{"id":27768,"date":"2026-10-20T09:07:45","date_gmt":"2026-10-20T13:07:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=27768"},"modified":"2026-10-20T09:42:20","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T13:42:20","slug":"27768","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=27768","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Jon Guerra - Citizens Lyrics\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fYtW2B7gCtU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Universal Healing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Tuesday, October 20, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Cherokee theologian Randy Woodley contrasts Western Christianity\u2019s emphasis on salvation through doctrine with the healing work of Jesus:&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People who believe themselves to be at the top of a hierarchy must find ways to maintain power. Doctrines can be a handy tool for doing so. If you can convince the masses that a reward awaits them in heaven, you\u2019ve got a way to keep the restive crowds a bit quieter, more compliant. And if you can convince them that they\u2019re actually sinful through and through\u2014and that as sinners, they\u2019ve got to keep themselves in line in order to have a chance at God\u2019s grace\u2014well, you\u2019ve got it made. Your power can continue to expand. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One such doctrine was the belief that all people are born sinful. This is often called the doctrine of original sin \u2026 [which] fits nicely with the dominant church\u2019s presumed authority to either grant or withhold salvation\u2026. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What Christian theology calls \u201csin\u201d Native American understandings often describe as imbalance, or broken harmony.<\/strong> These different terms point toward the same spiritual reality. Salvation then, is restoring the harmony and imbalance through healing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By reducing the idea of salvation to a series of formulas, or disciplines, or prayers, or creeds, the Western church missed the whole point. Salvation \u2026 was not something that could be bought with money, power, or obedience to words in a creed. <strong>Salvation is about one thing: healing. And not healing for later, in the by and by, but healing for right now. &nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Even today, many people allow doctrine to determine their idea of salvation rather than understanding salvation as the way God heals us all, including the rest of the community of creation. I would love to see people grasp this important concept: that<strong> healing is a much better way to think of God\u2019s greatest gift than salvation is.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Woodley describes how Jesus offers collective healing rather than individual salvation: &nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we look at Jesus through the lens of Indigenous and Hebrew understandings rather than imperial American and Roman frameworks, we see that <strong>his ministry was fundamentally about restoring wholeness, healing bodies, bringing outcasts back into community, challenging unjust systems, and mending broken relationships<\/strong>\u2026. Healing is the bigger picture of God\u2019s vision that Western Christianity calls \u201csalvation,\u201d and healing is for all of us now. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perhaps most importantly,<strong> healing language better reflects the Creator\u2019s heart for shalom: that comprehensive peace and abundance in which all creation coexists in harmony.<\/strong> Shalom, and the Indigenous visions of harmony, contains a justice and wholeness that extends far beyond individual souls to encompass whole communities, cultures, and the land itself. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The path forward must be about<strong> stripping away the imperial distortions to reveal the Jesus who heals rather than conquers, who restores rather than erases, who empowers rather than overpowers. In this understanding, salvation becomes what it was always meant to be: the healing of all things.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>============<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/app-link\/post?publication_id=47400&amp;post_id=220758373&amp;utm_source=post-email-title&amp;utm_campaign=email-post-title&amp;isFreemail=true&amp;r=2dkj2&amp;token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjozOTkyMzY2LCJwb3N0X2lkIjoyMjA3NTgzNzMsImlhdCI6MTc5MjMxMDc0MiwiZXhwIjoxNzk0OTAyNzQyLCJpc3MiOiJwdWItNDc0MDAiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.QpkYkRBQYfamOalEdy0Us31YmYBXOodtVbhCWal05WY\">Sunday Musings<\/a><\/h1>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Simple, but not easy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/@dianabutlerbass\">DIANA BUTLER BASS<\/a>.   OCT 17<\/td><td><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/@dianabutlerbass\"><\/a><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">TODAY IS THE TWENTY-FIRST SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>We are moving swiftly through these final weeks of Pentecost. Advent is coming.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The lectionary readings raise increasingly pressing questions about what it means to live in politically fraught and conflicted times \u2014 while hoping for a better world to come.