Thank you Sister Connie Keyohara for this wonderful post and to Janice Polk White for the awesome pictures!
Thank you Sister Connie……
I wanted to touch on a subject that I know many people don’t like to discuss, but is something that is mentioned in scripture. Something that should not be ignored. Because there are so many benefits in doing this. And that is tithing.
tith·ing. To give or pay a tithe or tenth of (produce, money, etc.).
Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything you produce. Proverbs 3:9
Whatever you give is acceptable if you give it eagerly. And give according to what you have, not what you don’t have. 2 Corinthians 8:12
Keep in mind that God does not need our money, He already has everything He needs. And it’s his money anyway. We tithe out of obedience to Christ and should be giving freely, without ulterior motives. We’re to be good stewards of what God has given us.
Tithing (giving) should be the practice of every believer even if your financial situation is not where you’d like it to be. Everyone can give something. Even if you start off small.
When I was a single mom I had a couple of jobs and at one point I had three jobs. Trust me, tithing was really difficult. I started off giving $10 and that was hard, and there were times that I could only give $5.
The whole point of tithing is not to try to give as much as you can all at once, because you see when I gave $5 or $10 it wasn’t about how much I gave, but about the sacrifice I made. I trusted God to provide what I needed for my son and I. And of course, he did.
Eventually, I could see God providing more so I was able to give more.
Unfortunately, People will say “God just wants our money” or “The church just wants my money.” To that I would say, that’s nonsense! And as I said before, God doesn’t need your money.
I also hear a lot of this scripture “money is the root of all evil.” But it’s often misquoted. The Bible says that the LOVE of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” 1Timothy 6:10
So it’s not the money it’s the love of it.
“If you love money, you cannot serve God. And if you cannot serve God, then everything you do is evil.” John Piper
In Malachi God says to test him in this and see if he will not throw open the windows of heaven and pour out many blessings, so many that they overflow. This is the benefit I was talking about earlier.
“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this,” says the Lord of hosts, “if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.” Malachi 3:10
We should give to support the needs of others and to support Christian workers. Might some people take advantage of this? Certainly, it’s this fallen world that we live in. But never let that deter you from doing Gods work and missing out on a great blessing.
My prayer for you today is that you would be a cheerful giver.
Many blessings,
Connie Keyohara
