Introduction: I heard about a farmer who called the office of famous Televangelist asking to see “The Head Hog at the trough.” The receptionist was shocked and said, “Sir, if you’re talking about our Pastor, you may refer to him as Doctor or Reverend, but I don’t think it would be proper for you or anyone else to refer to him as the “head Hog at the trough.’”
“Well, all right,” the farmer said. “I just sold a few sows and was going to donate ten thousand dollars to the building fund, so I was hopping to catch him.” Upon hearing this the receptionist said, “Oh, just a minute, sir.” “I think the big pig just walked in!”
Unfortunately thanks to TV evangelists like Jim Baker & Oral Roberts, who had reputations for exploiting and taking advantage of people financially, many pastors, including me go to the opposite extreme and talk about money very rarely, if at all. In fact, if my records are correct this is only the second or third time in 8 ½ years that I have preached a sermon about money. But today, I want us to consider an incident that took place in the life of Jesus during the last week of his life on Earth. Because interestingly enough, a couple of things happened during that very stressful week that had to do with money.
At the beginning of the week, after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Jesus ran the money changers out of the Temple. They were the people who were taking advantage of, or exploiting the people who had come to Jerusalem for the Passover.
A couple of days later the Pharisees tried to trick Jesus by asking Him whether it was lawful for a Jew to pay taxes to Caesar. Jesus realized what they were trying to do and wisely responded by saying “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to Give to God what is God’s.”
Have you ever gone to the Mall and just sat down on one of the benches and ‘watched or observed people as they come and go?’ It can be very interesting and entertaining. Well, during this very difficult week, Jesus went to the Temple to worship, and while he was there He did some people watching. He wasn’t interested in what they were wearing, or who they were with, or whether they had any body piercings, but He was interested in what they were doing. Let’s find out what it was they were doing and why Jesus was so interested. Follow along with me as I read our text this morning.
Let’s read our text together, Mark 12:41-44. (NIV)
MK 12:41 Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts.
MK 12:42 But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny.
MK 12:43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others.
MK 12:44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything--all she had to live on."
I don’t think anyone here this morning would deny that Money is important. After all, we have to have money to pay all of those bills I mentioned earlier during the children’s sermon.
But I’m afraid that many people in America today have an unhealthy attitude about money. I like how Jonathan Busch summed up the financial situation in many American homes today. He says, "The trouble is that too many people are spending money they haven’t earned yet, for things they don’t need, to impress people they don’t like."
Even though it’s been 2000 years since Jesus taught his disciples this lesson many People still look up to or admire those who are wealthy and look down on those who are poor.
Even though we’ve already established the fact that Money is important it can and often does cause problems. In fact according to Marriage and Financial counselors financial problems are one of the top 3 reasons many marriages fail.
Someone once said that, "Money talks – unfortunately for many of us all it ever says, is “bye-bye." Perhaps you heard those words this week as you were paying your bills.
But our text reveals that money talks in other ways as well. It speaks volumes about our faith, our relationship to God, and what we really consider important.
Some of us may have been offended, or thought that our privacy was being invaded, if we had been in the Temple that day.
Jerusalem was crowded with people from all over Israel, who had come to celebrate the Passover. Many of them made their way to the Temple treasury to bring their offerings to God. Jesus deliberately placed himself in a position where he could observe the people. The New Living Translation, translates verse 41, by saying, “Jesus went over to the collection box in the Temple and sat and watched as the crowds dropped in their money.”
Why? Why would Jesus do such a thing? I guess there could be a number of reasons why? But I believe one of the reasons was Jesus was interested in what people were giving. And guess what? He is just as interested about how we handle money and what we give, or don’t give, because money talks.
Did you know that 15 percent of all of the things that Jesus said that are recorded in the Gospels are related to (money or material possessions). He taught more about money than He did about Heaven and Hell combined.
Why did Jesus put spend so much time teaching about money and material possessions? The truth is there’s a fundamental connection between our spiritual lives and how we think about, and how we handle money. Someone once said all you have to do to find out how important something is to someone is look in their checkbook and see how much they spend on it.
The first thing I want you to remember about this message today is that .
I. God Cares About Our Giving
This passage of Scripture should make that fact pretty obvious.
Jesus was observing the people and what they were giving. God does the same thing. There is nothing that gets by God, He sees all, and knows all. He sees what we give and knows why we give it. The fact that Jesus made a deliberate effort to observe the giving habits of these individuals, underscores the fact that God is indeed interested in what we give. Some of you may still be wondering why?
Well, God is interested in our giving because His Word gives us a plan for our giving. God’s plan is called tithing. Tithing is giving God’s way. It is a plan for regular, equal giving for the benefit of His Kingdom and for the benefit of the church. Because what we give and how we give is directly linked to how God is going to bless us spiritually as well as materially. God cares deeply that we follow His plan when it comes to giving.
