How (NOT) to Give (Mark 12:41-44) | 11/17/19
Mark 12:41-44 11/17/19 | Will DuVal
Now, if you’re NEWER here, maybe this is your first time EVER visiting West Hills, I just wanna start by WELCOMING you – we’re SO glad you’re with us this morning, and I PRAY you’ll be blessed by it. But let me ALSO start by naming the elephant in the room: some of y’all are really uncomfortable right now. Aren’t you? You’re squirming in your chairs thinking, “of ALL Sundays we could have come visit, we HAD to pick the Sunday when they’re making people MEMBERS, they’re having insider church-MEETINGS, I haven’t been here 5 minutes and he’s already mentioning the budget and he’s teeing it up for a whole SERMON on giving!”
Friday I was at the gym playing basketball, and I struck up a conversation with this guy. And I’m always trying to steer conversations towards faith, towards the gospel, so I asked, “Sounds like y’all are newer to St. Louis, have y’all checked out any CHURCHES yet?” And he replied, “Ya know, we tried a couple of churches when we first moved here, but I swear: every Sunday we visited, they were asking for more money. That was LITERALLY the entire sermon. And I saw right through it and got SICK of it and we haven’t been back to church since.” So I just HAD to laugh. I said, “Wanna know what I’m preaching on this Sunday??
Visitors: here at West Hills, we specifically devote just ONE sermon a year to this topic, of giving / stewardship. PREFERABLY, as is the case this MORNING, we want to preach that sermon in the context of studying our way expositionally through a book of the Bible. Since March now, we’ve been studying the Gospel of Mark this year, and God, in HIS Sovereignty – I promise I am not strategic or ORGANIZED enough to have pulled this off – GOD ordained that “Giving” Sunday this year would coincide NOT ONLY with our new members’ recognition AND annual members’ meeting, but ALSO with our arriving at Mark chapter 12, verses 41-44. The story of the Widow’s Offering. But before we even read the passage, let me just ACKNOWLEDGE that some of you here this morning, like my new friend Eugene, may have been turned off and perhaps even downright CHASED OUT OF the church, in the past, specifically by how a pastor handled this exact topic. So let me be ABSOLUTELY clear from the outset: if you’re new this morning, your presence with us today is gift enough. We won’t STOP you from giving if the Lord so leads you, but PLEASE do not interpret anything I say this morning as a sales pitch for you. You can file this message away for later use when you find that church home where God is leading you. We pray it’s here – we’d love to have you. But personally, I wouldn’t give money to a church I was visiting for the first time. I’ve got WAY too many trust issues for that. I don’t know anything ABOUT you yet, how you’re gonna USE my offering, all that. If that’s you, please don’t feel compelled to give today. Now, that said, you CAN find our entire budget itemized for you at the Info Bar after the service, if you’re curious. We want to be absolutely transparent about how we spend every dollar here. But if you wanna take it slow and date awhile before we get married and open a joint bank account, that makes a lot of sense to me. (We don’t, by the way, require members to add us to their bank accounts. Bad analogy!)
Would you stand with me as you’re able for the reading of God’s word, from Mark 12:41-44, I’ll read from the ESV and you can follow along in your Bibles, or on the screen in front:
“And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums. 42 And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny.[f] 43 And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. 44 For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”” This is the word of the Lord... Let’s pray...
BACKGROUND:
Most of us, if we have heard this passage preached or interpreted in the past, have been taught to view this poor widow of Mark ch.12 as the PARADIGMATIC exemplar par excellence of giving. We read Jesus’ words here – “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing” – as a clear COMMENDATION of her generosity and selflessness. She has put in EVERYTHING she had to live on. And we ought to be more like her. She held back NOTHING from the Lord. “So let me ask YOU this morning, friends: “How much are YOU holding back from the Lord today?” *Cue emotional keyboard instrumentalist in the background, “Now with every head bowed, and every eye closed, and every checkbook OPENED... it’s time to sow your seed of FAITH this morning.” Are you willing to give EVERYTHING to the Lord, to hold nothing back, to trust God completely to provide. You can’t out-give God!
