As we approach the end of our sermon series “what is the church”, we need to remember that the first thing we talked about is that the church is the people of God. Because of that, when we talk about what the church is supposed to be, what we’re really talking about is what we, both as individuals and together, are supposed to do. Today, we talk about something very important that the people of God do. The people of God give.
As we start to talk about that, I want to mention how helpful it was to me to be able to sit in the congregation last week as Janet Madsen and Kelly Luken handled the service. Not only did I have a lot less stress when I was gone for most of the week, but sitting where you do reminded me what it was like to be sitting where you do. It strikes me that, if I was sitting where you are this morning, and I heard the pastor say that the people of God give, the first thing I’d think is “Oh, gosh, I hope he’s not going to start talking about tithing again.”
Now, maybe some of you already tithe, and if you do, that’s great. If you are giving ten percent of your income to the church right now, I congratulate you and give you permission to check out of the sermon for a while. I’ll let you know when it’s time to check back in.
The rest of you, though, are probably like I was. The reason I’d have thought that is that I knew tithing was talked about in the Bible as something we’re supposed to do, but it was the last thing I wanted to do. So, I got really good at coming up with excuses for why I should not have to tithe. See if any of these excuses sound familiar to you.
First, I thought, well, you know, I may not tithe, but I give a lot of time to the church, so that should count, too. That one sound familiar? Now, I want to say that I know there are a lot of people here who do give a lot of time to the church, and I really appreciate that. You know, I go to pastors’ meetings sometimes, and I hear some pastors—not all of them, but some—talk about how they can’t get their congregations to do anything. I just kind of smile when I hear that, because I don’t have that problem. We have great people here, and lots of you do a lot of things for the church. I know that.
Still, that’s really not an excuse for not tithing. It was not an excuse for me, either. See, the last time I looked, there were twenty-four hours in a day. One-tenth of that would two point four hours, or two hours and twenty-four minutes. Now, I don’t know about you, but before I became a pastor, I very rarely gave two hours and twenty-four minutes of a day to the church. I do now, but I get paid for it now, so that really does not count.
Even if we did give that much time to the church, though, it would still not be an excuse for not tithing. Serving God was never meant to be a substitute for tithing. Tithing is one of the ways we serve God. We cannot find anything in the Bible that says if we serve God in other ways, we don’t have to tithe. We’re supposed to serve God in other ways in addition to our tithe, not as a substitute for it.
So, that excuse was gone for me, so I moved on to the next one. “Well, I may not tithe, but I give to other things besides the church, so that ought to count, too.” That one sound familiar to anyone? Now, again I’m sure there are a lot of people here who give to a lot of things besides the church. That’s great. I’m glad you do. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. It’s a good thing.
Now, in my case, even adding the things I gave to did not get me very close to ten percent. Maybe it does for you. Even so, though, it still is not an excuse to get out of tithing. Again, giving to other things is not a substitute for tithing. We cannot find anything in the Bible that says we don’t have to give a tenth of our income to the church as long as we give to other things. Even if those other things are good things, even if they’re ministry-type things, they are still not a substitute for tithing. We’re supposed to give to other things in addition to our tithe, not as a substitute for it.
So, another of my excuses was gone. Then, I thought of this one, and I really liked this one. I thought, you know, tithing is really a legal thing, and since Jesus came, we’re under grace, not law. Therefore, that Old Testament thing about tithing does not apply any more.
That sounds good, right? We’ve even talked about that in the past, how we no longer have to follow those Old Testament laws. In fact, Jesus even talked about these people who give a tenth of their income to the church but have no love in their hearts, and how that was the wrong way to go about it. That must mean I don’t have to tithe, right?
Well, yes and no. It’s true that tithing is not a golden ticket into heaven. Giving ten percent or more to the church is not a guarantee of salvation, nor is giving less that ten percent a guarantee that we’ll be condemned. Ten percent is a standard, that’s all.
Here’s the thing, though. If we say Jesus saved us from being under the law and put us under love, then we have to ask what Jesus actually told us to do. Jesus told us to love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength. In other words, Jesus said we should give it all. That’s the point of the story we read in Mark about the poor widow giving everything she had. Allowing us to give just ten percent is actually letting us off easy.
