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Tithe

From the Series: Ritual
Speaker: Mark Batterson
Date: October 25, 2009

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Transcript

NATIONAL COMMUNITY CHURCH

October 25, 2009

Rituals: Tithe

Mark Batterson

Happy weekend to you! How is everybody doing? Welcome to all of you at all of our locations. Before we jump in this weekend, can I take a moment and say a huge thanks for your flexibility as a church. Two weeks ago we got the news about the movie theater closing at Union Station, and you guys touched your toes last weekend! Talk about flexibility! It was amazing! Here’s the deal, this could have gone terribly wrong but you all went to the perfect places at the perfect time. We had record attendances at some of our other locations and a lot of people came over to our Sunday mornings at Ebenezers and if we had told everybody where to go, it wouldn’t have turned out any better than it did. So, a huge thank you, and I want you to know that one of our prayers was that we wouldn’t lose a single person through this whole transition and here’s my pastoral heart in this, I’m not concerned about regular NCCers, well, I’m concerned about you, I love you, but we knew that we could weather that, but it was some of the people on the fringes that maybe sneak in the shadows of the movie theater and those were the folks that we prayed wouldn’t fall through the cracks or lose out during the transition. We got our numbers this week and I was anticipating what those were going to look like, and this is cool – our attendance this past weekend as compared to two weeks ago was one less person but that day, one of our leaders called me and told me that they were church and missed church the week before. So, the bottom line is I want to say thank you for your flexibility in this. We continue to pray for God’s guidance and to thank Him for his provisions, for Ebenezers, that we had a place to go to on Sunday morning. We continue to pray and seek the Lord together as a church and we are excited about where God is taking us.

We continue our ‘Rituals’ series this weekend. We’ve talked about Sabbath and Communion. We’ve got a few other topics on the agenda. We will talk about baptism and confession and worship, but this weekend, we talk about tithing. If you have a Bible, turn over to Malachi Chapter 3, I’ll give you a few minutes to get there. I’m excited about this.

I know that some of you are in a tough place financially right now. And I know that for some of us, those aren’t the times we really want to be thinking about or talking about finances. But I’m excited about this message because I’m going to talk about an ancient ritual more than four thousand years old that I think has the potential to revolutionalize our financial lives. I’m going to be perfectly candid, I used to hate to talk about money from the pulpit because I was a little bit self-conscience, a little bit defensive, like, are people going to think the pastor is making a money grab, or is this going to reinforce a perception that the church is always asking for money, and I was caught up in all that, but can I be honest with you about all that? The longer I tithe, the money I love talking about it because I’ve seen how God has proved Himself so faithful. What I want to do is a little bit of a reframing of this because I think it is easy for us to think about this in negative terms. So let me say upfront, if you attend any of our locations, my hunch is that your campus pastor said that if you are a guest, don’t feel obligated to give. We are very intentional about that because we have a lot of unchurched people who attend and I don’t know if you are going someplace for the first time and some thing comes down the aisle and you’re like, what do I do with this? Do I put money in or maybe I take money out? It is this ritual that happens in churches but if you haven’t been going to a church, you might be wondering how much to put in or can you make change, or how does this work?

I’d say on the flip side that we are very apologetic in saying that we believe that any investment we make in the kingdom of God is the best investment we can make. So we make no apologies for that either. But I want to say this upfront, please hear me, God doesn’t need our money. It is laughable to think about the Almighty, the One who owns the cattle on a thousand hills somehow needing our spare change. I think we get the wrong focus that somehow God’s eternal purposes are hinging upon our meager resources. Can I tell you that on one level, this message has nothing to do with money? Tithing is not a measure of how much you give as much as it is a measure of how much you trust. In fact, I’d encourage you to take some notes, so let’s start right here. Here’s a little equation – tithing equals trusting. How do I really know that I can trust God? Well, start to put a dollar sign next to it and you begin to give some evidence to the fact that maybe you do believe that God can do more with 90% than you can do with 100%. We are really talking about a trust issue. Here’s the bottom line, this is what I want you to hear, this is critical – as your pastor, my dream for you is for you to live your life in a way that you put yourself in the position of blessing. Let me say that again, I want us to live our lives in a way that we put ourselves in a position where God can bless us. I would suggest that that is what tithing does, it puts us in a position of blessing. That’s what this message is about. Malachi 3:6

I am the Lord, and I do not change. That is why you descendants of Jacob are not already destroyed. Ever since the days of your ancestors, you have scorned my decrees and failed to obey them. Now return to me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies. “But you ask, ‘How can we return when we have never gone away?’ “Should people cheat God? Yet you have cheated me! “But you ask, ‘What do you mean? When did we ever cheat you?’ “You have cheated me of the tithes and offerings due to me. You are under a curse, for your whole nation has been cheating me. ¹Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my Temple. If you do,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in! Try it! Put me to the test! Your crops will be abundant, for I will guard them from insects and disease. Your grapes will not fall from the vine before they are ripe,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies. “Then all nations will call you blessed, for your land will be such a delight,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.”

