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God Never Changes. What About Tithing?

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As we continue our ‘Tithing on Trial’ series, we will evaluate the most common tithing arguments used to defend its practice. So let’s evaluate another argument used to promote tithing.

Argument:
Malachi 3:6 States That God Never Changes, so we must continue to obey tithing.

Malachi 3:6-8 “For I am the Lord, I do not change;  . . . Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings.”

Anyone who says that tithing never changed because God never changes couldn’t explain these next NINETEEN ways that tithing had been changed. These 19 changes are not only examples of how things have changed from the Old Testament to the New Testament, but many of these examples show how tithing was altered and even exempted at times within the Old Testament alone.

Change #1
From This:  Abraham tithed on all the spoils of war (Hebrews 7:4).
  → To This:  Later Israel could only tithe from their crops or animals (Leviticus 27).

Change #2
From This: Abraham tithed items made outside the land of Israel
  → To This: Israel could only tithe from items grown from within the land of Israel. (Deuteronomy 12:5)

Change #3
From This: Abraham gave 1/10 of the spoils of war.
  → To This: Israel was commanded to give 1/500 of their spoils of war. (Numbers 31:9, 27-29)

Change #4
From This:  FIRST, Abraham gave the tithe out of obligation (Genesis 14:20)
→  To This: AND then Jacob offers it voluntarily (Genesis 28:22)
→ →  Then To This: AND then the nation of Israel is required to give it out of obligation (Leviticus 27)
  → → → And Finally To This: Now, we are under grace so we are told that it’s now voluntarily obligated? Huh?! (Galatians 4)

Change #5
From This:  Israel’s tithe only went towards taking care of the poor, Levites, and national feasts (Nehemiah 10:38, Deuteronomy 14:22).
  → To This: Today, we’ve been told that the tithe can be used for anything including building funds.

Change #6
From This: Non-farmers and non-herdsmen (ie: Bankers, Lawyers, Doctors, and Carpenters) were not allowed to tithe their income. (Leviticus 27)
  → To This: Today, we’ve been told that every occupation is required to tithe their income.

Change #7
From This: It was directly commanded by God to not include the best nor the first in the tithe. (Leviticus 27:32)
→  To This: Today, we are told to include the best and first fruits of our tithe, disregarding not only the Old Testament command in Leviticus 27:32 but also the New Testament command in 2 Timothy 2:6.

Change #8
From This: The poor didn’t give tithes in the bible, they received them. (Nehemiah 10:38)
→  To This: Today, not only do the poor probably see very little of the tithe, if any, but they are told they are required to tithe.

Change #9
From This: Most of the tithe was stored in storehouses to be distributed and consumed mostly outside the temple. (Nehemiah 10:37-38)
  → To This: Today, there is no storage house for the tithe, and mostly consumed within the Church instead of distributed.

Change #10
From This: Only 1% was stored in the Temple Storehouse, the other 9% were stored in Levitical cities
  → To This: Today, we are told to bring the whole 10% to the Church building. (Deuteronomy 14:28)

Change #11
From This: Some of the agricultural tithes were only given 5.5 out of every 7 years – The 7th year was sabbatical, so there was no gleaning or planting. The first half of the next year was planting. (Leviticus 25)
  → To This: Today, we changed it to give tithe year after year without a single sabbatical or rest.

Change #12
From This: Abraham & Israel gave a tithe while under the Old Covenant
  → To This: We are told it is still required under a completely new covenant.

Change #13
From This: Many types of offerings in the Old Testament were also required
  → To This: We’ve been told these offerings are freewill now.

Change #14
From This: We are no longer under the curse (Galatians 3:13)
→  To This: But are reminded that we are still under the curse of the tithe (Malachi 3:9)

Change #15
From This: The tithe was given to the Levites because they couldn’t have an inheritance of land (Numbers 18:24)
  → To This: No one is stopping ministers from owning land today.

Change #16
From This: Jesus’ own ministry was supported without tithes and also sent the disciples out without tithes. (Luke 8:1-3, Matthew 10:8-10)
  → To This: Ministries today do not follow Jesus’ example.

Change #17
From This: The tabernacle was built and maintained through only freewill offerings (Exodus 35).
  → To This: Today, we support the church through tithing while other “outside” ministries receive freewill offerings.

