Child's Story of the BibleLathbury, Mary A. (Mary Artemisia)
Religion
Child's Story of the Bible
Lathbury, Mary A. (Mary Artemisia)
Bible stories, English
And Jesus answered, "Neither tell I you by what authority I do these
things." They could not find what they wanted--something to accuse Him
of before the Jewish Council and so they tried to lead Him to say
something that would turn the Romans against Him. They came to Him
with flattering words, saying that they knew that He taught the way of
God truly, and would He tell them if it was lawful to give tribute to
Caesar or not? He saw their deceit and cunning, and said, "Why tempt
ye me? Show me a penny. Whose image and superscription is this?"
They told Him it was Caesar's. "Render therefore," He said, "unto
Caesar the things which be Caesar's, and to God the things which be
God's."
[Illustration: Showing the penny]
They wondered much at the wisdom of His answer, and could find nothing
whereof to accuse Him, but perhaps they never knew what He really meant
to say to them--and to us also--that His Kingdom was not of this world.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE LAST WORDS IN THE TEMPLE.
On this day also, as Jesus sat near the treasury of the Temple and saw
the rich, and the self-righteous casting their money into the boxes
placed there, He saw a poor widow come with her mourning dress showing
that she was the poorest of the poor--a pauper--and yet she had
something to give: she dropped two "mites" into one of the boxes under
the marble colonnade that surrounded the court of the women. Taken
together these two coins were worth much less than a penny, but they
were "all her living" and though the Lord did not speak to her, as far
as we know, He saw her faith, and His blessing must have reached her in
ways that we know nothing about. To those who stood about Him He said,
"Of a truth I say unto you that this poor widow hath cast in more than
they all; for all these have of their abundance cast into the offerings
of God; but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had."
[Illustration: The two mites]
Jesus, who "spake as never man spake," preached the new Gospel of the
Kingdom by means of stories, or parables, and on one long day of
teaching in the Temple He told several stories that the people never
forgot. Two of them were stories of the vineyard. One of them was of
a man who sent his two sons into his vineyard to work. One answered "I
will not," but afterward repented and went, while the other, who had
said "I go, sir," went not. Jesus taught in this that real sinners who
at first refuse to enter God's kingdom but afterward repent and enter,
are better than the heartless hypocrites who talk much of their
religion but are inwardly evil.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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