Tax Day For Jesus

This Week In Blunders – April 6-12

“Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s …” - Matthew 20:21 (KJV)

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Peter delivered bad news: Authorities wanted Jesus to pay taxes. They demanded two drachma, the equivalent of two days labor.

So what did Jesus do? He could have summoned an army of tax attorneys from hell. Instead, he told Peter to go fish.

“Go to the lake and throw out your line,” he said, according to Matthew 17:27 (NIV). “Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”

Naturally, this passage raises accounting questions:

• Why were there no quarterly payments from the carpentry business?

• Does one have to report income derived from a fish’s mouth?

• Wouldn’t it have been faster to demand money from followers, like prosperity gospel preachers do today?

• How could a fish swallow a hook with a coin stuck in its mouth?

Forget about tiny fish from the Sea of Galilee. Big mouth bass can fit a lot more coins. (Illustration: AI generated.)

Eventually, Jesus told Peter to start a church and start claiming tax deductions. On Wednesday, a federal grand jury indicted a Kansas City-area Realtor for doing just that.

Michelle O’Connor created the “Church of Revelation and Love” to dodge about $40,000 in taxes, according to prosecutors. The church’s only congregants were O’Connor, her husband and family members – but even Jesus had to start small.