June 22-23, 2002
Mark 12:41-44
“Nitty Gritty…Livin’ Large”
It is a mild Sabbath morning in the Palestinian City of Jerusalem. The sun has not yet risen to full strength, and yet people are already lined up all the way down the dusty road which leads to the Holy Temple. Smoke is in the air because of the animals that have already been sacrificed and burned on the altar. And in that slow moving line, there are rich and poor alike, carrying with them the offerings that are to be presented for the Lord God Jehovah. The line leads to a small square room lined with metal collection boxes. The boxes have metal horns extending out of them, to receive the offerings of the people. As you can imagine, the coins make a constant clanging noise as they are cast into the receptacles.
Most of the people shuffling along, quickly make their donation, and move on. But one person, who has already given His offering, stands over in the corner with His disciples. And notice that it DOES NOT SAY that Jesus is watching WHAT everyone is giving but rather “HOW the people put money into the treasury.” Of course, also in the room, supervising the money boxes, are several priests. As the wealthy citizens pass by and make loud clanging noises by virtue of their many coins, they seem to draw favored glances. Many seem quite impressed at the generosity of those who cast an abundance of big, heavy coins into the boxes. And it is not surprise that no one pays particular attention to one frail, little lady
who enters the room.
Only one person sees her, and that is the One who sees all. But
she nonetheless stops at the collection terminal. She then reaches into a tiny bag and carefully draws out 2 rather insignificant coins -- mites, the smallest currency used by the Romans. She tosses both of these lightweight coins into the big metal box, but their faint click is drowned out by the heavy clanking of more substantial coins made by the wealthy patrons. So, no one notices her. After all, what difference would her two
tiny tokens make?
But Jesus is impressed. He is so impressed that he singles this woman out to the entire multitude and cheerfully confesses that her offerings are more important that those made by men of wealth and prestige. And he recognizes her seemingly uneventful giving by telling the disciples and by having this episode permanently recorded both in the Gospel of Mark and the Gospel of Luke, insuring HER a place in history!
After reading about this event, we might wonder, “Why was Jesus so impressed with the widow who gave her two mites?” What was it that caused him to stop and single her out of the crowd? Why did he honor her minute gift so proudly and publicly? For years you have probably heard this story only in the context of giving. Statements have rained down about the woman’s sacrifice and therefore we are all called to sacrifice. The poor little woman gave all that she had, while the wealthy gave a lot but not everything!
Her story is not dramatic, revolutionary, significant or amazing. Her is the story of a woman whom no one notices and worse, whom no one even cares to notice. In her world she is just part of the landscape. She is just another blurry figure in the background of the photo on the 3rd page of section D in the local paper. Yet, she is a faithful blur. She is the one who loves God daily and lives God every hour of that day. She doesn’t care if she is noticed, she cares whether God is noticed. Jesus understood this type of life all too well.
Because we all know the glorious end of the glorious story of Jesus Christ we have let ourselves fall captive to the prevailing notion about how significant the ministry of Jesus was…in Jesus’ day. Because we have heard the biblical stories over and over again we have exaggerated the actual size of Jesus’ tiny ministry. There were crowds but he always was trying to avoid them. Jesus’ ministry lasted a scant three years and he really didn’t do a whole lot in the context of news and events even of his day. I like the condensation, the Reader’s Digest version of his ministry, that I found some time ago, it went like this. He hung around with a few guys, healed a leper or two and a couple of lame folk and a blind guy, made some wine, helped out three or four women, raised one person from the dead, calmed down a crazy person or two, caused a scene in a temple, got himself publically executed as a criminal then disappeared.
Just imagine what Jesus could have done if he had lived and ministered for thirty or forty years. But Jesus showed up for a little while, did a few small miracles, said some amazing words and left. But those few small miracles and those few incredible words changed the world forever. How did that happen? Jesus was trying through this story to get the point across that (change) the power of goodness is found in the tiny.
