The Image on the Coin
Matthew 22:15-21

Fr. Jijo Kandamkulathy CMF
Claretian Missionaries

We are all experts at the art of the questioning; not in the honest questions. The honest question seeks truth. It is open. It is vulnerable. It is willing to be changed by the answer. But there is another kind of question. The question that is not a question at all. The question that is a trap. The question that is designed to expose, to embarrass, to corner. We have all asked it. We have all received it. And we have all felt the sting of being ambushed by words that were not seeking truth but seeking victory.

The Pharisees and the Herodians come to Jesus with such a question. They do not come alone. They come together. Two groups who hate each other. The Pharisees, who resented Roman occupation. The Herodians, who supported it. They put aside their mutual contempt to trap this teacher from Galilee. They begin with flattery. “Teacher, we know that you are a truthful man and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. And you are not concerned with anyone’s opinion, for you do not regard a person’s status.” They butter him up before they try to bring him down. They praise him for his independence, and then they ask a question designed to destroy him.

“Tell us, then, what is your opinion: Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?”

If he says yes, he alienates the people who long for freedom from Rome. If he says no, he is guilty of sedition. Either answer is a trap. Either answer is death.

But Jesus does not answer the question. He asks for a coin. He asks whose image and inscription it bears. And they say, “Caesar’s.” And then he speaks the words that have echoed through the centuries. “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

This is not a simple teaching about taxes. It is not a division of life into two separate compartments. It is not a way of saying that some things belong to the state and some things belong to God. It is something much deeper. It is a revelation of what it means to be human. It is a revelation of what it means to bear an image.

The coin bears the image of Caesar. That is why it belongs to Caesar. But what bears the image of God? The human person. You bear the image of God. You are stamped with the imprint of the divine. And that is why you belong to God. Not just your Sunday. Not just your prayers. Not just your religious moments. You. Your whole self. Your body. Your mind. Your heart. Your work. Your relationships. Your time. Your ambitions. Your fears. Your hopes. All of it. All of you. You are the coin that bears the image of the one who made you. And you cannot be rendered to anyone else.

But here is the sad part. We have learned to divide ourselves. We have learned to keep our religious life in one pocket and our ordinary life in another. We give God our Sunday and we give the rest of the week to the world. We give God our prayers and we give our work to ambition. We give God our attention and we give our hearts to something else. We have created a compartmentalized Christianity. A faith that is separate from life. A God who is relevant on Sunday and irrelevant on Monday. And we call this wisdom. We call this being practical. We call this living in the real world.

But Jesus does not divide. Jesus does not compartmentalize. Jesus does not say, “Give some things to Caesar and some things to God.” He says, “Give to Caesar what bears Caesar’s image. Give to God what bears God’s image.” And the question is: What bears God’s image? You do. All of you. Every part of you. There is no part of your life that does not belong to God. There is no corner of your heart that is off-limits. There is no hour of your day that is exempt. The image of God is stamped on you. And you cannot render only part of what bears his likeness.

Think about what this means for the things we worry about. We worry about money. We worry about status. We worry about what others think of us. We worry about whether we are successful. We worry about whether we are safe. But these worries are the worries of the coin. They are the worries of Caesar. They are the worries of a world that has forgotten whose image it bears. The coin belongs to Caesar. The coin will return to Caesar. The coin will be spent and lost and forgotten. But you belong to God. And you will return to God. And every moment you spend worrying about the things that belong to Caesar is a moment you take from the things that belong to God.

This does not mean that money is evil. It does not mean that work is meaningless. It does not mean that the ordinary concerns of life are unimportant. Jesus pays the tax. He respects the authority of Caesar in the realm of Caesar. He does not rebel. He does not protest. He does not refuse. He simply puts everything in its proper place. The coin belongs to Caesar. So give it back. But do not give Caesar what belongs to God. Do not give Caesar your soul. Do not give Caesar your heart. Do not give Caesar your identity. Do not give Caesar the things that are stamped with the image of your Creator.

The question is not whether you will pay taxes. The question is whether you will give your whole self to God. The question is whether you will live as one who bears the image of the divine. The question is whether you will stop dividing yourself into pieces and give everything to the one who gave everything to you.

How often I have given God my Sunday and kept my Monday. How often I have given God my prayers and kept my worries. How often I have given God my words and kept my heart. How often I have rendered to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and rendered to God only what I had left over. How often I have lived as if my image belonged to the world. How often I have forgotten that I am not a coin. I am a child. I am not a possession. I am a beloved. And my whole life belongs to the one whose image I bear.

I am asking myself: What have I given to Caesar that belongs to God? What part of my life have I withheld? Where have I divided myself? Where have I compartmentalized my faith? Where have I rendered only a fraction of what I owe? And the answer is uncomfortable. But the answer is the path. The path to wholeness. The path to integrity. The path to giving everything to the one who gave everything for me.

The image on the coin fades. But the image on you is eternal. The moment you live in that truth is the moment of freedom. Free from the tyranny of Caesar. Free from the tyranny of the world. Free from the tyranny of your own divided heart. You belong to God. Not just a part of you. Not just the religious part. All of you. And the only thing you can render to God is everything. UNTIL YOU HAVE GIVEN EVERYTHING TO GOD, YOU HAVE GIVEN NOTHING.

© Claretian Publications, Macau 2026
Cum Approbatione Ecclesiastica