I wonder whether I will eat tonight?

My neighbours all think I’m a bit mad, and sometimes they even say I’m irresponsible in my dedication to God.  They say that I worry my neighbours and relatives because they never quite know when I might make an offering to God that leaves me with nothing.

Well, now I have.

But I don’t plan to worry anyone.  I won’t be asking for help and I certainly won’t be trying to get food from anyone.  It was my choice to give my gift to God, and I’m not going to let them criticise God because I gave him my last two coins.

It was time for me to pay my tithe, and those two coins were just what I calculated that I owed.  So, I gave them to God with my love, just as he had given them to me in his love.

But of course, I know that I can never out-give God.  My life, my happy childhood, my happiness with my husband, my ongoing life since he died – all these things come from God, and I cannot pay him back for anything whatever I do.  All I have came from him anyway.

So, no telling my neighbours and no telling my relatives.

Sometimes it’s hard to do what you want to do for God, not because of your own attitudes or feelings, but because of others.  At various times, people have told me that I need to plan more for the future and that I am being inconsiderate if I don’t.  People have told me that I make others feel responsible for my poverty or uncomfortable living near someone who is so poor.  Sometimes it almost makes me feel guilty for giving to God, but I always tell them not to worry because God looks after me – they don’t need to get upset.  It’s true, but they never listen.  They keep worrying and some keep criticising, while a few actually do try to help – but they are rarely the ones who criticise.

A woman once told me that if people ever give me money, they will already have paid the tithe on it themselves, so there is no need for me to do so.  Well, what would you think about that?  It seems wildly wrong to me.  I give at least a tenth of what I get, whether it comes from someone giving it to me or is part of the small amount of money I get from making and repairing clothes.  I’ve never been rich, but I’ve never starved to death either – though that has never been thanks to the people who complain about my giving!

Anyway, I don’t know whether or not I will eat tonight, but I’m very confident that I will not starve to death.  When I die, it won’t be of hunger, I know that.  I have had this certainty for many years, based on the words of King David:

“I have been young, and now am old,
yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken
or his children begging for bread.
He is ever lending generously,
and his children become a blessing.”[1]

My father was a righteous man.  He taught me the faith in God that I have treasured all my life, and I have never begged.  I have tried to be righteous myself, although I can never be as good as I would like to be, or lend as generously as I would like either, nor am I as much of a blessing to others as I would like to be.  Sadly, I let God down in these ways, but he never lets me down – so I know that when I die, it won’t be of hunger.

God always gives and that’s why I have to also.  On quite a few occasions, I have helped people who had more than me.  That annoyed my neighbours too, but really, they were people who genuinely felt that they had nothing and were worried about it.  I knew that even if I gave them all I had, God would still provide.  He always has.  I don’t know quite how he does it, but he always does: sometimes food lasts for longer than it should, sometimes merchants suddenly have to leave their stalls and sell off their items cheaply – just as I walk up.  These things I have noticed, but I am sure there are many others that I don’t even notice.  I just can’t possibly tell you how amazingly God works if you only let him.

People say that I am poor, but when I see the worry on their faces, the insecurity and unhappiness – when I see how much they desperately strive to make sure that they can provide for everything by themselves – I know that I am the one who is rich.

Poverty?  How do you judge poverty?  If you judge it by money, then I live in poverty, and the Pharisees and Sadducees are rich.  If you judge it by contentment, then I am rich and they live in utter poverty.

They worry about fortune, fame, important positions and being treated with respect.  On the other hand, I am completely content with a God who loves me and always gives me what I need.  I have tried to explain and give them what I have, but they don’t know how to take it.  All they see is poverty, not the contentment and confidence that have come with it.  If only they could realise that what I have is a blessing from God that makes me rich beyond their dreams!  But who would listen to a poor woman when their measure of the value of a person is how much money they have?

How would they react if they knew that I feel sorry for them?  It makes me giggle a little sometimes, but it also makes me thankful that I never had to make the decision to be poor.  Maybe if I’d had to make the choice, I couldn’t have done it any more than they can.  Maybe money would have been my master as it is theirs.  How much I would have lost!

This morning I ate the last of the food I had in my house, then I went to the temple to give those two little coins to God.  It is such a blessing to be able to give back some of what he gives me.  It is a bit disappointing that I cannot give the large gifts that some give, but at least I can give something and not have to go to worship God empty-handed.  That would make me feel so ungrateful.  My coins made a gentle jingle as they fell onto the huge pile of other coins in the box; I hope they can be used to give glory to our God.  He deserves so much more than I can give, and I certainly don’t deserve all that he gives me.

There, it happened.

As I was putting down my pen before, a voice called from outside my door.  I opened the door and saw a well-off looking man.  I have no idea who he was, but he said to me, “I believe you might need this.”

He handed me a large basket with a cloth over the top.  I must have looked puzzled, because he said, a little awkwardly, “Jesus said that you had put everything you had into the temple treasury, so I thought you might need this.  I got some food from the market, and there’s a little goat’s milk in there too.  May the Lord bless you and keep you.”

Now that I knew what was in it, I noticed how heavy the basket was and pulled back the cloth to see what God had provided.  Bread, vegetables, some grapes and even some dried figs!  “You are too kind, my lord,” I said.  “I’m sorry, but I must take the basket inside; it is so heavy I can’t keep holding it.  Please come in so that I can prepare some food for you.”

I ducked into the house and put the basket down hurriedly, then returned to the door.  The man had gone.

So now I have all this food – so much food that even half of it would last me at least two weeks.  What an opportunity: just down the lane I know a young widow who has a child, but no easy way of getting food.  I must go and see if she has enough at the moment.  She has been looking rather thin lately.  What a blessing this is!

And then I must go and see if anyone can tell me who this man Jesus is.  How did he know what I needed?