Whose Image Is This? Giving God What Is God’s

Election season can feel like a live scoreboard: pick the right side, beat the other team, prove the other person wrong. Political competition can swallow up the fact that actual people will live with the outcome. Claims to speak for Christianity make the question sharper: whose side is Jesus on?

Matthew places Jesus in Jerusalem, where his challenges to religious authority have brought unlikely opponents together. The Pharisees and Herodians want to pin him down with a question about paying taxes to Caesar. A yes risks alienating people living under Rome’s occupation. A no gives Rome grounds to treat him as a rebel. The trap depends on putting Jesus in a category: for Rome or against Rome.

Jesus asks for a coin instead. Caesar’s face and inscription make that coin a little piece of imperial propaganda, a constant reminder of who claims to run things. Jesus answers, “Give therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” That answer can sound like permission to keep politics over here and religion over there. But the question about the image will not let those two worlds stay neatly separated.

Genesis declares that God created human beings in God’s own image. Caesar’s image may be stamped on the coin, but God’s image is stamped on Caesar. God’s claim reaches beyond a portion of life reserved for Sunday morning. God’s image means that the whole person belongs to God, including fear, anger, loyalty, and the decisions made in a voting booth.

That same image belongs to the neighbor with the other yard sign, the immigrant family, the person sleeping behind the gas station, and the candidate whose voice is hard to hear. Political disagreement does not make anybody a throwaway person. Any movement that asks for a neighbor to be treated as less than human asks for allegiance to an idol. No policy is “just politics” when it lands on somebody made in God’s image.

God shows up with a face, not on a coin, but in Jesus. Christ looks at tax collectors, lepers, soldiers, and Pharisees as people who belong to God. Caesar’s coins wear out, but God’s image has not rubbed off. Fear and pride may bury it, yet Christ is restoring it, polishing it, making it shine again. The question that follows a person out of the voting booth is not merely which side won, but whose image is standing right there in the neighbor.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. God’s claim reaches the voting booth. Jesus’ answer does not give Caesar a corner of life where God has no say. God’s image lays claim to the whole person, including political loyalties and the fears that shape them. Faithfulness means that a vote cannot be handed over to a party as though it belongs outside God’s reach. [35:25]
• 2. God’s image leaves no throwaway people. God’s image remains on the neighbor whose politics seem impossible to understand. Political disagreement can be serious without turning another person into someone who no longer counts. The image of God makes the human cost of a policy a matter of faithfulness, not an inconvenient distraction from winning. [35:49]
• 3. Dehumanizing politics asks for another god. Any movement that requires contempt for a neighbor asks for more than political support. That demand reaches into worship, asking a person to bow to a different face. The temptation of power becomes idolatry when winning matters more than recognizing somebody who belongs to God. [36:25]
• 4. Christ restores what fear has buried. God’s image does not disappear beneath pride, fear, or the damage gathered along the way. Christ’s restoring work means that those layers do not get the final word about a person. That restoration also keeps hope from stopping at the edge of a familiar group, because the neighbor bears God’s image too. [38:18]

Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [20:01] - Election Season and Choosing Sides
• [22:21] - Claims to Speak for Christianity
• [23:44] - Unlikely Opponents Unite Against Jesus
• [25:37] - The Trap Behind the Tax Question
• [28:06] - Caesar’s Coin and Imperial Claims
• [30:31] - More Than Politics Over Here, Religion Over There
• [32:05] - Whose Image Belongs to God?
• [34:36] - No Throwaway People
• [36:25] - Power, Idolatry, and Christ’s Restoring Work
• [38:43] - Recognizing God’s Image After Voting

Bible Reading

Matthew 22:15-22
“Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him 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 way of God truthfully, and 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 him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said, “Caesar's.” Then he said to them, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.” When they heard it, they marveled. And they left him and went away.” [25:37]

Genesis 1:27
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” [32:25]

Observation questions

1. In Matthew 22:15–22, how was the tax question meant to trap Jesus? What could each possible answer have cost him? [26:18]
2. Beyond identifying Caesar, what message did the image and inscription on the coin communicate to people using it? [29:38]
3. How does Genesis 1:27 connect the image on Caesar’s coin with the people in this encounter—including Caesar himself? [32:25]
4. What examples of people who bear God’s image show that this dignity extends beyond religious or political agreement? [34:31]

Interpretation questions

1. How does recognizing that Caesar also bears God’s image challenge the idea that politics is a separate area where God has no claim? [34:16]
2. What is the difference between a Christian strongly opposing someone’s policies and treating that person as less than human? What might that difference look like in a political conversation? [35:38]
3. Why does a movement’s demand for contempt toward a neighbor become a question of worship rather than merely a matter of political style? [35:54]
4. How does Christ’s restoring work offer hope without excusing the harm people do through fear, pride, or the pursuit of power? [38:18]

Application questions

1. When have you caught yourself following politics like a scoreboard, more concerned about your side winning than about the people affected? What might help you bring those people back into view? [21:15]
2. God’s claim includes our fear, anger, and loyalty. Which of these is hardest for you to entrust to God when politics comes up, and what might entrusting it to God look like this week? [35:14]
3. Think of someone whose political views you find difficult to understand. Without naming them, what makes it hard to recognize God’s image in that person? What is one way you could treat them with dignity without pretending to agree? [34:36]
4. Consider a policy you care strongly about. Whose daily life is affected by it, and whose experience might you need to understand better? How could you listen to that person’s concerns? [35:38]
5. Have you felt pressure from people on your own political side to mock, dismiss, or dehumanize someone? What could a faithful response look like the next time that happens? [35:54]
6. Christ is restoring what fear and pride have buried. Where do you need that restoring work in your own attitudes or relationships, and what small step could you take in response to his grace? [38:18]