Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:07 Hey there. Welcome to village church, serving Q and a I'm pastor Alex. And I'm here with pastor Michael and pastor Craig. And on August 15th, we preached a sermon about generosity, about giving and about fundraising. And so, uh, regarding that, we have a question today and the question is where in the heck did Christians get the concept of a 10% tithe from? And so, uh, pastor Michael, I'm going to let you kind of take the first one, but we're going to bounce this around a little bit between us.
Speaker 1 00:00:37 Yeah. So very simply, probably most bad ideas come from taking old Testament principles and then misapplying them to the new Testament. It's like the origin of the prosperity gospel. It's the origin of really so many bad concepts. So if you're watching something, uh, in like modern American church that just kind of grinds you, there's like a 73.5% chance that they have
Speaker 2 00:00:58 An old Testament principle and they've misapplied it to,
Speaker 1 00:01:01 To the new Testament. So there's a whole structure of tides and offerings and, and, uh, it wasn't just 10%, but that was one of their times. Yep. And so it's just a really bad interpretation application. It doesn't mean they're like bad intention. It's just, we are not under old covenant law or under new covenant law. So that's a bad interpretation. Yes.
Speaker 0 00:01:21 So could you give us an example of maybe where we even see this pop up in scripture? Yeah, I would love to. Okay.
Speaker 2 00:01:29 Craig, you have an opinion. I'll tell you what I think.
Speaker 3 00:01:36 So, yes, the, the, um, the whole idea of the tie that actually is, is prominent through the old Testament. So it's not, uh, uh, uh, uh, there's no wonder why bad theologians or bad theology pulls that out. Abraham gave a 10% tie to, uh, the small kids at a priest. We're not told there's like five verses on this, but, um, but the principle is there of this giving of the 10%. There's no Levitical law at the time. There's, there's no, there's, there's no, um, there's no laid out structure as to where this comes from. It just is out of his heart and it's to the Lord. And so, um, but in the Levitical law, there is a 10% tie that's required. Uh, and the Lord is very, very adamant about this, belongs to him and Malakai and says, don't, you know, bring your tithe to the Lord, bring, bring it in.
Speaker 3 00:02:27 Don't be stingy. And don't steal from the Lord. It even says don't steal from the Lord by withholding your tide. Yeah. The thing that is required of you by the thing that is required. So it was very important and it's very prominent. And so we say, okay, what was it used for? And you can see in the old Testament that it was used for upkeep at the temple, it was to help sojourners foreigners in the land. It was to help widows and orphans. There was no, you know, there's no tax that the government is doing to help out these folks, you know, you're pretty much on your own. And so God puts his people in charge of helping these folks. Uh, it was for upkeep of the, it was to support the Levitical priests, um, and, uh, and the sacrifices and all, all of those things. And so everything had a specific point that it went to and that's what the 10% came from. But by the time we get to the new Testament, it's never mentioned in there other than in the gospel. And that's only twice in a negative way. And the gospels uses it in, Jesus uses a negative ways as you bring your tie, then <inaudible>, but you don't do anything else right. In your life. And so he uses it in a negative way, but by the time you get to the church, tithe is not mentioned at all
Speaker 1 00:03:30 For the old Testament you're referring to, it was the Levitical type. Yeah. And then there's another,
Speaker 2 00:03:35 The 10% that's right. For the feasts. And then there's, I have it here. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:03:40 You know? And so there's like two, 10% tides. And then there's an every three year tide, which comes out to like 3%, 3.3% or something like that. Yeah. So I think the total we were discussing, this was if you were a Jew under old covenant law, you were roughly giving, I think it was like 2300.
Speaker 3 00:03:55 And even more than that, if you entice and even more than that, if you're talking about now bringing your sacrifices, firstborn and those kinds of
Speaker 1 00:04:03 Yeah. And then there's the freewill offerings, which is what we preached on. Right. And that's like a completely free above and beyond your duty tied to pledge and yeah.
Speaker 2 00:04:11 So from worlds, right? Yeah. Oh, so you,
Speaker 3 00:04:14 You can't take that old Testament principle of 10%. Right. And say, that applies
Speaker 2 00:04:18 To us. That's what we're required to do now. It's not the same thing.
Speaker 1 00:04:23 And why do people, why is that just so ubiquitous? I mean, it's just the default
Speaker 0 00:04:26 Position. I think that like the reality is if, if one person said it in a church a hundred years ago, and then nobody ever corrected it. Right. And then every person in that church just took that for the word of the Lord. Right. It's just like, for a lot of people, it's all that they ever knew. Right. They just, this is the assumption, this is what we have. And so like, oh yeah. I give 10% because that's what I'm required to give. Interesting. You get that.
