Hello All,
(This is just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. These weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in our Father. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from “The Adult Sabbath School Study Guide” is titled “The Last Days”. Once more, a deep dive into a familiar story, quoted in Sunday’s lesson; the story of the widow’s offering of “two mites” as recorded in Mark 12: 41-44. It is such a familiar story. Moreover, most of us are sure we have squeezed all the “juice” out of it… that we have gleaned all the meaning and all the lessons. I thought that way. However, as I delved into this story, I discovered more then I had originally thought. Thank you for letting me share these thoughts with you.
In this account, the widow is said to be “poor”. This word means that she lives hand-to-mouth… someone who must labor each day to have something to eat the next day. This impresses us with the magnitude of her offering. Christ saw this in her, even as he saw the hidden hypocrisy of the Scribes.
In this story, the woman was a widow (Mark 12:42). This fact seems to be a counter point to Christ’s comments to the people in Mark 12:40. In this widow, he saw a means of showing them the plight of the poor… and a true demonstration of faith.
The scribes gave “out of their abundance” (Mark 12:44). The term “their abundance” means their “excess” or “that which is left over”. All of us know that giving out of any excess is not like the widow at all. Because “she (gave) out of her poverty” (Mark 12: 44).
Jesus said, “this poor widow put in more than all those who have given into the treasury” (Mark 12: 43). Meaning, more than all of the givers put together. So the question must be asked, “What is the ‘more’ that the widow exhibited”? The answer is quite obvious. Jesus is talking about the motive that inspired the gift. So what was the motive Jesus commended? Let’s look at a parable that Jesus told that may help clarify the widow’s motive.
Matthew 20: 1-16 is the parable of the worker’s in the vineyard. In that parable, workers are asked to work in the owner’s vineyard. The workers arrive in the vineyard at various times of the day… even up until “the eleventh-hour” (Matthew 20:6). As you may recall, all of the workers were paid the same amount, regardless of the actual work-hours. Even those who started working at the eleventh-hour were paid “equal to (those) who have borne the burden and the heat of the day” (Matthew 20: 12).
This whole story illuminates the motive that Christ values. In order to find that motive, we need to look at the workers that came to the vineyard after the initial workers. The initial workers were told they would be paid “a denarius a day” (Matthew 20: 2). However, those who went to work later were told “whatever is right, I will give you” (Verse 4, 7). This is the key. The workers who came later, even those who came at “about the eleventh-hour” (ibid), trusted the landowner. They trusted that he would do “whatever is right” (op. cit.). They knew not what the landowner would pay them. But they trusted Him and went into his vineyard and worked. This is what the widow in the first account did. She trusted God. And she gave of herself… willingly… completely… because she trusted Him.
This is reminiscent of that pillar of faith, Job. In the midst of the loss of all his children, the loss of all his wealth, and the intense pain of his afflicted health, stated, “Though (God) slay me, yet I will trust Him” (Job 13:15). What led Job (and the widow) to such faith? “For the love of Christ impels us, because we are convinced that One has died for all; therefore all have died. And His death with us means that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for Him who for their sake died and was raised” (2 Corinthians 5: 14-15). It is God’s love that compels us to… well… love. God cherishes this motive… the faithful motive of love. Love for Him and for those for whom He died. May we be so faithful… “yielding the heart to the sovereignty of love” (Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing pg. 141).
With brotherly love,
Jim