unto Caesar

Distraction is a big part of my life, with a job, family and various other bits and pieces it is difficult to line things up so that they fit into neatly segmented pieces and don't spill into one big mess. More than that I tend to distract myself - even as I write this blog I am likely to think of some fact or other which intrigues me, or a quote buzzing around in my head and decide to pause and look it up.

Mostly, the sort of distractions we face are relatively harmless - in fact there is a great old adage that the best ministry occurs IN the distractions and often this is true as the unscheduled encounter or conversation turns into a cascade of wonderful things.

However, there are more serious distractions which beset us. There are those which we really cannot help like health worries or financial problems - things which life throws at us which eat up our mental energy. But there are also those things which we get into our heads and use up huge amounts of energy on which seem almost petty by comparison.

The Gospel today is from St. Marks Gospel (chapter 12) and contains that famous phrase:

"Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and unto God what is God's" - at least in the traditional translation. This chapter has stories of the Jewish establishment pestering Jesus with,frankly, petty questions in order to see if they can catch Him out. He sends them off with easy replies - He will not be distracted.

This passage is often used to talk about our things but it equally applies to our attention. Our attention, ultimately, is all God's and we need to work really hard not to allow ourselves to be distracted by issues which take over our lives and fill us with anger to the point where we become useless as vessels of God's grace. It is really hard to render anything of value, of ourselves, to God when we are seething inside.

There are issues which we care about, but the key thing is how we care about them and what fills us from the inside out. Are we motivation by anger and faction or have we, indeed, turned all of that over to God, given God our full attention without a predictated agenda for God's action, and then from that point, explored the issues which light a fire in us?