Going All the Way

We’re always asking the unspoken question: how much do I need to give to God, and how much can I hold back for myself? Many congregations are now holding their annual “stewardship” (i.e., send money) campaigns, and urging each of us to be tithers (10%) of our income. TEN PERCENT! Not much, when you think about it; especially in a time in which income equity is so evasive… In the lessons you’ll hear this weekend, two widows will be introduced; plus some thoughts on how Jesus went the Whole Way in order to be a priest forever…

The story from RUTH 3:1-5, 4:13-17 is about sex, no way around it. In a culture where widows were dependent upon their children and relatives for support, it was important and fiscally sound to get a husband to care for you as soon as you could. So Naomi instigated Ruth’s seduction of rich Boaz, who promptly got Ruth pregnant. Being a good guy, Boaz made the arrangements to marry her: long story short, the baby was Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of David the Perfect (?) King. Finally the holy story begins to make sense, and God seems to have won another one…

HEBREWS drags on and on about Christ’s role as Eternal Priest, as contrasted with the Hebrew High Priest. Here in 9:24-28 we experience the totality of Christ’s saving event, and in this totality mortals have a constant audience with their Creator. In some ways the earth has been “widowed”, that is, cut off from a providential sense of completeness. The writer here urges a renewed acceptance of Christ’s ultimate importance in human living on EACH side of death, being restored to Real Life. “Thanks to Jesus, salvation no longer requires an annual renewal sticker.” (Peter M. Wallace, FEASTING on the WORD, B 4:281)

In MARK’s Gospel account, we’ve been “marking” (!) Jesus’ way to Jerusalem. In 12:38-44, we find him and his pals in the Temple watching folks drop their offering into the Treasury Box–some with great fanfare. But here comes a shabby, down-at-heel widow who puts in her “mite”–Jesus says to his friends, “This poor widow has put in more than all those [richer people] who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.” Went the whole nine yards, didn’t she! How much faith did she have to believe that the God who helped her live today will help her live tomorrow??

Well-meaning but Biblically-illiterate people have told me that their minute contribution is but “the widow’s mite”–and I’ve told them that I’m glad to hear it, for it means that they’ve given EVERYTHING! How then to go all the way for and with God? The final hymn at my funeral (I hope) will be an old one–“All the way my savior leads me; O the fullness of his love! Perfect rest to me is promised In my Father’s house above. When my spirit, clothed immortal, Wings its flight to realms of day, This my song through endless ages, Jesus led me all the way.” And please sing a loud and resounding AMEN!

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

Please join me each Tuesday to be confronted and changed by scripture to be read on the upcoming weekend: at horacebrownking.com