The scripture reading for today is Mark 12, 41 through 44. If you do not have a Bible, you are free to take one from the pews. Please stand for the reading of God's word. And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums, and a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. 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. For they 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. Please be seated. Let us pray. Father, now as we turn to your word, we ask that you would give us ears to hear and eyes to see, all that you have to give us this morning. We recognize the privilege, gift, and duty that it is to sit at the infallible word that you have provided. And so we ask, Lord, help us to feast upon your word now. Holy Spirit, illumine our hearts and give us understanding. And we pray that those who are in need of conviction would receive it this morning, and that those who need a word of hope would also receive that. And we ask these things in the incomparable name of our Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. So this morning we're going to finish out Mark chapter 12. Before we do, let me say a couple of things by way of preface. When I was like seven or eight years old, maybe slightly older than that, we had company, as it was called, which for those of you 40 and younger, that means you have a guest over your house. That was unusual for us at the time because I lived on a farm in a very desolate area. But we had this guy come over our house and for some reason, and I really don't know why, I went up to him and asked him, how much money do you make? And I don't remember what he said, but I do remember how my mom pulled me aside and told me how rude it was to ask a question like that. And that it is really impolite to talk about money in in casual conversation. And that has stuck with me. I think that is in fact true. You shouldn't talk like that. You shouldn't ask people questions like that. And I suppose the reason why is because it seems as though when asking somebody a question like that, you're trying to size them up economically. Like, how much are you worth? And I would imagine people fear the next question, namely, can I borrow some of your money? And so I've tried to stick with that and I've tried my very best never to ask anyone that question, which is why it was so mortifying and embarrassing when a friend of mine believed that I was pushing him on that question. We had run into each other at a parking lot of a grocery store. We had left church and gone there, and as I was coming out from the store, he was headed in. And I hadn't seen this brother. He is a Christian, but he doesn't attend here. And I said, hey, you know, how are you? And he said, oh, I'm doing great. I started a new job. And I said, awesome. So what do you do there? And he told me something about, you know, manufacturing or something. And I said, oh, what do you make there? And by that I meant, what do they make at your company? What do they produce? Not how much money do you make? But he didn't understand it that way. And he said, well, you know, we do okay. And I said, no, really, what do you make there? And he said, well, we make enough money to live on. And I thought, I'm sure you do, but what does that have to do with my question? And so I asked him a third time and said, why is this secret? I mean, you're making bombs or something? Just give me the answer. What do you make there? And he said, well, I make about $70,000. And I thought, what does that have to do with my question? And anyway, confused, we parted ways. And it wasn't until I was in the car when I realized that he believed that I was asking him and pushing him to give me What he makes in terms of his salary and It was mortifying and I can only imagine what he said to his family on the way home You know that pastor. He was really pushing me to tell me to tell him how much money I make I It's like my greatest nightmare right there. Somebody thinking that I'm one of those money-hungry pastors who fleeced the flock for personal gain. The next time I saw this guy, I went up to him and told him that that's actually not what I was asking. I was asking you about what you make at your job in terms of what your company produces. And we sort of had a nervous bit of laughter in parted ways. But it is impolite to talk about money in casual conversations and to ask people questions like that. And I think we generally know that and believe that within our culture. The only place that it is more inappropriate, according to public perception, to talk about money apart from casual conversation is church. It is pretty well known that there are many people who, for one reason or another, associate the church with some kind of financial misdealings or some kind of economic predation where the church is out to get your money. I have been told that a thousand times. Why don't you go to church? Because the church is filled with hypocrites and they just want your money, right? And yet the Bible says so very much about money. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. And we don't talk a lot about money here. I don't know if you've noticed that. We don't even collect an offering. There's boxes in the back. And that is by design. That is primarily because what you give is between you and God and it's no one else's business. But what the Lord provides us in this paucity of verses is really an entire theology of money. And there is a lot here for us. And so. And so let's look at our passage, however, because it has been a couple of weeks since we've been in Mark, I want to remind you a little bit of what's been going on in Mark chapter 12 up until this point. uh... this day which is the wednesday before the lord is crucified jesus is crucified of course on a friday and so this is a few a days before that and this day begins when jesus goes to the temple in the morning begins teaching and is confronted by a series of religious leaders. First, members of the Sanhedrin, then Pharisees and Herodians, then later on it's the Sadducees, and then finally a scribe. And each one of these groups has been seeking to trip Jesus up or trap him, and he has handily dealt with their attempts. And then he says this in verse 38, Mark 12 38. Beware of the scribes who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces. They have the best seats in the synagogues. Feasts who devour widows houses for a pretense and for a pretense make long prayers. Beware of the scribes, he says. Remember that the scribes were the ancient equivalent of the pastor-theologian. Pastors are not merely supposed to be men who deal with the matters of a local church. A pastor goes to seminary precisely so that he can become equipped to answer the objections leveled against the Christian faith, to teach the Bible in all of its fullness, And so a pastor is to be both a minister of the gospel and a theologian of the faith. And that is precisely what these scribes were. They were pastor theologians. Scribes devoted their entire lives to the study of the scriptures, and they would go to the synagogue on the Sabbath and teach. But they wouldn't teach the Bible. Rather, they took their office and used it as a means of personal benefit. And so Jesus says, beware of the scribes. It's the ancient equivalent of him saying, beware of the pastors. Just as scandalous. Why? Because they walk around in long, ornate robes, setting themselves apart from the common man. And they like these greetings in the marketplaces, pointing out their reputation to others. And they want the best seats. They want the places of honor at feasts. That is, they want the power and reputation that comes along with that office. And they devour widows' houses. That is, they Take the weakest in society and they use them for personal enrichment. They devour their estates while making long winded, elaborate prayers. Think of the irony. for a pretense that is so people will look upon them and see how spiritual they are. They make these long winded prayers out in public. Meanwhile, they're devouring widows estates. Jesus says these men. They will receive the greater condemnation. Maybe you have heard it said sin is sin. Have you heard that phrase before? Christians say that all the time. And what most Christians mean by that phrase is that all sin is equal in the sight of God. That is not true. I don't know who came up with that, but that is totally contrary to the word of God. All sins are not equal in God's sight. There are some sins which are certainly more heinous than others. For example, the sins of these scribes more heinous than. Some of the sins committed by the common man. I would imagine that where this teaching of all sin being equal in God's sight comes from is from a misunderstanding of what Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount when he says things like this. You have heard it said you shall not commit adultery but I say to you that if you look with lustful intent you've committed adultery of the heart. Some people, I suppose, look at that and say, it's the same thing. Looking with lust and doing the deed are the same thing. No, they're not. Adultery of the heart is not the same as going out and fornicating. Murder of the heart is not the same as doing the deed. What Jesus is getting at in the Sermon on the Mount is that He will judge not merely your external actions, but Even the thoughts and intentions of your heart. That's what he's after. That's what he's saying there. Not all sin is the same in God's sight. The system of jurisprudence that is reflected in the New Testament that God put in place in the nation of Israel has gradations of punishments for different crimes, doesn't it? You don't get capital punishment for everything in the Old Testament. That law reflects God's good and holy character, and that law is really what our system of laws and punishments is built upon. You don't get capital punishment for a parking violation. There's a reason for that. Because in the sight of God, there are some sins that are more heinous than others. And so, in hell there will be gradations of punishment and in heaven there will be gradations of rewards. Because God will judge you according to what you do. According to the contents of your heart and the deeds you do with your hands and feet. He will judge you according to what you have done and according to what you didn't do that you should have done. Jesus says, these men who fleece the flock will receive the greater condemnation. These men believe that they can make merchandise out of the people of God. And that God's just going to be OK with it. There are men like this today, aren't there? Christian television is filled with men like this who are under the strong delusion that they can enrich themselves by shilling false doctrine on the TV on the