Now, the subject of money is a touchy subject, and I’ll admit it makes me a little uncomfortable to preach about it. But the truth of the matter is that money impacts our lives, and the life of the church in many, many areas. Consequently if you want to be serious about following the Lord you must also be serious about giving to the Lord.
There are at least three reasons why some people do not tithe. The first is that they have never been taught to tithe.
Some of you here this morning may fall into this category. Let me take a moment and share with you, what the Bible means when it says that we should give a tithe to the Lord.
The word “tithe” means a tenth. So, when the Bible talks about tithing it is saying that we need to bring one tenth, or 10% of our income or possessions to God.
Let me share just a few Scriptures with you that deal with tithing.
Leviticus 27:30 says, “A tithe of everything from the land, whether grain from the soil or fruit from the trees, belongs to the Lord; it is holy to the Lord.”
In the 3rd chapter of Malachi, Malachi is doing his best to convince the people of Israel to return to God. In verse 7, God promised to return to the people if they would return to him. In the last part of that verse it says, “But you ask, ‘How are we to return?’ Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. But you ask, “How do we rob you?” “In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse – the whole nation of you – because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this, says the Lord Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.”
Steve Forbes, who ran for President back in 2000, and several other people have advocated doing away with our current Federal income tax structure and replacing it with a flat tax. They argue that it would be better system because everyone would be paying the same percentage of their income.
In one since that’s what a tithe is, all of us are expected to give the same percentage of our income to the Lord. God’s ideal starting point for giving is 10% for everyone. In reality, if we use that money in any other way it’s the same as stealing from God, which could cause Him to remove His blessing from us!
The second reason people do not tithe is that they misunderstand the place of tithing in the Bible. Some people mistakenly believe that tithing was an Old Testament practice that doesn’t apply to us anymore. But this is a misunderstanding of the principle of tithing as God’s plan for giving. I suspect the real reason many object is that they just don’t want to tithe, and so they justify their disobedience by saying that it is an old testament principle. Remember, Money talks, and it has a lot to say about our attitudes toward God.
The third reason people don’t tithe is because they simply refuse to do so, no matter what.
A pastor approached one of the wealthiest members of his congregation about making a pledge to the church. The man informed the pastor that he already had too many financial obligations. He asked the pastor if he knew that the man’s father was about to have his farm foreclosed, and that his mother needed surgery. The pastor said that he had not known these things.
The wealthy man then asked if the pastor knew that his brother had been badly injured in an automobile accident and needed reconstructive surgery, and that his brother in law was going to prison unless he was able to come up with the money to make up a shortage in his accounts by next Tuesday. The embarrassed pastor didn’t know what to say and admitted that he hadn’t known about any of these tragic circumstances.
The pastor apologized for taking up the time of this wealthy man, and started to leave. But the wealthy man hadn’t finished, he had something else he wanted to say to the pastor.
He said, “Now, Pastor, if I’m not going to give a single dime to my family in their times of need, what makes you think I’m going to give any money to the church.”
I certainly hope you don’t have that kind of attitude about giving to the Lord, because as we have seen God really does care about our Giving, and about our attitudes toward giving.
Jesus watched those who gave to the Temple treasury because God cares about our giving. He cares about our giving because He cares about our spiritual welfare. Giving an offering is one way we can show our love for the Lord. If we do not give God’s way our fellowship with God will be broken, and our relationship with Him will be affected in a negative way. God will not bless us if we are being unfaithful to Him when it comes to our giving. On the other hand, if we are faithful in our giving, God has promised that He will "open the windows of heaven" and bless us in such a way that we won’t have room to store all of his blessings.
God cares about our giving. But that’s not all. We see from our text that Jesus not only observed their giving, He observed how much they gave. Therefore, God not only cares about our giving, but also cares about how much we give. That’s the second thing I want you to remember this morning.
II. God also Cares About How Much We Give
Notice what was happening in our text: Jesus was sitting across from the Temple treasury, observing those who were bringing their money and placing it in the “collection box” or Temple Treasury.
The people were bringing their tithes and offerings to one of the thirteen brass treasure chests that made up The Temple treasury. These treasure chests were called "trumpets" partly because they were shaped like trumpets, and partly because of the loud noise it made when people threw in large sums of money. You see they didn’t use paper money like ours. Their money consisted entirely of metal coins. Consequently, the more money you put in the chest, the louder the sound. This is the scene that Jesus observed that day in the Temple.
Our Scripture says that He saw many rich people come along and put in very large sums of money. As they did, Jesus didn’t say a word. He simply observed. Then according to our text, along came a widow, who gave her offering to the Lord. Not only was she a widow, but according to our text, she was also "poor.”
She had with her two coins. Depending on which version of Scripture you are reading from, she had two "mites," or two "copper coins." They were some of the least valuable coins of that day. Our text says they were worth only a fraction of a penny. Now that doesn’t sound like much to us, and it wasn’t. However, these two coins represented a day’s wages for her. So it was a significant amount for her to give.
