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.”Peter and Taxes”•By Joshua AdamsPeter had a tax bill to pay.Jesus told him to go fishing.That sounds almost absurd until you read what happened next.The collectors of the temple tax had approached Peter and asked whether Jesus paid the tax.Peter answered, “Yes.”But when Peter entered the house, Jesus spoke before Peter even explained what had happened.Jesus already knew.Then He taught Peter that, as the Son, He was not truly obligated in the same way others were.Yet Jesus said:“Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them...”Matthew 17:27Then came one of the strangest instructions Peter may have ever received.Go to the sea.Cast a hook.Take the first fish you catch.Open its mouth.There will be money inside.Take it and pay the tax for both of us.Peter was a fisherman.He knew where fish came from.He knew what belonged inside a fish.Money was not one of those things.Yet the provision was exactly where Jesus said it would be.I think that matters.Because sometimes we become so obsessed with figuring out HOW God is going to provide that we struggle to obey what He has already told us to do.Peter was not told to understand the logistics.He was told to cast the hook.Imagine everything that had to line up.The right fish.The right coin.The right place.The right moment.The right hook.And Peter had to catch that particular fish first.What looked like coincidence from the shoreline was already under the authority of Christ.But there is another detail here we should not miss.Jesus could have simply produced the money.Instead, He sent a fisherman fishing.God's provision did not eliminate Peter's participation.Peter still had to walk to the water.He still had to cast the hook.He still had to pull the fish in.He still had to open its mouth.That has corrected something in me.Sometimes I have prayed for God to provide while secretly expecting provision to mean I would have nothing left to do.But Scripture repeatedly shows God providing through obedience, work, people, opportunities, ordinary places, and occasionally through circumstances nobody could have predicted.The miracle is not always that something falls into your hands.Sometimes the miracle is that God knows exactly where to send you.So when I cannot see where the answer is coming from, I am learning not to confuse “I cannot see it” with “God has not provided it.”Peter could have searched the shoreline all day and never found that coin.Because the money was in the last place he would have looked.But it was in the first place Jesus told him to go.That is the difference.Faith does not need to know where everything is.Faith knows Who does.#Matthew1727 #FaithInGod #BibleStories #BiblicalTruth #JesusChrist