Tithing and Giving

Why do we tithe, how much do we tithe, and from where do we tithe? How can our workplaces be used as vessels to further Gods kingdom and benefit Gods people? We'll discuss scriptural applications, as well as real world options. Happy Labor Day!!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:05

Welcome to another episode of Business by Belief. It is Labor Day, and I'm sure most of you are off, partially off, working from home this morning and going into work this afternoon. So those of you who have to work on Labor Day, we'll be thinking about you and praying for you, and hopefully you've got some time with family this weekend. But as we get into Labor Day and we're talking about... You know, that obviously comes from the labor force, and I'm giving everybody a day of celebration, a day of rest, but we get into, we're going to have a conversation today about tithing, not just personally, but corporately. How are we using our businesses to tithe to the kingdom, to give to the church, to give to God's people, and that tends be a bit of a rough topic for us on a personal level sometimes. You throw the business in there and a lot of people just don't think about that. They think that they give themselves a paycheck and whatever comes from that paycheck is what they tie back to the church. There's nothing wrong with that thinking, but I think that if you take Scripture and apply it the way it's intended, that It doesn't say be sure to set aside a tenth of all that you give yourself from what you've earned. It says to tithe a tenth of what you make. And it doesn't really specify where it comes from. So if you have the ability to generate income from multiple levels, and if you're a business owner, you do, you generate income corporately, and then you generate income personally when you pay yourself. And if you have multiple businesses and you have multiple, of course, multiple streams of income. So I thought it'd be kind of a good thing to discuss and talk about And... You know, tithing initially, and I'm kind of hitting on Deuteronomy, you know, it's to teach us to put God first in our life. And I learned from a very good friend at church and somebody who I look up to and I've had many conversations with, he said several years ago, he said, I started being more blessed when I started tithing first. So, you know, we have a habit of making tithing part of our budget. And not that there's anything wrong with that, but it typically falls at the bottom of the list. And it fell at the bottom of the list for me because I usually do things alphabetically. And so tiling would fall down at the end. It would fall past mortgage and car payment and electricity, everything just about except for water. It would fall at the bottom of the list. And so in your mind, you have a tendency to say, you know, I've spent all this money already and we get down here to the bottom and Here's what's left. That wasn't right, so I had to learn to move it to the top of the list. I don't even include it in our budget anymore. Tithing personally is a number that I derive from not only what I make, but on top of that, whatever I feel comfortable with. It doesn't say tithe only 10%. It says set aside a 10th. But there's nothing wrong with tithing more. And I don't necessarily believe that God will bless you more because you tithe more. That's being blessed for works. But he does say in Scripture that he will bless you for tithing. So we're to give God the first and the best of what we earn. And if we're spending our money everywhere else and giving last, he can't use that to bless us. Now, he doesn't want you to tithe to the point that you can't feed your family. that you can't take care of your home and pay your bills, but you are to tithe first. In Deuteronomy, they were told not to forget the Levites because the Levites had no inheritance. Their position was to maintain the temple and to do God's work. So in Deuteronomy 14, be sure to set aside a tenth of all that your fields produce each year. You know, if you scroll down in that scripture a little more, at the end of every three years, bring all the tithes of that year's produce and stores into your town so that the Levites who have no allotment or inheritance of their own and the foreigners, the fatherless, and the widows who live in your towns may come and eat and be satisfied so that the Lord your God may bless you and all the work of your hands. There was no question there or gray area. You know, bring what you have left or bring what you feel like bringing, it would bring a 10th. So that was the point of tithing, was to tithe to the church, to help the church grow, to help the church minister. And that's what it was for. And in doing that, God will bless them. It's not to be used in servitude. So tithing is not an option to put in place of actually going to minister to people or going on mission trips or providing food in a food bank or closing a clothes closet. Tithing is your first stop. Your first stop every week is to tithe to the church. After that, You can add on to that however you want to, however you feel that God is leading you to. But tithing is to come first. It is not to make the church rich. It's not so you can pay the staff more. It's not so you can buy a fancy sign to put out at the road. Tithing, at its base, is to supply the church with its needs to minister to the people, to bring the Word of God to the people. That is its ultimate place. After that, all the other things are great, right? If it helps the church maintain itself, help the church keep the lights on, keep the heat and air running, you've got to make sure that the pastors and the staff are paid, but it's not to make them rich. It's not to take a church of 800 people and create a mega building out of that that has a cafe in it and a gift shop and some of the other stuff I've seen online in some of these churches that's just unbelievable. But the bills have to be paid. And then it needs to be used to help the congregation, to help those in need, to disciple. That's what tithing is for. Tithing, you know, it blesses others. And in turn, it will bless you. And you may not see it immediately. You may never actually see it or realize that it happened. But tithing will, you know, God will bless you for your tithing. So that brings the question, can we expect the same if we tithe or donate from our business? You know, what if we don't put the word donate in there? We use that separate. Can we expect the same? Will God bless us as well? if we tithe from our business, and we're going to talk about that. In Malachi, the book of Malachi, Malachi 