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Matthew 22:15-22<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>The Pharisees went and plotted to entrap Jesus in what he said. So they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, \u201cTeacher, we know that you are sincere, and teach the way of God in accordance with truth, and show deference to no one; for you do not regard people with partiality. Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, \u201cWhy are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin used for the tax.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And they brought him a denarius.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then he said to them, \u201cWhose head is this, and whose title?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They answered, \u201cThe emperor\u2019s.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then he said to them, \u201cGive therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor\u2019s, and to God the things that are God\u2019s.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When they heard this, they were amazed; and they left him and went away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/44691fc6-c7b5-4378-8fd7-eb0e94feb6f0?j=eyJ1IjoiMmRrajIifQ.ND0qR5RKsmVnltuWgIlyr3BY7uwq2Kt9ZzX29UJK4cg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/$s_!RFe6!,w_1100,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffe34e4d8-9369-41d5-9e6f-3691a8d1513b_1640x652.jpeg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><\/td><td><\/td><td><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p>I paid taxes this week.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I know. It\u2019s not April. This is October. But, since I\u2019m a freelancer, it takes time to organize everything. We always ask for an extension and pay in the autumn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While struggling through piles of receipts, I was thinking about preaching this weekend on this text:&nbsp;<em>Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar\u2019s, and to God the things that are God\u2019s.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so, I wrote a check and rendered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These verses are <strong>often quoted to support \u201cgood citizen\u201d theology.<\/strong> \u201cGood citizen\u201d theology teaches that we live in different spheres of duty, responsibility, and obligation \u2014 state and church, politics and faith, or the sphere of \u201cCaesar\u201d and the sphere of \u201cGod.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It seems, on the surface at least, easy. Pay your taxes, support the government; pray and serve, love your neighbor; honor the king, worship God.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just when we think we\u2019ve solved the problem of politics and religion, the New Testament throws us a story like Jesus\u2019 argument with his critics, the Pharisees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this passage, the Pharisees quiz Jesus, to \u201centrap\u201d him. Jesus was, most likely, a fellow-traveler to the first-century Jewish movement called the \u201cPharisees.\u201d He shared much of their theology, rabbinical teaching style, and practices of worship. But for all his similarities with them, there were differences, too. And those differences often emerged in sharp encounters.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Pharisees were both a theological and political movement. They hated Caesar and Rome \u2014 seeing the Romans as unclean and barbaric pagan overlords. But they\u2019d adopted a program of what one scholar calls, \u201cpragmatic survival and accommodation\u201d instead of violent resistance to Rome. As much as they detested Caesar, they really, truly wanted to stay out of trouble with the authorities, waiting out Rome and hoping for better years ahead. Instead of criticizing the political order directly, they emphasized faith and Jewish practice and kept out of Caesar\u2019s way.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When they questioned Jesus, they wanted to pin him down on politics and religion. Getting Jesus on record would serve them well. They could figure out if Jesus sided with their survival strategy. He\u2019d be a good ally both religiously and politically. If he didn\u2019t agree, he might be dangerous. Perhaps he sided with the Zealots or one of the politically revolutionary groups. The Pharisees needed to know that. If he became too popular, he might draw Rome\u2019s ire and threaten the already-tenuous survival of the struggling Jewish community.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Understanding Jesus\u2019 position on taxes was key to defining his politics. Generally, the Pharisees paid taxes as part of their \u201caccommodation\u201d strategy. Better to cough up the cash than go to jail \u2014 or worse. But Jesus? What did he do?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so their question:&nbsp;<em>Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I<strong>n one of his finest no-answer answers,<\/strong> Jesus said: \u201cGive therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor\u2019s, and to God the things that are God\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His critics were \u201camazed.