And the problem with ALL that, is, well there are a LOT of problems! For starters, Jesus DOESN’T commend her. He DOESN’T prop her up as the ideal giver. In fact, I want to turn our interpretation of this passage on its head this morning and argue the exact opposite! She, and ESPECIALLY they, the rich people putting in large sums, serve as examples of how NOT to give. And by the way, I’m not alone or original in suggesting that, I’ll be borrowing, as usual, pretty heavily from John MacArthur’s commentary on the passage. He points out that even the NARRATIVE context of the passage suggests as much: “At first glance, the inclusion of this story about a widow and her offering is puzzling. The previous section ended with a warning of judgment (v. 40) and the next section resumes that theme (13:1ff.). Universally, this woman is presented as a model of dutiful, faithful giving... [But] Jesus drew no principle regarding giving from her behavior. The text does not record that He condemned the rich for their giving, or commended the widow for hers... The widow is not the hero of the story but the victim, duped into giving all she had by the false promise of Jewish legalism that doing so would bring blessing. She is a tragic example of how the corrupt religious system mistreated widows, and that is what connects this passage with the judgment passages that precede and follow it.” (MacArthur, Mark, 899-900)
So like MacArthur, I want to examine this passage for what it teaches us about how NOT to give, and then contrast that with exhortations we find ELSEWHERE in Scripture about how we OUGHT to give.
You say, “Well, wait a minute; I thought we WERE called to be willing to give everything back to the Lord; just look at the example of the early church from Acts 4: “Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common... There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold 35 and laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.”
But that’s DE-scriptive, not PRE-scriptive. This is describing a pretty unique time in the history of the church; Scripture nowhere commands that this model of selling everything you own and laying it at the feet of the church’s leaders is supposed to be the model for the rest of church history. It was understandably NECESSARY for the very SURVIVAL of the church in the 1st c., but this same PRINCIPLE of generosity might well take on a different shape and application in a different historical time and place, like 21st c. America. For my part, I sure HOPE it does! AS the pastor, if y’all start selling everything and laying it at MY feet, frankly, I don’t know WHAT I’d do! I don’t envy these early church leaders one bit, who were serving not only as the pastors and preachers of the word, but as the financial re-distributers and caretakers of thousands of people. They’re overseeing a church AND an entire social welfare program all in one. I didn’t go to seminary for that! No wonder by ch.6 of Acts they’re appointing DEACONS to oversee the finances instead. Praise the Lord for David Merchant, Dave Holmes, and Bryan Arvison! Brothers: I’d probably be RETIRED already without you guys!
Even in the 1st c. church, they weren’t COMMANDED to share everything; they just DID it. They felt compelled by the Holy Spirit to do so. But here’s the other problem: the practice of giving ALL your money to the church is already beginning to be called into QUESTION just 2 decades later, around 50 A.D., when Paul writes his second letter to the church in Corinth. He wrote 2 Corinthians primarily to request their financial help of the impoverished church in Jerusalem, but listen to what he says in ch.8:
“But as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in all earnestness, and in our love for you[c]—see that you excel in this act of grace [financial generosity] also... complete it out of what you have... It is acceptable [to give] according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have. 13 For I do not mean that others should be eased and you burdened, but that as a matter of fairness 14 your abundance at the present time should supply their need, so that their abundance may supply your need, that there may be fairness.” (vv7-15)
In other words, it doesn’t make any practical SENSE for you to give so much of your money, that then someone else has gotta turn around and take care of YOU financially! No, rather, each person should give “according to what he has”.
So with ALL that in mind as our context, let’s ask 5 QUESTIONS of this passage, the Widow’s Offering in Mark 12, and see what principles we can glean regarding giving:
Question #1 – WHEN do we give?