computer and in print. And that they can take advantage of the bride of Christ and that Christ is just going to stand by idly and let them do it. Jesus has no they'll receive the greater condemnation. There will come a day when Jesus will have his reckoning and vengeance will be his. And it would have been better if those people hadn't been born. Because these are the people for whom Christ died. And he will protect them as a shepherd protects his sheep. And thus, a shepherd, an under-shepherd of the Great Shepherd, who is commissioned to shepherd the flock of God, must be absolutely loyal to the Bible. He must be loyal to what God has said in His Word, not merely for your sake, but for His sake. It's dangerous to get behind this pulpit and say something because it's expedient or because it's pragmatic and maybe because it'll give you some kind of personal gain because God will judge you for it. This is why James says, brothers, not many of you should become teachers. Why? Because teachers will endure a stricter judgment. God has the highest requirements for the teachers. And so it is upon this basis that Jesus now being in the temple sits down opposite the treasury and this is our passage verse forty one. He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Jesus is, at this point, inside of the temple complex, whereas previously he was likely out in the court of the Gentiles, which is as far as a Gentile could go near the temple. Now he's inside the temple proper, a place where only Jews could go, and we learn from ancient sources that are contemporaneous with Jesus that there are a number of offering places in this court of women. This is the largest court in the temple, and these offering places, we learn from things like the Mishnah and other ancient documents, that there were these horns that were set up, probably made of metal, that were located in and around that court so that people could give tithes and offerings. And so Jesus goes into this court, sits across from it, and he's people-watching. He's watching the people put their ties and offerings in this treasury box. You should know that the currency in Jesus's day is exclusively coinage. There's no paper money. The coinage in those days was valuable because of the kind of metal and the amount of metal that was in the coin. And so there are coins made of gold and silver and copper and this sort of thing. And they're all different denominations and sizes of coins that are circulating throughout the Roman Empire. And so when you come to this temple, probably on pilgrimage because it's the time of the Passover. You don't live in Jerusalem usually because most Jews didn't live in Jerusalem. Most Jews lived abroad. So you would have come on pilgrimage and you come into the temple and you give according to what is prescribed in the law of Moses. And when you put that money in that horn, it makes a very undeniable sound. You put more money, it sounds louder and the sound is longer. You put less money, people notice. It's conspicuous. Many rich people, Mark says, put in large sums. That is, these rich people come in and they put others to shame in terms of the volume of coinage that they are putting in these horns. And then Mark says, in the midst of this, these rich people going through, a poor widow comes and puts in two small copper coins which make a penny. A poor widow, he says. That's a little bit redundant because if you were a widow in the ancient world, it was pretty safely assumed that you were poor. You recall the story given to us by the Sadducees when they tested Jesus and they talked about a woman whose husband died and her brother subsequently remarried. Why was that law necessary in Deuteronomy 27? It was to protect the widow from poverty. And so to be a widow essentially means you are relegated to poverty. So why does Mark say poor widow. I think it's because this woman is especially impoverished. In fact I know that's why because of the rest of the passage. Not only is this woman a widow she is a completely poverty stricken widow and she comes in the ESV has she puts The language there, the ESV translators have done us a favor because they've put this language in readily accessible terms for us, but the underlying Greek is a little more specific than that. It has, she put in two lepta. Lepta are the smallest denomination of currency in the empire. Two very tiny little copper coins. If I had them in my hand, you would barely be able to see them from where you're sitting. It's the smallest amount of currency. One lepta was about 164th of a denarius. A denarius is the amount of money an unskilled laborer would make in a single day. So the person who is skilled at what he does The person who has some kind of decent job is going to make five, ten, twenty denarius, denarii in a day. But the unskilled person is making one and the amount of money this woman puts in is one thirty second, two lepta, one thirty second of what the lowest level worker would make in a single day. And so minimum wage is what, $15 an hour, so 15 times 8 hours, that's $120. That's about $3.50 in our money. So this woman has traveled all the way to the temple to go into the sanctuary area, to the outer court, to take two virtually worthless coins. and to place them in the treasury. Meanwhile, these people are dumping in large sums. Verse 43, Jesus called his disciples. He's going to make an object lesson out of this woman. He said to them, truly I say to you, that phrase, or a variation thereof, might be truly, truly I say to you or something, occurs over 70 times in the New Testament, in the Gospels, and it is a means of solemn emphasis. When Jesus uses that phrase, he is trying to get their attention, trying to get them to see what he is saying. Truly I say to you, The underlying Greek for truly is amin, from which we get amen. He's putting his amen out on the front to confirm to these disciples that what he is saying is accurate and important. Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. She put in the least amount of money Jesus says she gave more, not merely to one person's money by comparison. All of them together, all of the rich who have been dumping money in there all day, this one gave more. How can that be? Clearly, the measly two coins that she threw in there That money is nowhere near the scale of what others have been putting in, let alone all the people combined. Jesus says, here's how, 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. Meaning she didn't know where her next meal was coming from. She put it all in. And so that's the text. And the question is, what does this have to do with you and I as we look at our watches and think, where are we going to eat in 45 minutes? What does this have to do with? Christians living in the 21st century in the most prosperous nation in the history of the world. Well, I have some implications for you. As I said, Jesus really does provide us with an entire theology of money. First, this woman was giving money to the treasury in obedience to the law of God. That is to say that there are laws in the Pentateuch, particularly that prescribe giving a certain percentage of one's money to the treasury. And this woman was acting in obedience to that law. Which begs the question, are you and I under those laws? Are we similarly bound by laws in the Old Testament and thus required to give a certain percentage of our money? Because that seems to be what everyone's saying. Everyone ubiquitously says, oh, I have to give 10% because, you know, that's what the Bible teaches. Is that true? It is not true. It is not true. You are not bound by any law in the Old Testament pertaining to the amount or the percentage of money you are to give. That is simply a common misconception. Here is why. The laws pertaining to giving in the Old Testament were inherently tied to the system of priest and temple sacrifice. The Levites, the tribe of Levi, did not get an allotment of land when God gave out land to the other tribes. Rather, God was their portion and they were relegated to working at the temple in the system of sacrifice And thus the people gave a percentage of their income to support the ministry of the temple. It was considered their religious duty to uphold what is going on initially at the tent of meeting and the various sacrifices that were being made there all the way until even the second temple that Jesus is in right in this passage. You don't worship at a temple. Those laws pertaining to giving in the Old Testament were tied to the practice of Judaism when those laws were given. You don't worship at a temple. There are no Levites. There are no priests to support. There are no sacrifices to buy. Those laws don't apply to you. Those are ceremonial laws tied to the practice of Judaism. And to make this even more clear, there are different kinds of laws, obviously, in the Old Testament. There are moral laws which are binding on all people for all time. An example of those is the Ten Commandments. You shall not kill, meaning you shall not murder. You shall not dishonor your mother and father, this sort of thing. Don't lie, don't covet. These are moral laws, applicable to anyone. But ceremonial laws, like the laws pertaining to giving, were not generally applicable. God was not judging the Canaanites because they didn't tithe. But he was judging them for their murder and idolatry. And so the laws pertaining to giving in the Old Testament are not applicable to you and I because they were given to a people who were in a covenant that you and I are not in. They were given to a people owing to the fact that they were going to be worshiping at a temple. We're not doing that. And so you have to get over this idea that there is a percentage of money that you are obligated to give according to the Old Testament law. But there are some people who are just going to keep insisting that. They're going to keep reading those passages, especially in numbers, and come away thinking, this is what I must do. Let me make that a little harder for you. Tithing in the Old Testament is not 10%. The amount of money taken when you look at the cumulative laws that are applicable to the Israelite in the Old Covenant was more like 28%. Not 10%. So if you want to keep those laws, keep them. But it's not 10%. Second. Why, then, do Christians give? If there isn't. Some generally applicable moral laws in the Old Testament which apply to us and requires to give, and if there isn't any command like that in the New Testament and there isn't, then why do Christians give? And it is simply because this. Because while we were yet sinners, God gave his best for us. He gave his highest treasure, his only son. And we have received the Son of God as both Savior, Substitute, and Lord. And because of that, we respond in generosity and out of worship by giving