DYNAMIS!
A publication of St. George Orthodox Christian Cathedral
Wichita, KS

St. Mark 12:38-44       (2/14)       Gospel for Thursday, Week of the Publican & the Pharisee

 

Two Cents Worth: St. Mark 12:38-44, especially vs. 43: “So He called His disciples to Himself and said to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all those who have given to the treasury....’”  Today inflation has so eroded the value of the little penny, taking away even the poor thing’s copper heart,  that the majority of people will not bend down to pick up one that has dropped on a parking lot or sidewalk.  Still, in commerce and business, despite devaluation, one can hear people say that they hope “to get their two cents worth.”  What then?  Do you think the widow got her two cents worth?

St. Jerome observes that though “the widow in the Gospel...was but a poor widow [she] was richer than all the people of Israel.  She had but a grain of mustard seed, but she put her leaven in the measures of flour; and, tempering her confession of the Father and of the Son with the grace of the Holy Spirit, cast her two pennies into the treasury.  All the substance that she had, all her possessions she offered in the two testaments of her faith.  Her two pennies are like the two Seraphim which glorify the Trinity with their threefold song and are stored among the treasures of the Church.  They are like the two legs of the tongs by which live coal is caught up to cleanse the sinner’s lips.”  By her pure intention she bought heaven with two small copper coins.

The whole of the matter when we give tithes and offerings, pray to the Lord, worship at His Holy Altar, or invest time and energy in any good work of the Kingdom of Christ, is built on the foundation of our intention, for better or for worse.  St. John Chrysostom says of the widow that “since it was not money but rather her intention that prevailed, that woman received everything because she demonstrated firm conviction.”

However, when it comes to intent, and we examine carefully the vitality of our intentions, how often we find that our souls function like poor beggars, with little to offer to our All-giving Lord!  Each of us has said, “I have united myself to Christ, believe in Him as King and God, and bow down also before Him.”  Only let each of us admit with the Pilgrim: “I do not love God.  For if I loved God I should be continually thinking about Him with heartfelt joy....On the contrary, I much more often and much more eagerly think about earthly things, and thinking about God is labor and dryness.”  Our souls mostly have only two-cents worth of Godly intention.

What then?  Shall we not at least give that little bit of love and devotion that we do have to our Life-giving Savior?  “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief” (Mk. 9:24)!  Let us offer our paltry love to our King and our God and have joy in doing so, for even this one tiny mite of imperfect love, when offered together with the mite of repentance, will be received with “joy in heaven” (Lk. 15:7).  These are the two mites that our poor widowed souls can offer to God in hope.

Make no mistake about it: Christ sits “opposite the treasury and [sees] how the people put money into the treasury” (Mk. 12:41).  Even our shame at our lackluster love is the beginning of repentance.  It is a tiny mite, but it is something.  It represents the first waking breath within us of the knowledge of how very greatly God loves us.  Let us keep this truth in mind, reflecting on the Giver, the Lover, the One Who became poor for our sake, that we might be rich (2 Cor. 8:9).  Though we have no basis for pride in what we give, let us give, and pray, worship, and invest ourselves to the degree that His love stirs up even a tiny response in our shrunken hearts.  For when the widowed soul “out of her poverty [puts] in all that she [has], her whole livelihood” (Mk. 12:44), God sees and blesses her with His great love.  She will get infinitely more than two cents worth.

O Lord God Almighty, Who alone art Holy, Who dost accept the sacrifice of praise from those who call upon Thee with their whole heart: Receive also the prayer of us sinners.

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