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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text for this morning comes from the Gospel reading and the Old Testament reading. You may be seated.
One of the greatest gifts that you have in your possession is your faith. It was given to you at your baptism. That gift that God gave you, your faith, allows you to call the Father of all mankind your Heavenly Father. Not just any father, but your Heavenly Father. That faith that God gave you, one of the greatest gifts that you have in your life, allows you to call the Son of God who died and sacrificed Himself for all the world, your Lord, your Jesus, your Savior. And as the kids sang, our shepherd, our loving shepherd. It is your faith that you receive at your baptism. Your greatest gift in this world from God allows you to hear and receive the words of the Holy Spirit as He works through that word being read and through the preached word and through the Lord’s Supper. He brings you all that has been revealed about your Father, your Savior, and your eternal life.
Very personal thing, this gift that God has given you in your faith. The book of Hebrews describes faith as this: the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. The assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Meaning, you can say with certainty that what is going to happen because of God’s promise will happen. Regardless of what you see or hear, regardless of what the gray matter between your ears tells you, you believe this to be true from God’s promises.
And the reason I said this at the beginning, that faith is the greatest gift you’ve been given, is because the same writer to the Hebrews wrote this: without faith, without faith it is impossible to please God. You please God because you believe in him who has sacrificed everything for you. You please God because God makes you pleasing in giving you faith at your baptism.
Now you’re thinking, okay, pastor, isn’t this text about the woman who gave the coins in the treasury? Where are you going with this? Yes, the woman in this morning’s text is a beautiful example. But her example is not that she gave those coins. Her example is her faith. You see, the woman in this morning’s text is among the great cloud of witnesses. The same book of Hebrews writes in chapter 10 about the Old Testament prophets and the New Testament apostles and all the people in between as examples of faith.
Now, mind you, these examples of faith are not examples according to what you see on the outside because we’ve got grumblers, we’ve got complainers, we’ve got negative Nellies, we’ve got people who do not see the darkness only and not the light sometimes, and yet God uses them. And they’re used as examples for us. Isn’t that interesting? This woman reminds us of a beautiful passage again in the book of Hebrews because her faith encourages us to lay aside every sin and every weight that weighs us down. Every sin that entangles us and every weight that drags us down.
Well, that raises the question: what is the weight? What is that sin? Rather than get into a long laundry list, the text talks about a big sin. This morning’s Gospel reading talks about the sin of recognition. The sin of recognition. Wanting to be seen as somebody or some person of importance. And not just out there in the public, but here in the church. Because if you notice the text, and you notice what happened in that text, it did not happen out in the marketplace. It was in the church.
Satan loves the kind of things he can stir up among us as we want recognition within the church even. And if it’s not from one another, we sure want God to notice, don’t we? Our Lord’s warning was, “Beware.” That wasn’t a sign sitting on the edge of a dangerous parapet upon which you could fall. It was more of a statement saying, “Stay completely away from these kind of people.” Well, that’s not hard, staying away from the people outside the church. The problem is staying away from the people within the church.
Oh, wait a minute, that’s you and me, isn’t it? Yeah, that’s you and me. I’m glad you’re here with the rest of us sinners. This is where sinners are supposed to be. And this is the people that God wishes to talk to about your faith. The problem with those people? No, no, the problem with you and me, us people, we people, is that we love and we crave and sometimes we are even addicted to the accolades of someone else. And we’re more addicted to their accolades than we are to his accolades.
We crave more what we get from one another than necessarily we crave from what we get from him as approval. Because he’s the one that made you approved. He’s the one that made you lovable and worthy. He’s the one that made you loved. The other problem is that deep within us all, we really are opportunists. We’re opportunists, and we seek that opportunity and we seize it. For not to seize that opportunity, we are looked upon as being dumb, slow, and not seeing an opportunity when it is an opportunity.
The last thing that is tempting is to stick to our pride in such a manner that we don’t repent of this. That’s very dangerous. You see, our Lord doesn’t look on what’s on the outside like you and I do. Our Lord looks at what’s on the inside. The men who came forward in the text and dropped money in the offering box, they gave out of their abundance, the text said. So if they gave out of their abundance, how would they possibly be dressed except nicely? Right?
Look at how you and I look at people who are dressed nicely as compared to people who are dressed in dirty and grungy clothing. Look at how we view ourselves in comparison. When these men gave money and put it in that box, they still had a whole trainload left over. But because the amount was so big in comparison, everybody was going, “Ooh.” That happens within the church. Memorials and money donations sometimes. Recognition.
And sometimes we play the game the opposite way. If we don’t get recognized, then we’re hurt. That’s still a sign that we crave recognition. Our Lord looked at that woman who probably wasn’t dressed very well, if that’s all the money she had. She’s a widow, so whoever is taking care of her must not be taking care of her very well, or she may be on her own as a loan. Here she comes and puts into the box, amounts to maybe a penny, a penny. You can go to a car wash outside a car wash and you can see pennies on the ground that people throw away. And that’s all she put in.
