What Is the Most Important Thing to You?

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Luke 21:1-4

"As Jesus looked up, he saw the rich putting their gifts into the temple treasury. He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins. “Truly I tell you,” he said, “this poor widow has put in more than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”

 

 

1

To begin with, let us do a recap of what we learned together last Sunday. Do you still remember what we learned in this worship room last Sunday? Yes, last Sunday we took a moment to think of the Golden Rule; in particular, Jesus’ teaching about it. Jesus says this way, “When we summarize this thick Bible into only one sentence, it would be: Treat others the same way we want them to treat us.” With that in mind, we agreed that if we want to have good friends around us, first we must become good friends to others. If we want to be loved by others, we must love others before they love us. Do you still agree? When you think that you have no friend, I mean, no real friend because normally people have a lot of superficial friends, you would be better to think about how you treat your friends.

 

2

Today I would like to invite you for a moment to think of your most important thing. I know you have not one but many important things, maybe they are expensive. But, choose only one as the most important thing to you. I will give you one minute. Alright! Now can I hear your most important things? What is your most important thing? Do you want to hear your teachers’ most important things too? Yes, let us ask them. Teachers, could you share your most important things with us?

 

3

You know what? In the Bible, especially in the New Testament, there is a similar story about what we are discussing together. There was a woman who was poor. But you know what? The Bible does not tell us how poor she was. We do not know whether she owned her house, whether she had a job to do, whether she had her own family, etc. But, simply the Bible says that she was poor. Anyhow, when Jesus saw her do something at a temple, he was deeply impressed. Do you want to know what she did at a temple? OK, then let us read the Bible. As you know, when we read God’s Word, we pay respect to it by standing up gently. Actually, there are two different but similar stories about the woman in the Bible. One is in the Gospel of Mark and the other is in the Gospel of Luke. Let us read first Luke and then I will find one helper to read Mark for all of us. Are you all ready?

 

4

Now you know that Jesus highly admired the poor woman. Do you know why? If you know the answer, that would be the end of this Bible time because I have no more to talk to you. Anyone? As I said, I don’t think when it comes to the Bible there is only one right answer. As you grow and get old, you change bodily, mentally, and emotionally. In harmony with those changes, your viewpoint on the Bible also changes.

 

5

When you grow up like me, like your parents, and like your teachers here, you are going to face lots of crossroads where you must choose one road to go each and every time. You cannot choose more than one road. When you do it, people call it hesitation. To avoid hesitation, you need to have the ability to choose only one road among many roads. And people call it determination. Determination sounds better than hesitation, right? However, when we flip the determination over, we can see a hidden ability to give up something important. Yes, without giving up, there is no determination. The poor woman in the Bible shows the ability to see what is really important to her and what is not really important to her, and to give up what is not really important for what is really important. She thought God is more important than money. That is why she could give all her money to God, yes, without hesitation. Like her, guys, I hope we all here someday have the ability to discern what is really important to us from what is not important, and to give up what is not important to us. Do you want to have the ability? Then pray for it. And give it a try. Of course, practice it continually.

 

 

Prayer

God, today we learned from the poor woman in the Bible that it is important to have the ability to see what is important and what is not important. She also taught us the importance of the ability to give up what is not important in order to pursue what is really important to us. Please help us remember this and put it into practice in our daily lives. We pray in your name Jesus Christ. Amen.