See, the reason we tithe is not because of legalism. It’s because of what that tithe means. When we tithe, we’re saying that we recognize that everything we have comes from God. As it said in our psalm, God owns the cattle on a thousand hills, as well as the hills themselves and everything else. When we tithe, we’re also saying that we trust God. We trust God enough that if we rely on God, God will take care of us.
When it came right down to it, that was where I was really stumbling on the whole tithing deal. What I was really saying was that I knew I was supposed to tithe, I knew I should tithe, but I just did not trust God enough to tithe. In fact, the thought of actually tithing scared me to death. I thought, I’m having a hard time getting the bills paid just giving the amount I give now. If I give ten percent to the church, I’ll never have enough to pay my bills. I’d like to tithe, but I just cannot do it.
Maybe that’s where you are. If so, I understand. So, I’d like to suggest that you do what I did. This is not my original idea. It came from a former pastor of mine, who got it from another pastor, who got it from somewhere else. It’s been around a long time. The reason this idea has been around a long time is because it works.
I looked at what I was giving, and it was about two percent of my income. That’s pretty close to the average of what United Methodists give nationally. I looked at that, and increased it by one percentage point, to three percent. I said, I’m going to do that for a year, and just see what happens. If I still have enough to pay my bills, then I’ll think about increasing it some more. If I don’t, I’ll drop back to where I was.
In other words, I was testing God. Now, some of you are thinking that was pretty risky, because scripture says you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. That’s true, but in this case, God made an exception. In our reading from Malachi, God says, “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse…Test me in this, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room to store it.” In other words, when it comes to tithing, God specifically says it’s okay for us to test God and see what happens.
That’s what I did. I gave at three percent for a year. It was not always easy, but I did it, and at the end of the year, we had enough. We did not have much excess, but we had enough. So, the next year, I gave at four percent. Again, we had enough. Then I gave at five percent. As you can see, it took several years before we got to the ten percent figure. But each time we increased our giving, we found out that we still had enough. We may not have a lot extra, but we always seem to have enough. In other words, we tested God, and we found out that God passed the test.
So, that’s what I challenge you to do. Test God. Figure out what you’re giving to the church now, and increase it by one percentage point. If you’re at one percent, increase it by two percent. If you’re at two percent, like I was, increase it to three percent. If you’re at three percent, increase it to four. Do that for a year, and see what happens. I’ll bet you’ll find out that you’ll still have enough. I’ll bet that, if you test God, God will pass the test for you, just like God did for me. God can be relied on. God is worthy of our trust.
Now, those of you who already are tithing, I need you to check back into the sermon now. Remember how I’ve been saying that nothing in scripture lets us substitute other things for tithing? Well, there’s also nothing in scripture that says we have to stop at tithing. Ten percent is not a ceiling we’re never allowed to go above. Ten percent is a floor, not a ceiling.
Those of you who’ve gone to church for a while have probably heard this phrase: “we will now give our tithes and our offerings.” You know why it gets said that way? Because our tithes are different from our offerings. The tithe is the ten percent that we’re supposed to give. Our offerings are the amount above ten percent that we give to show our gratitude to God for all God has done for us.
So, if you’re already tithing, that’s great, and I appreciate it, but don’t feel like you have to stop there. Keep going. Keep testing God. God will keep passing the test. God can be relied upon in all circumstances. We can always trust God.
Again, I’m not saying we should tithe because God will send us to hell if we don’t. I’m not even saying we should tithe because the church needs the money, although the church can certainly use it. I’m saying we should tithe because it’s the best, most tangible way to show our trust in God. It’s easy for us to say we have faith. It’s easy for us to say that we rely on God. When we tithe, though, we’re actually putting our money where our mouths are.
I understand that tithing is scary when we’ve never done it. It took me several years to work up to it. Sometimes, I still hesitate a little when I make out that check, wondering if the money is actually going to be there. It always is, though. God has never let me down yet. God won’t let you down either. Trust in God. If you cannot put complete trust in God, just put a little trust in God. See what happens. God will pass the test. God is worthy of our trust.
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