Tithes, Gifts and Offerings: What's the difference and why does it matter?
Notes
Transcript
6 Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
7 Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed;
9 as it is written, “He scattered abroad, he gave to the poor, His righteousness endures forever.”
10 Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness;
11 you will be enriched in everything for all liberality, which through us is producing thanksgiving to God.
12 For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing through many thanksgivings to God.
Introduction - Explain 6-8 and then 9-12 (above)
We are going to look at the three ideas in the Old and New Testament about giving. They are:
Tithes
Gifts
Offerings
And with each one of these we will look at three things about each, 1. what is it (a definition), 2. how it works 3. Does it matter to us?
Let’s begin with:
1. Tithing
What is it? (define and an example)
Tithe is to give a tenth Le 27:30
30 ‘Thus all the tithe of the land, of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord’s; it is holy to the Lord.
and Lev 27:32 says:
32 ‘For every tenth part of herd or flock, whatever passes under the rod, the tenth one shall be holy to the Lord.
So, one part out of every ten is Holy to the Lord. But where does this number come from? It is based on the history of the patriarch of the Jews - Abraham. Gen 14:20 says:
20 And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.” He gave him a tenth of all.
This is Abram giving Melchizedek a tenth of that he took as spoil when he defeated Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him in order to save his nephew Lot.
So, that’s what a tithe is but,
b. How does it work?
So the tithe is a tenth of all that was grown. It wasn’t the necessarily the first tenth Lev 27:30-32 says that it will be counted out and the tenth one will be holy to the Lord. (Bring some apples).
That’s the basics of the tithe to be dedicated to the Lord and to be brought into the town. However, every third year the tithe was to be given to the Levites, the stranger, the orphan and the widow so that they may eat and be well. But what if they needed the food for themselves and they wanted to redeem it - or buy it back? Well Lev 27:31 says:
31 ‘If, therefore, a man wishes to redeem part of his tithe, he shall add to it one-fifth of it.
In other words if you are paying cash - you pay fifteen percent of the value - not ten percent. The Levitical law has no other requirements for cash as a tithe to be given to the Lord. The tithe was to be an inheritance for the Levites because they had no inheritance in the land. They were to do the work of the Lord by ministering to the people. In other words those who had food were supposed to help feed the Levites.
c. Does tithing matter to us?
This is where a few of you may get mad at me and some may be very happy. I’m going to say no, tithing is not something we have to do. Tithing was a point of Levitical law for the Jews before Christ Jesus. We are gentiles so we aren’t bound by the law and we are Christians so we aren’t bound by the law. However, that being said. Tithing is an example of giving to the Lord that we can use for our own habit of giving to the Lord.
It’s a starting point. It’s a number - 10%. We can use it as a challenge for how much we give. Some of you may never give that much, some of you may give more. So here’s two challenges for you - first - be like John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church.
When he had earnings of 30 pounds and living expenses at 28 pounds, he gave away two pounds. When his earnings increased to 60 pounds, he gave away 32. As his earnings increased to 120 pounds, he continued to live on 28 and give away 92 pounds.
In other words he gave away everything he earned except what he needed to live on. Try that for a challenge.
Another challenge of tithing comes from the prophet Malachi. When the Jews were not doing the right thing after they returned to Jerusalem after their time away in Babylon they were having troubles feeding themselves. So, the Lord gave them a challenge Malachi 3:10 says:
10 “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this,” says the Lord of hosts, “if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.
This is the only time God ever said to test Him. For us it works out that if we bring in the full tithe - or the 10% - then the Lord will open the flood gates and pour out a blessing that will overflow.
This challenge is mimicked by God to the Corinthians in 2 Co 9:10
10 Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness;
Think about it - pray about it - talk about it - give it a try. Put God to the test.
2. Gifts
a. What is it? (define and example)
According to the dictionary gifts are:
1. a notable capacity, talent, or endowment
2. something voluntarily transferred by one person to another without compensation
In other words it is something inside us, or something we give away to some one else. A different definition comes from the Bible:
A gift is - faculty, aptitude, bent, talent, genius, knack mean a special ability for doing something. gift often implies special favor by God or nature. faculty applies to an innate or less often acquired ability for a particular accomplishment or function.
So it’s like definition number one above - a notable capacity, talent or endowment.
So...
b. How does it work?
Gifts in the Old testament were extras given to God. Things that weren’t required by the law but given to God anyway. It seems that most of the time the gifts were money, gold, silver or stuff that would not be covered under the law of tithing.
The other way gifts was used was something given by someone to someone else. Happy birthday! We like to give lots of gifts, Christmas, Easter, birthdays, graduation. Well they weren’t any different in the Old Testament. They gave lots of gifts to.
However, in the New Testament things changed. Almost every time the word gift is used it is God giving something to us. Acts 2:38 is an example:
38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
In the New Testament God has poured out an abundance of gifts on His children. There are few examples of people giving gifts - there’s the Wise Men giving gifts to Jesus and Paul delivering gifts from the church in Corinth to the poor in Jerusalem. Beyond that God gives the gifts - we get to receive them. The greatest gift of all being salvation and the gift of the Holy Spirit given to us when we repent and are baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins.
c. Does gift giving matter to us?
Absolutely. We need the gifts that are given to us by God each and every day. The gifts of the Spirit are totally necessary for the success of the church, and there are a lot of other gifts that we need that help us each and every day.
We can give gifts too. However, the gifts we give are from person to person. An example is the gift that you give me for Christmas. It is given voluntarily from one person to another. The money we give to people who come for special events, like the international workers who come to visit. That would be a gift offered in love to support them and their ministry. Giving gifts from the love in our hearts is wonderful and very necessary.
