Thursday, June 7, 2018
Babylon system
Mark 12:17
And Jesus answered and said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
Faith and religion are lived out every day in the real-world context of the political economy and social and cultural context of time. This often puts the religious establishment on a collision course with politics, and more and more these days, the religious establishment is on collision course with the culture warriors of our time.
Often, those with the political power use the system to bring the religious establishment under control. Control of religion usually equates with control of the people. In the time of Jesus, the Romans who had political and military control over Palestine had come to a pact with the Jewish leaders. This pact allowed the High Priest and his loyalists a measure of control over the affairs of the Jews and made it easy for the Romans to manage their subjects.
The Jewish leaders, therefore, when challenged by Jesus, sought every opportunity to turn His conflict with them, into a conflict between Him and the Romans. That way they could get the Romans to execute Him and not have His blood on their hands. The ideal set up was to leave Him in the difficult position of having to decide between offending the Romans or offending the people.
Oppressed people are always looking for a way out from under the oppressor’s yolk and tended to look to their religion and its leaders to provide that way out. Religious leaders tend to find themselves in one of two difficult positions, either colluding with the political system for their own benefit and survival, or in conflict with the system for the people’s benefit. For recent examples, we could very quickly think of American Civil Rights leader Dr Martin Luther King Jr or South African Anti-Apartheid Campaigner Bishop Desmond Tutu.
In the Caribbean, Rastafarian Religious Leader, Robert Nestor Marley, better known as Bob Marley, had a complete understanding of his role as a revolutionary campaigner for and on behalf of displaced and oppressed peoples in West Indies and Africa. Marley is mistaken as an entertainer, or more accurately, mistaken as an entertainer only. For indeed, he was an entertainer, but the entertainment was a vehicle for both the spread of his religion and the spread of his revolution.
Marley, a student of the scriptures, recognised that our God-given existence continued to be undermined by evil. He recognised that there was a system in which we existed and against which we had to struggle. Marley, using a biblical metaphor, labelled the oppressive system the Babylon System, in a piece by the same name on his 1979 critically acclaimed and militant album Survival.
Marley declared, “We refuse to be / What you wanted us to be / We are what we are / That’s the way it’s going to be, if you don’t know” and then in the refrain, “Babylon system is the vampire, yea! / Suckin’ the children day by day, yeah! / Me say de Babylon system is the vampire, falling empire, / Suckin’ the blood of the sufferers, yeah!”
At the time that Jesus conducted His earthly ministry, the Jewish people were feeling the same way. The Romans had been like the Babylon System which held their fathers in captivity in exile. They were looking for a way out.
According to the Pharisee Gamaliel, there were Jewish rebel leaders who had tried and failed, “For some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody. A number of men, about four hundred, joined him. He was slain, and all who obeyed him were scattered and came to nothing. After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the census, and drew away many people after him. He also perished, and all who obeyed him were dispersed.” Acts 5:36,37.
The people wanted to get out from under the Babylon System, Roman rule with its oppressive taxes, and the religious leaders wanted to get rid of Jesus. There was a simple solution for them, give the people their rebel leader by setting Jesus in conflict with the Romans. The people would be happy, but the Romans would arrest Him and probably kill Him and life would once again return to their version of normal.
The trap was laid, the question posed, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not? Shall we pay, or shall we not pay?” Mark 12:14,15
Jesus, seeing the trap from a mile away, demanded a coin, the denarius, and asked: “Whose image and inscription is this?” Their answer, “Caesar’s,” created the way out for Jesus and a lesson for them and all of us. We live in the world’s system, the Babylon System, controlled by the devil.
“Then the devil, taking Him up on a high mountain, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, “All this authority I will give You, and their glory; for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish.” Luke 4:5,6.
We live in the Babylon System, and for as long as we live in it we have obligations to it. Not that we embrace it, and not that we shouldn’t resist it every opportunity that we get, but we must recognise that our faith must be lived out in the context of that world system. We must honour our obligations to it while we faithfully serve God and honour our obligations to Him.
Think on these things:
- What aspect(s) of the operation of the state where you live do you find most difficult to accept?
- Are you deliberate about honouring all of your obligations to the state without looking for loopholes to avoid them?
- How do you think we are going to be able to resist the state where necessary without bringing dishonour to God?
Prayer focus:
Let us pray today that we would be godly citizens, meeting our obligation to the state while honouring God in everything we do.
In His Grace
Pastor Alex