Sermon Tone Analysis

“I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.

From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them.

Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts.

But you say, ‘How shall we return?’

Will man rob God?

Yet you are robbing me.

But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’

In your tithes and contributions.

You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you.

Bring the full tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.

And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.

I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts.

Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts.”

[1]

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, was recognised for his godly stewardship.

Wesley was one of the great evangelists of the eighteenth century.

As a young man at Oxford, Wesley once was interrupted whilst hanging some extravagant paintings on his walls.

A chambermaid, quite obviously impoverished, knocked at Wesley’s door.

This poor woman, locked in poverty, sought some charitable assistance from Wesley, but he was unable to assist because he had just spent his allowance on the pictures.

The journal Mission Frontiers records the guilty recrimination which haunted him.

“Will thy Master say, ‘Well done, good and faithful steward?’ Thou hast adorned thy walls with money which might have screened this poor creature from the cold!

O justice! O mercy—Are not these pictures the blood of this poor maid?” [2]

Wesley determined to limit his expenses so that he would have more money to give to the poor.

In the first year, his income was thirty pounds and he found he could live on twenty-eight.

So, he gave away two pounds.

In the second year, his income doubled, but he held his expenses even, and so he had thirty-two pounds to give away (a comfortable year’s income).

In the third year, his income jumped to ninety pounds, and he gave away sixty-two pounds.

In his long life, Wesley’s income advanced to as high as 1,400 pounds in a year.

Rarely, however, did his expenses rise above thirty pounds.

He said that he seldom had more than one hundred pounds in his possession at a time.

This so baffled the English Tax Commissioners that they investigated him in 1776, insisting that for a man of his income he must have silver dishes that he was not paying excise tax on.

He wrote them, “I have two silver spoons at London and two at Bristol.

This is all the plate I have at present, and I shall not buy any more while so many round me want bread.”

[3]

When John Wesley died in 1791, at the age of 87, the only money mentioned in his will was the coins found in his pockets and dresser.

Most of the 30,000 pounds he had earned in his life had been given away.

He wrote, “I cannot help leaving my books behind me whenever God calls me hence; but in every other respect, my own hands will be my executors.”

In other words, Wesley himself put a control on his spending and he invested the rest in the cause of Christ.

[4]

Few of us know what it means to give sacrificially.

Consequently, few of us know what blessings might result from such sacrificial giving.

Perhaps we can learn as we give attention to the text chosen for our study this morning, MALACHI 3:6-12.

*FAILURE TO WORSHIP THROUGH GIVING IS THEFT* — Week-by-week I briefly provide instruction concerning the act of giving.

As we give, we are called to worship God.

In giving, we acknowledge that God is the source of all that we hold.

Moreover, we confess that we are but administrators of God’s goodness.

Thus, in bringing before the Lord our gifts and offerings, we worship Him as the giver of every good and perfect gift.

What would you say is the greatest robbery ever committed?

Of all the robberies witnessed on television, read about in newspapers or heard of in our conversations, which would you say is the greatest?

I suggest that the greatest robbery of all history is that God’s redeemed people have robbed Him—and they do so on a continuing basis.

The text before us is shocking!

“Will man rob God?

Yet you are robbing Me.”

We are so accustomed to ignoring God’s claims in our lives that we would be shocked to think that these pointed words might somehow apply to us! Unfortunately, professed Christians are not particularly shocked when they realise that they have withheld honour from God through failure to give generously to His cause.

Furthermore, we Christians do not expect anyone—the church treasurer, the finance committee, the deacons, the pastor—even God Himself—to do anything about it!

A little girl came home after attending for the first time a service in the local church.

Arriving home, a neighbour asked if she were good.

She said not only was she good, but she was polite.

She explained that when they passed the plate around with money in it, she did not take any.

This would seem to be the measuring stick by which most of us determine whether we have robbed God.

If we take nothing from the plate, if we receive nothing from corporate worship, if we participate in none of the learning, educating or serving functions of the church—we decide that we owe God nothing and we have not robbed Him of anything!

How good are Christians at honouring God through the act of giving?

The State of Church Giving Through 2010, a report from a group called Empty Tomb, suggests that as people grow richer, they give less.

Though personal incomes increased 130% from 1968 to 2010, the percentage given to the churches declined by 23% during the same period; giving to churches as a percent of income declined by 16%.

If the same proportion of income had been given in 2010 as in 1968, aggregate total contributions would have been $6.3 billion greater.

Giving during the Great Depression stayed above 3%, whereas present giving has dropped to 2.4%.

If historically Christian churches had received a tithe from the members, an additional $165 billion would have been given.

[5]

In 1916, Protestants were giving 2.9 percent of their incomes to their churches.

In 1933, the depth of the Great Depression, it was 3.2 percent.

In 1955, just after affluence began springing up throughout our culture, it was still 3.2 percent.

By 1999, when Americans were overall much richer, after taxes and inflation, than during the Great Depression, Protestants were giving 2.6 percent of their incomes to their churches.

Therefore, on average, Americans give 2.4% of their disposable income to the churches.

However, Americans spend 5.3% of their income eating out! [6] What is worse, 33-50% of church members give nothing to the support of their congregation.

[7]

Here’s the shocker.

America’s poor are more generous than America’s rich—if you look at their giving as a percentage of their income.

[8] Among the most generous states are also some of the poorest—Mississippi, Arkansas, South Dakota, Louisiana, Tennessee and Alabama.

[9] With the exception of South Dakota, each of these states has large Baptist populations.

Perhaps we Baptists do a few things correctly.

Americans who earn less than $10,000 gave 2.3 percent of their income to religious organisations, whereas those who earn $70,000 or more gave only 1.2%.

Households of committed Christians making less than $12,500 annually give away roughly 7% of their income, a figure no other income bracket beats until incomes rise above $90,000.

In absolute terms, the poorest Christians give away more dollars than all but the wealthiest Christians.

[10]

And the shocks just keep coming!

Widows and widowers are some of the biggest givers, with 17.6% giving 10% or more of their income to their church, compared to 8.6% of non-widowed people!

[11]

Past studies have indicated that roughly 75 percent of charitable giving is provided by 25 percent of the people, and that giving levels vary greatly from denomination to denomination.

[12] Only non-Christian groups (such as Latter Day Saints and Seventh Day Adventists) approach the level of giving expected of the Word of God (about 30 to 45 percent of Latter-day Saints give ten percent).

However, it is necessary to keep in mind that such cults employ religious coercion to compel such compliance.

For example, Latter-day Saints go before their bishops every year and account for their giving.

Those who haven’t tithed the full ten-percent cannot go to the temple.

[13]

Perhaps you wonder how we in Canada compare to the United States in giving.

The answer is—poorly.

Total donations to charitable organisations in 2011 averaged $260 per donor in Canada.

[14] As is true of the United States, in Canada, Conservative Protestants donate the most to religious work ($948 annually).

Liberal Protestants donate much less ($557 annually), and Catholics ($245 annually) and donors with no religious affiliation rank very far behind ($126).

[15]

Perhaps the story told of three men discussing their giving is true.

One of the men, a Baptist, said that he drew a circle and threw his money into the air.

All that fell outside the circle he gave to the church.

A second man, a Presbyterian, said that he drew a circle.

Then, throwing his money into the air, all that fell within the circle he gave to God.

The third man, a Catholic, said that he simply threw all his money into the air.

What God wanted, He could keep.

All that fell to earth the man kept.

Though the story is humorous, it should pierce our hearts, for this is not the way to determine what we will give to our God.

None of the men in the account honoured God as they should have.