In Giving, We Receive
Children's sermon
Illustration
Preaching
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Dear Fellow Preacher,
Two widows and St. Francis play important roles in this issue of The Immediate Word, which centers on the art of giving.
No pastor and no congregation can avoid the topic of stewardship, and this week's lectionary, especially the alternate First Reading, 1 Kings 17:8-16, and the Gospel, Mark 12:38-44, are opportune springboards for reflection on the subject. In our lead article, Carlos Wilton comments on these two lections and suggests ways the preacher might approach the subject in a sermon. He also shows the ambiguity in the experience of joy in giving: Do we give because it makes us feel good and causes us to think we'll be rewarded? Or is it possible to give out of more altruistic motives? And does the motive really matter?
As usual, we include responses from team members, illustrations, worship resources, and a children's sermon-all related to the art of giving.
In Giving, We Receive
by Carlos Wilton
1 Kings 17:8-16; Mark 12:38-44
The Message on a Postcard
Charitable giving is down. Many pastors have sensed this trend for some time, but now the statistics confirm it: donations to the country's largest charities dropped in 2002. This is the first time in a dozen years this has happened, according to a survey recently published by The Chronicle of Philanthropy. (See the full article at http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v16/i02/02002801.htm; it is also reported in the New York Times, October 27, 2003: "Charitable Giving Falls for First Time in Years," by Greg Winter; http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/27/national/27CHAR.html.)
November is when many churches conduct their annual stewardship campaigns. Now, more than ever, it's vital for preachers to address the subject of giving from the pulpit-and to do so in a positive, encouraging way.
Two of this week's lectionary passages, both of which tell of women who take bold risks in their giving, provide excellent opportunities for positive, affirming stewardship messages. First Kings 17:8-16 is the story of Elijah and the widow of Zarephath; Mark 12:38-44 is the story of the widow's mite.
The title for this article, "In Giving, We Receive," taken from the beloved "Prayer of St. Francis," expresses a great spiritual truth. The widow of Zarephath comes to know that spiritual truth as she fulfills the ancient laws of hospitality, setting out scarce food for her guest. The widow in Mark's Gospel, dropping her last two copper coins into the temple treasury, likewise demonstrates that giving is pure joy. Christians give not in order to receive something in return-a quid pro quo-but rather because the act of giving itself is a joy.
Some Words on the Word
First Kings 17:8-16
"When elephants fight, the grass suffers." So goes an old African proverb. As today's passage from 1 Kings 17 opens, a certain widow of Zarephath and her son are like the trampled grass. The dueling "elephants" are Yahweh and Baal, who are contending for the people's loyalty.
Yahweh's weapon of choice against the fertility god is a drought. The widow of Zarephath, and all the people of that region besides, risk starvation until the cosmic contest is decided. Elijah has abruptly appeared at the beginning of this chapter, with no introduction provided; the author conveys us directly into the thick of the narrative. The first thing we hear of the prophet is his announcement to Ahab, "There shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word" (17:1). Elijah is very evidently a powerful prophetic figure. Not only does he announce the coming drought, but in v. 6 we learn he's exempt from its effects: the ravens feed him twice a day, and-at least until the nearby wadi dries up-he drinks from its stream.
Once the wadi does dry up, God sends him to Zarephath. This Gentile city, along the coast near the mighty Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon, is close to the ancestral home of Jezebel (perhaps there's some significance to the location: Yahweh sends Elijah to work wonders among the evil queen's own people).
By all normal standards of the day, the widow of Zarephath would have no standing in the eyes of an Israelite male: she is (1) a foreigner, (2) a woman, and (3) a widow. Yet Elijah is God's agent, and God is concerned for the welfare of the poor and lowly, so that is where God's servant obediently follows.
As John Gray puts it in his commentary on 1-2 Kings in The Old Testament Library series (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964), "The position of widows and orphans without a breadwinner or male protector was precarious. Levirate marriage, i.e., with the brother of the deceased husband, was not designed primarily to relieve the widow, but to provide an heir to the name and property of the dead man. Thus a childless widow was the responsibility of the family, but a widow-mother, as the woman of Zarephath, had no such provision, save by charity" (p. 380).
One of the homiletical dilemmas of this text is the way Elijah treats the widow, as he first meets her. Rather than responding sensitively to her suffering, he imposes on her an obligation to feed him. In a scene reminiscent of the sufferings of Hagar and Ishmael (Exodus 21:17), the widow and her son are about to abandon themselves to starvation; yet the prophet of Yahweh, rather than feeding them, seems ready to snatch the last morsel from their mouths. (While this sounds harsh to modern ears, in this primitive pastoral culture that cherishes hospitality as the most solemn of obligations, it's not so strange.)
Along with her visitor's demand for food, however, comes a surprising promise. If the widow risks giving Elijah all she has, he declares, then God will bless her with an unlimited supply of food. The widow is obedient, and as a result she's blessed with a veritable cornucopia.
In the passage that follows this week's pericope, Elijah does even more for the widow of Zarephath: he raises her son, who has just died from a terrible illness. As Abraham bargained with Yahweh for the lives of the faithful few in Sodom (Genesis 18:22ff.), so Elijah bargains for the life of this young boy. Boldly he chides Yahweh for bringing "calamity" upon his host, who has offered him hospitality. Yahweh relents, the boy is saved, and the prophet is spared any shame for having neglected his obligations as guest. The widow, amazed, speaks the benediction that ends the episode: "Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth" (17:24).
Mark 12:38-44
The Gospel reading for this week has undoubtedly been matched with the Old Testament reading because of the similarity of the two stories: both contain a destitute widow as a main character, and both have to do with sacrificial giving.
The Markan story of the widow's mite follows hard on the heels of Jesus' denunciation of the false piety of the scribes (12:38-40). The widow's story is one of extravagant generosity, that Jesus contrasts with the story of the religious authorities, whose response is calculated legalism.
It is well to beware, here, of any slide into anti-Semitism. While Jesus condemns the scribes, he is certainly upholding the principles of the law, as explained by Richard I. Deibert: "We must never accuse Mark of condemning Judaism. He most certainly is not. And we most certainly must not. In its chastisement of the various offices within first-century Temple Judaism, the New Testament skirts along the edge of anti-Semitism. Because of this, many in the church have fallen off this edge and have seen in the New Testament a wholesale condemnation of Jewish faith. Nothing has been (and could be) more disastrous for Christianity than this. Suffice it to say, the New Testament provides glimpses that both confirm Christianity's enthusiastic embrace of the core tenets of Jewish faith and admonish Christianity's ongoing observance of the tenets of Judaism" (Mark [Interpretation Bible Commentary; Louisville: Geneva Press, 1999], p. 79).
R. G. Bratcher and E. A. Nida, in A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark (New York: United Bible Societies, 1961, rev. 1993), suggest that the offering-receptacles are "presumably one of the thirteen contribution boxes, or receptacles, in the form of trumpets, with broad bases and narrow openings at the top, which were placed under the colonnade in the Court of the Women. It may be that the particular area, in which the thirteen boxes were placed, was known popularly as the treasury." It would have been hard to drop a coin into one of those elaborate receptacles without making a distinctive sound.
The widow's "small copper coins" were known as lepta (singular, lepton). It was the smallest coin in circulation at the time, which some have valued at 1/96 of a denarius. Many modern readers have come to know it as a "mite"-from the King James Version, which speaks of "two mites, which make a farthing."
The fact that there are two coins, rather than one, is significant. If there had been but one, it could be said that the woman-in giving the smallest gift imaginable-was simply complying with the minimal requirements of the law. (Actually, she would have been giving much more than that, since one of her two coins would have amounted to 50% of her money, a quintuple tithe!) Since there are two coins, however, she clearly has the choice of giving one and keeping the other for herself. As Lamar Williamson suggests, no one would have faulted her for that: "Jesus contrasts her gift with those of the rich, who were placing large sums into the Temple treasury. Theirs were probably calculated gifts, guided by the law of the tithe and a long tradition of how it was to be figured. Hers surely was not: she might have kept one of the two coins but did not ... Jesus might have scolded the woman for lack of prudence in giving both coins or for lack of discretion in giving them to this decadent religious establishment. Instead, he praises her highly" (Mark [Interpretation Bible Commentary; Atlanta: John Knox, 1983], p. 234).
In Mark's version, this story occurs at the very end of Jesus' public ministry. It is fitting that the story of the widow's sacrificial gift precedes the story of Jesus' sacrificial gift of his own life.
A Map of the Message
Both the Old Testament and the Gospel this week are tried-and-true stewardship texts. A significant portion of our listeners will have heard them many times: not just in general, but also with respect to this specific topic, that of financial stewardship. The challenge for many of us preachers will become not to find something to say but rather to find something fresh to say.
