Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in all she had to live on.”
NL Daily Devotion for Friday, March 26, 2021
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
Here’s yet another story where Jesus talks about money. It’s not a parable, so it’s on top of the 11 parables of which money is the subject. And once again, Jesus is challenging norms about finances.
I don’t for a moment believe Jesus is advocating that people contribute money to their worship communities or other places doing God’s work in the world to the point at which they can’t meet their own basic needs. I think his point is that those with much need to give more. That kind of talk in political discourse is extremely unpopular. No one wants to look honestly at the fact the reason they have so much more than others just might be unfair policies and systemic injustice. Jesus didn’t shy away from such things. He was clear again and again and again that the accumulation of wealth was anathema to God. If it was God’s command that the community care for the widow and the orphan, why on earth would the widow have so little with which to support herself in the first place? Now that is a question I’d love to have Jesus address directly.
Do I grudgingly, rather than cheerfully, give out of my abundance? Do I give more than what I might want to think of as my “fair share?”
