One Christian’s Review of “Caring for Widows,” by Brian Croft and Austin Walker

Brian Croft and Austin Walker’s “Caring for Widows” is a step in the right direction for the church. It is a much needed reminder to every Christian that ministry to widows in the church is a massive biblical mandate that cannot and must not be ignored.

Sadly, though, the first half of the book has a major biblical error and a serious biblical omission relating to believers caring for fellow Christian widows they are not related to, and these problems lead to a dumbing down in our understanding of what caring for widows in the church actually entails.

Along with an additional problem with interpreting a passage in 1 Timothy 5 on how the early church cared for her widows, the book’s “caring for widows lite” view, as one might call it, results in a major applicational misstep in the second half of the book.

“Caring for Widows” Compels Us to Care for Widows

First, the positives, and there are a lot of them.

In the first section entitled “Biblical Warrant,” Austin Walker makes a compelling case that the biblical teaching on caring for widows is pervasive and extensive in both the Old and New Testaments and must be taken more seriously by the church today.

One takeaway after reading this book is that God really, really cares about widows, and he really, really cares that his people care about widows too. Clearly, every Christian, not just pastors, should be concerned about widows in their church and take practical action to help them.

I applaud Walker for starting his discussion on caring for widows with the example of Jesus Christ himself who, as he died on the cross for the sins of the entire world, cared for his own widowed mother Mary by assigning her into the care of John.

But I was very much disappointed by a mistake Walker made while explaining why Jesus assigned John to care for his mother, a mistake that colors his entire approach to caring for believing widows whom we are not related to. I will discuss this mistake later.

“Caring for Widows” is a Biblical Tour De Force

In the Old Testament, Walker directs our attention to how Boaz treated Ruth, how Elijah and Elisha treated widows, and how caring for widows is a major mandate in the Mosaic Covenant. In story after story, and passage after passage, we see God’s intense concern for widows.

And yet here again there is a problem. Walker barely mentions Ruth’s commitment to the widow Naomi, which is the key turning point of the book. Again, this omission affects his understanding of what it means to care for believing widows we are not related to. I will discuss this later as well.

From the Old Testament, Walker directs our attention back to the New Testament and Christ’s general teaching and actions regarding widows. He then covers how the early church cared for widows in the Book of Acts and the epistles, but he equivocates at one crucial point. Again, this affects the book’s understanding of what it means to care for widows.

“Caring for Widows” has Some Great Ideas for Making Widows Feel Special

In the second section of Caring for Widows entitled, “Pastoral Application,” written by Brian Croft, Brian gives us practical examples of what the biblical teaching on caring for widows can look like in a local church.

We see the kind of care Croft has in mind in the titles of the chapters in this section, titles like, “Minister the Word,” “Equip the Church,” “Stay a While,” “Write a Card,” and “Take a Gift.” I found this section helpful (as far as it went) and every pastor will benefit from reading it. But as I mentioned above, Croft’s concept of caring for believing widows we are not related to falls far short of what the Bible actually teaches.

But What Does Caring for Widows Really Mean?

Now on to the problems.

As I mentioned above, the problems I see in the book revolve around what exactly we mean by “caring for widows” in our churches, widows we are not personally related to, other than that we share a common faith and are, therefore, members of the body of Christ, the family of God.

One answer to this question lies in what is the central passage to the Book of Ruth, a passage that Austin Walker mentions only in passing.

“Caring for Widows” Overlooks Ruth’s Example

“Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.” But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her. (Ruth 1:15-18)

This passage is one of the most beautiful examples of commitment in all of human literature and it explains a key tipping point in Israel’s history: how the nation of Israel transformed from the social chaos during the period of the judges (the book begins with “In the days when the judges ruled”) to the heights of David’s reign (the book ends with a genealogy of David). It is saying, “Do you want to know how God can transform an entire culture? Then look at how Ruth’s radical commitment to Naomi, a widow in dire circumstances whom she is no longer related to except through a shared common faith, transformed her culture.”¹

In this passage Ruth is saying to Naomi in many different ways something simple and yet profound: “I am going to do whatever it takes to make sure you are okay. May God strike me dead if I don’t.” In the process of making this radical and unconventional commitment to Naomi, Ruth set off a spiritual atomic bomb that reversed the forces of evil and advanced the kingdom of God for everyone around her long after she died.

Thinking of Ruth specifically, note that at this point, because Ruth’s husband has died, she is no longer physically related to Naomi, her former mother-in-law. But Ruth does share with Naomi a common faith in Jehovah God and it is because of her faith in God and her love for Naomi that Ruth makes this unconditional and irreversible commitment to her.

