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The Widow’s Offering

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 21, 1907

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 84, No. 8.

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The Widow’s Offering

By J. S. WASHBURN

How natural it is for men to seek to hold this world with one hand, and to reach after the next with the other. The gift of God was costly. He gave us his most precious, priceless possession, his only begotten Son; and yet how many consider that they have really given when they have an abundance left! This is not the Scripture principle of giving.
“And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury: and many that were rich cast in much. And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing. And he called his disciples, and said unto them, Verily I say unto you that this poor widow hath cast more in than all they which have cast into the treasury.” Why?—“For all they did cast in of their abundance; but she of her want did cast in all that she had, even all her living.”
This poor widow had but two mites. She gave both to the Lord. She did not give one, and keep the other. What a misapprehension of this touching Bible story do those have who give, we will say, one dollar, and call it the “widow’s mite.” Remember, brother, there was not one, but two mites. She gave both. If you have given but one, have you followed the example of the widow, which Jesus commended? Where is the other mite? Have you kept it for yourself?
How can one who could easily give one hundred times as much claim to have given as this poverty-stricken widow in Israel gave? Remember that God measures not the gift as men measure, but by what you have left, and what it has cost you to give; and the blessing is in proportion to the sacrifice.
The glorious Saviour calls his sons in the last day who have made a covenant with him by sacrifice. The widow’s two mites given by every Seventh-day Adventist, would doubtless raise one hundred times as much as is now being given by our people in all the annual and special offerings combined. Before the Lord comes, we shall certainly give the widow’s two mites.
J. S. WASHBURN.