The main thing is to keep The Main Thing the main thing!
Homily preached October 22, 2023
by Monsignor Michael Deering

The main thing is to keep The Main Thing the main thing!

And just what is The Main Thing?

I think you’ll agree there are a lot of things competing to be the main thing. Just look at the ads in the Sunday paper or the commercials on TV and you’re repeatedly told that cars, clothes, jewelry, health, wealth, and good looks are the main thing to have and to hold.

Yet somehow we know there’s more. And in a quiet moment of reflection you may even yearn to get your Priorities in order ... with God #1, family #2, and then everything else on down the line: job, career, school, sports, hobbies, travel, etc.

But the reality is that in this world of ours, there are many pressures and distractions pushing and pulling you in many different directions, to the degree that you can easily get side-tracked from keeping the priorities you’ve established.

Both good people and bad people are trying at various times to get you to focus on things they think are important. And this always risks taking you away from focusing on what’s really important, from focusing on the Main Thing, which is God.

In our Gospel today, the Pharisees wrestle with this idea of priorities when they approach Jesus and ask Him, “Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?”

Here they are in the very presence of the Messiah and they’re pretending to be undecided on whether or not they need to pay taxes to Caesar.

Jesus saw right through them and drew them right back to ... the main thing. He said, “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” 

What wisdom! There’s no denying that living successfully in community takes tax revenue to provide things necessary for the common good, like roads and police and schools and hospitals. So yes we do need to pay our taxes to the government.

But we cannot neglect to give to God what belongs to God. 

And what belongs to God?    Everything!    Everything we have belongs to God.

Therefore He ... is The Main Thing.

And for us His people: the main thing is to keep The Main Thing the main thing!

And it’s this truth that God has been trying to get humanity to understand ...

from the beginning of Salvation History.

When God called Abraham (1800 BC) to gather a tribe & travel to the Promised Land,

He revealed Himself as ... the God of the Israelites ... which made it look like He was just one more god of the many gods that the people worshipped at that time.

People acknowledged a god of: the sun, the moon, the mountains and many others.

So, God took another step 600 yrs. later ... when He revealed Himself to Moses as:

“The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”, it gave great longevity to His presence,

but, people still believed that the God of Moses was just one of many other gods.

This was strikingly portrayed in the great movie classic, “The Ten Commandments”

      with Charlton Heston as Moses and Yul Brenner as the Pharaoh of Egypt.

The movie showed how the God of Moses sent 9 plagues upon the Egyptians to move Pharaoh to release the Israelites from bondage, but he remained obstinate.  

With the 10^th Plague, the Angel of Death struck down the firstborn of all the Egyptians, including Pharaoh’s firstborn son, so Pharaoh finally lets the Israelites go free ... and we see this pitiful picture of Pharaoh holding his dead son in front of this huge statue of a man-beast, that the people had hand-made as their god,

      and begging this supposed god  for three days to bring his son back to life.

When that doesn’t happen, Pharaoh decides to go after the Israelites and bring them back into slavery. But when he finally catches up to Moses, Moses and all the Israelites have safely crossed through the Red Sea on dry ground. When Pharaoh’s Charioteers then enter the channel, the sea closes on them and they’re all killed!

We see an exasperated Pharaoh return to his palace ...

and he goes and slinks down in his royal throne defeated.

And his wife chides him asking, “So the God of Moses is better than your God?”

And Pharaoh admits:   “The God of Moses … is God!”

The Egyptians, like many other cultures thought there were many different gods, with varying degrees of power, and so each country and each people chose a god and tried to please their god to be assured of their god’s protection.

But now here comes the leader of the Egyptian people, having just witnessed the total annihilation of his army in the supernatural event of the parting of the Red Sea and he has no other choice but to admit ... that “The God of Moses … is God!”

What a powerful declaration!

What a profound truth ... from the Pharaoh of Egypt ... seated on his throne!

                                                          “The God of Moses … is God!”

That’s what God was trying to tell the people all along … ever since Abraham …

that there is no other God … that there’s only one God!

Yet then, like now, plenty of people continued to believe there is a choice in gods.

Even the Psalmist expressed this understanding writing around the year 1000 BC.

In Psalm 96 that we prayed today, he writes:

“For great is the Lord and highly to be praised; awesome is he, beyond all gods.”

You see, the challenge God had ...

was to first get the people to see ... that He... was the main God.

              And then get the people to see ... that He... was the only God.

So, finally, some 400 years later ... in 600 BC, God clearly declares this through

the Prophet Isaiah ... what was proclaimed in our First Reading today:

 “I am the Lord and there is no other; there is no God besides me.”

So how many Gods are there?     One!

There’s only one true God!

