My Two Cents

Our church has been going through a stewardship campaign for the past few weeks. Reverend Dudley, has encouraged us with the statement- "every member, a mission." He's challenged us to think and pray through the work that God is calling us to do- so that we might build the Kingdom of God right here, right now, and meet Christ in doing so. It's been an excellent challenge.

Yesterday, he finalized his "campaign speeches" with a sermon about the widow who gives everything that she has to the temple. Many others pass before her placing large offerings in the plate, but Jesus commends her because her small gift- only two cents- is all she has to offer. Reverend Dudley made the point that even those two coins would have been given to her. Widows had no way to support themselves. She couldn't have worked to earn the money she whole-heartedly returned to the house of God.

As he does every Sunday, Reverend Dudley, sent us out with a challenge and a blessing. May we unclinch our fists and whole-heartedly offer back to God what He has blessed us with, because it isn't ours anyway.

There are so many ways that this story can take form in our lives. But yesterday, I saw it materialize for me in an unexpected way. Not for the first time, I received a communication that accused me and Andy of ongoing unforgiveness.

This accusation, and others similar to it, has destroyed my heart over the years. I believed them, rather than what God was clearly saying to me, and I entered into the soul-destroying, joy-consuming, lie-based death spiral. God has recently been working so hard to bring me up out of that pit and replace lies with the truth.

But it's hard to not want to defend myself. To give someone else your "two cents" and explain your side of the story. There is a time for very clearly explaining boundaries to one another. We cannot thrive outside of the freedom and truth God gives each of us as His children. We have to learn to advocate clearly and respectfully and then to listen well in order to be generous and sincerely love one another. Crushing one another with our expectations and ignoring one another's needs is not what God intends when He asks us to live in unity in the bond of peace.

But, once you create that boundary line, you're left to maintain its integrity- just you and the Lord and the people that He has put in your corner. Doing so is costly, because it means receiving those accusations from time to time, even from well-meaning brothers and sisters in the faith. Tough love and obedience to God's wisdom can look cruel or wrong from the outside. Sometimes obeying God costs you your "good" reputation.

That's been one of the hardest parts for me. Losing my reputation. Losing the opportunity to be seen as someone kind and loving and who loves the Lord and wants to obey Him whole-heartedly. Instead, I've been given a reputation that's pretty shameful and heart-breaking. But what I am learning, is that I need to offer to the Lord my "two cents"- to give back to Him the real identity that He is giving to me. To trust Him with the transformed woman that He has been so meticulously creating through this trial. He alone knows the value of what He has made and is making still.

So, I unclinch my fists. I am who He says I am. Nothing more. Nothing less. I offer my reputation , my true identity, to Him. For certainly He is the One who has given it to me. I didn't work for it or create it. It's been received. And I give it back to Him. Let the accusations come. Let the desire to defend myself die. Let Him do with my reputation what seems good to Him. I have come to trust Him completely.