Devotion 2.32/85: Luke 2:1: God-King

Presented to River Street Cafe, 24 December 2016

Read Luke 2:1-7

The second chapter of Luke’s Gospel opens with, “And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.” It is not by accident that Luke invokes the name of Caesar here. It is actually a crucial part of our Christmas pericope. Do we know why? Do we know who was Caesar Augustus? His given name was Octavian or Octavius.

Before he was king, his uncle Julius Caesar was king in Rome. Julius Caesar was worshiped as a god. He was murdered in 44 BCE and in his will Julius Caesar adopted Octavian as his son thus making him his heir to the helm of the Roman world. Octavian then became the adopted son of the ‘god’ Julius Caesar and he became the king of all the kings in the Roman Empire. When Octavian / Caesar Augustus became king the fastest growing religion was the worship of the king. Caesar Augustus was known as the son of a god and the king of kings.

After taking power, Augustus and his allies slaughtered thousands of political enemies. Antony and Cleopatra then waged war against them.  They were actually defeated by another famous person in the Christmas story. King Herod Agrippa was the one whose navy defeated Antony and Cleopatra in 31 BCE and within a year they both famously committed suicide.

Following this Rome officially changed Octavian’s name to ‘Augustus’, which means ‘the exalted.’ The politicians then gave him the legal power to rule every aspect of the Roman Empire all to himself. Through wars, murder and intrigue, Caesar Augustus became Rome’s ultimate Emperor, bringing stability to the realm.

Caesar Augustus ruled with an iron fist. He was worshiped as a god and as a son of a god; by destroying his enemies in war he even ironically became known as the prince of the Roman peace. When the Gospel of Luke was recorded, Augustus was known as a god, a son of god, prince of peace and the exalted one. This is extremely important to Luke’s Gospel because in this Gospel Luke goes out of his way so that the readers will understand that Caesar is not god, son of god, prince of peace or the exalted one, someone else is.

Our thought for today thus concludes with the same questions as was before the readers of Luke’s gospel in the first century. Which of these two do we believe is in authority? Which will we serve? Will we serve Caesar or Christ? Will we serve the apparent rulers of our current time and place in history who stand where Caesar did – Presidents, Prime Ministers, Premiers – and their empires and systems – capitalism, democracy, consumerism, imperialism… - or will we serve the real Son of God who lived and died and rose again so that we can all have the opportunity to live forever in His Kingdom to come?

On this eve of Christmas Eve two centuries closer to the return of our King, the choice is ours. Who will we serve: the apparent rulers of our age or the real ruler of the age to come? And what is the difference between serving one or the other.

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