Giving It All
Mark 12.38-44
Dr. D. William McIvor
November 9, 2003
Presbyterian Church in Sudbury 

Introduction to the Morning Lesson

Today is the third of four Sundays in our stewardship season the theme of which is “Giving That Counts.” Next Sunday we’ll be talking about “Giving to the End.” What does it mean to live and give knowing that the end of our lives and the end of the world are in God’s hands? Also next Sunday during worship we’re going to all march forward and place our financial commitments for next year in the Jehoash Chest which will be right here in the sanctuary.

And this leads to our subject for today which is “Giving It All.” The text extols the virtues of a woman who put in the offering plate of her day literally everything she had. What does that mean for you and me in our day? Let’s read it in Mark 12.

Mark 12.38-44 (NRSV)

As he taught, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”

He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

Introduction

This text from Mark’s Gospel is like someone coming up and poking us hard in the ribs. When that happens, we naturally pull back. But if we are going to hear it at all, this scripture will keep coming after us until it gets us. In other words, this is not a text of comfort but a text of challenge. It does not tell us that God loves us but rather what a loving God expects of us. It is not a feel-good text but like any good discipline it is a text good for us.

Of course, this text is also the archetypal scripture for stewardship sermons. I would guess that more stewardship sermons have been based on this than any other passage of the Bible. Let’s be candid, however, to note the irony of that. When they are trying to raise the church budget, preachers may praise the poor widow who gave her two copper coins worth a penny. But the same preacher wants many rich people to also put in their large sums. It is one thing to extol the faith of the poor widow. But two small copper coins will not fund a church budget, not in the widow’s day and not in our day. So preachers, including this one, need to watch our rhetoric and come clean about what is really needed and why.

Having said that, let me also say that this is not a budget sermon, at least not in the specific sense of asking for financial commitments. We’ll make our pledges or estimates of giving next Sunday. Then the Session will work with the results and then we’ll know more about next year’s church budget. We have many challenges right now and next year we will all have to give more generously than before. But I’m not going to talk about that this morning.

Instead I think this text is urging us to reflect seriously about who we are and what it means to give it all. We can get at that by asking a single, simple question: how poor are we? It’s a simple question with a complex answer It’s one question but I’m going to ask it many times today. The widow was poor. She had nothing and gave it all. Can we see ourselves in her and model our living after her? How poor are we?

ONE: How poor are we?

Contemporary students of the Bible increasingly use tools of social analysis to find new insights in the scriptures. The questions asked of a text are, what were the sociological circumstances of the time and what do they tell us about the people and experiences we read about in the Bible? Applying those questions to today’s text might produce a series of insights like this:

• The Jewish people had for centuries been instructed by their scriptures and prophets that God expected them to take care of the most vulnerable in society, specifically the widow and the orphan.

• The prophets frequently condemned the nation’s political and religious leadership for not following God’s word. For example, the prophet Isaiah told them, “learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.” (Isaiah 1.17)

• Within this tradition, why were the leaders of the Jerusalem Temple letting the poor widow put anything in the Temple treasury? The Temple should have been giving to her, not the other way around.

• In the very next paragraph of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus predicts the destruction of the Temple, which when it happened in the year 70 ad, was seen by Christians as an indictment of a corrupt religious system. So today’s text has Jesus pointing to the widow as a concrete example of how innocent people were victimized by the Temple authorities. In other words, Jesus was lamenting the widow’s plight and denouncing the scribes who, instead of caring for her as the law directed, were robbing her of her last penny.[1]

These are some of the reflections that a social analysis of this text might provide for us and I think they are important learnings.

Nonetheless, Jesus commended the widow. She was not just an object lesson to indict corrupt religious leadership. She was a model, an exemplar, a person that we should be like. Why? Because she knew she was poor. She was so poor that it was obvious. She couldn’t escape her poverty and she who had nothing gave it all. She was so poor that all she could do was rely on God and in giving everything she witnessed both to her poverty and her faith.

How poor are we? Are we poor enough to know that all any of us can do is rely on God? How poor are we?

TWO: How poor are we?

I’ll tell you a story about myself, an embarrassing story that shows I’m not poor enough. Maybe you can see yourself in this.