3, 8 through 12, he says, He talks about how God put an entire nation under a curse because of Israel's unfaithfulness. And he basically told them, he did tell them, you're robbing God of his tithes and offerings, but gave them a chance, told them what was happening and told them why they were cursed and said, if you bring food into the storehouse, he will pour out so much blessing that there will not be enough room to store it. And can you imagine if God could pour out his blessings on you to the point that you just couldn't handle it. The joy that would be in your life would be immeasurable. But that scripture starts out, will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me. But you ask, how are we robbing you? In tithes and offerings, you are under a curse, your whole nation, because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house. Test me in this, says the Lord Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the flesh It doesn't get much clearer than that. If you do not tithe and give to God as we're instructed to do, you won't be blessed. He will not bless you. In fact, he cursed an entire nation because of it. His people were not being taken care of. His church was not being taken care of. His temples were not being taken care of. Therefore, he was not being taken care of. Nothing we have is ours. 100% of everything we have is because of God. It doesn't matter whether it's your home, your car, your clothes, the pencil on your desk, the knife in your drawer, or the money in your pocket. None of it belongs to us. We might have gone out and earned it. But ultimately, God is in control of everything. And we didn't earn it. So we need to be open and excited about giving back to the kingdom what is His to start with. And all he asked for in the Old Testament is 10%. And 10% can be a lot depending on your income. It can be a lot whether you make a lot of money and definitely a lot if you don't make a lot of money. If you're already struggling paycheck to paycheck trying to make ends meet, 10% adds up. But there's a joy that comes from it. There's a joy that comes in your heart knowing that you have obeyed the Lord. There's a joy that comes from knowing that you have helped the church be able to continue its mission. There's a satisfaction in knowing that what you have done may have just saved somebody's soul, may have just been able to get your mission team off on a mission and where they were able to witness to somebody who they were able to help lead to salvation. And you may never know about that, but that's what tithing does. Tithing keeps the church going so that they can minister and be disciples to God's people, which is what we are called to do. That's what we, as God's children, are called to do. So we need to be making sure that we're contributing to that, and tithing will be can. not just what we want and not always just the minimum, but if we can and we're able to do it without putting our family's welfare at risk, then we should be doing it graciously because there are many people out there who can't do it. There are many families out there who are struggling so bad they don't have 10%. They don't have any extra leftover at the end of the week. And they're on the verge of losing their house or they're on the verge of not, you know, every week they might just be scraping by barely getting food on the table. We need to be able to compensate for that because if we can bless the church and compensate for what other people are not able to do because we've been blessed and are able to, not only do I believe wholeheartedly based on scripture that we'll be blessed for that, but I believe that that will eventually get those people an opportunity to get on their feet and continue that trend down the road. I really do. And And I'm not a big fan of taxpayers funding people who don't want to work or are too lazy to work. I'm not speaking of those who physically actually can't, but those who take advantage of the system. And I don't want to make it sound like we should be covering for everybody who just doesn't feel like tithing. I think that God will take care of that themselves, but there are those out there who can't. And we need to have a heart for that and try to make up for that and know that when we tithe more than we have to, that we're probably helping somebody or helping the kingdom for somebody who's not able to at this particular moment, who might be going through a rough patch, who may have been laid off or hours cut or run into some medical situations or medical bills. You never know. And it just might be that maybe the church ends up ministering to that particular person and can help them get back on their feet. So, you know, anything that you do and give is a blessing to the church, to the people of the church, and God will bless you as well. So, you know, can we expect the same if we tie from our businesses absolutely I think God will bless you for giving to the kingdom regardless of where it comes from and I feel in my heart that God has put me in a place where I've got a job and a business where I can tithe from the business and I used the word donate earlier and so I'm going to use that word again but I don't know that it's really the right word because I believe that if you do anything for God's people you can that's also considered a tie. And there's several ways that you can do that. And of course, the church, donating extra to the church is one way to do it straight out of your company or a company you work for. There are tons of charities out there, faith-based organizations, you know, children's homes, battered women's shelters, health charities, you know, St. Jude, you know, any kind of diseases or illnesses, especially chronic ones or those diseases that are going to be terminally ill that need to be funded and researched. Anything like that, VA homes, VA centers, veteran organizations, those suffering with PTSD always could use some extra help. Food banks, clothing drives, donating to nursing homes or hospice organizations, tithing or giving a donation to chaplains at those places so that they can go in and better minister to those who are in their latter years or in hospice, if you know some people within church who are just having a bad time, they're struggling, right? Financially, they're just going through a drought. For whatever the reason may be, your business can help support that, can help contribute to them a little bit and help them out some. Help them just get through a week. Go to the grocery store. Buy some groceries. Go meet them at the gas station, fill the car up with gas. I mean, anything helps