There are times, however, when it's best not to chase too energetically after novelty. Stewardship is a "tough sell" to many of our listeners. Nearly every waking hour, they're bombarded with communications exhorting them to consumer spending: communications which unaplogetically promote a sense of entitlement. With but one hour a week that we have the privilege of speaking to them, it's hard to compete.
I suggest starting with the statistics about declining charitable giving (see "The Message on a Postcard," above). Pose the question, "Why has giving fallen off?" Some of our listeners may be inclined to respond with that political mantra of several years back: "It's the economy, stupid!"
Or is it? Economic downturn notwithstanding, all of us live in a society vastly richer than the one our grandparents inhabited. This has been documented again and again, so many times and in so many ways it cannot be questioned. Yet even as our income has gone up, our spending has gone up even faster. As income has climbed, many people's giving to others has decreased-it may perhaps have stayed the same in dollars, but it hasn't kept pace with inflation. One recent study indicated that churchgoing Protestants in America give an average of 2.5 percent of their household income to the church. Now that may sound pretty generous, as an average-until you consider that in the depths of the Great Depression, Protestants gave an average of 3.3 percent of their income. As a people, we're earning more but giving less (Henry G. Brinton, "Faith and Numbers," in the Washington Post, October 10, 1999, p. B2).
We comfort ourselves by explaining, "We just don't have it to give"-when in fact, the standard of living for practically all of us (at least as measured in the creature comforts we enjoy) is higher than ever. If we would all resolve to give to the Lord's work off the top, before the other bills are paid-if we all followed the biblical standard of proportionate giving, in other words-our churches would have no difficulty meeting their program budget, and would have extra money available for all kinds of important mission work besides.
It may be tempting to use the story of the widow of Zarephath-coupled, perhaps, with Jesus' teaching in Luke 6:38 that "the measure you give will be the measure you get back"-as a sort of quid pro quo inducement to give. We've all heard stewardship sermons like that. "Don't worry about whether your gift is too large," this argument goes: "Whatever you give, God will give you back even more. As Elijah blessed the widow with a bottomless grain-jar, so will God bless you if you fill out a pledge card." I remember one television preacher of my childhood, who was a particularly egregious example of this kind of commercial theology. He traded under the name, "Reverend Ike." His followers were always showing up on his TV program, waving car keys and gleefully shouting, "Looky here! Reverend Ike told me to give all I could, and I did, then I woke up the next morning and found a Cadillac in my driveway!" Reverend Ike's appeal to self-interest was particularly crass, and his followers' stories particularly unbelievable, but there are more subtle varieties of his appeal that are equally tempting-and equally wrong.
It is possible, however, to hold up the words of the Prayer of St. Francis-"it is in giving that we receive"-as a stewardship text. As long as we avoid giving the impression that the rewards of giving are financial, it's very possible to encourage giving by emphasizing less tangible rewards. There is the feeling of joy that goes along with making someone happy, for example.
In downtown Seattle a few years back (though it could have been any city in this land) a man was out walking one day, just before Christmas. He came upon one of those Salvation Army kettles. As he approached the volunteer ringing the bell, he felt an unaccustomed spirit of generosity wash over him. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out all his change. He dropped every last coin into the kettle with a smile.
The man turned to leave, but then he stopped. He reached into his back pocket, pulled out his wallet and emptied every last bill into the kettle as well.
Grinning like an idiot, he walked away with a bounce to his step. But about two blocks later, the bounce wore out. Suddenly it hit him! "What have I done?" he asked himself.
The man turned around, walked back to the old woman and asked for his money back. He got it, and left again, walking very quickly this time, head down, looking neither to the right nor the left.
"For two blocks," writes Donel McClellan, a UCC pastor from Bellingham, Washington, who posted this story on the Ecunet computer network, "that man walked in the Kingdom of God. For two blocks he was free of the burden of his possessions. For two blocks he put other people above himself. For two blocks he was self-giving and generous. For two blocks he was blessed ... but, like most of us, he could not stand the uncertainty that goes with that much blessing. He wanted to continue to think that he is in control. He walked back, out of the realm of God and back into the well-worn grooves of his weary world."
Team Comments
Carter Shelley responds:
I've got the stewardship blues and I don't know what to do.
Jesus loves me, God forgives me, but he wants my money too!
-Carter Shelley, 1982 (unfinished country music song written for stewardship season-rejected because it didn't communicate quite the right tone)
Carlos, one of the things that caught my attention immediately in your comments for a stewardship sermon was the statement about charitable giving having fallen off significantly in the past year. I thought this trend had begun several years ago as many computer companies were hard hit by the stock market corrections in values. It seems like the unemployment and job layoffs of blue- and white-collar workers would mean 2003 is yet another year of decreased charitable giving by Americans. For pastors and their stewardship or finance committees, the financial slump may have begun sooner. Thus it's important for each preacher to know the economic patterns and shifts that affect his or her congregation. For example, I have one friend who pastors a church in which every adult in the congregation, with the exception of two people, has been laid off in the past two years or is already retired and struggling to live on a fixed income that provides less support than it did before. In such congregations, financial giving will be difficult this year, and these Christians need to hear of other ways they can give and share their time and talents.
Another thing that strikes me about the decline in charitable giving this year pertains to those who've been generous in the past and cannot be this year. It is so easy for those of us who live middle-class American lives to allow others to do most of the significant giving. Sure, we may buy a magazine subscription from the neighbor's child selling them to raise money for their school or mail a check to our local Public Television station during their fund drive, but few of us are anteing up so much that our failure to give would be noticed. We are used to the Ted Turners, Bill Gates, and U.S. government underwriting social programs and responding with funds to meet crying demands that arise on the international scene. When those and other sources dry up or change their policies, we don't feel any need to attempt to replace them, because, of course, the amounts they have given are beyond our own imagining. But what about the local sources of funding that are drying up due to changes in government policy and city, county, and state financial deficits. We who have never had to offer our last mite, like the widow Jesus praises, may have to evaluate the ways we do spend our money and reorient our giving to help feed and care for people and programs that Christian compassion cannot ignore.
In thinking about the two widows we meet in the First Reading and the Gospel for this week, it may be important to expand our own initial ideas about who widows are today. Paintings in Bibles and placed on the walls of Sunday School classrooms often portray widows as elderly women without beauty or physical strength. Because older women tend to outnumber older men in significant numbers in our congregations, we need to remember that widows come in all ages, shapes, and sizes. While widows were clearly understood by faithful Jews to be persons most in need of God's advocacy and the community's charity, today that category would also include the many unwed and single mothers living in or on the edge of poverty in our own communities. In addition, our current military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq has created a new generation of younger widows and widowers not seen since the Vietnam era.
Thank you for including the St. Francis of Assisi prayer as one of your illustrations. Not all may know that St. Francis began life as a child of wealth and great professional promise who appalled his parents and family by his decision to forsake all of that in order to better serve God and the poor. The Franciscans took very seriously their vows of poverty and simplicity, and by their founder's example understood that in giving of themselves to others, indeed they would receive.
Rather than view Elijah's conduct with the widow as a homiletical dilemma, I confess I am always grateful to learn about the personality and behavior foibles of biblical heroes and heroines. While the written account's intention may have been to further emphasize the goodness and generosity of the widow in the face of personal grief and the insistent demand of an irascible prophet, such revelations better connect the life of this biblical man with that of me and the congregation.
The hospitality factor in this same instance does reflect the generous spirit of the people in that ancient time. Reflecting upon that, I was struck by how different are our American views of hospitality. With people in the ancient Middle East, hospitality was readily extended to traveling strangers who were dependent upon the invitations of people they did not know as they traveled from place to place. Today, travelers can stop at MacDonald's, Wendy's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, or Subway, but such options didn't exist back then. What's remarkable about such openness and welcoming by the widow, Abraham, and the many other biblical examples we've encountered is the willingness to trust a stranger and to share not just one's daily bread, but more often to give the best of what one has to the stranger passing through who stops for a meal or a night repast. From friends who've traveled and lived in Arabic countries in the Middle East today, such as Lebanon, Kuwait, and Egypt, I know that such hospitality continues to be the norm in these societies, and it continues to be shared with strangers, visitors, and tourists who come to their doors.
In contrast, in the United States we rarely invite a stranger or traveler to dinner for fear of danger or getting more involved than we want with someone who's just "passing through." For us, hospitality is what we show towards the potential new faculty member, law partner, associate minister, or church member we hope to recruit. As a rule, hospitality doesn't occur spontaneously. It usually comes as a result of explicit invitations, careful planning of a guest list, menus, house cleaning, and preparation. I even own a book that tells me how to be a good hostess and how to be a good guest. None of the helpful instructions provided take into account raggedy old prophets stopping in for a meal when the cupboard is bare.
The John D. Rockefeller quote you supplied for the illustrations below rings true, not because the spokesman was kind and generous with his own workers, but because of the pattern of discipline and habit that his giving established for his life. Clearly, Osceola McCarty (see the illustrations, below) had a similar discipline and habit to have saved so much while denying herself many of the things the rest of us consider necessities.