Here’s what we are going to do this week, we are going to unpack this passage one verse at a time. It says: You have cheated me of the tithes and offerings due to me, you are under a curse, you and your whole nation have been cheating me.

Let me make an observation here. Some of us are in a tough financial position because of something we cannot control. This week, I got an email from an NCCer who lost their job, a by-product of a company downsizing. Many people own a home or maybe a stock portfolio that maybe some of the economic changes and maybe you’ve suffered because of that. There are some things you can’t control. Let me make a distinction here, I don’t think you should feel bad about the things you can’t control. But there are some of us that are in a financial position that is the by-product of some decision we’ve made. Some of us have lived beyond our means by virtue of the credit card and it has put us in a very difficult place where your blood pressure goes up every time that credit card bill comes in the mail. I think for others, maybe it is the fact that you haven’t saved for retirement and it has caught up with you. You are at that place asking what you do now. But here is one particular decision I want to zero in on because what I want to be clear about is that it is within our realm of control. We can control this. Some of us are in a bad financial place because we’ve been robbing God. We have not been giving God the tithe. How do I say this as nicely and as bluntly as I possibly can? If you aren’t tithing, don’t expect a blessing, because God will not violate the standards that He has established. So, what you have here is a very definitive curse. Some of you are struggling and what you haven’t even realized to this point is it’s because you are not living under that umbrella of obedience.

I had to say that. Let me say this, I think for many, Malachi 3 is one of those chapters that can get a negative wrap, like, are you saying I have to tithe? No, that is not what I’m saying, I’m saying you GET to. Are you telling me that the tithe is some sort of obligation? Absolutely not! It is an opportunity! I’m reading the Bible here. I think some people perceive this as a threat. Did you read the whole passage? What a promise to stand on! What a promise! Here is the bottom line, you read this passage and if you get caught up in all the negatives, you are going to miss the point of the whole thing. Here it is – God wants to bless you. It is the heart of our heavenly Father, it is who God is, it is his nature, it is his character.

I remember when our kids were real little, we used to celebrate most birthdays at Chuck E. Cheese. It’s awesome for kids and parents, the kids have a hay-day and the parents can actually have a conversation. So they are playing games and getting tokens and riding rides. So, Parker is getting ready to celebrate his birthday and I asked him how many tokens he wanted, and I don’t know where this came from but Parker said, “Five.” I couldn’t believe he asked for so few. And as loving father who wants to bless his children, I wanted to lead him into the blessing, so I said, “Parker, would you like five or six?” He said, “Six.” I said, “Would you like six or seven?” He said, “Seven.” “Seven or eight?” We got all the way up to ten, I said, “Would you like ten or eleven?” He said, “Ten.” Why did he stop there? Maybe he ran out of fingers? It was interesting to me, maybe it was his perceived limit, like maybe Dad was good for about ten tokens, I don’t know. What he didn’t know was I was good for a lot more than ten tokens. He could have asked for 25 tokens and I would have gotten him 25 tokens. My ability to bless him was far beyond his ability to be blessed. Can I suggest that the same is true of us? God’s ability to bless us is far beyond our ability to contain it. I sure hope at the outset that you’ll understand that heart of your heavenly Father. He wants to bless you but you’ve got to put yourself in the position of blessing.

What is that? How do I get there? That sounds great! The over-arching answer is – obedience. Obedience is putting ourselves in a position of blessing. In fact, write down this definition because I think sometimes it is helpful for us to redefine things a little bit so that we have clarity on them. Obedience is living your life in a way that you put no limits on God’s ability to bless you. When we live in that place, we begin to experience that blessing. As it relates to finances, the tithe puts us in a position of blessing. Let’s keep going, verse 10

Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my temple.

Let’s talk nuts and bolts for a minute. How much should I tithe? Well, the Hebrew word literally means tenth, so the tithe is not 2 percent or 9 percent or 29 percent, tithe is literally 10 percent. Well, should I tithe on my gross or net income? Let me ask you, would you like a gross blessing or a net blessing? I think you tithe on the entire thing because I want as much blessing as I can get. If that’s your perspective, I believe that’s the biblical perspective, then you’re not going to look for loopholes or excuses. Now, let me say this, some of us are here this weekend, ‘If I could just get to 10 percent, that would be the ultimate goal.’ I better caution you here because that is not the ultimate goal, it is not a finish line, that is the starting line, that’s where we begin to cross into obedience. I think the goal ought to be to give more and more away as we continue to grow spiritually. It starts with 10 percent, and let me be specific, not any 10 percent, but the first 10 percent. The biblical term is first fruit. Why is that significant? Because if you give God the last 10 percent, it’s like here are the leftover, like if you’ve got it leftover, here you go. But what I love about the first fruit and giving God the first 10 percent, what an act of faith! It is trusting God for the next 90 percent.