The answer the Book of Ruth gives us, then, to the question of what it means to care for a widow we are not related to, but who shares our faith in God, is that we are to make the same commitment to our fellow believing widows that Ruth made to Naomi. We are to do whatever it takes to make sure they are okay, even if it means risking our own life to do so.

Thus, by ignoring this passage, Walker diminishes the radical nature of what it means to care for fellow believing widows.

“Caring for Widows” Misunderstands Why Jesus Entrusted Mary to John

But Ruth is not the only example of this kind of a believer making an absolute commitment to guarantee the wellbeing of a believing widow they are not otherwise related to. Jesus on the cross entrusting his mother to John is another example.

Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, “Woman, behold your son!” Then He said to the disciple, “Behold your mother!” And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home. (John 19:25-27)

John is no relation to Mary, and yet Jesus entrusts his mother to him by saying, “Behold your mother!” Jesus treats John as an actual brother since normally a son who was dying would entrust his mother to another son. “Treat my mother as if she is your own mother,” he is saying.

The question is, why did Jesus entrust his mother Mary to John? Walker’s answer to this question is that “It was because there was no husband or other family in a position to care and to provide for her after his death” (Page 24).

But this answer is incorrect. Jesus had four adult half-brothers who could have cared for his mother. From a purely human perspective, Jesus could have and should have entrusted Mary to one of his four half-brothers: James, Joses, Jude, and Simon (Mark 6:3). Jesus knew he was going to die on the cross long before he actually did. He could easily have made these arrangements with one of his brothers beforehand.

To understand why he didn’t entrust Mary to one of his brothers, we need to consider a previous encounter Jesus had with his family.

The story in Mark 3 of Jesus’ mother and brothers coming to see Jesus (and take him away because they thought he had gone crazy) but not being able to get in because of the crowd answers this question of why Jesus chose John instead of a brother to care for Mary.

When told of his family standing outside, Jesus responded, ““Who are my mother and my brothers?” Looking at those seated in a circle around Him, He said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother”” (Mark 3:33-34).

It is easy to think that Jesus is speaking metaphorically here. But Jesus entrusting his mother to John by saying, “Behold your mother!” proves that he was not. He actually regarded the relationship he had with believers to be more real and basic than any earthly family relationships he had.

When Jesus died on the cross, his brothers were not believers. They didn’t come to saving faith until after Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to James (1 Corinthians 15:7). After this appearance we see Jesus’ brothers and Mary praying with other believers in the upper room in Jerusalem (Acts 1:14). James, the Lord’s half-brother, would go on to become the head of the Jerusalem church and to write the Book of James. Jude, another half-brother of Jesus, wrote the Book of Jude.

But in spite of the fact that Jesus’ brothers quickly came to faith in him following his death and resurrection, John continued caring for Mary until her death (“From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.”)

John’s faithful care for Mary, a woman he was not related to except by a common faith in Jesus, along with the prominence of Mary and her sons in the early church in Jerusalem, must have been a powerful lesson to the church that Christians are to treat all believing widows as if they are their own mothers. (And in fact, Paul states this explicitly in 1 Timothy 5:1, 2 at the beginning of his discussion of the widows list: “Treat…older women as mothers…”.)

What Ruth and John Teach Us about Caring for Widows

So what Ruth and John teach us about caring for widows in the church is that we are to treat widows as if they are our own mothers (John) and we are to do whatever it takes to guarantee their wellbeing, even if it means risking our lives (Ruth).

Why do we treat fellow believing widows this way? We treat them this way because we love them, and because we love Jesus and Jesus loves them too, and because this is the way we want the church to treat our wives when we are gone.

How the Early Church Followed Ruth and John’s Examples in Caring for Widows

How then did the early church put this biblical teaching on caring for widows and the biblical examples of Ruth and John into practice?

With the leadership and approval of John, Mary, James and his brothers, this is what the early church did:

The church made caring for widows its top priority from the very beginning. (Acts 2:44, 45)
The church guaranteed the wellbeing of its widows by establishing a list of widows in its midst who were living in poverty and had no one to support them. (1 Timothy 5:3-16)
It began distributing food to its needy widows on a daily basis for as long as those widows lived, or for as long as they were in need. (Acts 6:1)
When finances ran low, other well to do believers from time to time sold off lands and possessions to meet the need. (Acts 2:45; 1 Timothy 6:17-19)
The church used it’s ministry to widows to mend fences between Christians with different cultural backgrounds by appointing men of outstanding character and ability as deacons to lead its ministry to widows from these different backgrounds. (Acts 6:1-6)
The church encouraged its members to visit widows. (James 1:27)
The church made sure its members understood how important it was for believers to care for widows in their own families, thus reducing the burden on the church. (1 Timothy 5:4, 8)
The church established specific guidelines by which widows were qualified to be on its list for support. (1 Timothy 5:3-16)
The church used its ministry to widows to bring healing and create unity between members from different races. (Paul’s Jerusalem mission, i.e., 2 Cor. 9)
The church was able to say, “There is no needy person among us.” (Acts 4:34)
And finally, the church’s ministry to its widows became an extremely effective platform for the gospel. (Acts 6:7)

