Bible Verse of the Day Tuesday January 25th 2022

Luke 21:1-4 As Jesus looked up, he saw the rich putting their gifts into the temple treasury. He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins.  “Truly I tell you,” he said, “this poor widow has put in more than all the others.  All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.

One day when Jesus was at the Temple, he observed certain wealthy people giving large sums of money. It would not have been out of character for the rich people in the days of Jesus to create attention to themselves for such an offering. That same day Jesus saw a poor widow put in two mites, that would be a small fraction of a penny in our modern currency. Jesus also sees us today when we give, and He is more interested in the condition of our hearts than in the amount we drop in the offering plate. The exciting aspect of this account is that she gave two mites instead of one. One mite would have been most of her money, so her giving was astoundingly charitable.

Jesus did not say that the poor widow gave more than anyone. Instead, he indicated that she gave more than all other givers combined (Luke 21:3). The theory here is that God determines the value of the gift by the giver's spirit (2 Corinthians 9:7). God most certainly does not need our monetary offerings. We should present our offering for our good, not the good of God. Any offering we might give to God is not gauged by its monetary value but by the faith of the heart and soul that presents them. The theme Jesus is attempting to bring forward in our minds is our giving is an indication of our faith in God, that He will provide for all our needs. 

In your mind's eye, visualize it's your birthday, and your child wants to give you a gift. The child goes up in the attic and finds something they have outgrown and no longer wants and presents it to us as a gift. What might be our response? The child did show some inventiveness, but most likely, we would not be impressed. Imagine this identical situation except our child gives us their most prized possession. How might we feel? Even if the gift was something we could never use or didn't want or need, I suspect that our hearts would jump for joy, and our eyes would overflow with tears of delight. The value of the gift in this illustration is not the point; the sacrifice made by our child in this example is first and foremost.

Our Lord and Savior gave us the greatest gift known to humankind, eternal life. The greatest gift we can give our Lord and Savior is the gift of ourselves. No worldly gauge could measure the joy in our savior's heart when we surrender ourselves to Him, heart, mind, spirit, soul, and body. When we do this, we will have grown into the poor widow's heart.

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