of our funds. We also give because we believe in the message of the gospel. We give not only out of gratitude but out of a desire to see the nations transformed. We give because there's only one name under heaven by which men are saved. We give because we believe that when we fund the ministry of the local church we are in fact incrementally bringing the will of God to bear on the earth as it is in heaven. We give money to the cooperative program of the Southern Baptist Convention because we believe that those missionaries going abroad bring with them the power of God unto salvation that is the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so we give our money for those reasons. We support the ministries of Baptist churches. Why? Because we believe in the power of the gospel. not out of some begrudging obligation that I have to give this percentage of money, but because God redeemed my life and everything I have is his because I've been bought with the price. And so while there's no law, if your soul has been redeemed from the pit, you cannot help but respond in generosity. Not because of the letter of the law, but because of the blood of Jesus Christ shed for you. Third, this woman didn't merely give according to what was prescribed in the law. Rather, Jesus is careful to note that she gave all she had. Not only did she give everything she had, she gave everything she had to live on. Her obedience was one thing, but her generosity is another. What was this woman doing? She was putting her life in the hands of God, depending upon him for the next hour. depending upon him for her next meal, depending upon him for how she was going to return to her home after having given everything she had. We give because it is a means by which we may put our trust in Christ. We give because in our generosity, the Lord pries our idolatrous fingers off of the treasures of this world. And he reminds our dull hearts that our treasure is really in heaven. And when you give generously and sacrificially, not out of your abundance, When you do that. You demonstrate what you really believe. You demonstrate that. God is utterly sovereign and you believe him when he tells you he'll provide. When you give in this way. You demonstrate. That Christ is of infinitely more value to you than the trinkets people are chasing after in this life. She gave all she had to live on because God was worth it in her estimation. And when you give sacrificially like that, when you give out of your income, you attest to the fact. That God owns a thousand cattle on a thousand hills. And that you'll be generous to him because he has always been generous to you. not be out of some begrudging commitment to obey a law, but because of Christ. She gave all she had, thereby putting her life in the hands of God. That is an act of faith. She gave sacrificially. It hurt her. It cost her something. Not merely the money she put in but the fact that she didn't have a safety net to land on if something went bad. Which is what we most of us do. We want to keep that nest egg because you know something could happen. And so we give out of our abundance. And what we're doing is. Most of the time, we're showing that we don't trust God with our finances because we want that safety net. We gotta make sure that we're taken care of. Did this woman do that? This is a lesson I had to learn the hard way because it didn't come naturally to me. When Marion and I, my wife, moved to Connecticut, we found a church, but we never gave. It didn't even occur to me that we should give. And probably a couple of years after attending this church my wife said we should give. She's usually ahead of me in spiritual matters anyway. And so I said OK fine. And so we gave a certain amount because we felt like that's where we were at. That's what we could do. It hurt but we for one reason or another felt like it was the right thing to do. And within a couple of months, it became extremely hard to give because this was, I don't know, 2008, 2009 economic downturn. My job had been restructured. I lost a significant amount of my income, about 30%. And so all of a sudden, giving became this incredible burden. And it got bad. We routinely had our utilities shut off because we're trying to pay all the bills, yet there is not enough money to pay them. And it got so bad that we would get the electricity turned on one month, and then they'd shut off the gas. And we'd think, OK, how are we going to give the kids a bath because we've got no hot water? I'm gonna heat up some water on the stove like they did in the old days. It got to the point where we were sitting on the couch looking at each other one night, exhausted trying to figure this out. And Marian said to me, we need to decide what to do. Are we gonna pay our mortgage or are we gonna give? And remember at this time foreclosures were rampant. There were houses on our street that were being foreclosed on. And we drove past the signs they put up out in front of those house to tell everyone that this house is being foreclosed on. Why did they do that? You gotta advertise the fact that this person is losing their home. And so in seeing that, we had already been late like six months in a row and so I don't know why, but Marion said, I think we should give. And I said, okay. And with a polarized look, we got in the car to go get a Coke to share. We had like a dollar between us. And Marion said to me, you