By David Faust
When I was a young boy, I heard people at church talk about tithing, but I didn’t understand what they meant.
In those days, our church provided little cardboard boxes filled with offering envelopes that were labeled and numbered—one envelope for every Sunday of the year. Dad brought home three of those cardboard boxes for his three sons. He took a hammer and pounded three small tacks into the doorframe next to the kitchen in our old farmhouse. On those tacks, he hung our three cardboard boxes—a not-so-subtle reminder that his boys should give offerings to God. Most weeks, I put a nickel in my offering envelope and placed it in the Sunday offering.
A Strange Word
But what did tithing mean? That was a strange word to me, and although the preacher may have explained it, I must have missed the explanation. I saw people put cash in the wicker baskets the ushers passed around every Sunday, but what were those mysterious tithes? I wondered if a tithe was something like a check—or even an IOU. As a teenager, I finally began to understand the concept of giving back to God 10 percent or more of one’s income—but I struggled to apply it.
After Candy and I were married, she insisted we should tithe, but I balked at the idea. We were college students getting by on part-time incomes from her job serving in a restaurant and my weekend work with CIY (Christ In Youth). Candy’s convictions were strong. She saw tithing as a way to show faith and gratitude to God, and she insisted the Lord would provide. She helped me understand it’s not just about the 10 percent; the other 90 percent belongs to God, too. Everything we own is actually “on loan” from God, and we are stewards or caretakers. All of it—100 percent—is God’s property.
Candy and I can testify that whether our finances have been tight or abundant, God has faithfully provided our needs.
A Joyful Rhythm
No one should tithe out of misguided guilt or because a preacher twists their arm. Tithing shouldn’t be done to brag or to impress others. We shouldn’t try to manipulate God and give so we can get.
It’s true that tithing is an Old Testament concept and New Testament Christians are not explicitly commanded to practice it. But after God has blessed us so much and filled us with his Holy Spirit, why should we who live under the new covenant of grace give less than believers gave before Christ came? God has opened “the floodgates of heaven” (Malachi 3:10) and poured out lavish blessings on us through Christ (Ephesians 1:8), so isn’t tithing a reasonable starting point for anyone who aspires to “excel in this grace of giving” (2 Corinthians 8:7)?
Jesus said to give without public fanfare (Matthew 6:1-4). He rebuked the hypocrites who were meticulous about tithing but “neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness” (Matthew 23:23). He didn’t say tithing was wrong; he emphasized having the right attitude and priorities when we give.
Grateful generosity should be a joyful rhythm in a believer’s life. I think that’s what Dad was trying to teach my brothers and me when he hammered those tacks into the doorframe years ago.
Personal Challenge: Do you practice tithing? What do you think Jesus meant (and didn’t mean) when he said, “Give, and it will be given to you” (Luke 6:38)? What new or additional step should you take to “excel in this grace of giving” (2 Corinthians 8:7)?
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