Calculating Tithes

Let's look at this from God's perspective. Christian's submission to God is to be accepted by God, and must be sincere from the heart. Whatever is done out of habit is not approved. "And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." (Colossians 3:17). Sometime it is regrettable that the activities of reformed churches must be cut back to agree with actual or anticipated income. Should the members of a local reformed church withhold their tithes that will accomplish less statistically? Financial income and expenditures do not determine the quality of a church. Quality is measured by the Christlike living of the reformed church members. If Christ is reigning in us, we will be giving joyfully and generously regardless the word "tithe" is being used. I know "tithe" is not being used in the New Testament. We never see the word "tithe" in the New Testament because it is from the Old Testament (the Law). Therefore tithe is from the Law. In the New Testament, we see the words "give" or "giving" or "cheerful giver" because they are related to grace. (see Mark 12:41-44, Romans 12:8). We are under Grace and that we are to obey God and follow His Word (the Bible). God wants a pure heart from us and He does not need to give us rules in order for our hearts to be pure. Jesus Christ cleaned our sins and all God wants us to do is be Christ-like. Jesus said in Matthew 5:8 "God blesses those whose hearts are pure, for they will see God." God wants our hearts more than He want us to follow rules. If we give our hearts to God, then we will know what is sinful and what is not sinful. We all have to realize that a local church's accomplishments will depend upon members' spiritual condition. The church's financial health will be healthy if the people are submitting to the Holy Spirit, who will give them fruit.

I want to point out another view that may help us understand. The concept of 2 Corinthians 8:9 is actually about giving and sharing. If you look the whole chapter (8), you will see how the topic of wealth came up. We all are capable of working, earning money and provide our family's needs. God gave us opportunities for us to be successful in our lives and at the same time, God do not want us to forget those who are not. There were those who made a lot of money wanted to help those who did not make a lot of money. 2 Corinthians, Chapter 8 is about giving. Those early Christians in the early church did a remarkable thing; no one told them they had to share and give in the manner that they did. They had just been filled with the Holy Spirit who would help them to be more like Jesus and to walk and live as He would in a loving and giving manner. While we as Christians are not under a legalistic law that gives us specific details on our giving, again, we are indeed commanded to be giving people, and we ought to look for opportunities to give.

"And now, brothers, we want you to know about the grace that God has given the Macedonian churches. Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity." (Second Corinthians 8:1–2)

We need to look at "tithe" from a different perspective. God's perspective of grace rather than law. I pray and hope this will help.

pinkieposies said:

Oh, and I have a question: If one was to give 10% after taxes, and then give 10% on tax returns, would that amount to the same as 10% of all of your gross income? {I haven't been doing taxes for very long! }

.:Erin:.​

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You can give as much as you want. My recommendation is to follow God's plan of giving which is 10% of gross income. Even though the New Testament does not require tithe but we are to "give". I usually look at my "total annual income" to see if I am within or above 10%. There is no right or wrong way. The main issue is the heart of the giver. God looks at the heart. That's the most important.

Currently post income tax - although I'm working towards pre-income tax. If I were to include all charitable giving - I probably exceed 10% of pre tax dollars now. My church makes sure we give at least 10% for missions/charitable ministries also. Seems only right

As an aside - I know I mentioned this once on another thread. My pastor has never used the pulpit, not even once, to discuss giving. We also never pass a collection plate.

edie

We give post tax.

but we don't tithe I guess - so maybe you should discount my vote. We don't like restrict our giving to 10%. We give where we see a need, and prayerfully consider what to give, and to who. We haven't always given as much or as little as 10%. Stages and needs presented to us contributed.

We do tend to give by percentage though, so as to be sure that our giving increases as our income does.

Pre tax, of course. The tithe is on our increase, not on what the government leaves us.

On the other hand, The NT tells us to give what we purpose with a glad heart. But since God allows, even commands, that we test Him in this area I don't see why every Christian doesn't give 10% of the gross just as a starting point.

Bob Moore said:

Pre tax, of course. The tithe is on our increase, not on what the government leaves us.

On the other hand, The NT tells us to give what we purpose with a glad heart. But since God allows, even commands, that we test Him in this area I don't see why every Christian doesn't give 10% of the gross just as a starting point.

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I found it fascinating that this is the ONLY place in the bible well God tells us to test Him. In every other single way, we are not to test God.....interesting isn't it?

That said, I cannot say we have taken Him up on it.

As the wife, I have no control over that area, and while my husband tries, we do not always tithe as we know we should. I do not think he's able (yet) to take that leap of faith.

