Just before we begin, and in order to make a link to the Series, Lets Talk about Me – I need to share a little bit more about myself.. Mostly so you may understand a little more the approach I am taking with today’s sermon. For no matter how hard we pray that the words we speak will be God’s words, we need to accept that we understand and then interpret through our own experiences and world views.

I am actually the result of an interesting confluence of factors and events:

Genetic defiance, planted in the fertile idealistic intellectual upheaval that was the 60’s and 70’s, and fertilised with liberal amounts of Australian, egalitarian, anti-authoritarianism !!!   Viola.. you have me..!!

What this has meant is that I have been perceived most of my life as a crazy, left-wing, liberal hippie type.. Which on the whole I could live with.. However, we do grow up eventually and, as those of you who are parents know, we undergo a profound elemental shift in consciousness when we have kids. So I found myself in a couple of strange situations at theological college. In classes where there were a large number of young idealistic 20 somethings, and lets face it.. we take life very seriously when we are in our 20’s.. anyway in those classes I was often left feeling as if they thought I was somewhere to the right of Ghengis Khan.. Now in Singapore I again find myself portrayed as being somewhere to  the left of Lenin !!! It can get confusing. 

The truth is that I am neither of those things.. As an astute friend pointed out recently.. I am pretty much a moderate. One could even say a conservative... though that might be stretching it...

So this is the person who God is using as a mouthpiece to give you his message today. I take full responsibility for any mistakes, bizarre statements and errors of translation.... Any good bits that may come forth are certainly God’s doing...

1 Kings 17:8-16

The word of the LORD came to Elijah, saying, "Go now to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and live there; for I have commanded a widow there to feed you." So he set out and went to Zarephath. When he came to the gate of the town, a widow was there gathering sticks; he called to her and said, "Bring me a little water in a vessel, so that I may drink." As she was going to bring it, he called to her and said, "Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand." But she said, "As the LORD your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go home and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die." Elijah said to her, "Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the LORD the God of Israel: “The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the LORD sends rain on the earth." She went and did as Elijah said, so that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. The jar of meal was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail, according to the word of the LORD that he spoke by Elijah.

Mark 12:38-44

Teaching in the temple, Jesus said, "Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honour at banquets! They devour widows' houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation."

He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, "Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those 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."

Once again we have stories about Widows. As I have said before, widows in the bible are the poorest of the poor. They have no social security, no pensions and are reliant on the generosity of others in order to live.

The widow in the Hebrew text appears to be so completely despairing of her situation that she has decided to take the very last of the food that she has to feed her child and poison it. Thus bringing an end to her suffering and despair.

Yet when asked by the prophet to share that last precious food she puts up the very barest of protest. With only the word of the Prophet to go on, she does as she is asked, trusting in the ‘word of the Lord God of Israel.’ She gives ALL that she has, .. because if the word of the prophet proves to be false then she and her son are going to be left with nothing.

Likewise, her New Testament sister gives all that she has to the Lord. The tiny sum that she placed in the offering was all that stood between her and possible starvation, yet she also gave it to God.

What amazing faith and trust these women had.

When I last spoke, I talked about the idea that God is more concerned with our relationships than with anything else. Our relationship with God, and our relationships with other people. I also talked about how when God came to earth in the person of Jesus of Nazereth we were given only two major commandments. To love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and to love your neighbour as yourself.  Both commandments about our relationships.

Today, with the texts we have been given from the Liturgical Calander, I would like to explore how those commandments may translate into our context. What will our lives look like if we follow the example of The Widows.

Do we give all that we have to God , or do we only give out of our abundance?

Do we give our best?

Or do we ‘tip’ God?

The idea of ‘tipping God came from a conversation I was having with Catherine during the week. She told me of a minister friend who used this phrase.

Obviously our first thought relates to our financial contributions.  You know, - those times when we stick our hand in our wallet or pocket and pull out a $10 note to stick in the offering.

Now $10 dollars is not in and off itself a small amount.. indeed it is a great deal to most of the worlds population.  However when we think of ourselves and the fact that we may have dropped a couple of hundred the night before on dinner or at the club. Or perhaps spent a few hundred dollars during the week on a new pair of shoes or a new gadget, then that $10 does start to look a bit like a tip.

