Welcome to 2019! To many people, January is a time for a fresh new beginning. As I put away all the decorations from Christmas, I find myself with the urge to start spring cleaning all through the house, even though it is the middle of winter. I also like look back on the past year and reflect on areas of growth and areas that need improvement. One thing I focus on is financial decisions. Would Jesus be honored with how I spent money? Did I give my full tithe throughout the year? If I’m honest, not always.
One of my favorite verses in scripture is about this very topic: tithing. It is a difficult subject to talk about because, if you’re anything like me, you get a bit squirmy when money comes up. It makes us feel uncomfortable, generally because of the challenge of truly giving a full 10 percent of our income. I love the following verse because not only does it consist of a command, but also an invitation and a promise:
A Little Background
When God speaks to Judah through the prophet Malachi, He commands them to give an entire tithe of their harvest. In the Hebrew, tithe means to set aside a tenth (Goodrick & Kohlenburger, 1999).
After Moses brought the Israelites out of Egypt, God established the tithe because He ordained the Levites to live as priests that offered the Israelites’ sacrifices. This was a full-time job for them. They were not given land to plant and harvest, so God provided for them through the other 11 clans’ offerings. During the time of Malachi, the Israelites were not tithing. This left the Levites to get jobs to provide for themselves and their families, which ceased the worship of God and offering of sacrifices.
Today, instead of a harvest, we work for monetary income, so our tithe is a tenth of our salaries given, generally, to the church we belong to. It provides for the pastor and workers employed by the church, and supports the church’s ministries.
The Command
“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house” (Malachi 3: 10a). There are several reasons God presents this as a command:
- He wants us to take care of those He has established in church leadership, knowing that in most cases, they do not have other jobs to provide for their family.
- In tithing, we acknowledge that God owns everything. He just allows us to use it.
- It gives us the opportunity to show we trust Him to provide.
- It keeps our hearts free from the love of money.
The Invitation
“Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty,” (Malachi 3:10b). God invites us to test Him in this area. This is the only place I can find in scripture where God gives us permission and encouragement to test Him. This is amazing! The God of all creation allows us to test his promise!
The Promise
I love this part, “and see if I don’t throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing there is not room enough for it, (Malachi 3:10b).” I can picture the Lord unlatching the heavenly gate and blessings pouring down over me as I stand with arms open wide! Yes, please! In my own life, God has been so faithful to this Word and poured out blessing after blessing over the years as I try to be obedient to tithe. Sometimes they are monetary and some are unabashed answers to prayer. Here are just a few.
- When we had a mold issue under our pier and beam house, the restoration company bid $5000 to fix it. The very next day after praying and trusting God’s provision, a check arrived in the mail for that amount.
- One morning, in my prayer time, I said to God, “Lord, I pray for people all of the time. Who prays for me? I don’t know of anyone who prays for me.” That very morning, precious Betty Garner walked into my classroom and announced to me, “I want you to know that I pray for you every morning!”
- On a teacher’s income, paying for my daughter to attend Texas A&M was a challenge. However, the Lord ALWAYS provided. I always had what I needed, and my bills somehow always got paid.
- My daughter wanted to attend a formal dance with friends from another school in December. I had $100 in the budget to purchase all the things she would need to attend. Before she and I went into the mall, we prayed, sharing with God that we would like to get a dress, shoes and jewelry with the money we had and asked Him to help us. When we decided on a dress, we took it to the register thinking we were going to get a great deal of $54. However, when the cashier rang it up, it was $27 with tax! We bought shoes, a purse, and jewelry and even had a little money left over.
The Challenge
Sweet friend, I want you to experience the blessings of God! He honors obedience and He always comes through on His promises. A promise that was written almost 450 years before Christ still applies today.
I know, it truly is hard to restructure the budget to allow the tithe to come out first. It’s going to feel like a LOT of money, especially the more you make. But God owns it all anyway. It’s not really ours. He is just allowing us to be stewards of it. He promises to meet your every need (Matthew 6:33).
God honors taking steps of obedience. I challenge you to take Him at His Word. Trust Him. Trust His words of promise. Then sit back, spread your arms wide, turn your face toward heaven and experience His promised overflowing blessings!
Has He blessed you in this regard? I’d love to hear your story!
Be blessed.
Reference
Goodrick, E.W. & Kohlenburger, J.R. (1999). NIV Exhaustive Concordance (2nd ed.). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing Co.
I absolutely loved reading your post and especially your answered prayers. Reading this was a reminder of how intimately God wants to be involved in our finances and every thought and worry.
I absolutely loved reading your post and especially your answered prayers. Reading this was a reminder of how intimately God wants to be involved in our finances and every thought and worry.