If you will, please take a moment to pray that he will get to that point in his walk where he can trust God in every area of his life.

ClementofRome said:

I cannot answer the question as stated. We used to be very wishy-washy with tithes and began to have a sense of guilt over it. So, I decided to set a certain dollar amount per week and be faithful to that dollar amount even if we felt like we could not afford it. We have been faithful with the dollar amount for over a year now. I will also admit that it is less than 10%, but the Lord has greatly blessed out faithfulness. I plan to up our giving in Jan to another dollar amount and be faithful to that. Ultimately, I do believe that we will be at 10% soon.

I am not concerned with pre-tax or post-tax; I am concerned however, with faithfulness. One thing to keep in mind that that God did NOT want the sacrifices of an unrepentant heart in the OT....I suspect the same remains today.

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You and I are in agreeance. I do the same thing.

I finally got a little time to properly respond to this topic. I voted a while ago, but now I'd like to share from a sermon I preached on the topic earlier this year. I'm an elder at a tiny non-denominational country church. The entire sermon was about 12 pages long, so I'll just use from the last half or so:

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...People somehow think that because we are no longer ‘under the Law’ that we have fewer obligations and responsibilities, but in fact, it’s quite the opposite. "If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord..." God doesn’t just own whatever we happen to throw into the plate on Sunday morning. He owns it all. When we accept Him as Lord, we’re giving Him the right to rule over every aspect of our lives. If we hold anything back from Him...then He’s not really Lord, is He? I’m not saying that we all instantly have a full understanding of what this means the moment we believe. It’s part of the sanctification process, where we grow in our knowledge of Him and grow in our obedience to Him and mature as believers.

Remember the phrase that became popular around the time of Watergate: ‘Follow the money’? Since then, I’ve noticed it’s usually true that whenever there’s a scandal or some outrageous turn in political events, that if you follow the money trail, you can find out a LOT about who and why is really behind what happened. Well, the same holds true for all of us little people sitting here today. It’s been said that you can tell where a person’s heart is by looking at his/her checkbook. Isn’t that usually true? Take a look at my checkbook and you’ll see some interesting things about me. Here’s a few entries for Barnes & Noble. OK...maybe more than a few!! Here’s some for Redding Christian Supply...christianbook.com...let’s see...The Fly Shop in Redding....here’s some chest waders from Cabella’s...can you start to get a picture of some things about me? What’s this? Manton Community Church? OH!.....Well, I’ll get back to that later.

Anyway, where does most of your money go? Now, I know that there are some people on a subsistence income, and I’m not necessarily addressing right now those people who, after paying for rent, utilities, food, and car have a lot more week left at the end of their check. I am talking about those who maybe pay their rent, utilities, food, and car, and then rent ten videos a week, and then eat out five or six times a month, and go down to Rolling Hills Casino, or maybe Reno a couple times a month, and have to have that new boat, or RV, or trip to Monterey....and then when the offering plate comes around pull a lint ball from their pocket and say, "Sorry! That’s all I have." This is paying ourselves first, and then giving the Lord whatever, if anything, is left over. (Now please remember my two anchor points here...God loves a cheerful giver...if you can’t give cheerfully, then just don’t give. And please don’t let anything I’m saying here become a barrier to your hearing from the Lord.)

And please note...I’m not saying that these other things are bad. I’m not saying that movies or eating out or boats or RV’s or trips to Monterrey are bad. I am saying that the typical order of giving to the church in MOST American Christian lives seems to be that we give the Lord the gleanings from our harvest...our last-fruits, not our first fruits. We tend to give God what’s left over after we’ve paid for all of our necessities and had our fun. Church...that is not how it ought to be. Let’s take a look at some other New Testament teachings on the topic:

MT 23:23 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices--mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law--justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.

AC4:32 All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had.

Wow! Sounds like the first century believers did more than tithe, huh?

33 With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. 34 There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales 35 and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.

Now, I don’t see this as necessarily meaning that we should make the building here the Manton Community Commune. It doesn’t say that everybody immediately dumped all of their possessions and turned the proceeds over to the church...it says ‘from time to time.’And we can see a further refinement on this if we go down to chapter five:

AC 5:1 Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2 With his wife's full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles' feet.

AC 5:3 Then Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4 Didn't it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God."

But if we go back up to 4:32-35, we do see a model we can use. The believers brought money to the church leaders, who distributed it as they saw fit.

