And He looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury, and He saw also a certain poor widow putting in two mites. So He said, “Truly I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all; for all these out of their abundance have put in offerings for God, but she out of her poverty put in all the livelihood that she had.” Luke 21:1-4
“[Epiphanius] said, ‘God sells righteousness at a very low price to those who wish to buy it: a little piece of bread, a cloak of no value, a cup of cold water, a mite.’ He added, ‘A man who receives something from another because of his poverty or his needs has therein his reward, and because he is ashamed, when he repays it he does so in secret. But it is the opposite for the Lord God; he receives in secret, but he repays it in the presence of the angels, the archangels and the righteous.'”
Epiphanius of Cyprus, a bishop in The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, translated by Benedicta Ward (Kalamazoo: Cistercian, 1975) 59.
The irony of the widow’s mite story never ceases to amaze me. It reminds me, with the words of Epiphanius, that the right way is a path that anyone can take.
Generosity and sacrifice is not just something rich people can do. It’s actually hardest for them because they have so much. Give sacrificially and secretly today.
Compared to the reward in heaven, anything we would give, including all the wealth of the world, is a very low price compared to our eternal reward.