other, but now they had a common enemy, and this brought them together. They wanted to discuss taxes and Roman authority, hoping to provoke Jesus into offending either the Jews (“Pay the poll tax!”) or the Romans (“Don’t pay the poll tax!”). But Jesus lifted the discussion to a much higher level and forced the spies to think about the relationship between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of men.
The spies ultimately lost that round and went silent. Can you imagine the scene? Eyes wide, the spies look at Jesus then look at each other, shrug their shoulders with “I got nothing.”
HOLY PAUSE…
When has the wisdom of God affected your life in such a way that it amazed you?
What was your reaction?
How did it change your heart and behavior?
Caesar’s image and name were on the coins, so it was basically his currency. To pay the poll tax meant simply to give Caesar back that which belonged to him.
God’s image is stamped on us; therefore, He has the right to command our lives as citizens in His kingdom. We should seek to be such good citizens that God will be glorified and the unsaved will be attracted to the gospel and want to become Christians (1 Peter 2:9–12; 3:8–17).
It is unfortunate that some Christians have the mistaken idea that the more obnoxious they are as citizens, the more they please God and witness for Christ. We must never violate our conscience, but we should seek to be peacemakers and not troublemakers. Daniel is also an example to follow (Dan. 1).
Dear Heavenly Father, Lord and Savior,
You are Creator of all and in all. There is no one like you in all that you created. You are Truth. You provide the skills for living this life on earth. We just have to ask. So, Lord we are asking for your wisdom, insight and understanding as we grow closer to You, loving and behaving more like You each day. Teach us to be peacemakers with your wisdom in us. You are God and we are not. Help us to listen, truly listen before speaking. Help us to be gracious and kind in all our responses. You spoke Truth in love. Help us to do the same.
In Jesus Name, Amen
So, they had no respect for Jesus. They criticized Him, refuted his authority and plotted to kill Him. They forgot God. Left God. When reminded of God by His One and Only Son, their hardened hearts, closed minds and sick souls plotted to kill the One sent from the Father.
One day as Jesus was teaching the people and preaching the Good News in the Temple, the leading priests, the teachers of religious law, and the elders came up to him. 2 They demanded, “By what authority are you doing all these things? Who gave you the right?”
17 Jesus looked at them and said, “Then what does this Scripture mean?
But there was more to this series of questions than mere guile. The word translated “rejected” in Luke 9:22 (and also Luke 20:17) means “to reject after investigation.” It was required that the Jews carefully examine the Passover lambs from the tenth day to the fourteenth day to make sure they had no blemishes (Ex. 12:1–6). Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God (John 1:29), was watched and tested by His enemies during that final week, and yet in spite of what they saw and learned, they rejected Him.
HOLY PAUSE…
Jesus, Son of God, comes to God’s house to correct the lies and cheating of the common people in the courtyard leading to the Temple. The behaviors of the sellers of sacrifices had degraded to cheating the people who were coming seek God which was the opposite of what the Temple was built to be…a house of prayer. The “price of admission” was big business to fill the pockets of the corrupt.
But Truth DOES exist! Truth, the only Truth, the unchanging Truth, is the Person of Jesus Christ! John explains Truth’s beginnings to us in his introduction of who God is and his relationship with His Son, Jesus Christ;
The court of the Gentiles was the only place in the temple that was available to the Gentiles. There the Jews could witness to their “pagan” neighbors and tell them about the one true and living God. But instead of being devoted to evangelism, the area was used for a “religious marketplace” where Jews from other lands could exchange money and purchase approved sacrifices. The priests managed this business and made a good profit from it. 
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” 
“The secret is Christ in me, not me in a different set of circumstances.” — Elizabeth Elliot, Missionary
“Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?” 
Those of us who have kids know that they love us best when they want something. Kids are kids. They think we don’t know their tricks of manipulation to get what they want or think they need. Parents want love and hugs so we fall for it at first until it goes over the top with doing tasks without being told, suddenly helping their siblings instead of fighting with them, doing their homework, or even washing the car! Yes, that happened once with one of our kids. Washing the car was certainly over the top! When “love” is expressed as a bargaining chip, we would sit them down so we could get to the heart of what is really going on…AFTER, they finish all these good activities, of course! (Smiling.) 
Jesus has gained a great deal of popularity because of His love, compassion for all people, and his miracles of restoration and life. He is like no other the world has ever seen. So in response, people burst into praise for Jesus. Jesus allows it but knows their hearts well for He is also God, sent from God in human form. He knows that many praise Him for only what He has done. Many praise Him for Who He is. He heard all their praise. 