Probably the place where stewardship sermon weary preachers can best establish a connection with the congregation this Sunday is through an emphasis upon the positive nature of giving. I have always wondered why the stewardship season couldn't be and feel more like Christmas. Think: Ebenezer Scrooge postconversion in A Christmas Carol. Here was a man so stingy he wouldn't even let his employee have the whole of Christmas day off from work, who through insight into the hollowness of his own life and heart gets converted into a person who gives out of joy and discovery that it is indeed more blessed to give than to hoard. Who among us in any Christian congregation doesn't love the feeling of discovering just the right present to give to someone we love at Christmas or for their birthday? Who hasn't felt the great sense of pleasure and excitement one first felt as a child, when one made or carefully saved money to buy a present for a parent? All of us find joy in giving to those we know and love. Our challenge as Christians is to expand that circle to include people we don't know in order to better serve and enjoy the God whom we do know.
Stan Purdum responds: It occurs to me that not only was Elijah God's agent but so was
the widow who fed him.
Regarding Rev. Ike, a friend of mine used to say that Rev. Ike's contribution to the poor was to make sure he never became one of them. But then I suppose that could be said of many of us. Rev. Ike was just more blatant and enthusiastic about it.
George Murphy responds: I know that some clergy dread having to preach stewardship sermons and have bad memories of stewardship campaigns. That hasn't generally been my experience. But I can share a few stories that I hope will be instructive.
Back in the old days before I went into the ministry, I was a member of the church council of the Lutheran congregation we belonged to and had the task of writing a stewardship message for the congregation. We had just gone through a significant building program, so there were some financial challenges because the budget had increased sharply. Being younger and considerably more naïve back then, I took a straightforward "just the facts" approach. Basically I said, "Our budget for the coming year is X dollars, we have Y active adult members in the congregation, and that works out to a need for each person to give, on the average, X/Y dollars for the year."
I emphasized that of course that was an average and that some people were able to give more than others. Still, a lot of people were upset. "We can't give that much," they complained. What could I say? Here's X, here's Y, and you can do the arithmetic.
I'm no longer so young, no longer a layperson, and no longer quite so innocent. But when it comes to financial stewardship I still think that setting out the facts is a good idea because they are the facts, whether we talk about them or not. In church we tend to talk about money without really talking about it-especially if we've gotten some flak for a stewardship sermon in the past. We use religious jargon like "working in the vineyard" and strange monetary units like "talents" and "mites." What we often need to talk about is working in the church and in the world, and what's needed to do that in dollars.
And sometimes religious jargon gets in the way because people simply don't know what it means. "Tithing" has for some become synonymous with "contributing to the church," so they think that they're tithing if they put an envelope in the plate every week. It may seem embarrassingly obvious, but if you're going to talk about tithing, it probably wouldn't hurt to explain that it means giving ten percent.
No, I'm not suggesting that a stewardship campaign be a straight business proposition. There are distinctive theological and ethical motives for giving. Still, we are talking about giving money and not picking grapes. Preachers often like to quote "The Lord loves a cheerful giver." I think the Lord also loves a realistic giver.
If a stewardship campaign involves pledges for the coming year, there should always be a reminder of the deo volente provision of James 4:13-15. Tell people that if something like unemployment or illness comes up that makes it impossible to fulfill a pledge, all they need to do is notify the church and there will be no expectation that it will be fulfilled. In my first year in a new parish I said this to a stewardship gathering and one man told me afterwards that he's never pledged before because no one had ever told him that, but that this year he would.
A lot of parishioners who don't pay a lot of attention to the lectionary probably think that Mark 12:38-44 is chosen at this time of the year because it's a good stewardship text. Of course that's not the case-it's just the way readings from Mark in this year of the lectionary fall. Still, it is an excellent choice for this theme, with more to it than just a poor person's generosity. This is the last scene in Jesus' public ministry. It's followed by the little apocalypse of Mark 13 as a prelude to the passion narrative (the messianic woes of the church and the world paralleling those of the Messiah himself), and then the account of the betrayal, Last Supper, condemnation, and cross.
And at this point the widow puts into the Temple treasury holon ton bion autes, which NRSV translates as "all she had to live on" but KJV rendered as "even all her living." It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say "her whole life." If these were indeed her last bits of money, she was betting her life on God to care for her as she dropped in those coins. But the words also point forward to the one who quite literally gave his whole life.
That ought to be the ultimate stewardship example-the widow of Zarephath or the widow in the Temple, as important as they are, but the one of whom St. Paul reminds us: "For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich" (2 Corinthians 8:9).
While I've often used one of these "widow" texts for stewardship, I've been reminded that our preaching for this purpose shouldn't overemphasize the role of people who have little. I recall giving one stewardship talk after which the first comment was made by a widow who wasn't especially well to do who said rather sadly, "I just don't think I can give any more." It's often the people who are giving the most, percentage-wise, who feel that they ought to give more. For all that we may have texts about poor widows, our goal is not to get them to put their Social Security in the offering. It's rather to get all our people to realize that following Christ means putting their lives on the line-and that financial offerings are part of that.
Related Illustrations
The Prayer of Saint Francis
O Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, harmony;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light, and
Where there is sorrow, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not
so much seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
* * *
In the book Kitchen Table Wisdom there are repeated accounts of medical patients dealing with cancer diagnosis and treatments. One of the insights that recurs over and over again in its pages is the recognition by individuals who know they are going to die that, in having to let go of this world, they actually come for the first time to value it and treasure life as never before. For us as Christians the challenge is to let go of our own ambitions and needs in order to truly find God and to truly celebrate the many opportunities we have to make Christmas happen all the year round.
* * *
The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried."
-G. K. Chesterton
* * *
I love the Christmas-tide and yet,
I notice this, each year I live:
I always like the gifts I get,
But how I love the gifts I give!
-Carolyn Wells, A Thought
* * *
Jack Stotts, the retired president of Austin Presbyterian Theological seminary, tells a story from the early days of his ministry, when he was serving as a pastor in Texas. Members of the stewardship committee of his church were opening the envelopes that contained pledge cards just received in the fall annual campaign. When they came to the card of Mamie Cades, an elderly member of the church, they were dismayed. The amount seemed far more than Mamie could afford.
Mamie was a tall, homely woman who always wore threadbare, faded dresses that looked to be decades old. She lived by herself in a house that was in terrible repair. Everyone assumed she was poor-which, by most definitions, she was.
"Somebody's got to go talk with Mamie, and tell her she can't afford this gift," they said. "She ought to keep the money; the church doesn't really need it, and she could use it to fix up her place. You go tell her, pastor."
So young pastor Stotts, with some trepidation, went off to do just that. He arrived at Mamie's ramshackle house, and sat down in her parlor. He could hear the wind whistling through cracks in the walls.
Jack told Miss Cades (for he said he would never have dreamed of calling her by her first name, in that place and time) of the stewardship committee's concern.
A look of utter dismay came over her face. "Would you take my joy away from me?" she asked.
-Jack Stotts, in an address to the "Embraced by Abundance" stewardship conference, Phoenix, Arizona, August 2002.
* * *
"What people don't realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket when, of course, it is the cross."
-Flannery O'Connor
* * *
"Love does not arise out of what we have to give, but out of knowing we have nothing to give. It is good to give what we have. But until we give what we have not, we fall short of unconditional love."
-Mike Mason, The Mystery of Children: What Our Kids Teach Us about Childlike Faith (Waterbrook Press, 2001)
* * *
"When we let go of money we are letting go of part of ourselves and part of our security. But this is precisely why it is important to do it. It is one way to obey Jesus' command to deny ourselves ... When we give money we are releasing a little more of our egocentric selves and a little more of our false security ... Giving frees us to care. It produces an air of expectancy as we anticipate what God will lead us to give. It makes life with God an adventure in the world, and that is worth living for and giving for."
-Richard J. Foster, The Challenge of the Disciplined Life
* * *
"Never measure generosity by what you give, but by what you have left."
-Fulton Sheen
* * *
The story of Osceola McCarty is a modern parable of the widow's mite. An African-American from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, Ms. McCarty spent her years from age 11 to age 86 doing other people's laundry. She did it the old-fashioned way: boiling the clothes in cast iron kettles, scrubbing them on wooden scrub boards, using a stick to transfer them through four rinse cycles (four separate kettles of clear water). She would wring the clothes by hand, hang them to dry, then fold and iron them. Ms. McCarty never much liked washing machines: "didn't do the clothes right," she said.
From her very first day of work, Ms. McCarty put a little of what she earned "away." At first, everything that was left over went to her older relatives, and during those years she learned to live frugally. She never spent money on luxuries like soda, never smoked or drank, never bought lottery tickets. When she inherited a little from an aunt, she just added that to her savings.