Change #18
From This: From 1 A.D. through 566 A.D. the Church did not recognize tithing.
  → To This: In A.D. 567 The Church ordered the payment of tithes.

Change #19
From This: God did not accept money for tithing (Leviticus 27).
  → To This: The church accepts checks, cash, credit card, and even Bitcoin.

Now that the evidence has been given in this court of law, it is your turn to decide

YOU BE THE JUDGE

Has Tithing Changed?

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Are Tithes A Blessing or Curse?

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I watched a video sermon on tithing from Life Church. It was titled “Tithing the Tithe”. One of the statements that the preacher made on the video was, “Why do so many people give and not see results, not see return, not see the covenant promises of God? It’s either the wrong motive or the wrong method. It’s not because the word of God is not true.”

If you are the one tithing, and not seeing the blessings, how many times have you heard a pastor say that you do not have the blessings because your heart must not be right? it’s so frustrating to hear that, as someone trying as best as he can to give with a good heart. I know. I’ve been there. What if I told you that you are not receiving a blessing from giving because you are under the curse for tithing?

5 Reasons Why Tithes are a Curse

  1. Obeying the law has a curse upon it (Galatians 3:10)
  2. You are fallen from grace (Galatians 5:4-6)
  3. God doesn’t say anything about loving a dedicated giver (2 Corinthians 9:7)
  4. Tithing makes you a slave (Galatians 5:1)
  5. Tithing makes you weak (Romans 8:3)

Ok. you get it, Israel was punished and cursed for disobeying the law, but doesn’t the bible say that we are free from the curse of the law? Yes, it does. Galatians 3:14 states, “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us”. Of course, this sounds like great news, and it is, but this actually comes with bad news for some out there.

If you read four verses earlier in Galatians 3:10 it states, “For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.“

For those of you who are continuing to practice the works of the law, including tithing, you are actually placing yourself back under the curse. Ouch! So, you practice tithing to protect yourself from the curse, but in actuality, you actually are bringing it upon yourself.

5 Reasons Why No Tithes are a Blessing

  1. You are under grace (Romans 6:14)
  2. God said He would supply all our needs without mentioning the tithe (Philippians 4:19)
  3. Our gifts are a sweet-smelling sacrifice that is acceptable and pleasing to God (Philippians 4:18)
  4. God Loves a Cheerful giver. (2 Corinthians 9:7)
  5. The Spirit gives life (Romans 8:5-10)

If you don’t practice tithing, you are free from the curse, free from the law, and free from tithing. So many feel led to give to someone outside their church but are terrified to do so because of the fear of the curse. It’s not that they don’t like their church or disagree, but in their heart, they have the desire to fill a more urgent need. When people pass up the opportunity to give from their hearts, they invite doubt or event guilt in their hearts, which robs them of their blessing

You can take away the punishment for not tithing and you can make it appear as graceful as possible; but underneath the sheep costume, tithing is still the Big. Bad. Law.

Let’s read a passage in Galatians 3:10

For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.”

Tithing is part of the Old law. So, if you are trying to obey tithing by giving 10% of your increase, then I would suggest that you either obey the whole law or do not follow the law of tithing. Before I go any further, I did not say “do not give sacrificially”. I said, do not follow the law of tithing.

Obeying the law of tithing puts a curse on your life. Could that be the reason why you are not receiving the blessing? I’m not into the prosperity gospel thing at all, but I do believe God blesses his people for obedience. Some of that blessing can be external in financial rewards, and some of that blessing can be internal peace and satisfaction. I like to say that people reap what they sow. If you reap generosity you’ll sow generosity. It doesn’t always mean that if you reap $100 bucks, you’ll sow $200.

It’s up to you to decide in your heart the truth about tithing. God did not intend for his church to be under the giving requirements of the law. He gave us his Spirit to tutor us and help us down the road of sacrificial giving. Don’t be fooled by those that say “tithing is under the grace age so now we should give it by grace instead of the compulsion of the law”. Run far away as you can from that line of thinking. As you can see, the early church is still not the only one that struggled with mingling the old law with the new. We are still trying to do it today and they are putting others and themselves under the curse.