However it is not only what we give God in terms of money that I think these passages are talking about. Like many of the stories in both the Hebrew and Greek texts, these stories can be seen as metaphors for our lives.

These widows gave everything they had, they held nothing back. The widow in the Joshua story was even prepared to give up the exit strategy that she had prepared for herself and her son.

Are we prepared to give as much to God? Or. Like the wealthy scribes, do we give only from our abundance, From what we have left over when we have taken all we desire? Do we tip God with our lives?

Do we spend more time preparing to go out on a Saturday night than we do getting ready to worship?

Do we assume that if we spend some time at church on Sunday morning, God will be so grateful that he will ignore or forgive what we do the other 6 days?

I would like to look a little bit more closely at the last question...

Most of us are used to bringing our pain and brokenness to God. When we are at our lowest ad most despairing it is easy to turn to God, because there is no-one else... This is what we should do and it is good that we can, BUT

Do we ever bring our BEST to God? - , our brilliance and beauty and goodness?

Do we even believe that we HAVE a BEST to bring?

We are children of the MOST HIGH GOD !!! Everyone of us.. Regardless of what the world may say about us, we were designed and shaped in the image of God. !!

Yet so often we give our best to the world of humankind and bring only our leftover brokenness to God.

We aim for academic excellence in our secular education, yet we are satisfied with a superficial understanding of our Creator and our Sacred Text.

We give the bulk of our time and energy to our earthly employer and bring to God only our exhaustion.

We take this glorious heart and mind and body , designed by the Creator and we hawk it relentlessly at parties and clubs searching for love, and yet to God , who truly loves us, we bring only the pain and the despair when we can’t find what we were looking for.

The Scribes thought a lot of themselves, they gave their best to build a reputation among humans and to gain power and privilege – And Jesus made it quite clear that this was not what God wanted...

The Psalm reading for today is Psalm 146

Hallelujah!
Praise the LORD, O my soul!
I will praise the LORD as long as I live;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

Put not your trust in rulers, nor in any child of earth,
for there is no help in them.

When they breathe their last, they return to earth,

and in that day their thoughts perish.

Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their help!*
whose hope is in the LORD their God;

Who made heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is in them; *
who keeps his promise for ever;

Who gives justice to those who are oppressed, *
and food to those who hunger.

The Psalmist is clearly telling us that we need to put our faith and trust in God rather than in mere mortals.

Our employers, politicians and the like , are human just like us. When their time on this planet is over they will be there alongside us, waiting to be let in to the presence of God. They have no shortcuts in, no special privileges...- and they can’t help us ... They, like ourselves are powerless in the face of God. The psalmist is pointing out the absurdity of putting our faith in ..-. of giving or best to... earthly power, when we should be giving it to the creator of the universe, The only entity capable of establishing a just world.

Just as we need to think about the first commandment of The Christ, we also need to think about the second.

Just as we need to think about whether we give our best to God, we need to think about whether we give our best to the people God has put in our lives.

Parents, Siblings, life partners, Children, dearest friends.

As a mother I know I have been guilty of saying... ‘ as long as they are good when they are out, they can be horrible at home !!!’ and yes there is an element of truth in that.. and it may be appropriate for children, but is it still appropriate for adults.?

Is it acceptable for us to give our best to others, particularly work, and only our leftovers to the people who love us the most?

Tony Campolo wrote in one of his books, and I think it is a story that has been used by others, .. He was talking to a Pastor Mentor and saying how busy he was, Travelling, preaching, councelling etc.. and that he rarely got anytime at home.. This wise old gentleman looked Tony in the eye and said :

You give so much of yourself to the world, and you have nothing left for the people for whom you ARE the world...or words to that effect

Each of us at some time ARE the world to someone!! Parents, children, partners, friends, We are the face of God to someone who needs the Best of us. Sadly, because they love us, like God, they continue to accept so much less.

Matthew Chapter 22,  Vs 37 – 39

You shall Love the Lord your God with all your heart , and with all your souls and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it. ‘ You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets !!  Amen