know, if we lose our house, that's what the Lord wants. He has somewhere else for us to go then. which was not how I felt. I felt like a failure because I'm not providing for my family. I'm not providing what they need. The next day I went, was working a night shift at the time, went and pawned a bunch of stuff to get gas money to go to work. If you never pawned anything, it's not a great experience, by the way. You don't get a good ROI on that. And I went to work. I came back that night, stressed as usual, trying to figure out how I can steal from Peter to pay Paul. And I walked in the house and Marian said, you're not going to believe this. You're not going to believe this. And I said, what? Somebody sent us a check for a thousand dollars. We hadn't gone around telling people about what we were going through because everyone was going through this sort of thing at that time. People had their own trials and burdens and we did not want to, you know, burden people like that. We're going to figure this out on our own the way we felt. And so somebody mailed us a check for $1,000. It was a bank check. We still to this day don't know Who did that? I have no idea. We paid our mortgage, and the next month it came due, and God provided again, and the next month, and the next month, and the next month. What I'm saying to you is not to give instead of paying your mortgage. Don't miss my point here. My point is, well, my point is Paul's point. Look with me at 2 Corinthians chapter 9. Second Corinthians chapter nine. My point is simply this. If you are faithful and generous with your money to God. God will respond to your faith. And he will provide what you need. Paul says, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. And whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. This is verse six. This is not the prosperity gospel. This is not a give to get scheme. I know those men. I grew up in that church. This is not that. If you think this is a give to get scheme, you're totally wrong. Because God knows your motivation in giving. You're not going to con him. And yet, Paul says, if you sow bountifully, you will reap bountifully. This isn't the prosperity gospel. This is simply a kingdom principle God has put in place for his people. But if you are miserly and you sow sparingly, you will reap sparingly, which is why the stupidest thing you can do if you are poor is not give. Which is also why if you're rich and you give out of your abundance, but you don't give sacrificially, you're asking for poverty. Because what you have has been given to you. There are no self-made men in the church. It is God who determines what you have. It is God who provides the talent you use in order to make a living. It's God who does all of these things. He has given you the opportunity as a steward to steward his resources. And he is, in fact, testing you by the way you manage those resources. And he wants you to know that Jesus is not merely Lord over your spiritual life, but he is Lord over your relationships, he is Lord over your work, and he is Lord over your bank account. You can't serve two lords. Either he is Lord or he's not. He won't play second fiddle. But if you recognize the lordship of Christ and you're faithful. He will bless you, Paul says, verse seven, each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, meaning Paul recognized that there was no law that was binding upon the Christian conscience, forcing people to give. No, each one must give as he has decided in his heart. Not what he has decided in public, talking to people. No, this is a private matter. And he has to do that not reluctantly. If you're reluctant in your giving, don't give. What's the point? This isn't about money. This is not about money. This is about who your God is. This is about whether or not you are a worshiper of the living God or an idolater. Not reluctantly, not under compulsion. For God loves a cheerful giver. To the unregenerate mind, that is an oxymoron. When do people cheer in our culture? They cheer when they get money, not when they give money. I saw an advertisement for a casino in Connecticut, one of these casinos closer to the coast and there was money pouring out of the, you know, whatever the slot machine is and people are happy and, you know, they're having this great time because they're getting paid. Not in reality, that's an ad and everyone knows that casinos are making merchandise of you should you go there. People get happy when they get paid, they don't get cheerful when they give, but God's kingdom is an upside down kingdom. And in this kingdom. Because you've been redeemed from both sin, death and the devil, and because you have been given the righteousness of Christ and union with Christ and peace with God, because of that, you give cheerfully because. All of these things pale in comparison to the infinite worth of knowing Christ Jesus. You give cheerfully, joyously. Because you recognize that your treasure isn't in dollars and cents. And so you give bountifully, cheerfully, you give, you should give of your first fruits. Why? Because he first loved us. And some of the questions that I get asked, like, One question I got recently is, should I tithe my gross or my net? If you're asking questions like that, I don't want you to give. If that's your mindset, do something else with your money. Buy a boat or something because you'll be better off. If you think