Jesus’s closing statement in today’s Gospel—“Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God”—demands that we answer the following question: what, fundamentally, belongs to God? Hopefully, the answer comes naturally enough: everything! Such is the testimony God offers through the prophet Isaiah, saying, “I am the LORD and there is no other.” Or again, as we hear in today’s Psalm: “The LORD is king, he governs the peoples with equity.” The Lord God is king over all; all creation belongs to him.
But if the answer to the question of what belongs to God is straightforward enough, living it out is a different matter. For if everything belongs to God, then God has a rightful claim on every aspect of our lives. Our work belongs to God, our family belongs to God, our prayer belongs to God . . . even our very being belongs to God, for as human beings we are made in God’s image and likeness (cf. Gen 1:27). How, then, do we repay what belongs to God, if all our being and our very self belongs to God? Only by making a complete self-offering, as Jesus Christ himself shows us how to do. This is not to prescribe a specific kind of response, but only to say that in all that we do, we should do it in Jesus’s name and for the glory of God (cf. Col 3:17; 1 Cor 10:31).
Today, in our prayer and reflection, let us ask the Holy Spirit to show us concretely how we can more fully repay to God what God has given us, giving thanks for all we have received and allowing the Spirit’s power to penetrate every facet of our lives.