November 12, 2006 Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost

It's been a long day for Jesus. Who can blame him for sitting down and watching the crowd go by? Just yesterday he drove the money changers and the merchants out of the temple and then the text tells us he got busy not allowing anyone to carry anything through the temple. Let's show some respect for where we are and whose we are, Jesus seems to be communicating. So today's he's back and the religious professionals are ready for him. The Pharisees and Herodians try to trip him up with questions about paying taxes. The Sadducees pose a brain teaser about seven brothers all dying after marrying the same woman so who's wife will she be in the resurrection? And then Jesus is asked which is the greatest commandment? He responds: “you shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, mind, soul, and with all your strength. The second commandment is this: you shall love your neighbors as yourself.” Jesus affirms the questioner's conclusion that obeying these two commands is more important than offering sacrifices to God.

So now we pick up the scene with Jesus warning the lay folks about the hypocrisy of religious professionals who like to dress the part, be treated with respect, moved to the front of the line to get plenty of the good food at the church dinners, but devour through mismanagement and greed the inheritances of widows entrusted to them. Or said another way, Jesus is warning us clergy that we will be judged by how we care for the people we shepherd and not by how well we act the part of being “a religious professional.”

So now Jesus takes a load off his feet and entertains himself by watching who comes to make an offering for the temple's budget. Who would have thunk, even back then that there were upkeep, maintenance and staffing expenses for the house of God! And like First Moravian today, some of the offerings were set aside to help folks in need, widows in particular.

The text tells us many rich people offered large sums of money, and thank God for that! Thank God both the text and Jesus are noticing that some folks offer large sums of money because what they give is vital! Do you get the feeling there's always been this great inequity in the size of people's offerings for the work of the church? I did a little math with the stair step of giving Gay Cass prepared of our giving here at First Moravian, and learned that 10%-- that's 13 giving units--give about 45% of the total offerings we all give to First Moravian. 10% giving 45%!! When one of these folks stop giving, we will be in a heap of hurt. And frankly that's a common fear and problem in small aging churches these days. I can think of at least two Moravian churches whose offering dropped 20% in just one year when a couple of big givers died. Being a former tax attorney, I can't help but wonder if those departed Saints are looking down from heaven now on the struggles of their congregations thinking to themselves, gee, I wish someone had told me or I'd gotten around to leaving part of my estate to my church. It's painful to see my church struggling now on what should be cut, when there wasn't any fat in the budget to begin with.

So thank God for First Moravian's “top ten %” who fund nearly half of our ministries.

But then in today's gospel story, something amazing happens. Jesus notices this widow. The text doesn't say why she caught his attention. Like a lot of widows and single mothers in our society today widows, especially poor widows, were invisible in the world of the first century. Women of no consequence who come and go and no one notices. Women who other folks look right through. Who of us, if sitting next to Jesus and watching, could describe in detail what the rich folks were wearing, how old or young they were, the color of their hair, but couldn't begin to describe this widow, because well, she was just nothing out of the ordinary? Just one among many just like her? The temple was full of poor widows who found safety and support there. Widows, like Anna who greets Mary and Joseph when they bring baby Jesus to the temple and prophesizes Jesus would redeem Israel ? Remember that story we read after Christmas from Luke's gospel?

Jesus sees this widow offer two mites, coins of insignificant value, worth this translation tells us about a penny. And we know how little that is. When's the last time you stooped down to pick a penny up off the ground? But something about the way she makes her offering tells Jesus that she has given her entire life's fortune, everything she had to live on she puts in the church offering plate. Is that bizarre or what?

Does the practical and compassionate person in you want to react as I do? No, no you keep your mites? The temple, the church, doesn't need your money that bad? Sure we could buy a couple of paperclips, or a plastic spoon or two with your offering, but really—you can't afford to give the church.

But Jesus' take is one that drives all of us who watch the church's finances crazy. He says,” Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in MORE than all the other folks who give to the church treasury. They all give out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty.”

But God takes a different approach, and focuses not on how much the widow gave, but instead on how much she kept for herself. My guess is this is why Jesus calls the disciples over. He wants to be sure they and we modern day disciples, get the point. Earlier in the day remember, Jesus says the greatest commandment for a disciple is about loving God and loving your neighbor. Giving is a sign, an expression of this love, but it is not love itself. God takes notice of the condition of our hearts before honoring what we give with our hands.

Sometimes a large gift is an act of faith an expression of love and gratitude, a keen desire to live out the great commandment. But for a lot of us our offerings are nothing more than “tips” that really don't affect our lifestyle, how we live our lives. How much more would each of us have to give away before our lifestyle was really impacted? We will just have a little less accumulates stuff, or money to leave our children and grandchildren when we die. And yes, sometimes a small offering is a sign of fear and selfishness, a lack of real devotion to the ministries God calls this congregation to. But for others, like the widow a small gift speaks volumes!

I was reading recently about the budget woes of a small church of immigrants. I imagine it's a lot like our Moravian churches in South Florida or California made up of immigrants from Central America and the Caribbean and subsidized by our provincial fair share. Like these Moravian congregations, this church needed financial help from their denomination to pay its bills. In this congregation of 120, you could get the word out by contacting a total of 17 people, because they all lived or worked with other church members to keep down the costs so they could feed and clothe family members back home. Most worked for less than $8 an hour, and sent every extra penny back to help their families. Yet they faithfully gave $5, $10, occasionally $20 a week to their church. All total the weekly offerings hardly paid the utility bills, much less the pastor's salary, but according to Jesus' mitey bizarre way of accounting, they are giving more than we middle class folks.

How much should I give? How much is okay to keep for myself? What's my personal definition of generosity? What do I really know about sacrificial giving? What does my sharing reveal about my understanding about what it means to be a Christian? These are the kind of questions I wrestle and struggle with in coming to terms with Jesus' mitey bizarre way of accounting. That it's not how much I give, but how much I hold back that matters. As brother and sister disciples of Jesus Christ, I hope you wrestle with these questions too. Not for purpose of feeling guilty, but for the purpose of presenting ourselves and what we have to God so that Jesus can show us what is the best stewardship of our resources, giving all the competing demands of job and family, and the constant consumer temptations we are bombarded with. It's not easy, is it? It's note easy to switch from the world's way of accounting to God's way of accounting.

But maybe, just maybe it's easier than we think!! Picture in your mind's eye, if you will, that widow. The woman who caught Jesus' attention in giving her two small mites. Picture her walking away, melting back into the crowd. How do you think she felt? Fear, confusion, anxiety? Peace, joy, comfort, or hope? What thoughts were going through her mind? Where's my next meal coming from? What will I do now? Or were her thoughts focused on something else? Or asked another way, did this widow receive more than she gave? I invite you to ponder these questions as we prepare to bring our commitments for next year forward.