Officials in a state university in Mississippi were flabbergasted, one day, when Osceola McCarty walked in-an elderly woman they had never met-and offered them her life savings, a quarter of a million dollars, to pay for scholarships for African-American students. She wanted to help those students get the education she had never been fortunate enough to have.
* * *
It had been a hard winter in the Appalachians. Snow had piled up deeper and deeper, the mercury dropped, rivers froze, people suffered. The Red Cross used helicopters to fly in supplies. One crew had been working day after day, long hours. They were on their way home late in the afternoon when they saw a little cabin submerged in the snow. There was a thin whisper of smoke coming from the chimney.
The rescue team figured they were probably about out of food, fuel, perhaps medicine. Because of the trees they had to put the helicopter down a mile away. They put on heavy packs with emergency supplies, trudged through heavy snow, waist deep, reached the cabin exhausted, panting, perspiring. They pounded on the door.
A thin, gaunt mountain woman opened the door and the lead man gasped, "We're from the Red Cross." She was silent for a moment and then she said, "It's been a hard winter, Sorry, I just don't think we can give anything this year."
-James S. Hewett, ed., Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale, 1988), pp. 237-238.
* * *
"I never would have been able to tithe the first million dollars I ever made if I had not tithed my first salary, which was $1.50 per week."
-John D. Rockefeller
Worship Resources
by Chuck Cammarata
Two short calls to worship this week focus on praise!
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Are you here to worship?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: To let go of the concerns of this world?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: And turn hearts and minds to the things of God?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: So let us now remember the things of God.
PEOPLE: Infinite power,
LEADER: Enduring mercy,
PEOPLE: Abundant patience,
LEADER: Gracious love.
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: Let us remember the things of God.
PEOPLE: Amen.
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Clap your hands, all you people of God!
PEOPLE: (The congregation applauds loudly)
LEADER: Shout your praises to the Lord!
PEOPLE: PRAISE YOU, LORD! PRAISE YOU! (The people shout)
LEADER: For you, O Lord, are good.
PEOPLE: You reign over all the earth.
LEADER: Praise you!
PEOPLE: Hallelujah!
LEADER: Amen.
PEOPLE: AMEN!
And two prayers of confession focus on the gifts God has given us.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: God of grace,
PEOPLE: We have abused your gifts.
LEADER: You gave us the garden,
PEOPLE: We created toxic dumps;
LEADER: You gave us plentiful food,
PEOPLE: We created a starving world;
LEADER: You gave us water for refreshment,
PEOPLE: We created acid rain;
LEADER: You gave us a rainbow of races,
PEOPLE: We created the Ku Klux Klan;
LEADER: You gave us sexuality,
PEOPLE: We created pornography;
LEADER: You gave us minds to think,
PEOPLE: We created weapons of mass destruction;
LEADER: You gave us Bethlehem,
PEOPLE: We created Golgotha.
LEADER: O God in heaven,
PEOPLE: Forgive us!
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
It begs the question, doesn't it? Why should God? Forgive us, that is.
All those good gifts-twisted and broken.
God's design ignored and perverted.
God's intent disregarded.
Why shouldn't God just give up on us?
Simply because he can't.
God is love itself, and love is not capable of giving up on the beloved.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never ever ends.
God's loving kindness and patience endure forever.
Let us praise our God for these truths!
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: All good gifts around us
PEOPLE: Are sent from heaven above.
LEADER: And all these gifts
PEOPLE: Have been entrusted to us.
LEADER: To be used to glorify God
PEOPLE: And enrich God's children.
LEADER: But we have used them selfishly.
PEOPLE: Hoarding them,
LEADER: Hiding them,
PEOPLE: Using them only to enrich ourselves.
LEADER: Lord, forgive us for forgetting
PEOPLE: The source of our gifts,
LEADER: And for trusting in our riches and talents
PEOPLE: Instead of in you.
LEADER: We pray in Jesus' name.
PEOPLE: Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
Listen to these words from the book of Ephesians:
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For God chose us in Christ before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love God predestined us to be adopted as his sons and daughters through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of God's glorious grace, which has been freely given us in Christ.
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under Christ."
The world seeks riches of silver and gold
But these are the riches we should seek:
Every spiritual blessing, freely given to us;
Redemption, the forgiveness of sins;
The riches of God's grace lavished on us;
The mysteries of his will and good pleasure.
So, repent and seek forgiveness and it will be yours
and live in Christ that the riches of his grace may be yours as well.
Amen.
PASTORAL PRAYER
Jesus, beloved son of God, we confess you as our savior and Lord. But truly allowing you to be Lord of our lives is hard. Surrender doesn't come naturally to us. We seek independence-self-sufficiency-freedom. Help us this morning to begin to truly understand that it is only in total surrender to you and your will that we can find wholeness and abundance of life. Help us to know in our heart of hearts that your will is for our best and highest good. And strengthen us to surrender fully to you and your will. We bow before you this morning; help us to bow before you all week long.
And we ask that this humility extend to all who find themselves in dire and difficult circumstances today. We pray for ... (insert the prayers of the people here)
HYMNS AND SONGS
Now Thank We All Our God
Freely, Freely
Seek Ye First
I Will Serve Thee
Make Me a Blessing
Take My Life and Let It Be
All for Jesus
I Surrender All
I Have Decided to Follow Jesus
More Love to Thee
You Are Worthy of My Praise
That's Why We Praise Him
CREATIVE WORSHIP IDEAS
This little skit might be used as a stand-alone, a sermon illustration, a children's sermon, or a call to the offering.
As the skit begins a loud person dressed as a clown enters down the center aisle. This person is pushing a wheelbarrow full of money. He or she makes a point of talking to members of the congregation about the money. The actor should ham it up, saying things like,
"O, how rich I am!
Check me out, a wheelbarrow full of money.
Hey, buddy, would you like some? Aaahhh, I don't think so!
What will I do with all my money today?"
As the clown wheels down the aisle, she notices two offering baskets sitting out in a prominent place. She says loudly something like the following,
"I think I will be generous today and give a lot of money to the church."
As the money is placed in the basket, she continues,
"Yes, I am so generous. Look how much I am giving. (Shows the congregation)
"Did you give this much, buddy? I don't think so. I should get some kind of award for this."
As she takes her wheelbarrow still quite full of money and leaves, she should be patting herself on the back with words like,
"My, oh my, I am a generous soul, ain't I? God is gonna be happy with me today ..."
After she is gone, a quiet woman enters and walks up to the offering basket. She says:
"Oh, I wish I could give as much as that rich woman, but all I have is this penny."
She looks around guiltily and drops her penny in and hurries off.
Then the narrator or preacher ends the little skit with these words:
"Jesus, upon seeing the rich offer their tithes and watching a poor woman place the little she had in the basket, asked his disciples, 'Who has given more, this widow, or the rich?'
'I tell you,' he said, 'she has given more, for they out of their abundance have given a small portion, but she, having nothing, gave all she had.'
You should go and do likewise."
A Children's Sermon
by Wesley T. Runk
Who gives the most?
Mark 12:38-44
Text: "Then he called his disciples and said to them, 'Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.'" (vv. 43-44)
Object: a poster with pictures of a house, two cars, a boat, a television, and a swimming pool, and a couple of pennies
Good morning, boys and girls. Tell me what you think is a lot of money. (let them answer) Is five dollars a lot of money? (let them answer) How about a hundred dollars or a thousand dollars? (let them answer)
If you had $1.10, would you think that the 10 cents was a lot of money? (let them answer) What if you had $20.10, would 10 cents be a lot of money? If you had $50.10, would you give me the 10 cents? What if you only had 10 cents, would you give me the 10 cents?
It makes a difference how much money we have to know how important the money is to us. If I own a house, two cars, a boat, a big television, and a swimming pool in my backyard, how important is 2 cents? (show them the pennies; let them answer) But what if all I had was two pennies, would the two pennies be important to me? (let them answer) It makes a difference, doesn't it?
One day Jesus was watching people come into the temple and leave the temple. Some people came into the temple and gave an offering to God. Some of these people gave big offerings with a lot of money. Everyone knew they gave a lot of money because when they put it into the offering it made a lot of noise. Other people gave a lot of money because they had done bad things and they wanted to show God how sorry they were for the bad things they had done.
Jesus watched and listened. He didn't say anything to the people who were doing the giving. He just watched. After people-watching for a while, he called his disciples over to ask them if they saw the old woman who made her offering. She didn't say anything, she didn't make a lot of noise, and she was very poor. What difference would her offering to God make?
Jesus said she had given more than anyone else who had been there that day. The disciples were amazed. How could this poor, old woman give more than the rich people with lots of money? "How much did she give?" they asked. Jesus said, "She gave two pennies." The disciples kind of chuckled because they thought Jesus was kidding. Jesus told them that she only had two pennies and she gave it all to God.
The next time you think about your offering in Sunday school or church, I want you to think about the woman who only had two pennies and how much she must have loved God to give it all.
The Immediate Word, November 9, 2003, issue.
