November 10, 2024 – Twenty-Fifth Sunday After Pentecost
Kahu Gary Percesepe
He sat opposite the treasury; he was watching how the crowd threw coins into the treasury. Many rich men threw in many things. There came one woman, a poor widow. She came. She threw two coins (worth about a quarter of a cent). He called to him his disciples; he said to them: I tell you the truth: this widow, this poor widow, more than all the others she threw, more than all those who threw into the treasury. For all those, out of their excess, they threw. She, however, out of her deficiency, she threw all, as much as she had. She threw the whole of her life.
This is a sermon about money, and we begin with a story. A gambler came up to the famous Chicago evangelist Dwight L. Moody, and said, “Preacher, I’d like to make a big donation, but the money was made by gambling, and I wasn’t sure you could accept it, considering where it came from.” Without batting an eye, Moody said to the gambler, “hand it over, son, the devil’s had it long enough.”
Money is a topic filled with moral ambiguity and complexity, yet Jesus spoke more about money than anything else. Not one word from Jesus about homosexuality, but passage after passage about money and how to manage it. But there is no ambiguity nor complexity in these words: She threw the whole of her life.
We are at the Temple Treasury. Jesus warns his haumana about hypocritical religious leaders who make long prayers but devour widow’s houses. As they sit there, opposite the Treasury, religious leaders interested in how they appear to others attract considerable attention. A lone widow appears. No one notices her or thinks her important save Jesus.
Ironically, the widow gives all she has to an institution that is going to be utterly destroyed. In the very next passage Jesus declares that not one stone of the Temple will be left upon another; all will be thrown down. Jesus condemns the entire religious apparatus that has become perverted. The religious operators of the Temple lead privileged lives, but no longer protect widows, the poor, the orphans, the vulnerable of the earth. Religion lives off them instead.
What has changed? How many religious institutions have lost sight of their founding mission, and now exist only for their own sake and not for the most vulnerable of society? Churches that embrace their mission to be an outpost of hope in a heartless world, churches that seek the welfare of their communities, churches that become hubs of service and outreach to the wider community even when folks aren’t members or don’t attend—churches who not only have a mission statement but are themselves a mission—these are churches that thrive.
Jesus condemns the corrupt practices of the Treasury, as unworthy of the widow’s gift. It’s not a house of prayer for all people, Jesus says. It’s become a den of robbers.
The widow in this story is a sign. She gives her whole life to something corrupt and condemned, but she is a sign, as so many of the women in the gospel are, a glimpse into the heart of God, for Jesus is on the way to giving the whole of his life for something that is corrupt and condemned: all of humanity, the whole world.
This widow is a prototype of Christ himself. While we were flailing about, mired in futility, Jesus didn’t stand back waiting for us to get our act together, to be perfect, or to show ourselves worthy. No, Jesus gave. He gave all that he had, his very life for our sins. This is grace. While we were yet sinners, Paul said, Christ died for us. This unspeakable love is available right now, right here in this room, right now. Our lives and the life of this church are a grateful response to this grace freely given, not to the worthy, but to the unworthy. The church is not a meritocracy, it’s a hospital for sinners like me, like you.
The widow’s gift was objectively small. We too may think of our gifts, what we have to offer, even our faith, as small, not worth much, inadequate and imperfect. But while humans look at appearances, God looks upon the heart. Our gifts, though small, when given with a grateful heart are never small in God’s sight.
Jesus, watching her, calls his disciples to gather round him. He makes sure they witness the sign of the widow. The disciples—the haumana of Jesus Christ—this is us, the church, Keawala’i. Like this widow, we are to be a sign in the world, a sign for the world of the new reality that God is undertaking.
How is the church a sign? By healing the sick, by binding up the wounds of all who hurt, by ministering to the needs of the poor, the sick, the lonely, and the powerless, by engaging in the struggle to free people from sin, fear, oppression, hunger, and injustice, the church gives itself to the suffering world. The church is called to undertake this mission even at the risk of losing its own life.
John Wesley, founder of Methodism, died with just enough money to pay for his funeral. As a young man he’d calculated his living expenses at £24.Everything he made above that he gave away. At his funeral, he requested that six paupers carry his casket down to the grave. Wesley said, “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”
If there is poverty, it is because some have filled their pockets first. In a corrupt and faithless world that had failed her, the unnamed widow out of her poverty threw all, as much as she had, into the treasury. She does not act as though she were poor. Presented with an opportunity to give, she gave all. She threw the whole of her life.
Think about her two coins. Look at them, examine them carefully, weigh them in your hand. When you think about how to manage your money, feel them calling to you. The coins are a sign. They might be you. Amene.