I Got 5 On It
There’s a rap song that says, “Cash rules everything around me.”
Although we may complain about how much we have to pay for food, clothes, supplies and other things, we ultimately know we don’t have a choice but to pay. However, when it comes to tithing and giving money to the church, all of a sudden, either we don’t have money to give or we give $5 with an attitude. What we don’t realize is tithing is biblical and tithing shows God and us our heart posture.
First, let’s discuss what the tithe is. The tithe is the first ten percent. In the context of money, it is the first ten percent of your income. The following scriptures further explain what the tithe is:
Deuteronomy 14:22 (NIV): “Be sure to set aside a tenth of all that your fields produce each year.”
Numbers 18:25-29 (NLT): “The LORD also told Moses, ‘Give these instructions to the Levites: When you receive from the people of Israel the tithes I have assigned as your allotment, give a tenth of the tithes you receive -a tithe of the tithe- to the LORD as a sacred offering. The LORD will consider this offering to be your harvest offering, as though it were the first grain from your own threshing floor or wine from your own winepress. You must present one-tenth of the tithe received from the Israelites as a sacred offering to the Lord. This is the LORD’s sacred portion, and you must present it to Aaron the priest. Be sure to give to the LORD the best portions of the gifts given to you.’”
Genesis 28:20-22 (NLT): “Then Jacob made this vow: ‘If God will indeed be with me and protect me on this journey, and if He will provide me with food and clothing, and if I return safely to my father’s home, then the LORD will certainly be my God. And this memorial pillar I have set up will become a place for worshiping God, and I will present to God a tenth of everything He gives me.”
Therefore, if a person is paid $1,000, the tithe is $100. (If tithing from gross income vs. net income is a conundrum, as always, I suggest asking God where He wants the tithe to be taken from.)
However, as with all things, God doesn’t just want us to tithe because He asks us to, He wants us to tithe with gladness and because we want to. An example can be found in Genesis 4:3-5 (NLT): “When it was time for the harvest, Cain presented some of his crops as a gift to the LORD. Abel also brought a gift – the best portions of the firstborn lambs from his flock. The LORD accepted Abel and his gift, but he did not accept Cain and his gift. Thus made Cain very angry, and he looked dejected.”
The Lord accepted Abel’s offering because Abel gave it willingly and gave Him the best of what he had versus Cain’s giving of just “some” of his crops. In today’s time, Cain’s offering is the equivalent of saving $200 for a vacation but on Sunday only giving God $10 because that’s all you have left to spare.
Furthermore, Psalms 100:2 (NLT) tells us to “Worship the LORD with gladness.” Tithing is a form of worship. It’s how we show our thankfulness and gratitude for God providing for us. Therefore, if tithing is a form of worship and the Word tells us to worship in gladness, then we should tithe in gladness. Think about how you feel when you ask to spend time with someone and they have an attitude the entire time they are with you or when someone gets you a gift, but they didn’t put any thought or effort into the gift. It frustrates you. It makes you feel unappreciated and unloved. So, if we feel like that, how do you think God feels after He made a way to provide for you, after He gave you a promotion, after He blessed you with a house, after He gave you the extra finances and budgeting skills so you can enjoy vacations and outings, but when it comes time to give Him just the first ten percent of what He blessed you with, we want to pay everything and everybody else, but Him?
Tithing also breaks idol worship. Matthew 6:21 (NLT) says: “Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of you heart will also be.” Where do we put our treasures? We put it in our homes, our cars, our kids, beauty products, vacations, etc. When we pay for all of these things before God, what we’re ultimately telling Him is I don’t believe you’ll provide for me so I’ll provide for myself. When we pay for material things before God, we’re telling Him, I care more for these material things that you blessed me with than I care for You. God should come first in our lives in every facet.
Moreover, tithing is a show of faith. I heard a pastor say that you never have enough to tithe until you start tithing. To the natural senses, that sounds ludicrous. If I only make $2,000 a month and my bills and essentials are $1,900 a month, how will I be able to give God $200 a month and still be able to pay my bills? My honest answer is I have no idea. However, what I can tell you is, I tried God to see if the pastor’s statement was true. Five years ago, I received a promotion and relocated to a smaller city. In my naiveness, I believed that a smaller city meant a lower cost of living. My bills in the smaller city were significantly more than my bills in a bigger city. At this point, I had been learning about tithing and desired to tithe; however, money was extremely tight. At times when I couldn’t pay God ten percent, I recorded how much I owed Him. At the beginning of the next year, I prayed and asked God to give me enough from my refund check to cover my credit card bill and my tithes. A few months later, I received my refund and it was more than I needed. I paid the tithe from the refund plus the tithes I owed as well as paid off my credit card bill. Now, what was really amazing and miraculous was that without a promotion or an extra job, I was able to tithe from each check and still had enough money to pay my bills and necessities. 2 Corinthians 5:7 (KJV) says: “For we walk by faith, not by sight.” Paying God ten percent of your income before you pay bills and necessities can seem risky, but that is the ultimate definition of depending on God. To spend money not knowing where the remaining is going to come from forces you to trust that God will make a way. We tend to forget that God is a provider. We tend to forget that God created all of this. Matthew 6:26 (NLT) says: “Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are?”
The answer is “yes, you are.” So, shouldn’t you praise, worship and thank God for loving you in such a way? Shouldn’t we trust Him that He’ll provide for us? The older I get, the more I learn that love is a verb; it requires action. Loving God requires us to live righteously according to His Word. It requires us to repent and change from our wicked, fleshly ways. It requires us to acknowledge Him above ALL else – even bills. Matthew 6:24 (NLT) says: “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money.”
So my question to you on today is:
