I had a sermon for today… which is why I wasn’t worried about Grace Presbytery meeting on Friday and Saturday. But, by Wednesday, I also had a clear conviction that the sermon I had was not the sermon I was supposed to preach. I have learned to listen to that voice speaking to my heart… even when that voice scares the living daylights out of me. So, last night, I gathered what I had… basically, a sermon title and the story of the poor widow… and I asked God what he wanted me to say. So, yes… this is a Saturday Night Special… by the grace of God. Will you pause with me a moment for prayer? O Lord, uphold me that I might uplift thee. Amen.
When I was young, I read the short story of “The Nightingale and the Rose” by Oscar Wilde. When I first read the story, I was horrified by this tale of a young student who desperately wanted to give a red rose to his lady love to win her affections. But, alas, there were no roses to be had and he despaired. A nightingale heard the young man crying. She learned of his love for this lady, and of his need for a red rose to impress her. Captured by the vision of his love, the nightingale searched high and low for a red rose, but her search yielded nothing. Finally, a tree of white roses told the nightingale that the only way to create a red rose was for the nightingale to pierce her own heart and allow her life’s blood to drain into the tree and color the white roses red. That night, the nightingale pressed her heart against a thorn and sang to the tree as her blood drained from her body. It took every drop of her blood to create one blood red rose by dawn. That beautiful rose was discovered by the young man, who picked it and presented to his lady love. She rejected him for another who was wealthier than he. So, the young man took the rose and threw it in the gutter where it was destroyed by the wheels of a passing cart.
I am no longer horrified by this story. Instead, I see it as a powerful example of one individual’s willingness to give a priceless gift to another… a gift born of a deeply inspiring vision… a vision that, in the mind of the giver, was worth the price of the gift. The gift itself, however, was given to one who was totally unconscious of the sacrifice that was necessary for the creation of the gift. In fact, the one who received the gift was so careless of its value that he threw the gift away. But that uncaring act in no way diminished the value of the gift.
I see a parallel between the story of the “Nightingale and the Rose” and the story of the widow and her coins. The widow is nightingale and her two coins represent the nightingale’s rose. The rose was given to a student who threw it in the gutter. The widow’s coins were given to the Temple scribes, who looked upon it with contempt. We know why the nightingale was willing to pay the price of her own life to create one red rose, but what is not clear is why the widow would give her two coins to the Temple when, according to Jesus, the two coins were all that she had to live on. What difference would those two coins make in the Temple coffers? Why, probably, no difference at all. Knowing this and knowing that she needed those coins for food to survive, the widow still freely gave the two coins to the Temple. What was the vision in her heart that inspired her to give all that she had?
The twelfth chapter of Mark is a fascinating study of Jesus’ final teachings before his death. It begins with the story of the wicked tenants of a vineyard who killed the son of the landlord when he came to collect what was due to his father. We all know that the vineyard is the earth and that we are the tenants who killed Jesus, the beloved Son who was sent to us. The next story is the story of the taxes paid to Caesar and how we are to pay to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar and to God that which belongs to God. When we face the fact that everything belongs to God, then it becomes clear that none of us has ever paid to God what is owed to God. The next story talks of the power of God and how our God is not the God of dead patriarchs, but of living saints who have gone before us. The next is the story we discussed last week of the scribe who knew the commandment to love the Lord our God with all of his heart and all of his mind and all of his soul and all of his strength, but still was unable to make the commitment to give his life to the Lord. That story is followed by two stories for today: the story of the pompous actions of the scribes and how their showy pride is condemned by God… and the story of the widow and her coins… a story of one person’s sacrificial gift given to those who had no appreciation of its true value. And the chapter closes with Jesus’ prediction of the total destruction of the Temple… and the end of the reign of those whose collaboration with the Romans led to the oppression of the poor. In all of these, we keep getting drawn back to the story of the widow and we keep asking ourselves “Why?” Why did she give those two coins if they were all that she had to live on? Couldn’t she… of all those who came to the Temple to give… couldn’t she be excused? Would God condemn her if she kept those coins to carefully feed herself and her children?
Both Ruth, in the story that Eloise read for us today, and the widow in our text today were poor. Ruth had to glean grain from the fields for food and the woman’s two coins were all she had. Both were women… and both were widows… as was Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law. To be a widow in ancient times was a tragedy. A woman had no property and she, herself, had no real value beyond providing an heir for the husband and raising his children. When her husband died, the husband’s brother was supposed to marry her and the first child of that union was supposed to be the dead man’s heir, inheriting all his property. So, the man who married a widow did not benefit at all financially, but he was still obligated to provide food and shelter for the woman and her children. So, who would want to marry a widow? Answer: No one in their right mind.
But widows had a special place in God’s heart… a place that every faithful Jew knew. To do help you understand this, I have to take you back to Exodus… back to when the Law was given to the children of Israel by Moses. Exodus 22:22 states clearly “You shall not abuse any widow or orphan. If you do abuse them, when they cry out to me, I will surely heed their cry; my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children orphans.” Deuteronomy 24 tells landowners in several different ways about their obligation to leave the gleanings of their fields and their orchards for the widows and the orphans as Boaz did for Ruth. Deuteronomy 27:19 is a curse upon anyone who deprives a widow or an orphan of justice. Yes, widows were special to God, but that did not mean their lives in ancient Israel were easy.
Despite all these instructions from God that were designed to protect widows and orphans, the scribes of the Temple still managed to exploit them for personal gain, leading to Jesus’ denouncement in our text when he calls them “those who devour the houses of widows.” Let me list just a few of the ways in which the scribes frequently exploited their position in society. First of all, they often took payment for legal assistance, even though such payment was forbidden. Acting in the capacity of lawyers appointed in the wills of the dead husbands, the scribes often cheated the widows out of their estates. Scribes often “freeloaded” on the hospitality of widows who had no men to protect them. Scribes often mismanaged the estates that were entrusted to them for safekeeping as men of the law, using the profits for their own personal gain. Scribes also took money from widows to act as intercessors in prayer. Finally, scribes often took widow’s houses as collateral for debts that the widows could not realistically repay. It was a lucrative business… one which allowed the scribes to wear the long, flowing robes described in our text today… and allowed the scribes to parade in the marketplace seeking the adulation of others. But it was also a business which also left defenseless widows with no recourse… resulting in poverty and want.
So, why would a poor widow bring her last two coins to the Temple? I believe that there were three reasons why she would do this. First and foremost, she had a simple faith in a God who was greater than any Temple… or any scribe. The God of Abraham… the God of Isaac… and the God of Jacob was a mighty God… the God of a covenant people… the God who had sworn to be the God of the children of Israel for all time… omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent…a God who had always provided for the needs of the children of Israel throughout history… and a God who, unchanged and unchanging, would always provide for their needs in the future. This widow trusted in God to provide for her needs… just as God provided for the widow of Zerephath whose jar of oil was never empty. She was able to give the two coins freely for she believed in a God who would care for her and protect her.
Secondly, this widow had an eschatological vision of the coming Kingdom of God and wanted to contribute to the coming of that Kingdom in any way that she could. She had heard the voice of the prophets who told of the coming of the Messiah. She knew that this Messiah would redeem God’s people and establish a world free from strife… free from want… where all would share in the bounty of God’s rule. In first century Palestine, the common belief among Jews was that this time was coming soon. She wanted to be counted among those who shared in this vision of God’s coming kingdom. She wanted to give what she could to help.
Finally, this poor widow loved the Lord her God with all of her heart… and with all of her soul… and with all of her mind… and with all of her strength. God was the center and focal point of her life. All that she had belonged to God… and all that she gave, on this day, was his. She withheld nothing from God… and she trusted that God would withhold nothing from her. She was his child… and she could not give less than her best.
So how much did she give? According to the scriptures, her widow’s mite consisted of two lepta. Together, these two coins amounted to approximately one one-hundreth of a day’s wage. In 2005, the last year in which such figures are provided, the average daily wage for those in an agricultural community like ours was approximately seventy-five dollars ($75). One one-hundreth of that is seventy-five cents. But what is important here is not how much she gave, but what that giving represented in her own life. What she gave that day was all that she had to live on… everything she had.
What would it take for each of us to trust in God so deeply that we could give all that we have to live on? What would it take for each of us to catch a vision of God’s kingdom that would inspire us to give all that we have to live on? What would it take for each of us to love God with all of our heart… and with all of our soul… and with all of our mind… and with all of our strength… so that we would give all that we have to live on for God’s kingdom? This widow is one of the “least ones” in the Bible… unnamed… unknown… without means… without recourse… the last of the least in power… and prestige… and importance in society… and yet Jesus lifted her above all others on that day to show the depth of her love and her commitment to God. Would that we would follow her example. Would that we would do so much with all that God has given to us. Amen.
Mark 12:38-44, Ruth 3:1-5 and 4:13-17