Promises, Presence, and the Common Good

Exodus 33:12–23 and Matthew 22:15–22 

By Rev Dr Fei Taule’ale’ausumai

 

Talofa lava and greetings to those of you who have joined us on line.   

We are entering that familiar season when promises surround us. Political parties tell us what they will improve, what they will repair, and why we should trust them. There are slogans, advertisements, interviews, and arguments. Everyone wants our attention, and ultimately our vote.

Underneath all this activity are ordinary people asking ordinary, urgent questions. Will I be able to afford my home? Will someone care for me when I am unwell? Will my children have opportunities? Will there be enough for retirement? Will my community be heard?

Our readings today bring questions of leadership, trust, and responsibility into conversation with faith.

In Exodus, Moses wants assurance that the people will not be abandoned. In Matthew, Jesus faces a question about taxation and political authority. Across these different settings, we encounter people trying to understand what they can trust and how they should live.

Before exploring Exodus, it helps to consider how this book came to us.

Many of us grew up hearing that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. Biblical scholarship offers a more complex picture: these books preserve traditions gathered, shaped, and edited over generations.

One influential explanation is the Documentary Hypothesis, often called JEDP: J for the Yahwist tradition, E for the Elohist, D for the Deuteronomic, and P for the Priestly tradition. These names identify different strands of storytelling and theological concern. Scholars continue to debate their boundaries, dates, and how they were combined.

So we should be cautious about attaching one label to every verse of Exodus 33. Its composition is debated. What matters for our reflection is that we are hearing a community’s layered wrestling with divine presence, rather than a straightforward transcript of a conversation.

That makes the passage especially meaningful. Generations have asked the questions we still ask: Where is God? How do we recognise the sacred? What sustains a people when their future is uncertain?

Within the story, Moses speaks after the crisis of the golden calf. Trust has been damaged. The journey continues, but the relationship between God and the people needs repair.

Moses is carrying responsibility without possessing certainty. He asks who will accompany him. He wants to understand God’s ways. He wants reassurance that the people will not have to travel alone.

There is something deeply human here.

We may accept a responsibility willingly and still discover that it is heavier than we expected. We may care profoundly about others while wondering whether we have enough strength left to continue.

Moses gives voice to that vulnerability.

Leadership does not require pretending that we have no doubts. Honest leadership can acknowledge difficulty, seek help, and listen. That is true in families, congregations, workplaces, and governments.

God’s response includes the promise of presence and rest.

For those accustomed to giving themselves continually to others, that promise deserves attention. Rest belongs within faithful living. Our bodies and minds have limits, and acknowledging them is part of respecting the lives we have been given.

A community that values care must also care for its caregivers.

Then Moses asks to see God’s glory.

Perhaps he wants what many of us want: something unmistakable, something that will settle the uncertainty.

But he receives a sheltered, partial encounter. He is placed in the cleft of a rock while God passes by. He cannot see everything.

Here is a valuable image for progressive faith. We encounter mystery without mastering it. We have experiences, insights, traditions, and language, but none gives us possession of God.

That should make us careful about claiming divine approval for our own preferences.

Religious institutions have sometimes spoken with certainty while excluding women, marginalising Indigenous voices, and rejecting people because of their sexuality or gender. Those experiences remind us to ask what our theology actually does to people.

Does it nurture dignity? Does it encourage compassion? Does it make room for truth and healing?

In Exodus, the revelation speaks of goodness, grace, and mercy. These offer a way of discerning the sacred without pretending we have a complete picture.

We recognise goodness in someone’s patient care, in generosity that preserves dignity, and in a community refusing to abandon a vulnerable person.

Sometimes we understand the significance only afterwards. Looking back, we realise that a conversation, a meal, or someone’s steady presence helped us survive a difficult season.

We had a glimpse. It was enough to carry us further.

Matthew takes us from that sheltered encounter into a public contest over power.

Jesus is asked whether it is lawful to pay tax to Caesar. The question is designed to place him in difficulty. His opponents want an answer they can use.

We know something about questions like that. During election campaigns, interviews and debates can become contests in which the aim is to expose weakness rather than deepen understanding.

Yet the concerns beneath the arguments remain real.

Who should contribute? How should resources be used? What do we owe one another? What happens when authority serves itself?

Jesus asks for a coin and draws attention to Caesar’s image. His response about giving Caesar and God their due leaves his listeners with questions about the limits of political claims.

Government has responsibilities. It can organise resources, provide services, protect rights, and support collective wellbeing. It must also remain accountable.

No government, party, or leader deserves unquestioning allegiance.

As Aotearoa approaches the general election on 7 November, these questions belong within our reflection.

Different parties will offer different answers. We can listen carefully without imagining that any manifesto contains the whole truth or that one party owns compassion.

Our responsibility is to examine promises alongside their likely consequences.

When we hear a promise of lower taxes, we can ask what services will be sustained and how they will be funded. When spending is proposed, we can ask whether it is workable and whether it reaches those who need it.

When politicians promise security, whose security do they mean? When they promise growth, who will share its benefits? When they speak about responsibility, do they recognise the circumstances that restrict people’s choices?

These questions require more than slogans.

They require attention to evidence, to practical consequences, and to people whose experiences differ from our own.

Faith does not remove that responsibility. It deepens our concern for the human lives affected.

A parent choosing between groceries and electricity needs more than reassuring language. An older person waiting for care needs a functioning service. A disabled person needs access that exists beyond a policy document.

Promises matter when they become practices that sustain life.

For me, as a Pacific woman, questions of contribution and belonging carry the stories of families who came here with hopes, skills, and a willingness to work. Their experiences remind us that people can contribute greatly and still struggle to have their voices respected.

The common good must include those voices.

It must include Māori, Pacific communities, migrants, people living with disability, and those whose poverty makes public participation difficult. It must also extend to the environment and generations who will inherit our decisions.

The church has work to do here too.

We cannot scrutinise political promises while avoiding questions about our own resources and authority. Does our welcome become practical inclusion? Do we listen when people speak of harm? Do we share responsibility fairly?

Both readings invite humility and accountability.

Moses cannot see everything. Political authority cannot claim everything. Our institutions, religious and civic, remain answerable for how they treat people.

We can hold our convictions seriously while remaining willing to learn. We can disagree without denying another person’s humanity. We can ask difficult questions without surrendering hope.

As the promises multiply, may we listen beneath them for the lives at stake.

May goodness, mercy, and fairness shape our judgement.

And may the communities we build offer something of that shelter in the rock: a place where people find dignity, companionship, and strength for the journey ahead.

Amen. 

 

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Audio of selected readings and reflections

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Audio of the complete service