\u201d They got it. They understood his point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It seemed somehow clear to them. Clear enough to turn and walk away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it has rarely seemed that clear to us. Over the centuries <strong>Christians developed at least five interpretations of Jesus\u2019 \u201crender to Caesar\u201d comment:<\/strong> (1) Caesar and God are separate \u2014 pay the tax; (2) Caesar and God are an enigma, an unsolvable puzzle meant as a deflection; (3) Caesar and God are a paradox and we, somehow, must serve both; (4) Caesar and God are at odds \u2014 pay your taxes but \u201cwith contempt\u201d; or (5) Caesar is under the authority of God and give the state nothing, no matter the consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Take your pick. Each one of these positions has theological oomph \u2014 and has been supported and argued over and over and over again in church history.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That makes me wonder:&nbsp;<em>Have we missed the point?&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When this story was first written down, sometime between 60 and 80, Roman emperors made a claim to divinity. Indeed, the imperial titles for Caesar included \u201c<em>Dominus et Deus\u201d&nbsp;<\/em>and \u201c<em>Dominus et Salvator.<\/em>\u201d Not \u201cMr. President\u201d or \u201cYour Honor\u201d or even \u201cYour Royal Highness\u201d or \u201cYour Majesty.\u201d But \u201cLord and God\u201d or \u201cLord and Savior.\u201d Those were titles held by Caesar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jews hated it. This was idolatry. And Christians hated it, too. Christians hated it so much that they stole the titles and gave them to Jesus. No calling Nero their Lord and God. Instead, they proclaimed \u201cJesus is Lord.\u201d&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the year 60, they were being killed for saying it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s the invisible context of the Caesar tax story. In these early years, every Christian knew their creed: Jesus is Lord. Not Caesar.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The first audience of Matthew\u2019s gospel would have known exactly how it was intended. The story undergirded their creed \u2014 Jesus is Lord. Not Caesar. They might have laughed upon hearing or reading it.&nbsp;<em>Caesar thinks everything belongs to him. We don\u2019t think that! Because nothing belongs to Caesar. Everything belongs to God!&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The story was <strong>written down because it supported what Christians already believed. Not that they were trying to figure out some doctrine of church and state.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They were not worried about taxes. They were worried about Roman authorities throwing them to wild beasts.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They already knew that Caesar was a pretender. That evil was upon the throne. And God? Well, no matter what Caesar did, even if he murdered them, <strong>Caesar could never own them. Because God did. Through faith. Through baptism. Through their love of God. Through their solidarity with neighbors. Jesus is Lord!&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that\u2019s it. <strong>The first creed was a theological statement. And it was a political statement. The first creed was theo-political. Jesus is Lord. Caesar is not.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the case of this verse, the<strong> long historical argument of state and church in Christian theology is a complexity of our own making. It is complicated because we\u2019ve made it complicated \u2014 trying to justify governments and practices and systems of politics that literally have nothing to do with divine intention and the sacred heartbeat of the cosmos.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jesus is Lord. Caesar is not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Pharisees were amazed because it was so clear. So simple. They\u2019d complexified Caesar and God \u2014 and Jesus cut to the chase. Give to Caesar what is Caesar\u2019s \u2014 to God what is God\u2019s.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is simple. Everything belongs to God. Simple, yes. But it is very hard to live. The early Christians knew that. Simplicity doesn\u2019t mean it is easy. And we know that, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But the simplicity still shines: God. Dominus et Deus. Lord and God. Dominus Mundi. Lord of the Earth. Dominus universum. Lord of the Universe.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Remember the creed \u2014 the cry \u2014 of the first followers of Jesus: Jesus is Lord!&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Not Caesar. Never Caesar.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>May we be brave enough to proclaim the same \u2014 and courageous enough to live it in our day.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Universal Healing Tuesday, October 20, 2026 Cherokee theologian Randy Woodley contrasts Western Christianity\u2019s emphasis on salvation through doctrine with the healing work of Jesus:&nbsp; People who believe themselves to be at the top of a hierarchy must find ways to maintain power. Doctrines can be a handy tool for doing so. If you can convince [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27768"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27768"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27775,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27768\/revisions\/27775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}