Tithe Stewardship & Church Tithing

I am not a scholar, nor am i a pastor. I don’t have a PhD nor do i have experience as a teacher.  I don’t know the “theological big word” definitions of hermeneutics, homiletics, or exegesis. I couldn’t even tell you if i just spelled them right. I am the normal, every day joe schmoe when it comes to theology. Most would put me in the category of laymen. I don’t think my opinion matters more than a man who has a PhD and has 30 years experience as a senior pastor, but i don’t think that my opinion matters less either. At this point i don’t know why i’m sharing my thoughts here about this, but it’s just something that came to my mind, so here we go.

I don’t know how many others out there feel left out when the Christian conversations start progressing towards the “theological big words”. I don’t think i get in many conversations with those words as much as i read these big words from the pages of scholars who write them. I’m not saying that there is no relevancy to understanding these definitions, but i think i appreciate the more practical communication. i like parables. i like applications. Its very simple, and very practical.

I couldn’t tell you that Jesus sat down with his pupils during a course study and spoke a lesson to his disciples about homiletics (is that even a word?).  There were no university’s offering a masters of divinity. There was no doctorate of theology. You were either a disciple or follower of Jesus, or you were not.

Right now, many random thoughts are just coming to my mind. Like why spend 10 years in college? Why spend many thousands of dollars on these degrees? How is all this practical? How does all this help? Well, if life is just a vapor, what’s your opinion? I realize that these questions have very legitimate answers, and i don’t want to belittle any of the causes here. I don’t know, maybe i’m just trying to comfort some self doubt in my mind right now, because i am just the average joe schmoe. My vast use of vocabulary comes from just a small little town in eastern Pennsylvania. It doesn’t come from any dictionary’s or theology courses.  I did graduate with a bachelor’s degree, and i consider myself more fortunate than most.

I didn’t feel like writing about finances, stewardship, or tithing in this post. I just wanted to share some of my personal thoughts that have been running through my mind recently.

How practical do you think theology is these days? i’m not necessarily talking about what your pastor thinks of practical theology, but i’m asking you about your personal life. What is your own definition of practical theology in perspective of your own experience and own knowledge? Do you think the majority of theology out there today is practical?

I just read a news article written by Ken Walker on ChurchCentral.com. The title of the article is Rebellion Against Tithing: Lashing Out at Legalism? This article comes in response to the news article on Wall Street Journal - Backlash Against Tithing.

Here’s a quote from the article on Church Central:

“While there may be criticism of tithing, I have a feeling that it stems from a desire to throw the legalistic baby out with the generous bathwater.

In other words, those who teach tithing as an ironclad law reap the fruits of rebellion against something that wasn’t meant to be a barometer of our spirituality or salvation. Generous giving is a spiritual principle, not a Pharasitical law intent on binding people’s hearts.

After all, points out financial author and pastor Brian Kluth—whose materials are distributed in more than 100 nations—the idea of tithing to God’s work is accepted historically, across denominations, and around the world.”

My response is, “you bet were throwing the legalistic baby out with the bath water.” Their baby is tithing, and i’m sorry it is not adorable and not cute. Also, if my rebellion is in response to wrong, then that means i am doing what’s right. There is no rebellion my friend. If rebellion is part of proclaiming the truth then i’ll be the first claim myself guilty.

It’s so obvious how people are blinded by tithing. For instance Walker goes on to say that “generous giving is a spiritual principle not a Pharisaical law”. I say they are blinded by tithing because they can’t see that the backlash against tithing is not a backlash against generous giving. Generous giving is not about tithing. How much more plain can i say it? Just because i don’t believe in the tithing mandate does not mean that i am throwing out the generous giving baby out with the tithing bathwater. I just want to throw the tithing bath water out. I don’t want to throw the generous giving baby out.

Is tithing the bath water or is it the baby? This is another misconception in Walker’s analogy. He thinks that tithing is the baby! Is tithing the part that you are suppose to keep, while you throw out generosity with the bath water No! you are suppose to keep the baby, which analogously is the generosity, and throw out the water, which is tithing.

Why can’t people like Walker see the this picture clearly? It’s because they think my response to the tithing mandate is in rebellion against generosity. But his vision fails when he doesn’t see that my response to the tithing mandate is actually in response to what’s wrong. I am an advocate for sacrifice and generosity.

Lots of scandals going on in the Church lately but here’s the latest news written by Justing Juozapavicius in the Associated Press - “Embattled Oral Roberts President Resigns”. The link to the news article is here. There were allegations brought up a few months ago that Richard Roberts, the president, had used some of the University’s funds to support his lavish lifestyle. Some of the allegations brought forward are, “a $39,000 shopping tab at one store for Richard Roberts’ wife, Lindsay, a $29,411 Bahamas senior trip on the university jet for one of Roberts’ daughters, and a stable of horses for the Roberts children.” I’m one of those people that think our leaders deserve a bountiful reward and compensation, but i gotta tell you, 29,000 for a Bahamas senior trip, and a 39,000 shopping tab at only one store? I hope they were just shopping for a car.

It’s bad enough that Britney Spears is in the news for her shopping habits let alone a Christian evangelist. I’m glad that the faculty and chair members had enough guts to stand up for what’s right. This extortion of charitable funds in order to support lavish lifestyles needs to end inside the Christian community. I have nothing wrong with Christians having money, just don’t hoard it all. There’s just something wrong with a Christian group calling themselves a charitable organization, when the presidents and directors are living a life of luxury in the top 1% of the world. It’s practically an oxymoron to say that they are a charitable organization but yet, their biggest charity is to themselves.

I Just read a news article written by Meg Hibbert on OurValley.org that wrote about a couple who developed a board game to help teach Christians prosperity. We’re Americans. Aren’t we prosperous enough?

They said the game is much like monopoly, and that players do some things to work their way into the winners circle, including tithing. I can hear the windows of heaven opening right up.

You know what the most ironic thing about this game is that it costs $125.00! That is ridiculous! If you can afford a $125 game, i can tell you right now that you do not need to learn any more prosperity. I do not know the actual cost of the game for the couple to manufacture it, but it seems that they understand that prosperity always comes at the expense of others. I mean for them to charge $125. Either they need to figure out how to cut the cost by 70% or they need to cut their greed down a little bit. I wonder if overcharging is one of the goals to prosperity in this game? This is almost funny. Yeah let me teach my kids prosperity by blowing $125 on a game, i think there’s much more efficient ways of learning prosperity.

The title of the board game is called, “Living Life Abundantly”. You know why the name is given a lucrative “Abundant” title is because the word “stewardship” isn’t fun for people. I can’t stand this whole greedy mentality anymore. We’re so consumed with (our) life and (our) abundance. It’s sad that we don’t want to live the life of a steward because we love God and want to do what’s best. Through this board game you can see that most people force themselves to be stewards in hopes of reaching the abundance. Yeah, yeah, they included tithing in that board game, which is pretty selfless, but that doesn’t mean our prosperity multiplies just because we gave some money.

All i can do is speak for myself, but i wouldn’t touch that game. Do you think the game is worth it?