28 After telling this story, Jesus went on toward Jerusalem, walking ahead of his disciples. 29 As he came to the towns of Bethphage and Bethany on the Mount of Olives, he sent two disciples ahead. 30 “Go into that village over there,” he told them. “As you enter it, you will see a young donkey tied there that no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks, ‘Why are you untying that colt?’ just say, ‘The Lord needs it.’”
Jesus Weeps over Jerusalem
The second reason for this demonstration was to force the Jewish religious leaders to act. They had hoped to arrest Him after the Passover (Matt. 26:3–5), but God had ordained that His Son be slain on Passover as the “Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29; and see 1 Cor. 5:7). Every previous attempt to arrest Jesus had failed because “his hour was not yet come” (John 7:30; 8:20; also see John 13:1; 17:1). When they saw this great public celebration, the leaders knew that they had to act, and the willing cooperation of Judas solved their problem for them (Matt. 26:14–16).
No matter where Jesus looked, He found cause for weeping. If He looked BACK, He saw how the nation had wasted its opportunities and been ignorant of their “time of visitation.” If He looked within, He saw spiritual ignorance and blindness in the hearts of the people. They should have known who He was, for God had given them His Word and sent His messengers to prepare the way. 
20 “But the third servant brought back only the original amount of money and said, ‘Master, I hid your money and kept it safe. 21 I was afraid because you are a hard man to deal with, taking what isn’t yours and harvesting crops you didn’t plant.’
It’s sad when a Christian is motivated by slavish fear instead of loving faith. While there is a proper “fear of the Lord” that should be in every Christian’s heart, that “fear”should be the respect of a loving child and not the dread of a frightened slave. “Nothing twists and deforms the soul more than a low or unworthy conception of God,” wrote Dr. A. W. Tozer. How important it is that we do the will of God from our hearts (Eph. 6:6). 
There is so much more going on in this passage than a wee hearted man of small stature driven to see Jesus. Zacchaeus was a despised tax collector who had permission from the government to collect more than was required so he could make a living that suited him by skimming off the top. Being “chief” tax collector he had the ability to earn/take even more. So, you can imagine why he was hated by the common people. Zacchaeus was a Jewish man, hated by his own, and deemed a traitor of sorts for working for the Roman government…a sinner in the eyes of the religious elite. But, “the Lord he wanted to see”.
WHO was seeking?
Is Jesus, through His Holy Spirit, seeking you?
The blind man spent his life begging on the street for a living. His sense of hearing, however, was great! He HEARD the noise of the crowd who was following the man everyone wanted to be close to because of the miracles that had witnessed. He asked what was happening.
But he only shouted louder, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”
“The “human editions” we have “read” in this chapter encourage us to put our faith in Jesus Christ, no matter what others may say or do. The widow was not discouraged by the indifferent attitude of the judge, nor the publican by the hypocritical attitude of the Pharisee. The parents brought their little ones to Jesus in spite of the selfish attitude of the apostles, and the blind men came to Jesus even though the crowd told them to keep quiet and stay put. Jesus always responds to faith and rewards those who believe.”
31 Taking the twelve disciples aside, Jesus said, “Listen, we’re going up to Jerusalem, where all the predictions of the prophets concerning the Son of Man will come true. 32 He will be handed over to the Romans, and he will be mocked, treated shamefully, and spit upon. 33 They will flog him with a whip and kill him, but on the third day he will rise again.”
We have the details of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and many still do not grasp the significance of who Jesus is, why the Son of God came to earth as a human and what He did to save our souls. In our country, we cannot imagine the Roman forms of torture of being whipped beyond recognition then nailed to boards, hoisted up and place on a hill in humility for all to see. HE who had no sin died for all sinners.
HOLY PAUSE…
We don’t “get it” all at once. God understands and gives us exactly what we need to know when we need to know it as we trust Him. Be ready to listen when He does. He is such a good, good Father.
Dear God, you made many, many poor people.
The most important men in town will come to fawn on me
If I were a wealthy man.
18 Once a religious leader asked Jesus this question: “Good Teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?”
22 When Jesus heard his answer, he said, “There is still one thing you haven’t done. Sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
The rich young ruler (Matt. 19:20) may be the only man in the Gospels who came to the feet of Jesus and went away in worse condition than when he came. And yet he had so much in his favor! He was moral and religious, earnest and sincere, and probably would have qualified for membership in the average church. Yet he refused to follow Jesus Christ and instead went his own way in great sorrow. 
HIS HEART
Dear Heavenly Father, Lord and Savior,
Dear Heavenly Father, Lord and Savior,
