I think that if Jesus were walking on the earth today, there would be a good chance that he would be accused to be a zealot, or an extremist, or something similar to that description.
Just take a look at the type of behavior that he celebrates:
The rich people in the area to up to the temple to give their offering. They put a couple of coins in the offering. It is, in fact, what is required. Great! That’s good news.
But then there is a widowed woman who walks up and puts in a couple of copper coins. Barely anything, but it is everything to her, and what does Jesus say?
“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.”
Luke 21:3-4
Wouldn’t it be better if Jesus – who is also the God of the universe! – were to run up and give her back those two coins? Or maybe he should take two coins out of the common purse that he and the disciples are carrying around and replace them for this poor woman?
But that isn’t what he does. Jesus isn’t telling the woman that she must put in these coins, but he is certainly celebrating the fact that she has done so. And he isn’t taking any steps to replace the woman’s money.
In fact, Jesus goes on to say that she has put in everything that she has to live on. She doesn’t have more money to pay the rent. She doesn’t have more money to buy food tonight. What will she do?
We don’t know, but we certainly can see that Jesus has commended the woman and her faith. He has certainly shown that what this woman has done is worth much more in the eyes of God than what the rich people have put in. The rich people have deposited, in terms of monetary value, much more than this woman. In fact, the parallel recounting of this story in Mark 12 says that the rich people put in large amounts. But this woman only put in two copper coins.
Someone figured out that this would essentially amount to, at that time, the equivalent of about 1% of a day’s wage. In short, it was nothing. What she put in really wouldn’t buy anything, and yet it was all that she had, and she gave it all.
And Jesus says that she gave more than all of the others. She gave more than each of the rich people because they gave out of their abundance, but she would give all that she had.
This woman sees God as worth it all. Everything that she has. Everything that she is. God is worth it. Not a little bit. Not just a part. All.
And that is what Jesus is celebrating. Jesus is looking for people who will give it all. To repeat, all. Not a part, but all.
God cares for those who serve him. He himself is our provider. This woman lived that out completely. She gave, I believe, with the assumption that God would provide for her, that God would give her what she needed. Whether she knew Jesus’s teachings about God’s provision or not, she truly lived out what Jesus taught, that we shouldn’t worry about what we will eat or what we will wear because God provides for all of these things. This woman gave all, all that she had to live on.