Copyright 2003 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503.
Two widows and St. Francis play important roles in this issue of The Immediate Word, which centers on the art of giving.
No pastor and no congregation can avoid the topic of stewardship, and this week's lectionary, especially the alternate First Reading, 1 Kings 17:8-16, and the Gospel, Mark 12:38-44, are opportune springboards for reflection on the subject. In our lead article, Carlos Wilton comments on these two lections and suggests ways the preacher might approach the subject in a sermon. He also shows the ambiguity in the experience of joy in giving: Do we give because it makes us feel good and causes us to think we'll be rewarded? Or is it possible to give out of more altruistic motives? And does the motive really matter?
As usual, we include responses from team members, illustrations, worship resources, and a children's sermon-all related to the art of giving.
In Giving, We Receive
by Carlos Wilton
1 Kings 17:8-16; Mark 12:38-44
The Message on a Postcard
Charitable giving is down. Many pastors have sensed this trend for some time, but now the statistics confirm it: donations to the country's largest charities dropped in 2002. This is the first time in a dozen years this has happened, according to a survey recently published by The Chronicle of Philanthropy. (See the full article at http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v16/i02/02002801.htm; it is also reported in the New York Times, October 27, 2003: "Charitable Giving Falls for First Time in Years," by Greg Winter; http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/27/national/27CHAR.html.)
November is when many churches conduct their annual stewardship campaigns. Now, more than ever, it's vital for preachers to address the subject of giving from the pulpit-and to do so in a positive, encouraging way.
Two of this week's lectionary passages, both of which tell of women who take bold risks in their giving, provide excellent opportunities for positive, affirming stewardship messages. First Kings 17:8-16 is the story of Elijah and the widow of Zarephath; Mark 12:38-44 is the story of the widow's mite.
The title for this article, "In Giving, We Receive," taken from the beloved "Prayer of St. Francis," expresses a great spiritual truth. The widow of Zarephath comes to know that spiritual truth as she fulfills the ancient laws of hospitality, setting out scarce food for her guest. The widow in Mark's Gospel, dropping her last two copper coins into the temple treasury, likewise demonstrates that giving is pure joy. Christians give not in order to receive something in return-a quid pro quo-but rather because the act of giving itself is a joy.
Some Words on the Word
First Kings 17:8-16
"When elephants fight, the grass suffers." So goes an old African proverb. As today's passage from 1 Kings 17 opens, a certain widow of Zarephath and her son are like the trampled grass. The dueling "elephants" are Yahweh and Baal, who are contending for the people's loyalty.
Yahweh's weapon of choice against the fertility god is a drought. The widow of Zarephath, and all the people of that region besides, risk starvation until the cosmic contest is decided. Elijah has abruptly appeared at the beginning of this chapter, with no introduction provided; the author conveys us directly into the thick of the narrative. The first thing we hear of the prophet is his announcement to Ahab, "There shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word" (17:1). Elijah is very evidently a powerful prophetic figure. Not only does he announce the coming drought, but in v. 6 we learn he's exempt from its effects: the ravens feed him twice a day, and-at least until the nearby wadi dries up-he drinks from its stream.
Once the wadi does dry up, God sends him to Zarephath. This Gentile city, along the coast near the mighty Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon, is close to the ancestral home of Jezebel (perhaps there's some significance to the location: Yahweh sends Elijah to work wonders among the evil queen's own people).
By all normal standards of the day, the widow of Zarephath would have no standing in the eyes of an Israelite male: she is (1) a foreigner, (2) a woman, and (3) a widow. Yet Elijah is God's agent, and God is concerned for the welfare of the poor and lowly, so that is where God's servant obediently follows.
As John Gray puts it in his commentary on 1-2 Kings in The Old Testament Library series (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964), "The position of widows and orphans without a breadwinner or male protector was precarious. Levirate marriage, i.e., with the brother of the deceased husband, was not designed primarily to relieve the widow, but to provide an heir to the name and property of the dead man. Thus a childless widow was the responsibility of the family, but a widow-mother, as the woman of Zarephath, had no such provision, save by charity" (p. 380).
One of the homiletical dilemmas of this text is the way Elijah treats the widow, as he first meets her. Rather than responding sensitively to her suffering, he imposes on her an obligation to feed him. In a scene reminiscent of the sufferings of Hagar and Ishmael (Exodus 21:17), the widow and her son are about to abandon themselves to starvation; yet the prophet of Yahweh, rather than feeding them, seems ready to snatch the last morsel from their mouths. (While this sounds harsh to modern ears, in this primitive pastoral culture that cherishes hospitality as the most solemn of obligations, it's not so strange.)
Along with her visitor's demand for food, however, comes a surprising promise. If the widow risks giving Elijah all she has, he declares, then God will bless her with an unlimited supply of food. The widow is obedient, and as a result she's blessed with a veritable cornucopia.
In the passage that follows this week's pericope, Elijah does even more for the widow of Zarephath: he raises her son, who has just died from a terrible illness. As Abraham bargained with Yahweh for the lives of the faithful few in Sodom (Genesis 18:22ff.), so Elijah bargains for the life of this young boy. Boldly he chides Yahweh for bringing "calamity" upon his host, who has offered him hospitality. Yahweh relents, the boy is saved, and the prophet is spared any shame for having neglected his obligations as guest. The widow, amazed, speaks the benediction that ends the episode: "Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth" (17:24).
Mark 12:38-44
The Gospel reading for this week has undoubtedly been matched with the Old Testament reading because of the similarity of the two stories: both contain a destitute widow as a main character, and both have to do with sacrificial giving.
The Markan story of the widow's mite follows hard on the heels of Jesus' denunciation of the false piety of the scribes (12:38-40). The widow's story is one of extravagant generosity, that Jesus contrasts with the story of the religious authorities, whose response is calculated legalism.
It is well to beware, here, of any slide into anti-Semitism. While Jesus condemns the scribes, he is certainly upholding the principles of the law, as explained by Richard I. Deibert: "We must never accuse Mark of condemning Judaism. He most certainly is not. And we most certainly must not. In its chastisement of the various offices within first-century Temple Judaism, the New Testament skirts along the edge of anti-Semitism. Because of this, many in the church have fallen off this edge and have seen in the New Testament a wholesale condemnation of Jewish faith. Nothing has been (and could be) more disastrous for Christianity than this. Suffice it to say, the New Testament provides glimpses that both confirm Christianity's enthusiastic embrace of the core tenets of Jewish faith and admonish Christianity's ongoing observance of the tenets of Judaism" (Mark [Interpretation Bible Commentary; Louisville: Geneva Press, 1999], p. 79).
R. G. Bratcher and E. A. Nida, in A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark (New York: United Bible Societies, 1961, rev. 1993), suggest that the offering-receptacles are "presumably one of the thirteen contribution boxes, or receptacles, in the form of trumpets, with broad bases and narrow openings at the top, which were placed under the colonnade in the Court of the Women. It may be that the particular area, in which the thirteen boxes were placed, was known popularly as the treasury." It would have been hard to drop a coin into one of those elaborate receptacles without making a distinctive sound.
The widow's "small copper coins" were known as lepta (singular, lepton). It was the smallest coin in circulation at the time, which some have valued at 1/96 of a denarius. Many modern readers have come to know it as a "mite"-from the King James Version, which speaks of "two mites, which make a farthing."
The fact that there are two coins, rather than one, is significant. If there had been but one, it could be said that the woman-in giving the smallest gift imaginable-was simply complying with the minimal requirements of the law. (Actually, she would have been giving much more than that, since one of her two coins would have amounted to 50% of her money, a quintuple tithe!) Since there are two coins, however, she clearly has the choice of giving one and keeping the other for herself. As Lamar Williamson suggests, no one would have faulted her for that: "Jesus contrasts her gift with those of the rich, who were placing large sums into the Temple treasury. Theirs were probably calculated gifts, guided by the law of the tithe and a long tradition of how it was to be figured. Hers surely was not: she might have kept one of the two coins but did not ... Jesus might have scolded the woman for lack of prudence in giving both coins or for lack of discretion in giving them to this decadent religious establishment. Instead, he praises her highly" (Mark [Interpretation Bible Commentary; Atlanta: John Knox, 1983], p. 234).
In Mark's version, this story occurs at the very end of Jesus' public ministry. It is fitting that the story of the widow's sacrificial gift precedes the story of Jesus' sacrificial gift of his own life.
A Map of the Message
Both the Old Testament and the Gospel this week are tried-and-true stewardship texts. A significant portion of our listeners will have heard them many times: not just in general, but also with respect to this specific topic, that of financial stewardship. The challenge for many of us preachers will become not to find something to say but rather to find something fresh to say.
There are times, however, when it's best not to chase too energetically after novelty. Stewardship is a "tough sell" to many of our listeners. Nearly every waking hour, they're bombarded with communications exhorting them to consumer spending: communications which unaplogetically promote a sense of entitlement. With but one hour a week that we have the privilege of speaking to them, it's hard to compete.