this is about the amount of money, as I said, you've got it all wrong because this is about your heart. This is about your faith and trust in God. This is a very visceral means that God has provided to test you. And it just so happens that you can see whether or not you pass the test right away. There's a built-in metric for this test. And so Paul says, verse eight, and God is able to make all grace abound to you. That is to say, Paul is calling money here grace. Why? Because it's a gift. You're not owed it. He's able to make it all abound to you so that having all sufficiency in all things, Oh, oh, oh, what is he getting at? He's saying, if you give sacrificially to God, you will abound. So that at all times. You may abound in every good work. And so you give sacrificially out of a heart of worship that says, Jesus is my greatest treasure. And God responds to your faithfulness by blessing you exceedingly and abundantly. This is not, again, a get rich quick scheme. This is simply the kingdom principle that God has put within his holy word. And so Jesus holds this woman, going back to Mark 12, holds this poor widow, who from all external metrics hasn't given much at all, holds her out to you and I as the example. And he, by virtue of inscripturating this passage, calls us to be just like this poor widow. Everyone looking at this poor widow would look at this pathetic scene and, you know, feel sympathetic embarrassment for this widow. Meanwhile, all these ballers are going in there dumping their vast quantities of money. Jesus says, this woman gave more than them all. Jesus is telling you this morning, be like this woman. It's obviously not about the amount of money because she barely put anything in there. It is about her heart. The fact that she was trusting God with everything she had. It's about the fact that she recognized his sovereign lordship over her life. Here's my fourth implication. The tendency among us because of our hard and slow hearts is to worry about money should we become sacrificial givers. And we got a Bible passage for that, don't we? Jesus' Sermon on the Mount says, don't worry. Don't worry about the things you're going to put on your body or the food you're going to put in your stomach or the shelter above your head. What does he say? Consider the birds. Because his eye is on the sparrow, isn't it? And he feeds the birds, doesn't he? They working hard for that food? Are you not worth more than a bird? He's told you you are because he gave his son for you. Consider the lilies of the field. Jesus says they're arrayed in such splendor, better than even Solomon. And they're here one day and thrown into the fire. Are you not worth more than they? When he tells you not to worry about money, what he's telling you is that if you will trust God with this part of your life, he will take care of you. Do you believe him? If you don't believe him. You need to go to God in repentance. If this has been one of those areas of your life that you've sort of compartmentalized and you've not desired to trust God in this area, you need to go to God, confess your sin, be forgiven, and be set free. For Christ came into the world to set the captives free, to redeem hearts and minds, and to change who you are. But when you respond by confessing your sin, Don't build up again the sin that God has destroyed in your life. There is something inherently freeing about not worrying about money. There is something inherently freeing about depending upon God for what you have and what you need. You don't worry about the things of the world. You're not worried about whatever your retirement account or your savings account says. None of that matters. None of that matters, which is why I get so frustrated when I hear these guys go on TV or on the radio or something like, there's one guy, you know, he's always better than he deserves. You know what I'm talking about. Talking about how you need to generate wealth. You don't need to generate wealth. You need to generate faith. Stop listening to those people. You don't need to hear that. You don't need a big bank account. You need a big heart for the people of God. You need your soul to be filled with the word of God. You could have no savings account, no retirement account, not a dime like this woman and be richer than them all. Jesus says she gave them more than the rest because she gave out of her poverty. The worst sin in America is to be poor. God says that's not a sin to him. When we embrace the Lordship of Christ over our possessions, recognizing that all we have has come from him, we are set free from the temptation to value this world like it's all we live for. We're set free to live with an open hand so that God can put in and take out as he sees fit. We're set free to be generous and meet the needs of others as he provides to us bountifully. We're set free to give and see the gospel go to the nations. We're set free as God protects us from what is the root of all evil. And God says he loves the cheerful giver. There's not many verses in the Bible that talk like that. There's like 24 verses where God specifically says, I love this person. He says, this is one of those people. I love the cheerful giver. I love them. Why does the father love those people? Because like a little child, he puts their life in his hand and he honors that faith and blesses them for it. I hope you'll think about these things. Let us pray.