Well, unlike BOTH the rich folks AND this poor widow, who is made to be publicly SHAMED by her humble offering, we DON’T give when everybody else is watching. In the middle of Passover week, with millions of religious pilgrims in town, in the most public place IN town, the busy Temple square, in the VERY public treasury box located right in the middle in the Court of the Women. See, the chief priests and religious leaders had turned giving into a SPECTATOR sport. So what does Jesus do, in order to JUDGE and REBUKE them for it? He says, “Okay, I’ll play along...” And in v41, he pulls up a chair, and sits down right across from the treasury. And he spectates. And he says, “I’m watching, and you know what I see, you hypocritical, pseudo-religious fat cats, Jesus says, “You’ve concocted this whole system to make yourselves look good, and embarrass poor widows like this one. But the joke’s on you. Because she gave EVERYTHING SHE HAD. 100% back to the Lord. You gave, what, a measly 10% tithe? And you want a pat on the back?” See, Jesus isn’t looking at your total dollar contribution; he measures our faithfulness in giving by the relative percentage of your income given. So if I asked YOU what the fastest animal in the world was, you’d say? [Cheetah] Some of you, who are REALLY smart, might point out that the cheetah is just the fastest LAND animal at 68 mph, but the black marlin can swim up to 80 mph, and the peregrine falcon can fly at 242 mph. But Jesus would say you’re ALL wrong. Because he judges not by objective, absolute miles per hour and dollars offered, but by what you do with what you got. And the South Californian flea mite can jump at speeds of 322 body lengths per second. Which would be the equivalent of a human running 1,300 miles per hour. Jesus calls the cheetah a SLOW-poke; they only run 16 body lengths per second. And you’re like ONE body length.
So Jesus takes this opportunity to turn the tables and publicly SHAME these proud, religious leaders who have deep pockets but shallow hearts. Because they’ve already RE-desecrated the Temple that Jesus cleansed just one chapter earlier. They have REJECTED His teaching from the Sermon on the Mount: ““Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
2 “Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:1-4)
So I know some of y’all are freaking out, because I changed things up, and we didn’t pass the offering plates BEFORE the sermon this morning, and your money is burning a hole in your pocket right now; don’t worry: I promise I’m gonna give you a chance to give your offering today. But we’re gonna do it a little more “in secret” than the offering plates, just for this morning at least. We’ve got baskets beside the double doors on your way out, if you feel led to give. But that way at least for TODAY, for those who might be visiting, or maybe you’re like this poor widow, and according to Paul’s logic in 2 Corinthians 8 – you shouldn’t be feeling guilted into contributing to the offering plate; you ought to be TAKING FROM it! – that way you don’t have to feel publicly ashamed for passing the plate empty to the person beside you.
*Hey – if you REALLY wanna give in secret, just go set up “recurring giving” online. We’ve got all sorts of fancy tools the early church didn’t, to help give more in secret.
Question #2 – WHERE / To WHOM do we give?
Well, once again, unlike both the wealthy AND the poor widows of Jesus’ day, we ought NOT support a false, apostate, empty, gospel-less, religious machine that instead of leading people TO the Lord, is actually leading people AWAY from Him. Distracting them FROM God. In the case of these 1st c. religious leaders, it was all the extra-biblical RULES they were adding to God’s word, their interpretation of the Law, which they had decreed to be ON PAR with God’s word itself. To which Jesus says, “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses' seat... [They presume to be on par with Scripture itself.] They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear,[a] and lay them on people's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger... “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.” (Matthew 23:2-4; 13-14)
But friends, is the 21st c. church any better? I SHUDDER to think about some of the highest grossing “churches” in America today, and the FALSE gospels they are promulgating and proliferating. The prosperity gospel – this idea that the good news of Christianity is that God wants to BLESS YOU, and if you just have enough faith, and you prove it by giving enough money to the church, then God’s like some karmic vending machine, and “your blessing is right around the corner, so get out your checkbooks...” – it’s utter GARBAGE. And it is RAMPANT in the church world today. But it’s nothing new. It was rampant 2,000 years ago; it’s really just another version of what the Pharisees had convinced people of in Jesus’ day. And what the Catholic church was peddling 500 years ago in Luther’s day: “God will love you more, if you give more.”
So let’s throw out the trash this morning and clarify the BIBLICAL GOSPEL that we will continue to cling to here at West Hills:
You cannot do anything to make God love you any more or any less than He does right now.
I typed out that line yesterday, writing this sermon, and I just started crying. Because it’s SO true, and it’s SO good. The good news, the REAL good news, of Christianity is that “You cannot do anything to make God love you ANY more or ANY less than He does right now.” Because unlike every other person you have EVER encountered in your entire life, I don’t care HOW great your momma was, and how unconditional her love SEEMED to be, she’s not as great as MY mom, and even Jill DuVal is a broken sinner whose best attempt at unconditional love was still flawed and tied in some ways to my performance – listen: God is UTTERLY unique, in his unconditional love and acceptance and mercy and favor and grace towards you and me, PRECISELY BECAUSE it’s not tied to anything we have done or are doing, or ever COULD do, but rather, He loves us because of what JESUS has done FOR us.
