The Widow's Gift

We’ve all heard sermons on Mark 12:41-44, about how Jesus pointed out how a poor widow’s miniscule gift was more than everyone else’s offerings. Jesus told His disciples, that she had “put in everything—all she had to live on.”

My question is how did Jesus know that this was all she had? Her poverty might have been obvious, but how did Jesus know that she gave everything? The answer is God knows everything and this snapshot reinforces Jesus' claim to be God.

Even though this story is only two paragraphs long, it tells us something very important about God and us. This incident doesn’t give us much detail about the widow. We don’t know anything about her life before this moment and we don’t know anything about her after this incident. We don’t know if this widow was young or old. We don’t know if this widow had young children to feed. We don’t know if she was blessed of God for her giving or if the LORD took her home shortly after she had given everything she had to live on. We don’t even know her name.

But this we do know—she is immortalized on the pages of Scripture. Centuries after she died, we are still reading and reflecting on her giving. We also know that Jesus (God) does not speak directly to her, but Jesus (God) speaks highly about her and commends her in the presence of others.

We may not have a lot of information about the poor widow. But this we know, God sees and God knows. Isn’t this good enough when we think about our relationship with our God?