S05E045, Giving to God, Cheerfully, Andy B 2 Minute Video
Have you ever received a gift that was begrudgingly given? Perhaps it was merely someone who you beat in a game but their ‘well done’ felt more like a knife in the back, rather than a sincere congratulatory statement. It can, so easily, spoil our elation at winning!
Tithing is something we often think as just an Old Testament thing - tithing is simply an old word for ‘tenth’, and tithing is the principle of giving God the first tenth of your harvest, if you’re a farmer, for example. Many people today seem to think that tithing died with Jesus. But that isn’t just not true!
Tithing is giving to God, albeit a specific amount. However, as we can read in the New Testament, tithing was not deleted as a religious act, but merely fulfilled. Tithing is, actually, a great opportunity for us to test God – the only time God not only allows us to test Him, but actively encourages us to test Him too!
And there is no set amount. You can tithe after tax or before you pay your tax, because there is no right or wrong amount to give to God – but whatever we give needs to be done both freely and willingly.
The world will tell you hold on to what’s yours; to hang on to what you’ve worked hard for. But Jesus has already given us more than we could ever deserve, so giving a small portion of that – with a glad heart – gets much easier when you keep in context the gift of eternal life we all have freely given to us, once we become Christians and seek to live like Jesus did.
Are you giving (tithing) to God at this time?
It doesn’t have to go to your local church either while we’re on this subject. It may be to a local or virtual ministry, your local church, a homeless shelter. It may be your time or your money or anything you have of value.
The principle of giving to God is what’s at stake here. And doing with a joyful heart.
Just a thought...
Andy B
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[00:00:00] So another, Andy B 2 Minute Video and I still have my cold. Apologies for that!
[00:00:12] Now I was thinking about how we give to God stuff. We give Him our time, we give Him our things, we give Him our money. If you go right back to Leviticus, and also in Numbers, it talks about the importance of tithing.
[00:00:24] Tithing, really simply, it's a religious word really. But it means a 10th actually. That's what the word means. And the basic principle was this in the Old Testament days before Jesus, that when you were, for example, a farmer, you would harvest your crops and the first 10%, the first 10th of your crops would go straight to God. No questions.
[00:00:45] That's what would go, and God would bless and honour that, and it's really clear. If you give me your tithe, I will bless that.
[00:00:51] Now, we are not so much post tithe, but we are post the birth of Jesus Christ. Jesus is still alive [00:01:00] today, but how we tithe, is different.
[00:01:03] Tithing as a principle has not changed. You still should be giving the first something to God. The difference when we are looking at post Jesus is it doesn't eradicate the old. He came to fulfill it. Not to eradicate or complete it or get rid of it. Actually tithing is just as important, but we don't give a 10th. Actually, we give gladly of everything that we have, and I was always taught a tent is a good place to begin and go from.
[00:01:28] Don't throw out tithing. Tithing is really important in New Testament and Old Testament times. We're in New Testament times today. Tithing is just as important as it always was, but tithing for you may not be a 10th. That's the only thing that's changed with the birth and the life of Jesus Christ.
[00:01:43] Now as a family, we give our Saturdays to God. We live in an amazing home. We have a second reception room. When we're looking for houses. We found very few with a second room. So you've got your lounge, dining room and another big room. I'm sat in that extra second reception room. It's a nice lounge, but we use it for a different purpose.[00:02:00]
[00:02:00] Now, when we were looking at houses, this is the only house we could physically look at and get. And we were about a five, what was it? About four hour, four, five hour drive away. So we couldn't, come back and forth, lots and lots. We came to the house, we saw it, we liked it. It was what we needed. We went for it.
[00:02:16] There are complications of this house. It is bigger than we would prefer, but when you have a second reception room, it generally means a bigger house. And this bigger house means that we can give to God this room for what I'm doing right.
[00:02:30] Where is God blessing you with something and He's saying, can you just give to me some of what I'm giving to you?
[00:02:36] We need to be grateful for what God's given us. And New Testament times. We should have glad hearts to give back to God from what He's already given us. Don't just cling on to what He's given you. This is mine.
[00:02:49] Don't forget to give back to God. It may be a 10th in our case. It's a seventh. We give the seventh day to God, for Him as a family. This is all we do all day. We [00:03:00] spend many hours doing Konnect Radio. We're doing our own ministry videos. Our tenth, our tithe, is a seventh. That's our time, and that's giving up one of the rooms of the house for this.
[00:03:12] So, what is God asking you to give to Him? Where is He asking you to tithe some of your money, some of your time, some of your house.
[00:03:19] Maybe it's your time for your coffee time on your own. Maybe you, you are being asked by God to tithe that time, to give that time to ask one of your work colleagues for a coffee instead? to surrender something of what God's given you to bless somebody else.
[00:03:38] Just a thought.