But that’s not all, according to Jesus it’s all the money she had to live on.
Yet, this widow came and dropped both the coins into the Temple treasury, and when she did, Jesus saw an opportunity to teach his Disciples, and us, a lesson about money. He said, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything – all she had to live on.”
The widow’s offering impressed Jesus, because of how much she gave. Therefore, I think it’s safe to say that God cares about how much we give.
In proportion to the money the rich people had, they had actually given very little. Jesus said they gave out of their "surplus." In other words, they gave what they had left over.
Which reminds me of a story about a missionary who was watching a group of natives who were killing hogs. The natives were cuting off the hogs’ tails and throwing them in a pile. The missionary asked one of the natives why they were doing this, he replied, “The meat is for us, the tails are for our gods.”
Unfortunately, for any number of reasons some Christians do the same thing. They keep most of their money for themselves and give God the leftovers, if anything.
These rich people never missed what they gave; even though it was a great deal of money, because it was out of their "surplus."
But the widow was different. She didn’t give out of her surplus; instead she gave all she had. She didn’t wait until she had all of her bills paid, and food bought for the week. It was a sacrifice for her two give those two coins, it cost her something. And Jesus commended her for it.
One of the things this tells us about the widow is that she was a woman of great faith. She trusted God to take care of her needs and provide her with her daily bread. I’m sure this was something that she had learned to do over time, which is why she didn’t hesitate to give the only money she had to the Lord.
Our giving reflects our awareness of Christ’s judgment. If we believe that He will be happy with anything we give, then we probably won’t do our best. Too often, Christians have the misconception that as long as the church is getting by and paying the bills, then that’s all that matters. However, this story reminds us that Jesus makes his judgments according to a different standard.
If you have rationalized and convinced yourself that you cannot give, or that you cannot give much, then you have forgotten that The Lord is watching. We should be obedient and give abundantly and cheerfully, just as this poor widow did.
Now don’t misunderstand me this morning. I’m not saying that we should give all of the money we have to the church. But I do believe we should “Give God His 10 percent.”
Of course, we also need to remember that everything we have God gave us. Which reminds me of something I read recently. J. Oswald Sanders says this about our giving habits: “The basic question is not how much of our money should we give to God, but how much of God’s money should we keep for ourselves.”
So, if God leads you to give more than 10 percent, by all means do it.
Now this is one of those things that is much easier to say than to do. In order to be able to give sacrificially like this poor widow we must take our eyes off of ourselves and our circumstances and put them on Jesus. Until you are willing to trust God’s power and ability to meet your needs, you will continue to practice surplus giving.
The last thing I want you to remember about this message this morning is that
III. God Cares About How We Give
This is apparent from Jesus’ reaction to the widow’s gift. Perhaps there were others standing by, watching the rich put in great sums of money. Perhaps they had been "ooohing" and "aaahing" over the size of their gifts. Then this little widow woman comes in. I picture her coming in with her head bowed, seeking to be as inconspicuous as possible. Trying to go unnoticed, she places her two copper coins in the offering chest. Do you think there was "ooohing" and "aaahing" when she made her contribution? I doubt it, at least not from everyone else, but according to our text Jesus was impressed about what she gave – and He was excited about how she gave it, because she gave with a heart that was focused on God.
You see, we all have different reasons for giving. Some people give in order to be seen by men. A good example of this, are the rich people in this particular story. Others give more out of a sense of obligation than out of their love for God. Others are motivated by what they can get out of their offering. These are people whose only reason for giving to the church is so they can take it off of their income taxes.
But, as Christians, we should have a different attitude about giving.
The first reason we ought to give is because we love the Lord and we are thankful for everything that He has done for us. After all, Jesus gave His life for us. He paid the penalty for our sins. With that in mind, we should be willing to give God anything that He asks for. We should give not because we know we should, but because we love God and because we want to please Him.
2 Corithians 9:7, says, “Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”
God loves those who cheerfully give their tithes and offerings to the Lord, not simply because they feel obligated to do so, but because they want to.
Finally, Our giving should be sacrificial in nature, just as the Widow’s was. We’ve already stated that Jesus is not impressed with those who just give from what’s left over. This widow is an example of sacrificial giving. She was willing to give up a few material possessions, or even miss a meal in order to give to the Lord. She is a good example of someone who loved the Lord with all of her heart, with all of her soul, and with all of her mind. I believe her love for the Lord and her unwaivering faith in Him is what allowed her to give the way she did.
Conclusion: The offering you give every week may seem small to you. But God can take our tithes and offerings and multiply them a 100 fold. With that in mind, we need to remember our responsibility to give, and to give cheerfully to the Lord.
Because as we have seen in our text He cares about how much we give, and, He cares about the attitude with which we give it.