Throughout much of the 1990s I served on the General Assembly Council, part of the leadership of our national church. Serving on the GAC required a lot of travel, some 70 or 80 days a year, sometimes more. When you travel on behalf of the church, the policy is to reimburse you for all travel-related costs from the moment you walk out of your door until the moment you get back home. If you need to park you car at the airport, parking is paid for. If you need to grab a cup of coffee between planes, coffee is paid for. Your travel, food, and lodging are all paid for, including gratuities. Tip the bellman for taking care of your bags or the taxi driver and that is all reimbursed by the General Assembly.

You don’t have to stay too often in too many hotels before you realize that a lot of people do some hard, unpleasant work to make hotel guests comfortable. I’m thinking mostly of the housekeepers who clean up your room and make up your bed everyday — things our mothers hopefully taught us to do when we were just kids. You also realize quickly that in most hotels of America most of the housekeepers are African American or Hispanic, all of them are women, and most of them are poor. Maybe not as poor as someone without a job but poor nonetheless and they’re doing work that is neither fun nor very satisfying to do.

So I tipped them, rather generously. Most folks who travel for the national church do the same. It’s something we ought to do and we’re happy to try and help those who don’t have very much. I tipped them … and all of those gratuities were reimbursed to me.

Do you think I’m as generous when I’m staying in a hotel on my own expense? It was easy to spend the General Assembly’s money. But I am embarrassed to realize and to admit publicly that I am not nearly as generous with my own money.

Why? Because I’m not poor enough. I’m not poor enough (or righteous enough) to really care about the poor housekeepers who take such good care of me. I’m not poor enough to know that nothing I have is really mine so I might as well give what I have away. I can be generous when it doesn’t cost me. That means I’m not poor enough. How poor are you? How poor are we?

THREE: How poor are we?

So let’s ask it one more time. How poor are we? The point is that only when we know we are poor are we able to hang loose with what we have. Only when we are poor can we possess what we have. Otherwise our possessions possess us. Only when we are poor can we realize that our lives belong to God and if God wants it all or needs it all, we may be just crazy enough to give it all. Only when we’re poor enough.

I read a true story not long ago about a pastor who was surprised to hear that a man who was a member at one of that minister’s former churches had been sent to the custodial care of a nursing home. The minister was surprised because, as far as he knew, the man — let’s call him Sam — even though he was in his late seventies, was in perfect health. Sam had always been hale and hearty, an avid outdoorsman. But the pastor was told that Sam was sent to the nursing home, not because of any physical problems, but because of his “distressing mental state.”

This surprised the minister even more. Sam was always a thoughtful, intelligent, and engaging sort of person. Had age taken so high a toll?

“Well, you see, it’s like this,” said the person who was explaining things to the minister. “Sam’s children became distressed about his mental wellbeing. Sam had volunteered, in his retirement, to work a couple of days a week at the church-sponsored soup kitchen. The next thing they know, Sam has gotten so involved over there that one day he sat down and wrote them out a check for $100,000, just like that. With no discussion, no forethought. $100,000. He handed it over to the soup kitchen. This was what was left of most of his life’s savings. $100,000. Of course, his children thought that he had gone over the deep end. So, they forced him to go into a nursing home where he would receive supervision.”[2] True story.

Do you think Sam was crazy? Or was he just poor enough to act crazy and give all he had away because he knew it all belongs to God? How poor are we?

Conclusion

Friends, Jesus wants us to see that the contrast between the poor widow and the rich people in the Jerusalem Temple was not a contrast of monetary wealth. It was a contrast of what they knew about themselves. The widow knew she was poor. The rich people did not know they were poor. For we are all equally poor before God. We don’t get to heaven nor do we live heavenly lives here by what we give, whether it’s two copper coins or a gazillion bucks.[3] We get to heaven and live heavenly lives here by God’s grace. Our only real wealth is in God’s mercy. The widow knew that and still had faith in God. The rich people did not know it so their faith was lacking.

For the measure of our faith is not what we give but what we have left over. The widow’s faith excelled because she had nothing left over.

I’m not going to stand here in front of you today and say that giving it all means for us giving every dollar, our homes and cars, our clothes and bank accounts and investments, our retirement and medical plans. I’m not going to say that and you wouldn’t believe me if I did.

But I am standing before you today in the name of Jesus Christ and with the authority of scripture to say that giving it all will mean having more faith. Of course, greater faith will lead to greater giving. Are we poor enough to be more like that widow and to have more faith? How poor are we?

Back to Top

Back to our Home Page

For questions/comments on this page, please click to e-mail: PCISwebmaster.

The contents of this site are copyright © 2003, Presbyterian Church in Sudbury. All Rights Reserved.