The Widow’s Offering

A Sermon for the Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 27, Year B)
November 10, 2024

Text: Mark 12:38-44

Now, O Lord, take my lips, and speak through them. Take our minds, and think through them. Take our hearts, and set them on fire. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

As a priest, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting so many wonderful and faithful people in the course of my ministry. And, as I’ve moved over the years and served in different parishes, I’ve carried all their stories with me wherever I go.

At the Church of the Holy Spirit in Alabaster, where I served before coming to St. Mary’s, there was a lovely couple named Mike and Judy.

They were the kind of parishioners you could always count on to be at worship on Sunday mornings and to get things done around the church that needed to be done.

And, they always greeted me at the end of the service with a big hug and told me how much they enjoyed my sermon that day.

Not long after I arrived at Holy Spirit, Judy pulled me aside one morning and shared with me the story of how she and Mike got started making the coffee every Sunday morning before the 8:30 service.

On one of their first Sundays at the church, they walked inside and discovered the priest making the coffee, and they thought to themselves, “He’s the priest! He shouldn’t be the one making the coffee!”

So, they walked up to him and offered to start making the coffee so that he could pay attention to other things that needed to get done before the service.

And week after week, year after year, they kept doing the same job. Even when we started coming back to in-person worship during the pandemic, Mike and Judy were there, ready to start making the coffee again.

That’s the kind of people they were.

Always ready to help, even in the smallest ways.

After about a year into my ministry at Holy Spirit, my family and I were on vacation during the summer.

One morning, I started receiving strange text messages from some of our parishioners.

They were asking me if I was the one who sent them an email asking for their help with money and gift cards to give to people in need.

Of course, I had no idea what they were talking about.

So, I quickly called around and tried to figure out what was going on.

And, what I discovered was that several members of the church had received an email from someone who was pretending to be me.

They had my name and my position at the church.

They had an email address that was very similar to my actual work email.

They even used a picture of me in the email, making it seem more believable.

They had all the things they needed to try and trick our parishioners into giving them what they wanted, which was personal information and money.

So, I called our secretary at the church and told her that we needed to get the word out to the parish as soon as possible so that no one became a victim of this terrible scam.

Thankfully, most of the people received the message in time and just deleted the fraudulent email.

But, that’s not what happened to Mike.

Mike didn’t receive the message in time, and he genuinely believed it was me asking him for money to help another person in need.

So, without even questioning it, he sent the person who was pretending to be me a thousand dollars.

When I found out, I was heartbroken.

And angry.

I was heartbroken for Mike and Judy because they lost so much, and I was angry at the person who had used by identity to take advantage of their goodness and generosity.

In the long-run, Mike and Judy would be fine. It was a lot of money but nothing that would cause too much of a hardship.

Mostly, I was just frustrated and upset by the fact that the person who scammed them was able to use their kindness against them.

The person who scammed them knew exactly what they were doing when they sent those emails out to the members of our parish.

When I got back home from vacation, I apologized to Mike and Judy.

Even though there was nothing I could do to stop it from happening, I felt so bad that this person—whoever they were—had been able to take advantage of them like they did.

Mike and Judy, of course, handled it with such grace.

And, they were much more forgiving than I would’ve been in their situation.

As infuriating as it was at the time, when I look back on what happened to Mike and Judy, I think it was a wonderful testimony to the kind of people they were—always thinking about others and looking for ways to help.

They legitimately believed that what they were doing was the right thing to do.

They believed that their priest was asking them for money to help another person in need, and they responded without even thinking about it.

Some may call them naive.

Some may call them foolish.

But, I think they were faithful.

Despite the fact that they didn’t actually help someone in need, their intentions were good, and they gave from their heart.

Faith means putting your whole trust into something you believe in—even when you might not be able to see it or understand it.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus said to Thomas soon after his resurrection, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

Now, I don’t believe that God wants us to be harmed or deceived in any way because of our faith like Mike and Judy were.

But, I think there’s something to be said about having faith and putting our whole trust in God.

And, we have a good example of that this morning in our Gospel reading from Mark when we hear the story of the poor widow who comes to make her offering in the temple in Jerusalem.

In the time of Jesus, it was required of all adult Jews, twenty years and older, to come to Jerusalem each year and make an offering to the temple treasury.

These offerings would be used to maintain the operation of the temple and support its ministries.

The required amount was a half-shekel—a single coin—which is what most people brought to the temple for their offering.

The treasury—the place where these offerings would be made—was located in a part of the temple called the Court of Women, which was the only gathering place where all Jews, both men and women, could congregate.

When we read in the Gospels about Jesus teaching in the temple during the last week of his life, the Court of Women is likely where these teachings took place.

It was the only place where everyone could gather to hear Jesus speak.

It’s probably also the location where our Gospel lesson for this morning takes place.

Jesus is teaching in the temple.

And, he begins to criticize the scribes, saying, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the market-places, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honour at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”

The scribes were religious leaders in Jesus’ time who were well-educated in Jewish law and responsible for making copies of the scriptures.

They were also highly respected members of society.

Jesus criticizes them for only being concerned about personal gain and drawing attention to themselves, which was a clear misuse of their power and privilege as religious leaders.

Then, he sits down near the treasury and watches as all sorts of people come by, one by one, making their yearly offering to the temple.

He watches as rich people come by and put in large offerings.

And, then he sees a poor, old widow walk by, carrying what appears to be two small, copper coins.

These coins were called mites, or leptons. They were the smallest denomination of Jewish currency, and they were only worth about 1/64 of a Roman denarius, which was a day’s wage for a common worker.

Today, a mite would be the equivalent of about an eighth of a cent.

It wasn’t much.

But, it was all this poor widow had to offer.

Jesus watches as the woman comes into the treasury, puts in her two coins, and quietly walks away.

Because of who she is and her station in life, he’s probably the only one who notices the incredible sacrifice she just made.

He calls his disciples over and says 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.”

A closer translation to the Greek in this passage would be, “Out of her poverty, she’s given her whole life.”

She’s put her whole trust in God because it’s something she believes in.

By drawing attention to the widow’s offering, Jesus teaches us in this lesson that it’s not the amount we have to give that’s most important.

It’s the intention behind our offering that matters most to God.

Unlike the scribes, who are only concerned about themselves, what God wants most is for us to be faithful, for us to put our whole trust—our whole lives—in his hands.

I think it’s also worth mentioning here that God doesn’t expect us to give more than we’re able to give.

Some people use this story about the widow’s offering during stewardship season as a good example of how much money we should give to the church.

But, that’s not really the point of the story.

God knows we have to have money to buy the things we need.

God knows we have families to take care of and other financial obligations to fulfill.

God doesn’t expect us to give to the point where we sacrifice our well-being.

God wants us to be faithful, like the widow in our story who gave out of her poverty, trusting that her offering would be used to the glory of God.

God wants us to be faithful, like Mike and Judy, who I mentioned earlier, who gave their money because they believed they were helping someone who desperately needed it.

God wants us to be faithful, and what that means for each of us is something we have to work out between us and God.

At the end of the day, it’s not really about the amount of money we give or the amount of time we spend serving others.

Being faithful means showing our love for God and putting our whole trust in him.

Our offering, whatever that may be, represents our faith in God and our trust that God will take all that we have to give and use it to his honor and glory.

Amen.