Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time B

Image: Ruth Agmon, Ruth and Naomi - the Dialog,
from Art in the Christian Tradition, 
a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN.

November 8, 2015

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The noise of the coins would have been telling.

Thirteen trumpet-shaped receptacles surrounded the outer court of the Temple.

The sound of coins being placed in the containers would have echoed in the Temple area and announced to those present the potential size of the donation.

Large ones would have sounded loudly, while the smallest of coins would have been barely audible.

As Jesus watched the crowds putting money in the treasury, he could hear what the rich  contributed as well as what the widow offered.

Jesus had no direct contact with the widow, but he noticed her offering of two of the smallest coins, just enough to buy her a little bread.

Today's Gospel tells of a widow found in a place she didn't seem to belong among the rich and well dressed.

Like a leper or a prostitute, a widow was regarded as an outcast.

She was among the scribes, who received respect and honor in public.

Jesus accused these same scribes of devouring the savings of widows.

This same widow might even have had her savings devoured by these very scribes.

It must have been difficult to go among them to the treasury.

Many of the rich had already put in sizable amounts, and here she was with her pittance.

And yet Jesus recognized her offering as all that she had.

In Mark's Gospel, Jesus demonstrated to his disciples a clear sense of his mission.

He liberated people from demons, sickness, sin, and oppressive laws and traditions.

Nothing kept him from working to bring the reign of God closer to God's people; he was not swayed by public pressure, fear, misapplied tradition or empty

religious authority.

Jesus spoke and acted with courage in his commitment to serve.

And it cost him his life.

Jesus was clear that God's invitation looked very different from what the religious

authorities or even his disciples had come to expect.

God cared what happened to the least. God wanted people to rejoice that others were cured or healed.

This God welcomed the sinner, the forgotten, the outcast and the widows.

This God's reign was very different from what many in authority had predicted.

All of the characters in Mark's Gospel saw the same signs, heard the same words.

All were invited to love others as God had loved them.

Yet loving the way that God loved challenged their ideas of who their neighbor

really was.

It was a big leap — bigger than some could make.

By his example, Jesus showed his disciples that loving this way was possible, but that it also leads to suffering and death.

This was the reign God wanted, but not one the world readily welcomed.

These were not the kinds of relationships that people would rush out to cultivate

God's reign stretched human generosity and notions about the kind of people that God loved.

We have seen the same signs and heard the same words of Jesus in Mark's Gospel all year.

We hear this same invitation to love.

This world, even this God, might be very different from the one we have come to expect.

Today God still seeks the forgotten ones, the disdained and oppressed.

The refugees and immigrants, legal or not.

God searches for the lost and holds the little ones close.

God holds the outcasts with our arms.

God searches with our eyes and heals with our words and our actions.

And God is waiting to hear the sound of our offering.