I suggest starting with the statistics about declining charitable giving (see "The Message on a Postcard," above). Pose the question, "Why has giving fallen off?" Some of our listeners may be inclined to respond with that political mantra of several years back: "It's the economy, stupid!"
Or is it? Economic downturn notwithstanding, all of us live in a society vastly richer than the one our grandparents inhabited. This has been documented again and again, so many times and in so many ways it cannot be questioned. Yet even as our income has gone up, our spending has gone up even faster. As income has climbed, many people's giving to others has decreased-it may perhaps have stayed the same in dollars, but it hasn't kept pace with inflation. One recent study indicated that churchgoing Protestants in America give an average of 2.5 percent of their household income to the church. Now that may sound pretty generous, as an average-until you consider that in the depths of the Great Depression, Protestants gave an average of 3.3 percent of their income. As a people, we're earning more but giving less (Henry G. Brinton, "Faith and Numbers," in the Washington Post, October 10, 1999, p. B2).
We comfort ourselves by explaining, "We just don't have it to give"-when in fact, the standard of living for practically all of us (at least as measured in the creature comforts we enjoy) is higher than ever. If we would all resolve to give to the Lord's work off the top, before the other bills are paid-if we all followed the biblical standard of proportionate giving, in other words-our churches would have no difficulty meeting their program budget, and would have extra money available for all kinds of important mission work besides.
It may be tempting to use the story of the widow of Zarephath-coupled, perhaps, with Jesus' teaching in Luke 6:38 that "the measure you give will be the measure you get back"-as a sort of quid pro quo inducement to give. We've all heard stewardship sermons like that. "Don't worry about whether your gift is too large," this argument goes: "Whatever you give, God will give you back even more. As Elijah blessed the widow with a bottomless grain-jar, so will God bless you if you fill out a pledge card." I remember one television preacher of my childhood, who was a particularly egregious example of this kind of commercial theology. He traded under the name, "Reverend Ike." His followers were always showing up on his TV program, waving car keys and gleefully shouting, "Looky here! Reverend Ike told me to give all I could, and I did, then I woke up the next morning and found a Cadillac in my driveway!" Reverend Ike's appeal to self-interest was particularly crass, and his followers' stories particularly unbelievable, but there are more subtle varieties of his appeal that are equally tempting-and equally wrong.
It is possible, however, to hold up the words of the Prayer of St. Francis-"it is in giving that we receive"-as a stewardship text. As long as we avoid giving the impression that the rewards of giving are financial, it's very possible to encourage giving by emphasizing less tangible rewards. There is the feeling of joy that goes along with making someone happy, for example.
In downtown Seattle a few years back (though it could have been any city in this land) a man was out walking one day, just before Christmas. He came upon one of those Salvation Army kettles. As he approached the volunteer ringing the bell, he felt an unaccustomed spirit of generosity wash over him. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out all his change. He dropped every last coin into the kettle with a smile.
The man turned to leave, but then he stopped. He reached into his back pocket, pulled out his wallet and emptied every last bill into the kettle as well.
Grinning like an idiot, he walked away with a bounce to his step. But about two blocks later, the bounce wore out. Suddenly it hit him! "What have I done?" he asked himself.
The man turned around, walked back to the old woman and asked for his money back. He got it, and left again, walking very quickly this time, head down, looking neither to the right nor the left.
"For two blocks," writes Donel McClellan, a UCC pastor from Bellingham, Washington, who posted this story on the Ecunet computer network, "that man walked in the Kingdom of God. For two blocks he was free of the burden of his possessions. For two blocks he put other people above himself. For two blocks he was self-giving and generous. For two blocks he was blessed ... but, like most of us, he could not stand the uncertainty that goes with that much blessing. He wanted to continue to think that he is in control. He walked back, out of the realm of God and back into the well-worn grooves of his weary world."
Team Comments
Carter Shelley responds:
I've got the stewardship blues and I don't know what to do.
Jesus loves me, God forgives me, but he wants my money too!
-Carter Shelley, 1982 (unfinished country music song written for stewardship season-rejected because it didn't communicate quite the right tone)
Carlos, one of the things that caught my attention immediately in your comments for a stewardship sermon was the statement about charitable giving having fallen off significantly in the past year. I thought this trend had begun several years ago as many computer companies were hard hit by the stock market corrections in values. It seems like the unemployment and job layoffs of blue- and white-collar workers would mean 2003 is yet another year of decreased charitable giving by Americans. For pastors and their stewardship or finance committees, the financial slump may have begun sooner. Thus it's important for each preacher to know the economic patterns and shifts that affect his or her congregation. For example, I have one friend who pastors a church in which every adult in the congregation, with the exception of two people, has been laid off in the past two years or is already retired and struggling to live on a fixed income that provides less support than it did before. In such congregations, financial giving will be difficult this year, and these Christians need to hear of other ways they can give and share their time and talents.
Another thing that strikes me about the decline in charitable giving this year pertains to those who've been generous in the past and cannot be this year. It is so easy for those of us who live middle-class American lives to allow others to do most of the significant giving. Sure, we may buy a magazine subscription from the neighbor's child selling them to raise money for their school or mail a check to our local Public Television station during their fund drive, but few of us are anteing up so much that our failure to give would be noticed. We are used to the Ted Turners, Bill Gates, and U.S. government underwriting social programs and responding with funds to meet crying demands that arise on the international scene. When those and other sources dry up or change their policies, we don't feel any need to attempt to replace them, because, of course, the amounts they have given are beyond our own imagining. But what about the local sources of funding that are drying up due to changes in government policy and city, county, and state financial deficits. We who have never had to offer our last mite, like the widow Jesus praises, may have to evaluate the ways we do spend our money and reorient our giving to help feed and care for people and programs that Christian compassion cannot ignore.
In thinking about the two widows we meet in the First Reading and the Gospel for this week, it may be important to expand our own initial ideas about who widows are today. Paintings in Bibles and placed on the walls of Sunday School classrooms often portray widows as elderly women without beauty or physical strength. Because older women tend to outnumber older men in significant numbers in our congregations, we need to remember that widows come in all ages, shapes, and sizes. While widows were clearly understood by faithful Jews to be persons most in need of God's advocacy and the community's charity, today that category would also include the many unwed and single mothers living in or on the edge of poverty in our own communities. In addition, our current military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq has created a new generation of younger widows and widowers not seen since the Vietnam era.
Thank you for including the St. Francis of Assisi prayer as one of your illustrations. Not all may know that St. Francis began life as a child of wealth and great professional promise who appalled his parents and family by his decision to forsake all of that in order to better serve God and the poor. The Franciscans took very seriously their vows of poverty and simplicity, and by their founder's example understood that in giving of themselves to others, indeed they would receive.
Rather than view Elijah's conduct with the widow as a homiletical dilemma, I confess I am always grateful to learn about the personality and behavior foibles of biblical heroes and heroines. While the written account's intention may have been to further emphasize the goodness and generosity of the widow in the face of personal grief and the insistent demand of an irascible prophet, such revelations better connect the life of this biblical man with that of me and the congregation.
The hospitality factor in this same instance does reflect the generous spirit of the people in that ancient time. Reflecting upon that, I was struck by how different are our American views of hospitality. With people in the ancient Middle East, hospitality was readily extended to traveling strangers who were dependent upon the invitations of people they did not know as they traveled from place to place. Today, travelers can stop at MacDonald's, Wendy's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, or Subway, but such options didn't exist back then. What's remarkable about such openness and welcoming by the widow, Abraham, and the many other biblical examples we've encountered is the willingness to trust a stranger and to share not just one's daily bread, but more often to give the best of what one has to the stranger passing through who stops for a meal or a night repast. From friends who've traveled and lived in Arabic countries in the Middle East today, such as Lebanon, Kuwait, and Egypt, I know that such hospitality continues to be the norm in these societies, and it continues to be shared with strangers, visitors, and tourists who come to their doors.
In contrast, in the United States we rarely invite a stranger or traveler to dinner for fear of danger or getting more involved than we want with someone who's just "passing through." For us, hospitality is what we show towards the potential new faculty member, law partner, associate minister, or church member we hope to recruit. As a rule, hospitality doesn't occur spontaneously. It usually comes as a result of explicit invitations, careful planning of a guest list, menus, house cleaning, and preparation. I even own a book that tells me how to be a good hostess and how to be a good guest. None of the helpful instructions provided take into account raggedy old prophets stopping in for a meal when the cupboard is bare.
The John D. Rockefeller quote you supplied for the illustrations below rings true, not because the spokesman was kind and generous with his own workers, but because of the pattern of discipline and habit that his giving established for his life. Clearly, Osceola McCarty (see the illustrations, below) had a similar discipline and habit to have saved so much while denying herself many of the things the rest of us consider necessities.