But what she put in was everything. She had great faith. Her gift wasn’t great; she had great faith. Do not forget that. It was her faith that said, “I don’t know where I’m going to get my next penny, but I know that God’s promise says to me, I will take care of you because he’s my father. And I’m his child. And a good father takes care of his children. Therefore, he will take care of me.” Though the world says, “You’re crazy.” Though my brain says, “You must be on something.” His promise says, “It is true.” Therefore, that’s why I can give that and know somehow God’s going to take care of me.
Look at the woman, the widow in Zarephath. She had nothing left but enough flour and enough oil, a handful of flour, a few drops of oil to make bread. She was gathering sticks to make a small fire to cook this bread that she and her son may eat it and die. And she didn’t even know that God had said, “Elijah, that’s the woman who’s going to make you food to eat.” If she’d have known that, she probably would have said, “Lord, are you crazy? I don’t have enough for myself, and you’re asking me to feed this guy?” Good thing God didn’t ask her, isn’t it? Good thing God doesn’t consult you or me when it comes to the exercise of our faith.
Because if he were to ask or consult you and me on the exercise of our faith, we would not be willing. But your faith, as I said at the very beginning, the most precious gift that God has given, Scripture talks about it being more precious than anything—gold or silver. And just as gold or silver must be heated and melted and purified with the dross being taken off the top, so your and my faith is exercised that way.
When Elijah comes to the woman and says, “Bring me a cake, something to eat.” Okay, she says, and she brings it out to him, and the great promise is that God provided for her, just like God will provide for this widow in the temple today. This is what Jesus saw was the great faith. You and I look at it and say, “You know, that’s really impractical. I mean, really? Giving everything away?”
Wasn’t it just a few weeks ago that the Gospel reading talked about a young man who said, “Lord, tell me what I must do to inherit eternal life.” And finally, what Jesus tells him says to him, “Go and sell everything that you have. Then you will have eternal life.” Because this man clung too closely to the things of this world and not to God’s promises.
Now there was a young pastor by the name of Timothy. And Timothy, being a young pastor, was given some important information by an older man named Paul, an apostle. Paul told Timothy in his first letter about these things that I’m going to read to you. Timothy was in the church; don’t forget that. Timothy is a pastor; don’t forget that. This applies to you and to me.
Now, there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world, but if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. We’re so blessed. We can choose what kind of food we want and choose the manner of clothing that we want, and we’ve got more clothing than we need, and we’ve got more food than we can eat. But those who desire to be rich, he’s talking to the people of the church. Those who desire to be rich fall into temptation. Those who desire to be rich fall into a snare.
Those who desire to be rich fall into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. He goes on, “As for the rich in this present age, do not be haughty, nor set your hopes on the uncertainty of riches.” And if we think that we’re not, we’re fooling ourselves, brothers and sisters. We are rich.
He says also, “Don’t set your hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly, not negligibly, richly provides you with everything to enjoy.” That which he gives you, he wants you to enjoy. What father wouldn’t want to see his children enjoy his goods and blessings? But instead, we are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for ourselves as a good foundation for the future. So that we may take hold of that which is truly life.
Now I skipped a verse. And I’m going to read you that verse that I skipped, which was in the middle of the thing that I began with and the thing that I ended with. Now this text you have heard quoted many times. But you need to know that this verse that I’m about to read to you is nestled in amongst everything that I just read. It’s nestled in the midst of it. In the midst of everything that I’ve just read to you, it’s nestled in the midst of it, and it’s this verse: “Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you have been called.”
When we think of fighting the good fight, we think of some militaristic thing. Fighting the good fight, according to that text, is fighting with your and my flesh, your and my desires to have more. More. You and my desires not to share. You and my desires really to this point, not to trust in the promises that God has given like that widow did, both at Zarephath and in the temple. It’s about faith. It’s not about money.
That’s why that text I waited to the very end to quote to you; it’s not about money. It’s about faith. This text has been misused and been used to say, “You need to give money like this woman who gave everything.” Yeah, but what’s behind it? She gave because she had great faith. That’s why Paul said, “Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life.”
That’s why I began by saying the greatest gift that God has given you is faith, your faith. It’s not the size of the gift. When she gave everything, the world says, “Wow, you gave it all.” Did she really give up everything? Did she not have anything? The one thing that she had that no one can take from her, nor anyone can take from you, no matter how destitute you and I have ever been in our mind’s perspective. It is all a matter of perspective, isn’t it? No matter how destitute we may think, the one thing that is not taken from us, that still remains, though we may have nothing, is your faith.
The woman who walked out of that temple completely penniless walked out rich. Rich. Rich, filthy rich and wealthy in her relationship to her father, who will make sure she’s cared for because he’s a good father, a loving father. And more importantly, she calls him her father, like you call him your father. And good fathers take care of their children. This is godly father; he is our heavenly father, and he takes care of you.
It’s not about money, brothers and sisters. It’s about faith. You have been given this faith. It will never be taken from you. In the name of the one who gave you that faith to call upon him in every trouble, our Lord, amen. The peace of God which passes all understanding. Keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
