He Is The Offering
1-13-22
1 min 19 seconds

One of my earliest memories from attending church as a young child involved putting my quarter in the offering plate. The golden plate, whose inside base was covered in deep maroon velvet material, was passed at the same point in the service every Sunday at our small country church.
By the time I was five, I knew the drill. When the offertory music began, my mom would slowly reach for her purse and unzip it as if on cue. Then, leaning toward me, she would press a coin into the palm of my hand which I would solemnly lower to my lap and carefully clasp while I waited for the golden platter to get to me. The platter slowly filled with money and checks as it passed through the congregation.
When the offering plate came to me, I would ceremoniously unfurl my hand and add “my” money into the collection. I remember feeling satisfied as the plate passed to the next row. As if somehow I had done a good thing. I wasn’t sure what that whole put-a-quarter-in-the-bowl was about. I remember thinking maybe I had just paid to sit in this pew, our pew, the one on the left, six rows back where our family always sat. It seems like I asked about this and someone told me that the money was for Jesus. When I got a little older, I wondered if giving that money had something to do with the forgiveness of sins.

I am thankful that my parents took me to church as a little girl. A reverence for God, a holy hush, grew within my soul from a tender age and God would use this reverence many years later when, because of His grace, my heart was softened to hear clearly and respond to the gospel when I was 17 years old.

Last month as we worshipped through December, the song and specifically the lyric that ran on repeat through my heart all month long was,

“So come, though you have nothing
Come, He is the offering
Come, see what your God has done”
–O Come, All You Unfaithful by Sovereign Grace

God bids us come as we are, trusting and following The Way that He provided. Come empty-handed. He is the offering.
No quarters required. Come to Jesus.