My Two Very Small Copper Coins' Worth

Mark 12:41-44 -

Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny.

Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on."

Throughout the Bible, God makes it pretty plain that He likes poor people. The ones who are down at the bottom, barely getting by, have a special place in the Heart of God, it seems. Under the Law, God's people were told to care for the poor among them, even if they were foreigners. When God delivered Jesus to the Earth, He chose Nazareth, a little pitstop so insignificant, so looked down upon, that the apostle Nathanael, upon learning the hometown of the Messiah, asked, "Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" (John 1:46)

But what is it about the poor that affords a special place in the Eyes of the Creator? What does it tell us about God when Jesus tells us that the poor widow's seemingly insignificant contribution outweighed the vast sums of the rich?

That last sentence from Jesus explains it all - "They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything - all she had to live on."

This is why Jesus tells us that the rich will have such a hard time getting into Heaven. It's harder for somebody who's got a whole bunch of stuff to get rid of it all. When you've only got one shoebox full of stuff to your name, getting rid of it all isn't as much of a challenge. This is also why the "poor in spirit" are the ones who will inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. When your spirit has already given up - or lost - everything else that stands in the way of its focus on God, He becomes a whole lot easier to get sight of.

Jesus makes it easy, doesn't He? Well, OK... No... "Easy" is the wrong word... Plain. He makes it plain. Time and time again, Jesus spells it out, and it's pretty simple to understand. The only thing God wants from you, the only thing that God will accept from you... is everything.

And that's kinda hard, isn't it?

Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them He said:

"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be My disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow Me cannot be My disciple.

"Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.'

"Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Will he not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be My disciple."

- Luke 14:25-33

Again, Jesus makes it plain. If you're not in it all the way, you're not in it at all. There are plenty of times where Jesus spells this out - when speaking to the church at Laodicea, through John, in the book of Revelation, He tells us that being lukewarm is worse than being hot or cold, and the synoptic gospels all contain variations on the phrase, "He who is not with me is against me."

The thing is... Deciding to take on Christianity isn't like ordering one of those multi-volume CD sets off of TV. You can't "keep only the ones you want" or "cancel at anytime" and expect everything to work out. (Also, there's no Dokken.)

So how are we supposed to take all of this "hate" speech? Hate my mother? Hate my father? My sister? Myself? Doesn't that invalidate "Love your neighbor as yourself"?

"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of Me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it."

- Matthew 10:37-39

Well, I guess I just answered my own set of entirely rhetorical questions... But I think it's worth noting that Luke's account still uses the word "hate," and that's still... Yeah, that's still really hard to handle, isn't it?

Here's how I think about it: my favorite movie of all time is Ghostbusters. I've seen it more times than I could possibly count, I've got the whole thing memorized, and I still bust a gut laughing every single time I watch it. I have never said no to watching Ghostbusters when somebody else asks, but at the same time, it's not the only movie I'll ever watch. Yes, it is far and away the winner, but sometimes I'm really in the mood for Blade Runner. Just because I'm watching Blade Runner doesn't mean I don't still love Ghostbusters, does it? Of course not.

But what if I could only choose one movie to watch for the rest of my life?

Well, I guess I would never see the "tears in the rain" monologue again, because Ghostbusters would win that fight in a heartbeat.

That example seems silly, because it only takes two hours to watch a movie, and there's nothing stopping us from watching all the movies we can manage to fit in. But I hope it still illustrates the point. Blade Runner is one of my favorite movies of all time. It's seriously in the top five. But compared to Ghostbusters...? I might as well hate it. I might as well have never seen it. It might as well not exist.

I love my parents. I love my sister. But compared to Jesus? They're nothing.

I kinda like being alive. It has its moments, at least. But compared to Jesus? I am such an insignificant mote of dust, barely a speck of existence, a fleeting thought in the mind of the Creator.

So if ever it came down to choosing between my family and my Savior... Jesus says I have to hate my family. If it ever came down to choosing between my own life and my Savior... Jesus says I even have to hate my own life.

Taking up the cross is not exercise. Jesus took up His cross and then died on it. That wasn't a surprise. When the Roman soldiers shoved the big, heavy cross onto His back, there was no mistaking what it was for. He knew that this was to be the instrument of His torture, His execution.

Carrying your cross means you know that you are going to face humiliation. Carrying your cross means you know that you are going to be persecuted. Carrying your cross means you know that your life is over, that you are dead, that nothing will ever be the same.

Carrying your cross means giving up everything.

Even down to the last two very small copper coins.

And that is a TERRIBLY frightening thing. It's a terribly HARD thing. It's so against everything that we feel makes up who we are. A complete denial of the self is so mind-bogglingly difficult because our selves are kind of a big deal to us! They're the only things we really know!

And it is in that fear, in that moment of realization that following Christ means being willing to sacrifice everything that makes up who we are, that Jesus comes in with one of my favorite verses in all of the Bible... Matthew, chapter 10, verse 39: "Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it."

Jesus is telling us - in the plainest words that He can possibly use for a concept that is so absolutely foreign and incomprehensible, down to contradicting our very instincts for self-preservation and survival - that the only way life works is by following Him to the point of death. Not to the point of tears, not to the point of pain, and not to the point of the threat of death. But to death. To the very loss of our own lives.

Because when we die to ourselves, when we have finally, with God's help, slain the creature of sinful nature and replaced it with the Spirit of Pure, True, and Holy Love, then we will understand the full reality and awesome presence of God. That is when we will truly understand what "life" is, because we will be wholly absorbed into the all-encompassing holiness of the Creator and Sustainer of all Life. And that is something I cannot wait to experience.

So I say we'd best get busy dying.