The lectionary does not give us stories of women very often. And often, when there are stories of women, they are behaving in an unusual or odd manner like the two women we hear about today. These two give up their money without thought for their own survival. I can imagine being faced with these stories, a lot of pastors looked at the passage from Mark and said to themselves, what a wonderful time to preach about stewardship for the story has stewardship written all over it. We should all emulate the widow, the one who is not given a name but is praised by Jesus for being very generous. Thinks about this, they may say: she gives all that she had to live on, not just a tithe of 5 or 10 percent of her salary, but 100 percent. We should all do likewise, giving all that we can to our church until it hurts because Jesus wants us to be just like the widow.
Now you know by now that I like to point out and debunk problematic interpretations and this is clearly one of them. There is a big problem with this interpretation and we can see it as we unpack it.
Where do you see any suggestion at all in the text that Jesus thinks it's a wonderful thing for this poor widow to put her last two coins in the Temple treasury, going away destitute? I could not find it anywhere in the text because it just isn't there.
Now you can breathe a sigh of relief that you are not going to be asked to give more money to the church right now, but before you get too comfortable, we have to ask what the text actually is trying to say to us. And what the text does say is not easy to talk about or easy to engage with.
I think that both the Hebrew scripture text and the gospel are asking us to look at who and what we trust, where our security lies. If we look at who the characters in the text trusts, there are a number of answers. We can start with the scribes and religious leaders, who put their trust in themselves. They walked around in their long robes, to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets!
Their robes gave them the attention they need and they are smart enough to turn that attention into influence so they could get the money they need. They knew that by doing those things, they would not be hungry. There is a certain security in knowing that you can do what you need to do in order to make sure you survive, that you will have what you need to take care of yourself. But is that really secure?
They, like us, know that even though things may be good now, it can change. Many of us may have found that out first hand when the economy shifted not too long ago. All of sudden the security we felt turns to anxiety as our job and/ or our pay is cut. Suddenly we are not as comfortable and we start to worry about money. Figuring out where the money is going to come from so the bills can get paid becomes our main concern. And we become anxious trying to figure out how to help ourselves, because we can’t ask for help in a society that tells us to pick ourselves up by our bootstraps. Asking for help would make it look like we were inept, not capable, not responsible and bring us to a whole level of vulnerable we are not familiar with and do not want to become familiar with.
But what if things could be different, what if we really could ask for help and have it be alright?
What if that asking for help could bring us to a new level of trust and community? A friend recently shared with me her story of when she was poor. She reminded me of the anxiety people feel when they are just on the edge of losing their money. Losing your money we think is the worst thing we could ever experience. But she did. And she discovered new things about herself. When you have no money, the anxiety of losing it no longer exists. You learn that not only is it ok to ask for help, but it is a matter of survival. It is matter of not just looking out for number one, but learning to share with others and let them help you.
I have witnessed how this works first-hand. I went on a street retreat with the Faithful Fools in
San Francisco.
-form community while standing in line
-barter system for what they need

-learn to live without what they do not need
They have a different level of security that the religio us leaders of Jesus’ time and perhaps what we ourselves have. They learned to trust their community, not just themselves. They learn that sometimes, picking your neighbor up by their bootstraps, picks you up as well. I think this is what the widow experienced. She put the money in the treasury to take care of her responsibility to the temple knowing that the community should take care of her for the Jewish community was often told to take responsibility for the widows. The text does not tell us what happened to her after that, but I would like to think that Jesus called the community to take on their responsibility to care for her.
So we have two places of placing trust, yourself or your community. The story of widow interacting with Elijah raises the place of trust even higher, into trust of God. The widow was fearful that she was near death because she was almost out of food. Elijah asked her to make him some food, and then told her: “Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and your son. 14 For thus says the God of Israel: The jar of meal will not be emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that God sends rain on the earth.” 15 She went and did as Elijah said, so that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. 16 The jar of meal was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil fail, according to the word of God spoken by Elijah. The widow was further assured about trusting God when Elijah healed her son who became ill and was near death.
We may think it strange to be asked to trust God. What does that mean? There are no easy answers. Howard Thurman wrote an attempt to answer.
But I must let go of everything.
I must let go of everything but God.
But God--May it not be
That God is in all the things to which I cling?
That may be the hidden reason for my clinging.
It is all very puzzling indeed. When I say
"I must let go of everything but God"
What is my meaning?
I must relax my hold on everything that dulls my sense of Him,
That comes between me and the inner awareness of His Presence
Pervading my life and glorifying
All the common ways with wonderful wonder.
"Teach me, O God, how to free myself of dearest possessions,
So that in my trust I shall find restored to me
All I need to walk in Thy path and to fulfill Thy will.
Let me know Thee for myself that I may not be satisfied
With aught that is less."
So today it appears we have a choice. We can continue to rely only ourselves and continue to be stressed out and anxious or do we open ourselves enough to let others help us. To trust anything or anyone other than ourselves or our family is not easy. But there are people in lives who love to help if we ask them, or step out the way enough to let them help. We will falter and we may pick ourselves up or we may find that we are picked up by others. Perhaps letting ourselves be picked up by others will bring us closer to them. And most importantly, we have a
God who is patient, who knows how we struggle and who walks with us in that struggle. And perhaps letting God pick us up will ever deepen our relationship with the one who loves us

through all our mistakes just as we are. And then who knows what we could accomplish together.