So let’s move on to the last type of giving...
3. Offerings
a. What is it? (man to God) - This is what man sacrifices or gives to God.
An Offering is: a sacrifice ceremonially offered as a part of worship
or - a contribution towards the support of a church
An offering is what we give to God - it’s our sacrifice.
In the Old Testament they offered up a Sacrifice to God or other gods. In the Bible especially the Old Testament a sacrifice is an offering which presents divinity, God, by way of expiation or propitiation, or as a token acknowledgement or thanksgiving; to immolate on the altar of God, in order to atone for sin, to procure favor, or to express thankfulness. All in all, there is no success without sacrifice. Lev 5:6 is a good example, it says:
6 ‘He shall also bring his guilt offering to the Lord for his sin which he has committed, a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat as a sin offering. So the priest shall make atonement on his behalf for his sin.
The guilt and sin offering were just two possible reasons to bring an offering. Other reasons were a peace offering, a drink offering, and a grain offering. That’s enough I think you probably get the point. They had a lot of reason to sacrifice animals.
However, in the New Testament they offered up gold and silver and other such valuables at the synagogue and the Temple to support the ministry that was conducted in these places. Lk 21:1-4
1 And He looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury.
2 And He saw a poor widow putting in two small copper coins.
3 And He said, “Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all of them;
4 for they all out of their surplus put into the offering; but she out of her poverty put in all that she had to live on.”
This is what an offering is for us now. There is need for monetary support. The building and the ministries of the Church require gold and silver to continue to thrive. Some give from their surplus and some give all they have. Which are you?
b. How does an offering work?
Well a simple version is to stick your hands in your pockets and pull out what is there (have some money in my pocket) - but that’s the simple version. A more complicated version is found in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians 2 Co 9:7 and it says:
7 Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
This more complicated version requires you to pray about how much to give, maybe even look at your finances and decide how much you really need for your living and how much you could give away. Then you have to make a decision. You have to choose a number. But remember don’t do it grudgingly, don’t do it and blame someone else for making you do it. Do it cheerfully with joy and gladness in your heart. Keep in mind the metaphor of sowing seeds. If you only throw a few seeds out you only reap a small harvest, but when you throw a huge amount of seeds out you reap a bountiful harvest.
This can be where the idea of the tithe comes into play. If you are having a hard time deciding how much to give you can use the Biblical example of the tithe. Pull out one dollar out of every 10 dollars or ten percent. Test the Lord so that you will reap a great harvest.
c. Does giving an offering matter to us?
Absolutely - this is our sacrifice of thanksgiving. Our offerings are not given to appease God, or pay for our sin. Our offerings are not a legalistic requirement that we have to do to obtain salvation. Our offerings are our sacrifice of thanksgiving to the Lord. We are thanking Him for the gifts that He has given us by giving some back for His glory.
Now if you are thinking an offering is nothing more than money you are wrong. An offering can be so much more than that. An offering can be just about anything - especially if it saves the Church money. Your time can be an offering. Small amount of money but lots of time. There is work that needs to be done - especially if you can paint, or fix things, do lawn work, it can all work out for God’s glory. Your talent(s) can be an offering. Find something that needs to be improved or started that your talent would work to correct. One such thing could be in the making of signs. We have very few signs directing people were to go. Nice signs would be a great help. In order to help with this aspect of giving to the Church I have a couple surveys for each of you to complete. One will help the leadership know what things you can do and what you are willing to do. Now Iv’e said it the ugly word of survey.
So, this idea of our offerings being more than just our gifts is found in Ro 12:1
1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
It’s great to give our silver and gold cheerfully and liberally but God wants us to present our very bodies to Him as spiritual worship.
Exit - So what’s the big point?
When we try to distinguish between tithes and offerings, it is important to first understand the concept of tithing. Often we think that what we give to our local church is a tithe, when in reality it is an offering. Christian tithing is a misnomer because we are under no obligation to fulfill the command to tithe as given to the Israelites as part of the Mosaic Law. The tithe was a requirement of the Law in which all Israelites were to give 10 percent of everything they grew. The New Testament on the other hand has no commands, or even recommends, that Christians submit to a legalistic tithe system. Paul states that believers should set aside a portion of their income as an offering, but this is not a tithe.
God expected the Israelites to honor Him by giving the first fruits of what He gave to them. Giving the 10 percent tithe was commanded of the Israelites and was therefore an obligation. When Christ died on the cross, He fulfilled the requirements of the Law once and for all. To continue to say that we must tithe nullifies, at least in part, the sacrifice of Christ and return to the idea of justification by works and law-keeping. The first fruits offering found its fulfillment in Jesus.
An offering is that which is freely given by Christians to the work of the Lord, the local church, and/or ministries and missions. But offerings are far more than simply the check we write on Sunday. We are to offer much more to God than our monetary resources. We are to offer our bodies “as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God” as part of our worship. The reason for offering ourselves is because we are “those who have been brought from death to life.” God is not nearly as interested in our monetary offerings as He is in our submission and obedience. The truth is that He doesn’t need our resources to accomplish His plans and purposes. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills and needs nothing from us. What He desires, however, and what He values, is the heart that overflows with gratitude and thanksgiving to the God who saved us and who gives us all things, knowing our needs before we even ask. Such a heart gives generously, willingly, and cheerfully in response to the love and grace that abound in Christ.
If we all gave in this way we would have very little trouble making our budget or being able to provide for the ministries and upkeep of the Church.
One final thought for you:
24 There is one who scatters, and yet increases all the more, And there is one who withholds what is justly due, and yet it results only in want.
25 The generous man will be prosperous, And he who waters will himself be watered.