Mark 12:38-44
38 As he taught, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces 39 and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! 40 They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”
41 He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. 42 A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. 43 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. 44 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.”
Remembrance Day is a time where we remember all those who have made sacrifices and are continuing to make sacrifices in the face of great evil so that others in this world may have the chance to experience freedom and love. We have many holidays and celebrations throughout the year, but Remembrance Day is one of those few occasions where our culture takes time to really remember the lives of those who make our life possible. Perhaps you are keeping in mind this morning a relative, a friend, an acquaintance or those currently at war in our world. You may be thinking about or remembering their war stories, the good and the bad, and maybe you too recount those stories with children and grandchildren, the generation of tomorrow, to help them remember. It’s hard to imagine as somewhat of a younger person, that we (and especially those younger than me) are a future come to fruition, the future of which many people of my grandparents generation gave their lives to make sure would one day be a reality. We don’t often think about how regular people who fought in the wars of yesterday were trying to make sure that you and me would have the opportunity to freely gather here today, to be able to peacefully go about lives. Just as they served for unknown people, so too we here remember them with unknown names. We remember them with poppies, we remember them with music and prayer, we remember them with silence.
Yet our scripture this morning invites us to remember them in another way as well. ‘The Widow’s Mite’ the story is often known as. The story of a poor widow who gave her whole life to God with just two copper coins. There is nothing especially unique about her, she appears to be a common person, and all we know about her is that she was very poor. How did her husband die? Did she have any children? What did she do all that day before she came to the treasury? So much we will never know. And what a contrast she is when compared to the scribes whom Jesus describes in much detail; we know so much about them. We know what they wear, we know how they socialize, where they sit in banquets and synagogues, and how they pray. So much detail about people Jesus wants us to ‘Beware of...”.
We tend to remember more about people who are in the spotlight than those who aren’t. When politicians die they lie in state, but when a common soldier passes we may never know about it, never even know their name. The people in Jesus’ time greeted those in certain offices with a higher respect than those who made simple donations to the temple treasury, and we too tend to be more in awe of titles and positions than those who live simple lives with short resumes. Yet, it is the widow who Jesus wants us to watch, not the others, not the scribes, not the politicians; watch the common widow and remember.
When the widow walks up to the treasury and puts in all she has left, her donation will go unnoticed, it is very small compared to others, her donation will never be spoken about or receive praise like other donations will, yet Jesus tells us her offering is worth even more because she is poor, because after giving it she has nothing left, because in these hardships that no one will ever know about her she is still choosing one thing: hope. And she chooses hope not for praise or glory, but because she believes in it! This widow’s offering reflects nothing but complete hope in God.
Through generations and generations, ‘common people’ encountered immense hardships, wars, famines, lethal forms of discrimination, and each time their sacrifices gave way to the future that has come to be. So many people have dropped their two copper coins into the treasury, handing it all over to something bigger than themselves, something more immense than their present situation, and they did so with hope for the future.
Now you all might be too young to remember, but the 1940s may have been the best decade for music in the 20th century. And many of the best songs from that time came out of the war period, and no voice carried that time better than Vera Lynn, the Forces’ Sweetheart as she was known. You’re probably all familiar with her “We'll meet again, Don't know where Don't know when But I know we'll meet again some sunny day”. She also sang and made famous The White Cliffs of Dover. “The song was written by Nat Burton about a year after the Royal Air Force and German Luftwaffe aircraft had been fighting over southern England, over the white cliffs of Dover, in what is known as the Battle of Britain. The lyrics looked toward a time when the war would be over, and peace would rule over the iconic white cliffs, which were Britain's symbolic border with the European mainland.” The lyrics go:
There'll be bluebirds over
The white cliffs of Dover
Tomorrow, just you wait and see.
There'll be love and laughter
And peace ever after
Tomorrow, when the world is free.
The shepherd will tend his sheep
The valley will bloom again
And Jimmy will go to sleep
In his own little room again.
There'll be bluebirds over
The white cliffs of Dover
Tomorrow, just you wait and see.
This song, like so many during that time, was a ballad about hope in the midst of chaos, it was a bold claim that with bombs coming down around them, tomorrow there would be peace above. Hope plays a more special role in the common soldier or widow than it ever does with those who sit in higher offices.
‘Tomorrow, just you wait and see’. We are the tomorrow that they just waited to see. We are the treasury that previous generations have dropped their coins into. And maybe, we can remember them not just in ceremony, but by also embracing the fact that we are now the generation who has two coins in our hands, we are the ones with a future that has not yet happened, with a people who are yet unborn. Will they look back on us, and how we met the battles of today, wars around the world, the rise of fascist and tyrannical movements in our politics, a climate that’s rapidly affecting our lives and say ‘beware of our ancestors for they gave only out of abundance and did not build the world for something greater than themselves’, or will they say, ‘let us remember our ancestors, for they gave everything they had for us, and built this world with something greater in mind’? Feel those coins in your hands, feel the preciousness and weight they bear. If you give them to the future people may never know who you are or why you did it, but your efforts and sacrifices will never be forgotten. There’s something at work in the universe, our lives may be a blink of an eye in the scheme of things, but through our actions, we see that God has helped humans in ages past, and God will continue to help humans in ages to come. So on this Remembrance Day, let us remember not only with poppies, music and prayer, and silence, but let us also remember with our faith and with our actions that show we believe there is hope for tomorrow, there really is, just you wait and see.
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