So you could give every last dollar you have, or never give a SINGLE dollar; you could volunteer in the nursery every single Sunday til the Lord takes you home, or keep telling me “No” when I call you to beg for help pulling off 2 services come January – God love you, cuz He knows MY love isn’t unconditional. I’m a sinner – I confess: I love some of y’all more than I love others! But you cannot do anything to make God love you any more or any less than He does right now. That makes for a HORRIBLE sales pitch, for a pastor, trying to rally the troops to volunteer, to write big checks to the church. No wonder so many have distorted and PERVERTED the gospel. It makes for a horrible sales pitch. But a BEAUTIFUL gospel.
So here’s my challenge to you: where do you give? To whom? Give to a church that preaches THAT gospel. Give to a church that has made it their mission and vision and purpose and passion to reach this city and the ends of the earth with THAT good news. “That God so loved the world that he gave his only son”. Cuz the world needs to hear THAT gospel. The ONLY gospel by which people can be saved from our inherent sinful rejection OF God, and therefore our deserv-ed eternal condemnation FROM God. West Hills is gonna keep preaching it. And we’d love to have you financially support our gospel ministry. But if it’s not us, find another church preaching it, and give to them. There are PLENTY of us here in town. Sheep amongst the wolves. Don’t be deceived. The world needs the GOSPEL. YOU need the gospel.
Question #3 – WHY do we give? (vv41-42)
NOT: For blessings from God.
BUT: For love of God.
This goes hand in hand with point #2, so I won’t belabor it, but it’s worth reiterating, as MacArthur notes: “According to the simplistic (and wrong) theology of first-century Judaism, wealth was a sign of God’s blessing. Conversely, they saw the poor as cursed by God. Further, those who were wealthy had the means to pay for more sacrifices than did the poor. They also could afford to give more alms and buy more offerings than other people, and the Jews believed that almsgiving was key to entering the kingdom. The apocryphal book of Tobit said, “It is better to give alms than to lay up gold: for alms doth deliver from death, and shall purge away all sin. Those that exercise alms and righteousness shall be filled with life” (Tobit 12:8–9; cf. Sirach 3:30).” (MacArthur, Mark, 739) 1st c. Judaism had become the early forerunner of the prosperity gospel: our wealth is a sign that God loves us more than others. And on top of that, the fact that we are able to tithe and give BACK more money than others, makes God love us EVEN MORE than he already did!
And to that motive for giving, giving SELFISHLY, with an ulterior motive, expecting a quid pro quo from God, blessings around the corner, God says, like he had 800 years earlier through the prophet Hosea, to apostate Israel then: “I desire love[a] and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” You think that you can IMPRESS me, you can EXPLOIT me, MANIPULATE me, with your giving, get me to do YOUR bidding, if you think you can EARN my love and favor then you can’t have it... If you’re giving for YOU, then you might as well just KEEP your money, because that’s exactly what you think it is: YOUR money. You don’t get it; it’s MINE. It ALL belongs to me. Friends, we really ought to be using a different word, than “GIVING,” because we cannot, properly speaking, give ANYTHING to God; Psalm 50:10 – He “owns the cattle on a thousand hills.”
Acts 17:25 “God is not served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”
STEWARDSHIP really is the better word, because it points to the reality that it’s HIS money already; we’ve just been temporarily entrusted with SOME of it, and God wants to see how we’re going to use it. Do we become distracted and consumed BY it – fall in love with the gift and forget all about the giver? Or do we remember where it came from, WHO it came from, and WHY He’s blessed us with it – in order to be a blessing to OTHERS, and advance His kingdom for the relatively few years we get to spend here on earth. If you know that’s why you’re here, to love and serve the Lord, then you’re GOING to live generously. You’re GOING to give generously. To live with open hands. Because you know it’s HIS anyway; to use as He sees fit.
