Sometimes, when you read a passage of Scripture so often without thinking, the power, and gravity of God’s word to us is lost. Other times, that same passage makes us question our motives in life up to the point you read the passage. This passage in Mark is the latter for me. I’m going to share the two questions that I had to ask myself in reading this passage recently and the life lessons that result from asking those questions.
And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”
Mark 12:42-44 ESV
Question 1: In what areas of life am I poor?
The reason I asked this question when reading this passage was because I look at this woman who gave her last two coins from her poverty to be the standard Jesus tells us to rise toward, and said that there must be something I am being asked to sacrifice as an offering to God. Most of you, including myself, would not be in the category of being poor. We may feel poor, but none of us really wonder where our next meal is coming from, nor are we worried about whether the two pennies in your pocket will be the last things of value we will touch. However, there are areas in our lives where we are poor. That’s the key observation we need to make.
For example, some of us are poor in time. We don’t have enough of it. We have our regular hustle, then our side hustle, and then our side, side hustle. We don’t have enough time to rest or recuperate. Moreover, we don’t have time to give to another. We are just far to busy to fit somebody else, even God into our calendars. Isn’t that a reason some of us neglect to pray? I know it’s the reason some of us fail to come to church and be with God’s people to worship our maker.
Another example of our poverty is in our relationships. Let’s be honest, for some of us, our relationships stink. I know, I have some pretty poor relationships. At best they are superficial and at worst, they are just imaginary. What about yourself, do you have superficial relationships or even toxic relationships that drain you?
I can go on with our poverty, but I won’t. I want you to meditate on those areas of poverty in your life and then ask this second question below.
Question 2: How can I give generously out of that poverty?
From the two areas of poverty that I have exemplified above in my own personal life, I want to be like this widow in Jesus’ life and give what I don’t have for the glory of God. I’m not going to throw resources from my abundance but from my poverty and see what happens. This is a counterintiuitive and even illogical thing to do, but this may be what God is asking me, and you to do as a way to stretch your faith.
I’m going to give from my poverty of time. What does that look like? Simple. The time I don’t have available already, I’m going to devote to God and to people I don’t want to give my time to. I’m going to do it by sacrificing my time. That means an intentional move toward doing less hustling for the sake of giving that up to God.
Moreover, I am going to invest into my superficial relationships. I can name a few names, but I won’t do that here, but I’m going to take one relationship a week and just work down my list of superficial relationships and do one thing of significance for them to add into my relationship with them.
So, how can you give generously in your poverty?
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