God has always chosen the tiny over the large. David over Goliath, Gideon and his three hundred soldiers over the many thousands of Midianites, Elijah over the prophets of Baal, one sheep over the ninety-nine sheep. Real spirituality is about doing the tiny work of God, little acts and small responses to God’s urgings in our lives. It is easy for us to imagine that God is about the big stuff, the spectacular and the miraculous. We often conclude from the books, sermons and TV shows that unless God is doing really big things around us and through us that we’re not very spiritual and that the only way we become spiritual is for the Nitty Gritty of our lives to LIVE LARGE. That is just not the truth. The widow at the temple shows us, the teaching of Jesus proves it and the life of Jesus magnifies it. (Change)The spiritual life is not necessarily a life of success, spirituality is really a life of faithfulness. God does do “big” stuff every once and a while but there is no doubt that the primary work of God in the world is tiny. Yes, we are dazzled by the big things, that is natural. Jesus told the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin, the prodigal son and the mustard seed. He was saying that if Your Nitty Gritty life is to Live large you must learn to live and revel in the tiny. The real spiritual life is filled with little decisions, tiny steps toward God, tiny glimpses of his presence, little changes, tiny successes and almost imperceptible movement in the right direction. (Yaconelli, p110) But, over a lifetime the collective weight of those decisions, glimpses and tiny steps is immense. Christianity shows itself most powerfully in the unnoticed life, in the invisible disciple or the unrecognized saint.
Our tiny choices and tiny movements toward God may not seem like much, but someday you and I will stand together in a great expanse called heaven. We will stand before the mighty God of eternity. On that day, Jesus will unroll this wonderful tapestry for each of us, a mosaic made up of thousands upon thousands of tiny responses to God’s love in each of our lives. When you and I and all heaven see it you will realize that the “Livin’ Large desire for the Nitty Gritty stuff of your life is about the little touch, the tiny words of encouragement, the little acts that service and sacrifice, the faithfulness of thought and word and deed. And, if you find yourself graced to believe that God is best served by the tiny stuff of your Nitty Gritty life in each of your today’s you will experience more joy and assurance and peace than you could ever imagine. Because “Livin’ Large” spiritually is living small physically.
I read a story that occurred during WW II that to me anyway, proves the power of tiny acts, see if it doesn’t speak to your heart as well. During the last months of World War II, the British conducted daily bombing raids over Berlin. The bombers would take off from an airstrip in England and fly surrounded by smaller fighter planes whose job was to keep German fighters from attacking the bombers which were easy targets.
One night after a successful bombing raid, as they were heading for the safety of England, the bombers were attacked by a large group of German fighter planes. Somehow, during the dog fight one bomber found itself flying alone with no protection and suddenly a German fighter appeared out of nowhere. The crew of the bomber watched as the German plane move closer and closer, until finally it was in range. They prepared for the worst and watched helplessly as tracer bullets began spitting from the fighter. Bullets whizzed by them, over and under until Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Five bullets slammed into the fuselage of the bomber near the gas tank. The crew braced for the explosion, but nothing happened. They could see fuel pouring from the bullet holes but there was no explosion. Miraculously, they were able to make it back to their base and get safely off the plane.
A few hours after they had landed, one of the mechanics showed up at the crew’s barracks. He had found five bullets in the fuel tanks, crumpled but not exploded. He handed them to the pilot. The pilot carefully opened up the shells and to the crew’s amazement found each one empty of gunpowder. Inside was a tiny wad of paper. When he unfolded the paper, he found a note which read, “We are Polish POW’s forced to make bullets in a factory. When gaurds do not look we do not fill with gunpowder. Is not much, but is best we can do. Please tell family we are alive. The note was signed by four Polish prisoners of war.
Sounds like tiny stuff. Just a few bullets out of the many millions and millions of bullets made during the war. But those five bullets made the difference for the crewmen of one British bomber.
Folks (Change) there is no end to the good that can come from tiny decisions, tiny actions or even tiny words of encouragement can make. When your Nitty Gritty lives large by being and doing the tiny stuff in this world you will recognize the power of the ordinary, the significance of the insignificant, the eternal difference that ordinary, messy, unfinished, under-construction people like you and me can make. This is a call for you to be happy with the ordinary and the tiny, it is, after all, how your Nitty Gritty will be Livin’ large.