1 Corinthians 9:7-14 tells us something about what these collections are for.

1CO 16:1 Now about the collection for God's people: Do what I told the Galatian churches to do. 2 On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made. 3 Then, when I arrive, I will give letters of introduction to the men you approve and send them with your gift to Jerusalem.

I’d like to take a minute now, step back, and recap some things...

OK....we do know from Scripture that God wants us to give to His church. The results of this giving are to pay for the ministry and to be distributed among those in need in the body. I think these points are indisputable.

The big question is...how much? Well...let’s go back to our key verse (I’m going back to include verse 6):


2CO 9:6 Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. 7 Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Working from this bottom line (being cheerful about our giving), we see all kinds of scriptural precedent for giving at least a tithe, or ten percent.

Now some could say here "Now don’t go and get legalistic on us!!" Let me give you an example of the way I would see legalism working here. If I passed around an earnings statement card right now and required you all to fill in how much you make, calculate ten percent of that, and use that as a base for your giving, that would be legalism. Would it surprise you that there are some churches I’ve heard of that do exactly that? Lotsa cults, too. Well, we’re not gonna do that. We would never want to do that. What we can do without being legalistic is agree that we are supposed to give something to the church and go over scriptural principles, and then let you decide between you and the Lord what you’re going to do. And remember...be cheerful about your decision!!

Back to ten percent...I think the scriptural baseline for giving is ten percent of what we earn. Ahh...but then the question comes up "Ten percent of gross or ten percent of net?" Well...do you want to get blessed gross, or do you want to get blessed net?

Seriously....this is where you need to look at scriptural principle and pray about it, and decide for yourself. Personally, I think that since it is giving from our firstfruits and not the gleanings after the government gets their hands on it, it should be ten percent of gross. This is what I’ve always done as long as I’ve been tithing. Even when I was working minimum wage jobs. Even when I was only bringing in about $200/month tutoring for my spending money when I was in college. Even when I was trying to support a family on $1200/month as a DFG seasonal in the Bay Area and rent was eating up almost half of my pay. (You see, I do understand where some of you on limited incomes are at.) I’ve always been committed to the idea that God comes first. Remember when I noticed MCC in my checkbook back there? What goes to the church is in proper proportion to every other place our money goes. And you know what? God has always been faithful to provide, even when it didn’t look like there was any hope otherwise.

Now, you know that I think that it is proper to tithe on our gross income. Now, it’s not leagalistic for me to share that with you. It would be legalistic of me to expect it from each and every one of you. Do you know that (Elder Bob) disagrees with me on this? I discussed this with him a few weeks ago and he feels it’s totally acceptable to tithe on ten percent of net. And you know what else? It’s OK!! If that’s his conviction, then he needs to be true to HIS conviction, and not mine. And you need to be true to YOUR conviction, and not mine. Hopefully, I’ve given you some information this morning that you didn’t have before. I’m not expecting our offerings to suddenly increase next week. I would hope, though, that you would take what I’ve said here this morning, think about it, pray about it, and see what the Lord has to say to YOU about it.


And remember....God loves a CHEERFUL giver!!

(My turn to be verbose, like all good Reformed folks can be!! )

edb19 said:

As an aside - I know I mentioned this once on another thread. My pastor has never used the pulpit, not even once, to discuss giving. We also never pass a collection plate.

edie

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Your first point is kinda sad. How will people know anything if they're not taught?

You second point is wonderful!! We didn't pass a plate at the first church I ever went to, either. We had boxes along the back wall that people could put their offerings into whenever they wanted to. I've tried to get every church I've belonged to to try this as well...to no avail!!

GrinningDwarf said:

Your first point is kinda sad. How will people know anything if they're not taught?

You second point is wonderful!! We didn't pass a plate at the first church I ever went to, either. We had boxes along the back wall that people could put their offerings into whenever they wanted to. I've tried to get every church I've belonged to to try this as well...to no avail!!

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Not sure how you got the idea we're not taught - our pastors are remarkable men of God with an amazing grasp of Scripture. David in particular is exceptional at opening the word of God to his listeners. He takes the role of teacher most seriously (the teaching portion of our worship lasts 40-45 minutes). A goodly number of people are generally at church 1 or more hours after worship ends discussing passages of Scripture with one or more of the pastors. For example, last Sunday I didn't leave church until 3:00, our service ends at ~12:30. Pastor David and a couple of other members (myself included) were discussing the sacraments - particularly the Lord's table. He never leaves until our thirst is quenched.

