Out of Poverty or Abundance?

Text:  Mark 12:38-44

Theme:  “Out of Poverty or Abundance?”

24^th Sunday after Pentecost

November 8, 2015

FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Denton, TX

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

+In the Name of Jesus+

38 As he taught, Jesus said, “Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, 39 and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. 40 They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely.”

41 Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. 42 But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.

43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. 44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”

It looks as though a teaching moment was about to transpire, and that is exactly what it was.  Mark says He (Jesus) “(called) His disciples to Him.”  It was as if He was saying, “Listen up!” 

They weren’t hunkered down in some sort of bunker or conference room where a session meets.   They were in the most public place of the most public temple of God in Jerusalem.  Jesus observed the crowds putting their money into the temple treasury.  Did they fill out an annual pledge card or tithe?  We are not told.  That’s not so important.

What is important, what we are told about is what Jesus observed:  rich people threw in lots of money into the collection plate or treasury box.  But they weren’t the only ones making an offering that day.

The gaze of our Lord fixes on a “poor widow”,           quote/unquote!  Already, she has two strikes against her – and maybe three:  1. She’s poor; 2. She lost her spouse; and 3. She’s a woman.  And into the treasury, says Jesus, went “all she had to live on.”

Talk about having to “live by faith”!  There was nothing else to live on. She was poor; she was a woman; she was a widow.  Now we can add crazy to the list of appertaining descriptions!  She left herself no cash on hand to buy bread; that’s rather idiotic, wouldn’t you say?   Then again, as Jesus did say, humankind “does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”  But, needless to say, such thoughts are far from us as we decide which variety of Eggs Benedict we want for Sunday brunch with friends – and, hopefully, we’ll be served in time to get home for most of the Cowboys game.  But Jesus wasn’t watching the Cowboys.

“Watch out for the teachers of the law,” He said.  Good idea.   What if we did?  Well, we’d see that, for them (the teachers of the law), it’s all about black and white, right and wrong, morals and ethics, and holier than thou!  It’s about separating yourself from the riff-raff.  (Christians tend to call it “Being ‘in’ the world but not ‘of’ it.) The problem going on just as much now as then is putting the cart of sanctification (or “godly living”, if that’s what you want to call it) before the horse of justification – “By grace are ye saved through faith, and this is not of yourselves.  It is the gift of God – lest anyone should boast.”   We are “justified freely as a gift,” declares the apostle Paul.  God wants children and not Pavlovian dogs who respond to little more than the reward incentive.  But we Protestant Christians in the reformed tradition, in our piety, DESPERATELY want a REWARD-GIVING God.  But a GIFT-GIVING GOD?  Not so much.

The point of this story does not revolve around how much money we have or don’t have.  Neither does it speak of how much of our treasure (money) or time or talent we give – or don’t give -- back to God.  Nowhere does it say:  “Be like the poor widow; Jesus will love you then.”

The point of the story is a point of reference.  Is the point of reference that we are fat cats and are, therefore, able to thrown in a large pledge, or is it that we are desperately, WONDERFULLY dependent on God’s grace no matter whether we have a lot or a little?

In the language of recovery (which is just as applicable to everyone as it is to alcoholics and addicts), this is the key question that our text puts to us:  are we willing to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God?

Jesus, throughout His earthly ministry, repeatedly pointed out that this is harder for rich people.  And Americans, even in their poverty, are far richer than the rest of the world. 

So, at the end of the day and at the end of this humble attempt at a stewardship sermon, how can we honor God with our giving?  Left to ourselves, we can’t.  But we are not left to ourselves, for Jesus is with us.  He is our point of reference!

“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,” declared St. Paul --  “that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty you might become rich.”  That’s a thought as blessed as it is revolutionary and as revolutionary as it is blessed!

Carried away by the truth of this, the Christmas carol lyricist declared:

We are rich, for he was poor; Is not this a wonder?

Therefore praise God evermore here on earth and yonder.

The vitality of our giving lies in how it enables us to praise the gift-giving God and not how it enables us to appease the reward-giving idol.

So, finally, only on this basis – not on the basis of need, not on the basis of worry, not on the basis of budgetary concern, but on the basis of God’s rich grace – do I ask you and challenge you to give generously to our temple treasury!

Amen.