Probably the place where stewardship sermon weary preachers can best establish a connection with the congregation this Sunday is through an emphasis upon the positive nature of giving. I have always wondered why the stewardship season couldn't be and feel more like Christmas. Think: Ebenezer Scrooge postconversion in A Christmas Carol. Here was a man so stingy he wouldn't even let his employee have the whole of Christmas day off from work, who through insight into the hollowness of his own life and heart gets converted into a person who gives out of joy and discovery that it is indeed more blessed to give than to hoard. Who among us in any Christian congregation doesn't love the feeling of discovering just the right present to give to someone we love at Christmas or for their birthday? Who hasn't felt the great sense of pleasure and excitement one first felt as a child, when one made or carefully saved money to buy a present for a parent? All of us find joy in giving to those we know and love. Our challenge as Christians is to expand that circle to include people we don't know in order to better serve and enjoy the God whom we do know.
Stan Purdum responds: It occurs to me that not only was Elijah God's agent but so was
the widow who fed him.
Regarding Rev. Ike, a friend of mine used to say that Rev. Ike's contribution to the poor was to make sure he never became one of them. But then I suppose that could be said of many of us. Rev. Ike was just more blatant and enthusiastic about it.
George Murphy responds: I know that some clergy dread having to preach stewardship sermons and have bad memories of stewardship campaigns. That hasn't generally been my experience. But I can share a few stories that I hope will be instructive.
Back in the old days before I went into the ministry, I was a member of the church council of the Lutheran congregation we belonged to and had the task of writing a stewardship message for the congregation. We had just gone through a significant building program, so there were some financial challenges because the budget had increased sharply. Being younger and considerably more naïve back then, I took a straightforward "just the facts" approach. Basically I said, "Our budget for the coming year is X dollars, we have Y active adult members in the congregation, and that works out to a need for each person to give, on the average, X/Y dollars for the year."
I emphasized that of course that was an average and that some people were able to give more than others. Still, a lot of people were upset. "We can't give that much," they complained. What could I say? Here's X, here's Y, and you can do the arithmetic.
I'm no longer so young, no longer a layperson, and no longer quite so innocent. But when it comes to financial stewardship I still think that setting out the facts is a good idea because they are the facts, whether we talk about them or not. In church we tend to talk about money without really talking about it-especially if we've gotten some flak for a stewardship sermon in the past. We use religious jargon like "working in the vineyard" and strange monetary units like "talents" and "mites." What we often need to talk about is working in the church and in the world, and what's needed to do that in dollars.
And sometimes religious jargon gets in the way because people simply don't know what it means. "Tithing" has for some become synonymous with "contributing to the church," so they think that they're tithing if they put an envelope in the plate every week. It may seem embarrassingly obvious, but if you're going to talk about tithing, it probably wouldn't hurt to explain that it means giving ten percent.
No, I'm not suggesting that a stewardship campaign be a straight business proposition. There are distinctive theological and ethical motives for giving. Still, we are talking about giving money and not picking grapes. Preachers often like to quote "The Lord loves a cheerful giver." I think the Lord also loves a realistic giver.
If a stewardship campaign involves pledges for the coming year, there should always be a reminder of the deo volente provision of James 4:13-15. Tell people that if something like unemployment or illness comes up that makes it impossible to fulfill a pledge, all they need to do is notify the church and there will be no expectation that it will be fulfilled. In my first year in a new parish I said this to a stewardship gathering and one man told me afterwards that he's never pledged before because no one had ever told him that, but that this year he would.
A lot of parishioners who don't pay a lot of attention to the lectionary probably think that Mark 12:38-44 is chosen at this time of the year because it's a good stewardship text. Of course that's not the case-it's just the way readings from Mark in this year of the lectionary fall. Still, it is an excellent choice for this theme, with more to it than just a poor person's generosity. This is the last scene in Jesus' public ministry. It's followed by the little apocalypse of Mark 13 as a prelude to the passion narrative (the messianic woes of the church and the world paralleling those of the Messiah himself), and then the account of the betrayal, Last Supper, condemnation, and cross.
And at this point the widow puts into the Temple treasury holon ton bion autes, which NRSV translates as "all she had to live on" but KJV rendered as "even all her living." It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say "her whole life." If these were indeed her last bits of money, she was betting her life on God to care for her as she dropped in those coins. But the words also point forward to the one who quite literally gave his whole life.
That ought to be the ultimate stewardship example-the widow of Zarephath or the widow in the Temple, as important as they are, but the one of whom St. Paul reminds us: "For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich" (2 Corinthians 8:9).
While I've often used one of these "widow" texts for stewardship, I've been reminded that our preaching for this purpose shouldn't overemphasize the role of people who have little. I recall giving one stewardship talk after which the first comment was made by a widow who wasn't especially well to do who said rather sadly, "I just don't think I can give any more." It's often the people who are giving the most, percentage-wise, who feel that they ought to give more. For all that we may have texts about poor widows, our goal is not to get them to put their Social Security in the offering. It's rather to get all our people to realize that following Christ means putting their lives on the line-and that financial offerings are part of that.
Related Illustrations
The Prayer of Saint Francis
O Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, harmony;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light, and
Where there is sorrow, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not
so much seek to be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
* * *
In the book Kitchen Table Wisdom there are repeated accounts of medical patients dealing with cancer diagnosis and treatments. One of the insights that recurs over and over again in its pages is the recognition by individuals who know they are going to die that, in having to let go of this world, they actually come for the first time to value it and treasure life as never before. For us as Christians the challenge is to let go of our own ambitions and needs in order to truly find God and to truly celebrate the many opportunities we have to make Christmas happen all the year round.
* * *
The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried."
-G. K. Chesterton
* * *
I love the Christmas-tide and yet,
I notice this, each year I live:
I always like the gifts I get,
But how I love the gifts I give!
-Carolyn Wells, A Thought
* * *
Jack Stotts, the retired president of Austin Presbyterian Theological seminary, tells a story from the early days of his ministry, when he was serving as a pastor in Texas. Members of the stewardship committee of his church were opening the envelopes that contained pledge cards just received in the fall annual campaign. When they came to the card of Mamie Cades, an elderly member of the church, they were dismayed. The amount seemed far more than Mamie could afford.
Mamie was a tall, homely woman who always wore threadbare, faded dresses that looked to be decades old. She lived by herself in a house that was in terrible repair. Everyone assumed she was poor-which, by most definitions, she was.
"Somebody's got to go talk with Mamie, and tell her she can't afford this gift," they said. "She ought to keep the money; the church doesn't really need it, and she could use it to fix up her place. You go tell her, pastor."
So young pastor Stotts, with some trepidation, went off to do just that. He arrived at Mamie's ramshackle house, and sat down in her parlor. He could hear the wind whistling through cracks in the walls.
Jack told Miss Cades (for he said he would never have dreamed of calling her by her first name, in that place and time) of the stewardship committee's concern.
A look of utter dismay came over her face. "Would you take my joy away from me?" she asked.
-Jack Stotts, in an address to the "Embraced by Abundance" stewardship conference, Phoenix, Arizona, August 2002.
* * *
"What people don't realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket when, of course, it is the cross."
-Flannery O'Connor
* * *
"Love does not arise out of what we have to give, but out of knowing we have nothing to give. It is good to give what we have. But until we give what we have not, we fall short of unconditional love."
-Mike Mason, The Mystery of Children: What Our Kids Teach Us about Childlike Faith (Waterbrook Press, 2001)
* * *
"When we let go of money we are letting go of part of ourselves and part of our security. But this is precisely why it is important to do it. It is one way to obey Jesus' command to deny ourselves ... When we give money we are releasing a little more of our egocentric selves and a little more of our false security ... Giving frees us to care. It produces an air of expectancy as we anticipate what God will lead us to give. It makes life with God an adventure in the world, and that is worth living for and giving for."
-Richard J. Foster, The Challenge of the Disciplined Life
* * *
"Never measure generosity by what you give, but by what you have left."
-Fulton Sheen
* * *
The story of Osceola McCarty is a modern parable of the widow's mite. An African-American from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, Ms. McCarty spent her years from age 11 to age 86 doing other people's laundry. She did it the old-fashioned way: boiling the clothes in cast iron kettles, scrubbing them on wooden scrub boards, using a stick to transfer them through four rinse cycles (four separate kettles of clear water). She would wring the clothes by hand, hang them to dry, then fold and iron them. Ms. McCarty never much liked washing machines: "didn't do the clothes right," she said.
From her very first day of work, Ms. McCarty put a little of what she earned "away." At first, everything that was left over went to her older relatives, and during those years she learned to live frugally. She never spent money on luxuries like soda, never smoked or drank, never bought lottery tickets. When she inherited a little from an aunt, she just added that to her savings.
Officials in a state university in Mississippi were flabbergasted, one day, when Osceola McCarty walked in-an elderly woman they had never met-and offered them her life savings, a quarter of a million dollars, to pay for scholarships for African-American students. She wanted to help those students get the education she had never been fortunate enough to have.