Clearly, the key to the early church’s care for its widows was its “widows list,” the list of impoverished, believing widows who were qualified to be fully supported by the church. But it is on this point that Walker and Croft fall short of the biblical teaching.

The Church Cannot Properly Care for Impoverished Widows Without a Widows List

Because Walker glosses over, or ignores altogether, the examples of Ruth and John, the true implications of caring for widows in the church are minimized in their book. For example, when discussing the key passage in 1 Timothy 5 relating to widows who qualify to be put on the list, Walker writes,

“There are different opinions about the precise meaning of verses 9 and 10. Some are persuaded that Paul is setting out the high standards required for widows who are going to serve in the church and become recognized women workers, perhaps deaconesses. He even sets a minimum age of sixty in order to be classed as a real widow and also adds she must be the wife of one man (v. 9). Others take these same verses and say that they describe the kind of widow who is worthy of the church’s full care and support” (pp. 79-80, emphasis mine)

The problem here is that Walker never tells us which view is the correct view! He just leaves us hanging. There are different opinions about the precise meaning of every passage in the Bible. The role of a Bible expositor is to tell us which opinion is correct through careful exegesis of the passage, along with attention to its context and the overall teaching of the rest of the Bible. Walker isn’t illuminating this text for us, he’s obfuscating it.

The consequence of this lack of conviction on the meaning of the widows list in this “Biblical Warrant” section of their book is that the widows list is not dealt with at all in the practical application section of their book.

In the last section of the book, Brian Croft never advocates for churches establishing a widows list. This means that, for all intents and purposes, pastors and deacons are not given a practical way to meet the ongoing, long term pressing needs of Christian widows living in poverty. (Since sixteen percent of all widows over the age of 65 are living in poverty, the odds are that there are tens of thousands of impoverished Christian widows in many, if not most, churches.)

Kind Gestures are Necessary, but not Sufficient, when Caring for Widows

Instead, what Croft gives us is a long list of kind gestures. For example, he writes of the importance of visiting widows in the hospital, nursing home, and in their own homes. He tells us how long we should stay during such visits. He gives us suggestions for sending cards and gifts. He shows us the importance of mentioning widows from the pulpit, praying for them, and preaching about them.

But we are never told about the importance of putting impoverished believing widows we are not related to except by faith on a permanent support list. All churches have a list of pastors and staff they support. Many churches even have a list of missionaries they support. Why cannot churches have a list of impoverished widow members they support?

Of course all American widows have Social Security. But sometimes it is the minimum amount. (In 2018, the minimum Social Security benefit was $848.80 a month, which was below poverty level. Would you be content with letting your own widowed mother live on that?)

Why can’t a church make a list of these widows and provide enough additional support to lift them out of poverty for their area? (Here is an example of one church that does this.) Or how about your church doing something like Paul did for the poor in the church of Jerusalem and help support the impoverished widows in a poor inner city church near yours? Paul used this mission to bridge the racial divide between Jew and Gentile. Maybe we could do the same to bridge the massive racial divides that exist in our churches.

The omission of the biblical widow’s list in the practical part of “Caring for Widows” is inexcusable and it explains why so many widows in churches today are languishing, receiving only ad hoc financial gifts from church benevolence committees in extreme emergencies, but getting no real long lasting financial solution to their poverty from the church. The result is that the way America’s churches treat their widows pales in comparison to the way the early church treated its widows.

Caring for Widows is good as far as it goes. But it could — and should — go so much further.²

*A single mom and her fatherless child with their team of men*

Since 2003 New Commandment Men’s Ministries has helped hundreds of churches throughout North America and around the world recruit teams of men who permanently adopt widows, single moms and fatherless children in their congregations for the purpose of donating two hours of service to them one Saturday morning each month. We accomplish this with a free training site called New Commandment Men’s Ministry Learn how to mobilize your men’s ministry to meet every pressing need in your church at newcommandment.org.

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Learn how to form teams of men for every widow, single mom

and fatherless child in your church at NewCommandment.org.