“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  — Matt. 6:19-21

In a few weeks you’ll receive the annual stewardship mailing from the church, which will include a pledge card for 2027.  I’ll let the Stewardship Team speak to the financial state of the church and our hopes and plans for 2027.  What I’d like to focus on here is why we believe committing to the regular habit of giving is important theologically, spiritually, and practically.

There are over 2,300 verses (7.5%) in the Bible that refer to money or our finances.  That should probably tell us something about how important it is, and how hard it is to get right.  Scripture does not condemn the accumulation of wealth, but it often warns that the more wealth we accrue, the more we desire to hold on to it.  This is one of many reasons why Scripture, from Old through the New Testaments, encourages us to commit to giving a “tithe” of our “first fruits” to the Lord.  A “tithe” is literally 10%.  The “first fruits” refers to the first grains or fruits collected during the harvest and is specified because the first items harvested are usually the freshest or ripest, and therefore best.  The exhortation here is to give God the first and best of what you have, not whatever happens to be left over after paying all of your other bills.  The requirement of a tithe, 10%, is just enough that it takes discipline, intentional budgeting and planning, in order to honor it.  The biblical command to tithe is repeated in Old Testament Law and Prophets and in the New Testament Gospels and Epistles.

The reason Scripture speaks so consistently about this is because how we handle and use our money is first and foremost a spiritual matter.  As Paul writes in 1 Timothy 6:9-10: “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”  Money is not evil.  Having money is not evil.  But the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.  The difficulty lies in how seductive the love of money is.  We can fall into it almost without realizing it, and it’s a trap that lies in wait for both the rich and the poor.  Jesus extends a similar warning in Mark 8:36-37: “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?”  The biblical commands to tithe and give our first fruits provide a spiritual antibiotic to this temptation.  By taking at least 10% off the top, instead of the bottom, and giving it to God, we take an important step to ordering our priorities and our loves, desires and wants properly.

Finally, committing to the regular habit of giving has practical benefits for us as well.  As mentioned, committing to give 10% of our income to the Lord requires discipline and planning.  To fulfill that commitment means that I have to think more carefully and purposefully about where my money is going and how I am spending it.  It will probably mean that I have to adjust some priorities and make sacrifices in other areas.  It is similar to how committing to practicing the Sabbath brings discipline and intentionality to how I use my time during the week, or how committing to eating healthier changes my grocery shopping and dining habits.  It takes effort, and will likely mean sacrificing some things I might want, but the overall result is better financial health.  Additionally, writing out our commitment (in other words, making a pledge) helps impress the importance of it to us.  This is the same reason we believe making public vows of commitment in a wedding ceremony is so important.  The public wedding vows move us from a promise to a commitment to love one another “until death do us part.”  As Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life says, “We become that to which we are committed.”  The act of writing down our pledge and sharing that with others (even if just by putting it in the offering plate) moves it from a promise or wishful desire to becoming a commitment that we’ll keep all year long.

If the idea of tithing and pledging is new to you, begin prayerfully considering what taking that step might look like for you.  Instead of starting at 10%, you might start at pledging 2 or 3% with a plan to increase that each year.  If you are already giving consistently, what would it look like for you to add to that by a percent or two next year?  Some of you might already be giving at 10%, for which we thank you!  Consider though that the Bible doesn’t talk about the tithe as the maximum you should give, but rather the minimum.  The more we give to the Lord, the more He promises to return back to us in blessings.

“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not drop their fruit before it is ripe,” says the LORD Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the LORD Almighty. — Mal. 3:10-12

Blessings,

Rev. David Garrison