* * *
It had been a hard winter in the Appalachians. Snow had piled up deeper and deeper, the mercury dropped, rivers froze, people suffered. The Red Cross used helicopters to fly in supplies. One crew had been working day after day, long hours. They were on their way home late in the afternoon when they saw a little cabin submerged in the snow. There was a thin whisper of smoke coming from the chimney.
The rescue team figured they were probably about out of food, fuel, perhaps medicine. Because of the trees they had to put the helicopter down a mile away. They put on heavy packs with emergency supplies, trudged through heavy snow, waist deep, reached the cabin exhausted, panting, perspiring. They pounded on the door.
A thin, gaunt mountain woman opened the door and the lead man gasped, "We're from the Red Cross." She was silent for a moment and then she said, "It's been a hard winter, Sorry, I just don't think we can give anything this year."
-James S. Hewett, ed., Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale, 1988), pp. 237-238.
* * *
"I never would have been able to tithe the first million dollars I ever made if I had not tithed my first salary, which was $1.50 per week."
-John D. Rockefeller
Worship Resources
by Chuck Cammarata
Two short calls to worship this week focus on praise!
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Are you here to worship?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: To let go of the concerns of this world?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: And turn hearts and minds to the things of God?
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: So let us now remember the things of God.
PEOPLE: Infinite power,
LEADER: Enduring mercy,
PEOPLE: Abundant patience,
LEADER: Gracious love.
PEOPLE: Yes!
LEADER: Let us remember the things of God.
PEOPLE: Amen.
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Clap your hands, all you people of God!
PEOPLE: (The congregation applauds loudly)
LEADER: Shout your praises to the Lord!
PEOPLE: PRAISE YOU, LORD! PRAISE YOU! (The people shout)
LEADER: For you, O Lord, are good.
PEOPLE: You reign over all the earth.
LEADER: Praise you!
PEOPLE: Hallelujah!
LEADER: Amen.
PEOPLE: AMEN!
And two prayers of confession focus on the gifts God has given us.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: God of grace,
PEOPLE: We have abused your gifts.
LEADER: You gave us the garden,
PEOPLE: We created toxic dumps;
LEADER: You gave us plentiful food,
PEOPLE: We created a starving world;
LEADER: You gave us water for refreshment,
PEOPLE: We created acid rain;
LEADER: You gave us a rainbow of races,
PEOPLE: We created the Ku Klux Klan;
LEADER: You gave us sexuality,
PEOPLE: We created pornography;
LEADER: You gave us minds to think,
PEOPLE: We created weapons of mass destruction;
LEADER: You gave us Bethlehem,
PEOPLE: We created Golgotha.
LEADER: O God in heaven,
PEOPLE: Forgive us!
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
It begs the question, doesn't it? Why should God? Forgive us, that is.
All those good gifts-twisted and broken.
God's design ignored and perverted.
God's intent disregarded.
Why shouldn't God just give up on us?
Simply because he can't.
God is love itself, and love is not capable of giving up on the beloved.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never ever ends.
God's loving kindness and patience endure forever.
Let us praise our God for these truths!
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: All good gifts around us
PEOPLE: Are sent from heaven above.
LEADER: And all these gifts
PEOPLE: Have been entrusted to us.
LEADER: To be used to glorify God
PEOPLE: And enrich God's children.
LEADER: But we have used them selfishly.
PEOPLE: Hoarding them,
LEADER: Hiding them,
PEOPLE: Using them only to enrich ourselves.
LEADER: Lord, forgive us for forgetting
PEOPLE: The source of our gifts,
LEADER: And for trusting in our riches and talents
PEOPLE: Instead of in you.
LEADER: We pray in Jesus' name.
PEOPLE: Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
Listen to these words from the book of Ephesians:
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For God chose us in Christ before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love God predestined us to be adopted as his sons and daughters through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of God's glorious grace, which has been freely given us in Christ.
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under Christ."
The world seeks riches of silver and gold
But these are the riches we should seek:
Every spiritual blessing, freely given to us;
Redemption, the forgiveness of sins;
The riches of God's grace lavished on us;
The mysteries of his will and good pleasure.
So, repent and seek forgiveness and it will be yours
and live in Christ that the riches of his grace may be yours as well.
Amen.
PASTORAL PRAYER
Jesus, beloved son of God, we confess you as our savior and Lord. But truly allowing you to be Lord of our lives is hard. Surrender doesn't come naturally to us. We seek independence-self-sufficiency-freedom. Help us this morning to begin to truly understand that it is only in total surrender to you and your will that we can find wholeness and abundance of life. Help us to know in our heart of hearts that your will is for our best and highest good. And strengthen us to surrender fully to you and your will. We bow before you this morning; help us to bow before you all week long.
And we ask that this humility extend to all who find themselves in dire and difficult circumstances today. We pray for ... (insert the prayers of the people here)
HYMNS AND SONGS
Now Thank We All Our God
Freely, Freely
Seek Ye First
I Will Serve Thee
Make Me a Blessing
Take My Life and Let It Be
All for Jesus
I Surrender All
I Have Decided to Follow Jesus
More Love to Thee
You Are Worthy of My Praise
That's Why We Praise Him
CREATIVE WORSHIP IDEAS
This little skit might be used as a stand-alone, a sermon illustration, a children's sermon, or a call to the offering.
As the skit begins a loud person dressed as a clown enters down the center aisle. This person is pushing a wheelbarrow full of money. He or she makes a point of talking to members of the congregation about the money. The actor should ham it up, saying things like,
"O, how rich I am!
Check me out, a wheelbarrow full of money.
Hey, buddy, would you like some? Aaahhh, I don't think so!
What will I do with all my money today?"
As the clown wheels down the aisle, she notices two offering baskets sitting out in a prominent place. She says loudly something like the following,
"I think I will be generous today and give a lot of money to the church."
As the money is placed in the basket, she continues,
"Yes, I am so generous. Look how much I am giving. (Shows the congregation)
"Did you give this much, buddy? I don't think so. I should get some kind of award for this."
As she takes her wheelbarrow still quite full of money and leaves, she should be patting herself on the back with words like,
"My, oh my, I am a generous soul, ain't I? God is gonna be happy with me today ..."
After she is gone, a quiet woman enters and walks up to the offering basket. She says:
"Oh, I wish I could give as much as that rich woman, but all I have is this penny."
She looks around guiltily and drops her penny in and hurries off.
Then the narrator or preacher ends the little skit with these words:
"Jesus, upon seeing the rich offer their tithes and watching a poor woman place the little she had in the basket, asked his disciples, 'Who has given more, this widow, or the rich?'
'I tell you,' he said, 'she has given more, for they out of their abundance have given a small portion, but she, having nothing, gave all she had.'
You should go and do likewise."
A Children's Sermon
by Wesley T. Runk
Who gives the most?
Mark 12:38-44
Text: "Then he called his disciples and said to them, 'Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.'" (vv. 43-44)
Object: a poster with pictures of a house, two cars, a boat, a television, and a swimming pool, and a couple of pennies
Good morning, boys and girls. Tell me what you think is a lot of money. (let them answer) Is five dollars a lot of money? (let them answer) How about a hundred dollars or a thousand dollars? (let them answer)
If you had $1.10, would you think that the 10 cents was a lot of money? (let them answer) What if you had $20.10, would 10 cents be a lot of money? If you had $50.10, would you give me the 10 cents? What if you only had 10 cents, would you give me the 10 cents?
It makes a difference how much money we have to know how important the money is to us. If I own a house, two cars, a boat, a big television, and a swimming pool in my backyard, how important is 2 cents? (show them the pennies; let them answer) But what if all I had was two pennies, would the two pennies be important to me? (let them answer) It makes a difference, doesn't it?
One day Jesus was watching people come into the temple and leave the temple. Some people came into the temple and gave an offering to God. Some of these people gave big offerings with a lot of money. Everyone knew they gave a lot of money because when they put it into the offering it made a lot of noise. Other people gave a lot of money because they had done bad things and they wanted to show God how sorry they were for the bad things they had done.
Jesus watched and listened. He didn't say anything to the people who were doing the giving. He just watched. After people-watching for a while, he called his disciples over to ask them if they saw the old woman who made her offering. She didn't say anything, she didn't make a lot of noise, and she was very poor. What difference would her offering to God make?
Jesus said she had given more than anyone else who had been there that day. The disciples were amazed. How could this poor, old woman give more than the rich people with lots of money? "How much did she give?" they asked. Jesus said, "She gave two pennies." The disciples kind of chuckled because they thought Jesus was kidding. Jesus told them that she only had two pennies and she gave it all to God.
The next time you think about your offering in Sunday school or church, I want you to think about the woman who only had two pennies and how much she must have loved God to give it all.
The Immediate Word, November 9, 2003, issue.
Copyright 2003 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503.
