Ah, let me ask you a question—a great question, one that we too often overlook in the rush of our busy lives. What do you think God wants? At this very moment, in the stillness of the universe, what is it that God desires? It may seem like a strange question, doesn't it? A question that shakes us from our daily distractions, our routines, and our self-focused thinking. After all, when we think of God, we think of Him as having everything; He's practically the biggest king on the throne. What could this all-powerful and all-knowing God possibly “need”?

What’s more common for us to think about is our daily lives. Many of us shoulder tremendous burdens, don’t we? We worry about what we need—our work, our responsibilities, our ambitions, our families. We wonder what we will eat for dinner, how we will tackle the demands of the day, how we will fulfill our duties. These are all good things, worthy of our attention.

But this Sunday, the Gospel passage challenges us to stop and consider His will, His heart, and His desire in this moment. For too long, we’ve been fixated on our own needs, our own wants, and our own plans. But if we truly seek to walk in the ways of the Lord, we must ask ourselves: What is God asking of us today? What is His heart beating for, right now, in this very moment?

We find Jesus sitting down “opposite the treasury and observing how the crowd put money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums.” At this point, we must ask: Why does God need our money? After all, God is all-powerful and all-knowing. What does God need money from me? I have my own bills to pay and children to feed, we might think to ourselves. Yet, from the very beginning of the faith, all the way back to the early chapters in the Book of Genesis, God demanded from Cain and Abel, the children of Adam and Eve, that they give a percentage of their income back to Him. It is the same for us now. Our beautiful parish here survives or dies based on your kindness and generosity. We have no other revenue streams than what you and I give in the collection basket. We must ask ourselves: Why is giving money back to the Church and to God a critical part of the Christian way of life?

The answer is in the next sentence of the Gospel passage: “A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents. … ‘Amen, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the other contributors to the treasury. For they have all contributed from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.’”

There it is! This poor widow gave God the one thing that the God of the universe does not have—her heart! The reason we give back to God a percentage of our income, like this poor widow, is because it forces us to trust in God’s care for us. We only give our hearts to those we trust. This poor widow in the Gospel did that. That is why she gave what little money she had—because her heart was given over to God first. Only people in a loving relationship with the living God can give in this way. If we want to grow in love with God, we must first surrender to God. Oftentimes, that means letting more of our ego die by giving more of our money away.