When I say he's never spoken on giving from the pulpit I guess I wasn't clear enough. David has spoken on giving when it is in context with the Scripture he is currently expounding (i.e. Matthew 6:1-4 19-22, Proverbs 28:27, Acts 5:1-11, Matthew 19:16-22, ). He makes a point of stressing our duty to "the least of these." He frequently talks about the fact that we have a tendency to make money and/or material items an idol.

Our church emphasizes giving to others - aside from our building expenses (rent now mortgage) our largest expenditures are mercy giving/mission support. We know as individuals that our church body can't give if we don't give. And we have extremely generous givers - but they are giving from the heart, not from being pressured into giving.

By comparison, every church I've attended in the past has an annual pledge drive that lasts anywhere from 4 - 6 weeks. The weekly update was discussed in every worship service ('have you completed your pledge card yet?')('you know we can't function without your money') culminating in some sort of recognition for all the moneys pledged. I've even seen one church list the pledges in general dollar amounts (i.e. 5 people pledged $500/year, 10 people pledged $1000/year, 2 people pledged >$5000/year). That is totally inappropriate. David hasn't and never will allow that in our pulpit - it isn't Scriptural and David's correct, it has no place in the church.

edb19 said:

Not sure how you got the idea we're not taught - our pastors are remarkable men of God with an amazing grasp of Scripture. David in particular is exceptional at opening the word of God to his listeners. He takes the role of teacher most seriously (the teaching portion of our worship lasts 40-45 minutes). A goodly number of people are generally at church 1 or more hours after worship ends discussing passages of Scripture with one or more of the pastors. For example, last Sunday I didn't leave church until 3:00, our service ends at ~12:30. Pastor David and a couple of other members (myself included) were discussing the sacraments - particularly the Lord's table. He never leaves until our thirst is quenched.

When I say he's never spoken on giving from the pulpit I guess I wasn't clear enough. David has spoken on giving when it is in context with the Scripture he is currently expounding (i.e. Matthew 6:1-4 19-22, Proverbs 28:27, Acts 5:1-11, Matthew 19:16-22, ). He makes a point of stressing our duty to "the least of these." He frequently talks about the fact that we have a tendency to make money and/or material items an idol.

Our church emphasizes giving to others - aside from our building expenses (rent now mortgage) our largest expenditures are mercy giving/mission support. We know as individuals that our church body can't give if we don't give. And we have extremely generous givers - but they are giving from the heart, not from being pressured into giving.

By comparison, every church I've attended in the past has an annual pledge drive that lasts anywhere from 4 - 6 weeks. The weekly update was discussed in every worship service ('have you completed your pledge card yet?')('you know we can't function without your money') culminating in some sort of recognition for all the moneys pledged. I've even seen one church list the pledges in general dollar amounts (i.e. 5 people pledged $500/year, 10 people pledged $1000/year, 2 people pledged >$5000/year). That is totally inappropriate. David hasn't and never will allow that in our pulpit - it isn't Scriptural and David's correct, it has no place in the church.

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Oops. Sorry...my mistake! That's what happens when I jump to conclusions! Sounds like you have an excellent teaching pastor.

GrinningDwarf said:

Oops. Sorry...my mistake! That's what happens when I jump to conclusions! Sounds like you have an excellent teaching pastor.

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No apology needed - I wasn't clear to begin with.

edie

bumping this thread....

just wanted to say that my husband went through a money seminar a few weeks ago. We've totally rearranged our budget, figured out where we were "bleeding" money wise, and am now tithing, pre-tax, the full 10%!

I admit, I was hesitant at first, and suggested to my husband that we start maybe with a 5% and go up from there, and he said no, that if we were going to trust God in our money, then we were going to start emmediately and that's that!

It's not going to be easy with this new budget, and we're going to have to be disciplined, but I can tell you already(it's been 2 1/2 weeks) that we've seen blessings. Mostly in the feeling of peace we have. Money matters were causing a fair amount of stress in our relationship(neither of us were ever taught how to handle money, and we've tried several times to get a handle on it, but always tried to do it on our own--sans God's help) and that stress has all but disappeared, because we now have a plan, a budget, and we are finally giving back to God our 'first fruits' so to speak.

Just wanted to give a little praise here!

Father......Thank you God for finally stepping in and making us aware of how much we needed to rely on you in EVERY area of our life. You've allowed us to stumble and fall and try to walk on our own in this area, so that we could really see how much we need You. Please, keep us focused and faithful, as we learn how to handle money Your way. We look forward to the day when we are able to give much more over our tithe to help our brothers and sisters in Christ. Thank you for all You've done in our lives..........In Christ's Holy Name..... Amen