Covenanter Witness Vol. 54 - Rparchives.org

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PRAYER MEETING TOPIC
THE TITHE
Psalms:
For May 18, 1955
Rev. Roy Backward
ONE PROOF OF OUR
LOVE
(Mai. 3:7-12)
22 :9-ll, page 51 Call to Worship
116: 8-12, page 282 A Reason for
Paying the Tithe
34: page 79 Taste and See
From 2:17 to 3:6, My Messenger
(Malachi) reviews what has gone before.
The current evils of worship and society
have their roots in hearts which do not
fear God. (3:5)
But displeasing God by doing things
He hadn't authorized in Worship Serv
ice, and being unfaithful to their fellow
men and wives in particular in their
Daily Service, weren't the only
ways in
which they proved to God that they
really didn't love Him enough to obey
Him. He had spoken primarily to the
priests in 3:3 and now He charges the
people
with unfaithfulness "from the
days of their fathers" (3:7), and when
they reply with another sullen question
(7b) another "prove it if you can!",
God charges them with robbing Him
(3:9). They had probably pleaded their
punishment as a reason for not obeying
God .
e. because crops were poor,
they couldn't give the tithe and offer
ings. It was a vicious circle, the more
they withheld, the harder things became,
until here God offered them a 'break'
when He said (3:10) Try the tithe once
and "prove me now herewith." I'll give
you good crops (3:10) and kill all your
bugs (3:11) and keep
(literally) from "miscarriage."
your fruit trees
God might have said, "Since man and
land, the seeds and the rain, the sun and
the air are all mine, I want 9/10 of
everything that's produced and man
may keep the tithe." But His gracious
love prompted Him to take the tenth
and give to man the 9/10. Once the law
was made (and no one has yet found the
place or example in the New Testament
which breaks it), God let it be known
that it was no light matter to break it.
The man who does not give tithe and
offering today is still robbing God, and
may expect punishment. Of that punish
ment, one of the early fathers said;
"There be three keys which God hath
reserved in His own hands, and hath
not delivered to any
minister or sub
stitute, the keys of life, of rain,
resurrection."
and of
(Compare Acts 14:17 and
I Cor. 3:7)
There is a close connection between
this chapter of the book of Malachi and
our previous studies. God has not only
ordered that we give one-seventh of our
time to particular services of worship
April 27, 1955
for the building and work of His king
dom; He has also ordered that we give
one-tenth of our income to the particu
lar work of building
These we owe to God
His Kingdom.
the Time and
Money for the building of His Kingdom.
He didn't need the "time" because He's
timeless, and He didn't need the money
because He could have made or taken it
all (Ps. 50:12) but He wanted some
definite minimum by which to check
man's willingness to return His own
great love. To argue about these or to
give Him less than He asks is an ex
cellent indication of a wrong heart-atti
tude toward God. It would speak louder
than any denial, to say that we were
spurning God's great love (II Cor. 9:7).
It is also true that the man who does
not have enough money to fulfill his
financial duty to God will soon find it
easy to neglect or forget his financial
duty to his fellowman even his wife.
The wife who discourages tithing is
cutting her own throat, and the girl who
marries a non-tither is taking a chance.
In 1951 I heard professors of the
Church of Scotland sneer at the tithe as
"hypocritical
legalism"
and in 1953, I
heard them cut their mission work bud
get almost one-third. When a babe in
Christ first asks, "How much should I
pay How much does God want me to
give"; and we soothingly suggest,
"Whatever your feelings tell you, what
ever your heart
"NO! !
God
says
I set the tenth as a minimum,
you'll be cursed for giving less,
and
those of you since Old Testament times
who have seen My
love-made-flesh and
walking and working and dying among
you to save you will surely not be
content with either one-seventh of time
or one-tenth of income. You'll go beyond
that because you're beginning to ap
preciate what Christ did for you and
because you would like to try to return
something of His love for
Christ did not change the law; on the
contrary, He fulfilled it (Matt. 5:17-20),
and in every respect went beyond it
(Matt. 5:21, 22, 27, 28, 33-37, 38-42,
43-
48), and so must we.
QUESTIONS FOR DICUSSION
1. Check the difference between a
tithe (Lev. 27:30, 32; Num. 18:21, 24;
Dt. 14:22-25; 26:12, 13; Neh. 9:38; 10:
29-32; 13:10-14) and the offerings (the
first fruits Num. 15:19, 20; the annual
half-shekel Ex. 30:13-15; the offerings
for tabernacle Ex. 25 :2, 3 & 35 :5, 21, 24
& 36:3, 6; offerings for the second tem
ple, Ezra 8:25; the ordinary offerings, 2
Chron. 31:10, 12; tithes of the tithes
paid by the priests, Num. 18:26, 28, 29;
tithes of the priest's "portions" (bonus
es) Lev. 8:14. See also Dt. 26:1-11) and
make a N. T. application. . . i.
e., if the
Hebrew gave that much in anticipation
of Christ's coming, how much should we
give How should we give (Matt. 23:
23; Lu. 11:42; 18:12)
2. What could be "profitable" about
contributing to the work of God's King
dom Prove it, as did Malachi with spe
cific instances. (Lu. 6:38; Matt. 7:2;
James 2:13, 14; Phil. 4:10, 14-19; and
others.)
3. What have you done recently re
tithing in your own congregation If
time permits, discuss recent actions of
Synod and the financial need for the
tithe i.e., the budget for the year.
God had previously proven to these
Israelites through Malachi that they
were spurning His love by their insin
cere and disobedient worship, and by
their treachery with their fellow Israel
ites. But these were, perhaps, too vague
(perhaps they didn't snore loud enough
to be heard in church and perhaps their
whip-marks did not show on the backs
of their unloved wives) so God now be
comes very
as the crowning
specific and cites the tithe
proof of their lack of
love for Him. Every good Hebrew would
have had a detailed account of all his
givings. Either he was a Hebrew or he
"did
not
know"
how much he had
given or should have given, that year
but he could not claim to be a Hebrew
and also "not know." In the same way,
every American wage-earning adult is
required by Uncle Sam's tax officials
not to be vague on this same issue.
What do your check stubs for the
past year indicate about your love for
God
The story is told of an only survivor
of a shipwreck who was thrown upon an
uninhabited island. After a while he
managed to build a rude hut in which he
placed the "little
from the sinking ship.
that he had saved
He prayed to
God for deliverance, and anxiously
scanned the horizon each day to hail any
ship that might chance to be passing
that way.
One day, upon returning from a hunt
for food, he was horrified to find his hut
in flames. All that he had, had now gone
up in smoke! The worst had happened,
or so it appeared. But that which
seemed to have happened for the worst
was, in reality, for the best.
To the man's limited vision, it was the
worst. To God's infinite wisdom, his loss
was for the best
that for which he
had prayed. The very next day a ship
arrived. "We saw your smoke signal,"
the captain said.
Can we not take our seeming calami
ties, and look for God's best in them
From BETTER CHURCH BULLETINS
by Stella O. Barnett
(Fleming H. Revell Company)
269