people. You can use your business and company to fund outreach ministries, mission trips. I mean, the possibilities are endless, but why aren't we using our companies to tie us to the church or to God's people or just to help in general? Why aren't we doing that? And listen, I've said it before, whether you want to do it and then know who did it or not is up to you. And sometimes you can't donate without them realizing who donated. But I'm a big believer of giving without recognizing, right? I'm a big believer that if I can donate to write a check to the Batter Women's Shelter, from the heart, a donation, a gift to help them, I know my name's on the check, the business name is on the check, but I'll typically... I'll put a note on there. I don't want any recognition for this. This is anonymous. donated to the church before anonymously uh we do have sponsorships at the church like well a golf tournament and they put your name on a sign and i've done stuff like that and i'll let them do that because that's that's what they want to do they want to recognize those people who who gave but you don't always have to be recognized it's it's not giving as a method of advertising if you're giving to the church to help and you're generally doing it from the heart you're not really doing it it's advertising you're doing it because you care and and that's what i try to do to best I can is if I want to help, but I don't need the recognition for it. I want God to be glorified for it. So if there's any way that I can donate to the church or to a church organization or to something that the church is helping or assisting with or participating in, I want God to have the glory for that. I don't want the glory for it. God's already blessed me. So I want to bless somebody else. And I think all of us could do better about that when we look at it from a business perspective. If you're the type that needs a bonus for doing it and you need that extra incentive, it's a tax write-off. I mean, charities are a tax write-off. You know, church donations are typically a tax write-off. I'm not an accountant. I don't know the tax law very well, but I do know that, you know, typically when I donate, it is. I don't even usually put it in as that. The accountant catches it and does it. So, you know, it's just a matter of what you feel led to do. And you don't do it to put yourself in a... You don't do put yourself in a bind, but if you're able to, there's several ways to do it, but giving back to the community. is the same as giving back to God. If you're doing it from the heart and you're doing it for the right reasons and you're doing it to the right places, you're giving back to God. You're giving back to God's kingdom. You're giving back to God's people to help them. And in doing so, just be thankful and be generous. Don't do it with a chip on your shoulder about it. Do it because you want to. And do it because good will come of it. If you do it, Scripture says God will bless you for that. God will bless you for being generous, for not being greedy, for not being selfish, because we need to help each other. It's a terrible world we live in. It's rough. It's hard to trust people. It's hard to get ahead. It's cruel. It's disgusting. So be the light in that world and help when you can. Help somebody when you can. And you'd be surprised, I think, how many people end up seeing the good in that. And if it's coming through the church, I'd love to know how many people have turned to God or turned back to the church and found God or let God come into their lives after they were able to do something good because somebody blessed the church. in a manner that they could minister and help the community. I'd love to know that. I'll never know that. That's not really for me to know. But I'd love to know that because I think the numbers would be surprising. I think we would be surprised at how many people turn to a Christian life after the church ministers to them and helps them. Now, I know many people who have been helped and ministered by the church many times and never came to God and rarely came to the church And really, we're probably just letting the church do it and taking advantage of them. That happens. There are people out there who will take whatever they can from the church because they know the church will try to help and typically won't say no. But sometimes we do put our foot down, right? We say enough's enough. But you're not doing it for their return. You're doing it for God's blessings. You're doing it because God has instructed us to do it. So it's just a matter of how you look at it. But as we, you know, as we celebrate Labor Day, there's some, you know, just remember that what you have been blessed with, we shouldn't be so hesitant to give back. I'm blessed enough today that I've got a job where I can take the day off, at least part of it. I'm using that time to try to bring a message to people. But there's so many people who don't have that opportunity and financially don't have the time to take the day off and spend or the ability to take the day off to spend with their families. They have to work because they're check to check. They're barely making that. So, you know, if you can help, help. If you can donate, donate. Most people's businesses, if they're successful, are able to do that to some degree. But, you know, you can tie it to church corporately as well as personally. And I think we should do that more. I don't have a habit of tithing for my businesses I should probably do that. I just tithe for my paycheck. So... you know, that was a lot to think about this week. And I think I probably need to start doing that. I do some of these other things when I can, but that's probably tied every week from my business. You know, and how much you do is up to you. But, you know, we're asked to attend in Scripture. And if you can do more, do more. I hope everybody enjoys their Labor Day. I hope everybody, you know, started school is back into the swing of things and staying safe. If you a born-again believer and redeemed, sincerely a child of God. I just pray you think on that this week and maybe we can all change how we view our money and what we do with it. Just pray on it and see where the Lord leads you. And I pray that God blesses you abundantly for whatever you're able to do. Anyways, I love everybody. I hope you have a great week. If you have any questions or comments, don't hesitate to reach out. with that link at the description. I always look forward to talking with people and conversing about some things off of each other. Hope everybody has a great week. Until next time, God bless.