2 Corinthians 9:6-7 “The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully[d] will also reap bountifully. 7 Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” THAT’s why we give: because we are DELIGHTED to play some small part, in the work of redemption that God is doing in the world, in the hearts and lives of those around us. We have the JOY of partnering with others, a community of like-minded believers, a CHURCH, one team, one dream: making disciples of all nations. Starting in Saint Louis. What a GLORIOUS calling God has left us with. And a PRIVILEGE to join Him in that effort.
Question #4: WHAT do we give / How MUCH? (vv41-43)
Doesn’t have to be “large sums” like the self-righteous wealthy religious people here. CERTAINLY doesn’t have to be “EVERYTHING”. If a “pastor” today tries to convince you that this passage means you have to sell and give EVERYTHING to the “church”, RUN – that’s called a CULT!
I’ll give you 2 tangible principles on this one:
#1 – as we just read in 2 Cor 9, “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart”. So ultimately, it’s between you and the Lord. Not you and the pastor. Not you and the church. It’s you and the HOLY SPIRIT. He’s got to be the one to convict you and compel you and help you discern how much you are being led to give financially.
But here’s the second principle, and I’ve used up all my time, so I’m not going to RE-make the case here. But fortunately, I’ve already recorded an “Ask the Pastor” PODCAST episode on this topic, and made the case there. For why I think that BIBLICALLY, the 10% tithe model is a helpful, default minimum expectation for believers.
Now, 2 Cor 8 is the caveat to that: some won’t be able to give 10%. You giving 10% would mean someone ELSE is burdened and has to pay YOUR utilities for you, so it doesn’t make any practical sense for you to try and tithe. On the flip side, for MOST of us in a West County church, we could get by just fine giving far MORE than 10%.
But I’ll see if Taylor can re-post that podcast episode on “TITHING”, and I encourage you to subscribe, and listen to that this week.
Finally, Question #5 – HOW do we give? (v44)
2 Cor 9 again, NOT “under compulsion” / or coercion, like this poor widow in Mark 12; NOT because you think it makes you holier than thou, like the wealthy religious elite in Mark 12...
BUT: we give cheerfully, faithfully, generously, and YES, even a little SACRIFICIALLY. The point of tithing your first-fruits, like, taking 10% out of your paycheck BEFORE you pay the bills, is #1 – it’s a reminder that God is supposed to come first, not get whatever is leftover AFTER you pay the bills, but #2 – tithing is intended to help us increase our dependency ON God. Our trust IN God. Remember the Rich Young Ruler from Mark 10 – wealth is so dangerous because is enables us to be self-sufficient. Or at least have the ILLUSION of self-sufficiency.
So God does exhort us, even when times are tight, like they were collectively for the Jewish people in the days of the prophet Malachi, to “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.” (v10) Do we trust Him to do it?
So I’m already over time. I had intended to conclude by helping us Apply the Text. Drilling down past the principles into the PRACTICALS. I had some IDEAS. I was going to do some math and calculate based on where our members and regular attenders live, your specific township – Chesterfield, Ballwin, Maryland Heighs, Creve Coeur, etc. – and the average household income for each of those townships, total it all, divide by 10 for the tithe, I was going to try and calculate a rough GUESSTIMATE, especially in advance of the business meeting afterward today, of what our total budgeted giving for 2020 should look like. If everyone actually tithed. And then I was gonna ask David Merchant to send out pre-end of year giving reports to each of you, so you could see where you stand as of 6 weeks left in 2019, and how much you would PERSONALLY need to give both to “close the gap” to 10% for you, in 2019, and to help US “close the gap” in OUR budget, as a church. And THEN I was gonna give out “Planning Ahead to 2020” giving planners, and challenge you to pray about it and BE intentional and proactive, and write down a number: God willing, I plan to give ___ % of my income in 2020 back to the Lord. Maybe you’re at 1% now, or ZERO% and 10% is totally unrealistic. Shoot for 3%. Maybe you’re at 6 or 7 and you really could tithe, if you would just reorder your budgeting priorities.
But I’ve run out of time for ALL that so let me just encourage you to take these principles, BIBLICAL principles, and PRAY about how the Lord would have YOU apply them, PRACTICALLY, in your own life and finances in the weeks and years to come. Amen? Let’s pray...