Today's Scripture Reading (March 15, 2021): Romans 13
Judith Martin, better known as
Miss Manners, makes this argument against the teenage years: "The invention of the teenager was a mistake. Once you
identify a period of life in which people get to stay out late but don't have
to pay taxes - naturally, no one wants to live any other way." I wish I
understood how lucky I was when I was a teenager. With only a part-time job, I
was probably richer than I have been at any other time in my life, and part of
the reason was a lack of things for which I was responsible for paying to live,
including taxes.
I
am now decades separated from my teenage years, but I remember that period of
my life fondly. And I still don't like tax time. Every year, one of my
resolutions is to get my taxes done early. And every year, you can find me busily
working on my taxes in the shadow of the due date. Maybe this year, I will get
it right.
Paul argues that we should be a
people who pay their debts. He begins with taxes. Here he echoes the words of
Jesus; "give back to Caesar what
is Caesar's" (Matthew 22:21). We may disagree with how the government
spends the money, but the reality is that we need at least some government
oversight. We require a government that will protect us and that maintains the infrastructure
on which we all depend. We need someone who will make sure that the roads and
bridges are safe for us to travel on, who will make sure that the garbage is
picked up, and that emergency services can respond when we are in trouble. I believe
that the coronavirus pandemic relief bills that we have seen enacted in several
nations that will help the citizens and enable the economy to recover after the
pandemic were necessary expenses. As a fiscal conservative, if I have a problem,
it is that the spending of the nations was out of control long before the
pandemic. I wish we had saved up for a rainy day before the pandemic so that
the pandemic didn't threaten to swamp our nations in debt. I hope that we will
get serious about repaying the debts that we have incurred for decades after
the pandemic. But those decisions aren't mine. In the area that I live, these
are the decisions that have to be made by the various levels of elected government
who have control over the necessities of life. My responsibility is to pay my
taxes. Fiscal questions and commitment are, for me, something that is a significant
factor during election years as I explore who it is that I want to represent me
in the government. Sometimes, it places me in a dilemma because the politicians
I trust have sometimes been fiscally irresponsible, which in my eyes
disqualifies them from leadership.
But
Paul doesn't end with just the idea of paying our taxes. He argues that if we
owe revenue (money for any reason) to someone, that debt needs to be paid. And
our debts do not end with monetary issues. Paul says that if we owe respect,
that debt should be paid, even if we disagree with the person in some matters.
If it is a debt of honor, that debt should be paid. Whatever it is that we owe,
that debt needs to be respected and we should never try to get out of what we
owe.
Jesus
finished his statement by saying that what we owe to God also needs to be paid.
We are a people who honor our debts. And that can only be true if we are
careful about what the debts are that we have incurred and that we take care of
retiring those debts as quickly as we can. We aren't teenagers anymore, and no
one else should be responsible for what it is that we owe.
Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Romans 14
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