Leviticus 27:30 says: One tenth of the produce of the land, whether grain from the fields or fruit from the trees, belongs to the Lord and must be set apart to Him as holy.

This is a holy thing we’re talking about, so the bottom line is that 100 percent belongs to God, He lets us keep 90 percent, but that 10 percent is set apart for the Lord, that’s what we call the tithe. And I would say this, I think that it is a decision you make and once you’ve made it, then it’s done. I can honestly tell you that in 17 years of marriage, one of the best decisions we ever made is when we got married, I’ve told you this before, we determined that we would never not tithe. It was a priority for us. So when I was a struggling student in graduate school and she was working to make ends meet, or at different times when we were trying to raise a budget and living offering to offering, it wasn’t like we made the decision over and over, we had already made the decision. I call it a pre-decision, it’s a decision you make before the decision you make, and pre-decisions are the most important decisions. We made a pre-decision what we would never not tithe and because of it, we’ve experienced God’s blessings. I’m going to talk more about that in a few minutes.

Where should I tithe? Again, nuts and bolts here, this says bring it into the storehouse. I believe the storehouse is the local church? But what about missionaries or other organizations that I support? I think those are wonderful! But again, I think there is a distinction in the Bible between the tithe, which is the first 10 percent, and offerings, which are anything above and beyond that 10 percent. So we give money to missions and we support different individuals or organizations, but those are above and beyond that tithe. I think it is important to mentally make a distinction between those two things. What is the storehouse? I think it is the place where you are spiritually set and relationally connected.

One last nut and bolt issue. I know there are some people who object to this idea of the tithe. They say isn’t that an Old Testament concept? I’ve found that most people argue that, not because they want to give more, but for some reason they don’t want to be held accountable to that standard. I’m just keeping it real. The problem with that is this, it’s the purpose of this ‘Ritual’ series, we want to reverse engineer this thing, you need to understand a couple of things. First of all, the tithe was not instituted under the law, it is pre-law. You go all the way back to Genesis 14 and you can find the first example of Abraham giving a tenth. Then you go to Genesis 28, we’ll talk about that at the end, and Jacob makes a vow and begins to tithe. It is pre-law. Then it is codified under the law, but then it is even affirmed post-law. It is almost a footnote, if you will, but Jesus affirms it in Matthew 23:23, you take a look at this. What sorrow awaits you, teachers of the religious law and you Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are careful to tithe even the tiniest income from your herb gardens, but you ignore the more important aspects of the law, justice, mercy and faith. Now, isn’t this interesting, this is exactly why we are doing this series, because we don’t want to get into some ritual and forget why we’re doing it or forget the bigger issue. But Jesus said this, You should tithe, yes, but not neglect the most important things. So it is even post-law it is affirmed. Finally, I’d say this, to those who would say that’s just under the law and we’re under grace, can you give me a single instance where grace doesn’t go further than the law? So, honestly, I believe that it is a biblical principle without an expiration date. It is one of those inviolable properties, I promise you, you put God first, give Him the first 10 percent and God will bless it.

Let’s dig a little deeper. It says: If you do,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in!

That is an awesome promise! Get your pens ready because I want you to jot down these principles, and I’ll blog them in case you don’t have a pen. Here are some simple principles that I want to get across.

Number one: God can do more with 90 percent than I can do with 100 percent. I’m just preaching the truth. The bottom line is – God has the ability to do more with that 90 percent if we honor Him with the first 10 percent than we can do with 100 percent. I love what John Mark Templeton said, billionaire founder of the Templeton Fund. He said, ‘Tithing always pays the best return on investment.’ Very interesting statement and I believe it is true.

Number two: I think giving makes managing your finances fun. Can I say that? I think for some of us, keeping a checkbook or doing our finances is such a stressful thing, but you know what I’ve found? I’ve found that when I start giving that tithe or giving above and beyond that, it turns into a little bit of a game, a fun game, because we have this core value at NCC, you cannot out give God. Try, but you can’t. It turns finances into this adventure and I could tell you story after story after story of moments in my life when it was so hard to give and I gave and God provided in unbelievable ways. But listen, God is not a slot machine. If you give for the wrong reasons, He sees right through that smoke screen and He is not going to honor that. But if you give for the right reasons, if you are putting Him first because you trust Him, God will honor that. I believe it.

