The readings (I was at another church this morning, so I used
the Revised Common Lectionary texts)
1 Kings 17:8-16
Then the word of the LORD came to him, saying, "Go now
to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and live there; for I have commanded a
widow there to feed you."So he set out and went to Zarephath. When he came
to the gate of the town, a widow was there gathering sticks; he called to her
and said, "Bring me a little water in a vessel, so that I may drink.” As she was going to bring it, he called to her
and said, "Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand." But she said, "As the LORD your God
lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil
in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go home and
prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die." Elijah said
to her, "Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a
little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for
yourself and your son. For thus says the LORD the God of Israel: The jar of
meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that
the LORD sends rain on the earth." She went and did as Elijah said, so
that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. The jar of meal was
not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail, according to the word of the LORD
that he spoke by Elijah.
Psalm 146
Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD, O my soul!
I will praise the
LORD as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God all my life long.
Do not put your trust
in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help.
When their breath
departs, they return to the earth; on that very day their plans perish.
Happy are those whose
help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the LORD their God,
who made heaven and
earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith forever;
who executes justice
for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry. The LORD sets the prisoners
free;
the LORD opens the
eyes of the blind. The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves
the righteous.
The LORD watches over
the strangers; he upholds the orphan and the widow, but the way of the wicked
he brings to ruin.
The LORD will reign
forever, your God, O Zion, for all generations. Praise the LORD!
Hebrews 9:24-28
For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made by human hands, a
mere copy of the true one, but he entered into heaven itself, now to appear in
the presence of God on our behalf. Nor
was it to offer himself again and again, as the high priest enters the Holy
Place year after year with blood that is not his own; for then he would have
had to suffer again and again since the foundation of the world. But as it is,
he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the
sacrifice of himself. And just as it is appointed for mortals to die once, and
after that the judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins
of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who
are eagerly waiting for him.
Mark 12:38-44
As he taught, he said, "Beware of the scribes, who like
to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the
marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor
at banquets! They devour widows' houses and for the sake of appearance say long
prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation." He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched
the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums.
A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them,
"Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are
contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their
abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she
had to live on."
The message
I am happy to be here with you for worship this
morning. I have spent most of this year
serving as the coverage pastor for this congregation. A lot of my work has been
behind the scenes and involved visiting the sick, counseling, funerals, worship
preparation, meeting with and helping the council during this long time of
transition and working with the Bishops office on plans for the future. This time has been challenging on us. I thank the leaders and members of this
church for covering up when I could not do something, for stepping up, caring
for each other, working hard, figuring things out, keeping these doors open and
this church together
Of course, I am not really here to share updates, This is church time, this is who we are, why
we keep these doors open, this is the strength for everything else. An
opportunity for us to gather as sinners saved by the same grace, together to
sing God’s praise, hear God’s word, engage with God’s word, encounter the presence of the Risen Christ
and lift up our prayers.
I would like to start off that work with a question about
our short, uncomfortable Gospel reading.
If you think this reading about the poor widow who gives the last of her
little money to the temple is about stewardship, about sacrificial, generous
giving to church or temple, if you have ever heard a pastor or religious leader
talk about it that way, please raise your hand.
I am going to spend the next few minutes explaining why I
think that’s wrong. This encounter of
Jesus and his followers with the poor widow is not about giving. I do not say
that lightly, to question the plain meaning of scripture is serious and needs
to be done in faith. I go way back to
our first reading from the Book of Kings. It tells the story of the prophet
Elijah who cares for and sustains a poor widow in the city of Zarepath. Elijah is considered the greatest prophet of ancient
Israel, the one who appears with Moses at the Transfiguration, the one who
defeats the prophets of Baal, a diety worshipped by Israel’s neighbors (and
many people in Israel too), who confronts kings and speaks God’s word fearlessly.
Today, we see Elijah following the law, caring for a
widow. There are many references in the
law where God instructs people to care for widows and orphans, verses like
Exodus 22 You
shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. If you do mistreat them, and
they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry or Deutermony 14 “At the end of every three years you shall bring out all the tithe of
your produce, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your
towns, shall come and eat and be filled, God commands people to care for
those in need and that is what Elijah does.
Jesus does many of the things that the prophet Elijah did accept Jesus
does them bigger and better. Elijah feeds hundred people with a little food,
Jesus feeds a crowd of thousands with even less food. Elijah heals the sick, Jesus heals the very
sick. Elijah restores sight to the blind, Jesus restores sight to a man born
blind. In Today’s Gospel reading, there is no amplification of a miracle done
by Elijah, Jesus does not feed this widow at the temple, he does not offer her
a full supply of food or a bag of coins, Jesus does not tell anyone to go and
do likewise. Jesus gives her no help and no reward (at least not that is
recorded or known).
To make this more clear, we need to look at the context,
where this story fits into the Gospel of Mark. This observing of the widow happens
during the week before Jesus betrayal, trial, death and resurrection. A few days earlier Jesus chases the money
lenders out of the temple, declaring my father’s house is a place of prayer and
telling those in charge of it they have made it a den of thieves. The religious
authorities made a lot of their income from charging visitors to the temple bad
exchange rates to purchase sacrifices. In Mark, this is the moment when Jesus
goes from annoyance to problem the authorities need to get rid of. Right before highlighting the actions of this
poor widow Jesus once again attacks the fake faith, the greed and hypocrisy of
the religious authorities. Right after
he tells his disciples the temple, the place the poor widow was giving her last
few cents to help maintain, will be destroyed, that not one brick will be left
on top of another. Jesus had just
accused the religious authorities of devouring widows' houses and here they
were, literally doing that. It was so
bad they did not even need to ask, the woman thought she was doing right.
There was a religion where the command to care for widows
and orphans is lived out by taking their last few cents. They were a community
of people rooted in today’s psalm which praises the Lord who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the
hungry, sets the prisoners free, opens the eyes of the blind, lifts up those
who are bowed down. watches over the strangers and upholds the orphan and the
widow. They celebrated this caring God by letting this widow give all she
has and standing around, not caring.
This woman’s act of giving all she had to the temple is
something to celebrate. She does the work of a prophet, exposing the corruption
of the religious authorities, revealing their failure to keep God’s law, an
ancient whistle blower who sacrifices everything to bring attention to a
crisis. She was making everyone around
her uncomfortable. No one could pretend
things were okay or that she was not there.
She is out of place. The
religious authorities should have done what God tells the people to do from the
very first days, what Elijah did, what Elisha did, what Jesus did, what st paul
did, what st Peter did, what the first Christians did, what we should do, care
for people in need. If anybody was paying attention to God’s word, that widow
should not have been down to her last penny. Her very existence and simple act
of giving has spoken God’s word of justice and correction for almost 2000
years, Its amazing what you can do with a penny.
I think of a recent Saint, a man named Oscar Romero who
served as an Archbishop in El Salvador until he was assassinated during mass
back in the 1980s. One quote he is known
for, which summarizes his work on behalf of the poor and against the violence
of civil war and corruption is “When I gave food to the poor, people called me
a saint, when I asked why the poor have no food, they called me a
communist” This morning Jesus is not
healing the sick, he is not feeding the crowds, he is not restoring the leper,
encouraging generosity or raising the dead, Jesus is asking why does this widow
have no support, how did she get to her last penny.
Of course, a few days after this, Jesus will make his own
sacrifice, exposing the sin of the world that kills their savior on a cross,
exposing our inability to save ourselves, exposing how resist people are to
God, exposing how loving God is. God
takes care of sin for us, takes care of forgiveness, gives out grace, we are left to say thank you and to deal with
poverty.
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