Our pastor spoke to us a while back on the topic of tithing. He acknowledged how difficult it was to talk about money in a church setting, and I agree: I used to be a pastor myself, and I always dreaded preaching about money. However, it is an important topic, and it is also something the Bible talks about a lot. The passage that our pastor based his comments on were from Malachi 3.

“Mal. 3:6   “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. ⁷ 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?’ ⁸ Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions. ⁹ You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. ¹⁰ Bring the full tithe 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. ¹¹ 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. ¹² Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the LORD of hosts.

Mal. 3:13   “Your words have been hard against me, says the LORD. But you say, ‘How have we spoken against you?’ ¹⁴ You have said, ‘It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the LORD of hosts? ¹⁵ And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.’”

The Book of Remembrance

Mal. 3:16   Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another. The LORD paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and esteemed his name. ¹⁷ “They shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him. ¹⁸ Then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him.” (Malachi 3:6-13, English Standard Version)

Pastor said many helpful things, but one of the most intriguing (at least, to me) was the idea that God doesn’t really need our money, so we can’t really rob him of that. Rather, when we refuse to acknowledge God with our pocketbooks, we rob God of the opportunity to bless us.

Whoa! Never thought of it that way before. I suspect that the number one way in which we experience God’s blessing is to serve God with our time, our treasure, and our talents. And the number one way in which God experiences delight in us is to bless us. Blessing means giving us what we need to be deeply happy and fulfilled in our lives. Good parents always get a kick out of giving to their children. So does the best Parent of all.

Of course, we also ought to remember that the word “tithe” simply means “a tenth.” When we tithe, it means that we are giving God back a tenth of what he has given us. As many have pointed out, this means that we get to keep nine-tenths of what God has given us. That sounds pretty reasonable to me. How about you?