"The rich are not to give more than a half shekel and the poor are not to give less when you make the offering to the Lord to atone for your lives." (Exodus 30:15)
This scripture puzzled me at first - why wouldn't God want the rich to give more if they wanted to or could afford to? But then I realized - God was asking each Israelite to make an offering to atone for their lives. They were to begin, at age 20, to repay the Lord in a small way that recognized His gift of life. No one man is worth more than another to God - the rich and the poor are equal in His eyes. God did not want more from the rich because their lives weren't more valuable to Him than the lives of the poor. God loves us all the same!
"What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Mark 8:36)
Jesus reminds us that the gift of life is extravagant! Worth so much that nothing on earth can purchase his own soul - not the whole world! Yet God instructed the Jews to give 1/2 shekel each year at census time as a reminder of the Gift of God they had received. Surely, God's gift was worth far more than that - worth more than the whole world - yet the Lord sought a token as a reminder to us.
Do I know the value of God's gift to me? I know I haven't always acted in ways that show God how much I appreciate the gift. Every time I've done something self-destructive, I devalue the gift. My 1/2 shekel - is it just a daily acknowledgement of the Lord's gift through prayer? Is it doing his will, or doing something for others? How will I spend my 1/2 shekel today?
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