Speaker 3 00:04:53 If I could interject just a second, my parents taught me to tie using the 10% principle. So I don't mind it too, by the way. Yeah. So, so I, and it wasn't because of bad theology or anything like that. I think they were using it as a guideline. Yeah, for sure. And I said, if you want to know how much to give, if you can use that,
Speaker 1 00:05:10 Honestly. So I think the 10% rule is a great it. As long as you're clear, you got to go before the Lord and pray about this. But by and large, the 10% is a great floor. You know what I'm saying? Like, so one of the principles that we tried to draw out in the message is that your heart follows your giving, right? So what you spend your money on your heart goes after that. And so the Lord wants us to give to his kingdom because he not because he's broke or desperate. Right, right. Because he knows that if we give to this, then our heart will follow it. It's genius,
Speaker 3 00:05:42 Which is exactly why Jesus said where your treasure is there your heart and not the other way around.
Speaker 1 00:05:48 So I think for many, so the average evangelical cash, we just looked at these stats, what does, it was like two to 3% or something like that. And you have a
Speaker 2 00:05:56 Bunch stats. Can
Speaker 1 00:05:59 You add in your sermon notes? Um, yes, we do swap sermon notes. Uh, you adding your sermon notes, um, some stats on Bezos and Zuckerberg for my 2017 or yeah. Yeah. And it was like,
Speaker 2 00:06:10 I did, I always read your notes. I read all of your notes. And then I take the things I want before I preach freedom of information act. It is a small group. Right, right. That's where this is going to come out as like plagiarism. Yes. We've all agreed. The
Speaker 3 00:06:24 Average, the average American is I 2.1%. Yeah. And that's not just to the church. That's the, yeah. And the billionaires were less billionaires.
Speaker 2 00:06:32 That was what was crazy. And you're like, wow, that's interesting. Now they give more, because 1% is more than to judge
Speaker 3 00:06:41 Their income, the billionaires, because it's, it's pretty much judged by their net worth. So if you look at what they make in a year, maybe the average has changed. So to be fair. Yep. But ultimately compared to their net worth their giving is less than the average American.
Speaker 1 00:06:55 Yup. Very interesting. Wow. Interesting. Okay. That's so 10%. Can we just, uh, somebody comes to you and they say, how, how much should I start tithing? What do you say to them?
Speaker 0 00:07:06 Uh, I mean, you start with prayer, right? Like, like I, in fact, that's what I told our folks yesterday. Like so many people are just like, well, this is what I'm thinking. What if God wants you to get more than 10%. Right. So I'm not going to give you a hard and fast number, but like start with a percentage. That is, I mean, what do you say? But like solid, like, you know, how do you talk about that? So like 10% is a good number to start with and then like commit to it. Right. So don't let others automate it, push it out. Right. Totally right.
Speaker 3 00:07:37 Yep. And it should also be said that when you're giving, you know, give to the church, but there are plenty of other opportunities. And so taking it back to the way our conversation started, God has a heart for the poor, for the sojourners, for the, for all of these, for the projects that he's doing around the world. And so I encouraged our folks. I said, you know, bring, bring something to the church, but don't forget. There's lots of other organizations that you should get involved in. Where, where these organizations provide clean water around the world. They provide food around the world. They provide education around the world and you should be involved in those things. In addition
Speaker 2 00:08:10 To whatever you're doing, we did a sermon
Speaker 1 00:08:12 Q and a on the sermon about manipulative fundraising. So it's interesting because one of the manipulative techniques that pastors will say is you're only allowed to give to your local church, but that is it. And that, that to me, I'm like, okay, that's great.
Speaker 2 00:08:24 I would love to justify that in script for my, like, it would make my love to also justify the 10% like,
Speaker 1 00:08:29 Yeah, we're gonna, I have so much money. But like at the end of the day, I think God's biggest concern is we're giving our first and our best for his kingdom. And one pastor, I loved what he said. He said it should pinch. And the reason he said that is because if it pinches, then you feel where it's going. And it doesn't mean go broke. It doesn't mean give more than you have. It just means there should be something about the quantity where it's enough that your heart is following. I
Speaker 3 00:08:53 Love that because we fund what we love. We find what we love. And so why not direct your funds so that you learn to love God more by funding? What God is funding, what he's doing
Speaker 0 00:09:02 Around the world. I mean, like, you feel like you should be able to feel the weight of it, right. You should be able to because when you feel that I'm missing something else, because I'm giving you this, then your heart gets starts to go. It does. Okay. I'm on board with that more and more. We should preach on this. We should. How about that? All right. Well, thank you so much for joining us for this sermon Q and a, please stick around for more questions.
