Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Prayer Meeting Lesson Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/pm/pm19990210.htm

LUKE: GOSPEL OF CERTIFYING THE CHRISTIAN FAITH
Part LXX: Certifying The Christian Faith By Its Messiah's GREAT Sensitivity Toward The Downtrodden
(Luke 21:1-4)
  1. Introduction
    1. Jesus Christ certainly had the mental prowess to put Him in the running as God's Messiah. His quieting the questions of Sadduccees and Pharisees alike who tried to entrap and thus discredit Jesus reveals His great prowess as the omnis cient God Incarnate.
    2. But, God is a God of infinite love, and if Jesus is that true Lord, we should expect that attribute to shine along with His mental brilliance!
    3. Luke 21:1-4, given in the context of Jesus' mental victory over Sadduccee and Pharisee opponents reveals the balance of Jesus, that He is the sensitive God Who helps the downtrodden with His brilliance:
  2. Certifying The Christian Faith By Its Messiah's GREAT Sensitivity Toward The Downtrodden.
    1. Luke's Gospel was written to give Theophilus insight on the credibility of the Christian faith, Luke 1:3-4.
    2. After revealing Jesus' great mental brilliance in deftly crushing basic Sadduccee and Pharisee theological errors, Luke revealed the equally compassionate side of Jesus, a balance certifying His divine credentials:
      1. Just after toppling both Sadduccee theological error (Lk. 20:27-40) and also Pharisee error (Lk. 20:41-44), Jesus critiqued these religious leaders' errant godless lifestyles, Luke 20:45-47:
        1. In the audience of the crowds, Jesus openly criticize the religious leaders who had tried to set Him up for a theological fall, Luke 20:45-46a.
        2. In particular, Jesus exposed these leaders' pride in seeking the false praise of men (Lk. 20:46b, 47b) while privately taking advantage of helpless widows by taking their possessions for themselves, 47a.
        3. Jesus predicted that these hypocrites would receive greater damnation in the final judgment, 20:47b.
      2. However, Jesus balanced this display of His powerful divine intellect and scrutinizing judgment of these leaders with a compassionate, very encouraging evaluation of a downtrodden widow woman, 21:1-4:
        1. Jesus had given His confrontation of the Sadduccees and Pharisees before the temple crowds, 20:1.
        2. So, after having finished His scolding defeat of them, He looked up across the way at the court of the women where people were casting in their offerings at the thirteen collection chests there, Luke 21:1 and G. Campbell Morgan, Luke, p. 234.
        3. The rich men were casting in their offerings, and also a certain poor widow was casting in two mites, or one-ninety-sixth of a laborer's daily wage of a denarius, Luke 21:2 (Ibid., Morgan)!
        4. Jesus commented to the crowd that the widow had cast in more of value to the Lord than had all the rich givers put together, for she had given out of her poverty unlike them, Luke 21:3-4.
        5. In the context, the widow accomplished much more in her giving than here dealing with her mere physical poverty because of the tremendous spiritual challenge she was facing at the time: (a) Jesus had just complained that the Scribes took advantage of widows to rob them of their deceased husbands' savings, Lk. 20:47. (b) By implication (Ibid., Morgan, p. 235), it appears Luke could be showing woman's poverty could have been caused by the leaders' thievery of her own resources, something that could lead her to become embittered over money as it relates to religion so that giving to GOD might seem impossible for her! (c) In the least, these rulers should have been eager to obey the Law about giving alms of their wealth to this widow rather than using their money for showy giving, Ex. 22:22-24; Deut. 14:28-29. (d) Nevertheless, this widow had NOT let the failure of these leaders in regards to her poverty status EMBITTER her against GOD! She had OVERCOME that bitterness temptation to give her last two mites to God! As such, Jesus saw her noble personal victory and claimed she had given more than all of the rest!
Lesson: Though He was mentally omniscient so He could crush the theological challenges of the religious leaders and critique the sinfulness of their lives, Jesus showed balanced sensitivity and COMPASSION in recognizing the noble spiritual victory of the poor widow in her giving to the Lord!

Application: We can be encouraged that Christ VALUES each spiritual victory we have, especially if the obstacles and limited resources we each have make it more difficult to gain such victories!