Scriptures Christians Forget: The Widow's Offering, Mark 12:41-44

The Widow's Offering

Then Jesus sat down opposite the offering box in the Temple, and watched the crowd putting coins into it. Many rich people were throwing in large amounts. And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, worth less than a penny. He called his disciples and said to them, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the offering box than all the others. For they all gave out of their wealth. But she, out of her poverty, put in what she had to live on, everything she had.  Gospel of Mark

The Widow's Mite and The Prosperity Gospel

From Huffington Post:

You may have heard the story a few months ago about an Atlanta-based minister who claimed he needed a $65 million private jet so he could "safely and swiftly share the Good News of the Gospel worldwide." But almost as quickly as Pastor Creflo Dollar asked his 200,000 followers to each donate $300.00 towards the purchase of a luxurious jet, the campaign vanished and was removed from his website. ~ But now, the board of World Changers Church International — which also operates as Creflo Dollar Ministries, has announced it is ready to purchase the plane. ~ "We plan to acquire a Gulfstream G650 because it is the best, and it is a reflection of the level of excellence at which this organization chooses to operate."

I recently wrote about the concept of oxymorons and Orwellian Newspeak. If you've forgotten, an oxymoron is defined as a combination of contradictory or incongruous words.

Surely no greater example of oxymoronic thinking is the idea of the prosperity gospel. The HuffPo excerpt above is a wonderful Orwellian construct. And who better than a televangelist named Creflo Dollar to demonstrate incongruity!

A so-called "minister of the Gospel of Jesus" is clearly someone whom Jesus would have noticed, called out, and excoriated - given the opportunity. The irony of such a shyster who dares to call his "ministry" the "World Changers Church" is (hopefully) obvious.

I would clearly place Jesus in the "World Changers" Club, but probably not Reverend Creflo Dollar… But I digress.

The thing about real world changers is their ability to turn things upside down. Jesus did it. Mahatma Gandhi did it. Both Martin Luther and Martin Luther King, Jr. would be considered by most to have changed the world into which they were born.

Real World Changers see the world differently than do most of us. They choose to resist "things as they are" and do not accept "that's just the way it is". For whatever reason, they are able to see a different reality and set their sights on a very different world.

In a time where the rich as seen as virtuous - when they were given preferential seating at public gatherings and religious services, Jesus went totally off-script and pointed out a poor widow's contribution as an example of real virtue.

Although her gift was small in the world's currency, in God's accounting it was the greatest gift. Any million-dollar gift by an Internet Billionaire is likely to the both appreciated by the recipient and hardly missed by the donor. But consider a gift of a few thousand dollars - in comparison - by a working person.

What if that gift were the totality of that donor's lifelong retirement fund? In heavenly thinking, whose gift is greater?

Unfortunately, many American Evangelicals have forgotten much of what Jesus was about. Jesus was a poor, traveling preacher who never owned real estate. His mother was pregnant "out of wedlock" - and likely impregnated by a much older man.

Jesus - one of the original World Changers - cared about love, compassion and care for the poor and those hated by society.

So the next time Creflo Dollar, or Joel Osteen, or any other preacher asks for a "large donation" to help "change the world", remember the Widow's Offering.

dg

1/19/17

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