It’s the same God who has been with us all along ... all through the ages.

Our God is the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Moses and David too.

I have a Certificate hanging in my Rectory that reads,

“He is the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Michael.”

This was a gift to me from my sister … and I smile each time I read it.

It says it all … doesn’t it?         If there’s only one god …

Then the God of Abraham, and Isaac and Jacob is my God too … and yours!

Who is He?  … He is the God of Heaven and Earth ... and of all created things.

Wow!    So how are we to reverence and relate to this one God of all?

Psalm 96 ... just proclaimed ... guides us:

 “Give to the Lord glory and praise; give to the Lord the glory due his name!”

Are you doing this?

And if so, how regularly & how passionately are you doing this?

Once a week … when you come here?   Are you?

Are you joyfully joining your voice to the community in the songs & responses?

How sad to look out and see people not singing or responding ...

     or just singing or responding under their breath.

Really?    Scripture says:

“Give to the Lord glory and praise; give to the Lord the glory due his name!”

The Gloria, the Creed, The Our Father and all the beautiful songs here at Mass

give us the chance to give the Lord ... glory and praise together ...

and some people don’t participate.

They give the excuse ... “well I can’t sing”.

Really, ... well, I can’t sing, either ... but when we sing together, we sound great.

Glory to God in the Highest ... and on earth peace to people of good will.

We praise you.

We bless you.

We adore you.

We glorify you.

We give you thanks for our great glory!

Lord, God, Heavenly King ... O God Almighty Father.

With joy and enthusiasm we should look forward to declaring our glory & praise!

God knows well ... the voice He gave you ... use it and He will be ... well pleased!

And not just here at Mass ... but everywhere ... every day ...

at your dinner table ... at your bedside ... at work ... in your car ...

“Give to the Lord glory and praise; give to the Lord the glory due his name!”

Yes ... doing this helps to keep God... the Main Thing ... in your life.

Here’s a beautiful prayer we Priests pray many mornings ... it goes,

“Lord, may our lips praise you, our lives proclaim your goodness,

   our work give you honor and our voices celebrate you forever.”

Wow! It’s a simple, marvelous prayer to remind us to praise the one true God in every way we can … with our lips… our lives… our work … our voices … forever!

You see, if we keep God as the main thing in our lives, then others will notice and they’ll be drawn to do the same thing and then person by person the whole world will come to recognize and glorify the one true God.

In our Gospel today, the Pharisees are questioning Jesus ...

regarding the rank of Caesar in the grand scheme of things …

and they ask if it’s lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar.

Jesus simply says:

“Pay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”

Notice how He brought God into their question!

He says yes, it is lawful to pay taxes to the government; that’s how human society works, but he adds … you must also give to God what belongs to God!

And what belongs to God?   Everything!  He’s the creator and governor of all.

That’s the very definition of what a god is …

A supernatural power that brings into being and governs all creation.

God has clearly revealed Himself as this throughout history ...

and his title and his role will never change.

God has always been #1 … He remains  #1 today … and He’ll be #1 for all eternity!

God is The Main Thing!

That makes him very different from all other things.

God’s ranking does not change with time ...

because His ranking is not dependent on His performance or on our polls.

No, God will always be #1, because there is no other God.

The God that we know and love and serve is the #1 God.

He’s #1 ... because He’s ... the only one ... forever!

Notice how Jesus presents this truth

when the Pharisees challenge if it’s important to give tribute to Caesar.

Jesus amazes them by referring to something very important … image.

When they hand Him a coin, He asks them, “Whose image … is this?”

The Greek word for image is “Eikon”, which is where we get the word “Icon”

that describes a form of Eastern Religious Art … that includes Holy images of Jesus and Mary and the Saints.

When Jesus speaks of image, He’s making a claim on every human being …

because we all bear a holy image … the image of our Creator … God.

When Jesus says to render unto Caesar those things that bear Caesar’s image,

He makes a case for them to also render unto God the things that bear God’s image ...which would of course be … our very selves … for we all bear the image of God! In Genesis we hear,     “in the Divine Image He made them.”  

So, Jesus moves the argument out of the material realm into the spiritual realm.

Jesus relates the tribute paid to Caesar in the form of taxes ...

to the tribute paid to God in the form of devotion, obedience, love and service.

Just as the Roman coin bore the image of Caesar making them indebted to Caesar ...

the fact that we bear the image of God, makes us indebted to God.

This is way more than just paying our tithe on Sunday.

This means offering our very lives to God ... whose image we bear.

So, let’s offer God our thoughts, words, deeds and actions every day …

happily acknowledging that He’s “the Main Thing” in our lives.

Because:   The main thing is to keep The Main Thing the main thing!