Number three: If you want to be blessed beyond your abilities, than give beyond your abilities. This is where I think we have a scarcity mindset and where we need the paradigm shift, because we think that if we give more, we’ll have less. That’s a lie from the enemy. The truth is, Luke 6:38: Give and it will be given unto you, good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be poured into your lap, for with the measure you use, it will be measured unto you.

It’s the law of measure. The measure we use will determine what comes back to us. I’ve experienced this in so many different ways. I’m thinking about this right now because we are about T minus two months until my next book releases and this week, we offered a free advanced copy to bloggers and I think about 750 bloggers signed up in 36 hours, and my poor publisher is going crazy. But we are in the process of giving away thousands of copies before we ever sell one. Why would we do that? I mean, every book given away means we can’t sell that book. That seems like lost income. But that’s the scarcity mentality. I’ve learned from experience, I believe that one reason why God has blessed In a Pit With a Lion on a Snowy Day, my first published book, is because on my birthday, I had this crazy idea to do a reverse birthday gift. I remember that day, I posted a blog and said, ‘Hey, church planters, I know a book can be a huge expense item for you so I want to give you one.’ We didn’t anticipate hundreds of church planters asking for a free book. It was like thousands and thousands of dollars out of pocket. Happy Birthday to me! I wondered if I’d made a huge mistake because I hadn’t sold any books yet. But over the years, I have met hundreds of church planters who have thanked me for writing the book and, oh, by the way, all our small groups are studying it! Or they’d say they just took their staff through the book, or other things like that. So, just be generous. With the measure you use, it will be measured unto you. We just need a little bit more faith to give a little bit more away.

Number four: When you start tithing, hang onto this one, when you start tithing, your financial problems become God’s problems! Everybody take a deep breath and let it out. It feels good doesn’t it? When our problems aren’t our responsibility, if you want to become God’s responsibility, then you get under that umbrella of blessing and you determine to live in obedience, and don’t wait until you make a little bit more money. Trust me, the longer you wait, the harder it will be to step out in financial obedience. I would do it when you’re making next to nothing, when you feel like you can’t afford it, you’ve got to be obedient in that area of your life and God will honor it and bless it.

Number five: from personal experience, the tithe is the only thing that keeps money from becoming your master. Can I just tell you that your pastor has a greedy heart, like everybody else. Enough is never enough. And you know what I’ve found? I’ve found that the tithe is the way God helps me get that grip of greed off of my heart and it releases that grip and helps me focus beyond my own needs and on advancing God’s kingdom. Who can I bless? What can I do? I’m looking for opportunities to be a blessing and to give.

Live those principles out. Let’s keep going. It says: Try it! Put me to the test!

This week, I came across the coolest tithe experiment. Let’s start thinking in those terms. We have a core value, everything is an experiment, so why don’t we think about tithing in experimental terms. More than half a century, a miller, someone who owned a grain mill, by the name of Perry Hayden was sitting in church listening to a message on tithing, not unlike this message, and he got inspired to do it. He came up with this idea and decided to put God to the test. Time magazine actually chronicled this, I saw the article, a 1943 article. Hayden wanted to test the law of tithing so he decided to plant 1 cubic inch of wheat and tithe on the increase and see what would happen. His first crop was planted the next week, he put it right into action. The year was 1940. He planted 360 kernels of wheat, just a tiny amount of wheat, that’s less than one-quarter bushel. His first crop was planted on a parcel of land four feet by eight feet. He called it the world’s smallest wheat field, and he told people that he took Malachi 3:10 seriously and he promised to tithe the crop at the end of the year. At the end of the year, the initial crop had increased 55 fold, or 70 pounds and he tithed to the local Quaker church. He obviously needed more land, and none other than Henry Ford, who was intrigued by this, donated the land and in 1943, one acre of land yielded 16 bushels. Henry Ford furnished the reaper and witnessed the harvest himself, then in 1944, Hayden planted 380 bushels on 14 acres, you can see what’s happening, and again he tithed on the crop. The next year, they needed 230 acres and a fleet of 40 combines, again provided by Henry Ford, and the yield was 5, 555 bushels. That tithe was given to a local Friends church, and the 5,000 bushels of wheat were sold to approximately 250 farmers in Michigan and nearby states who agreed to plant the wheat in 1946 to pay a tithe to their local churches. In the summer of 1946, the expected harvest was $100,000 from 360 wheat kernels. What I love about that is just how literally Perry Hayden interpreted this Scripture. We talked about that a couple of weeks ago. I think there is a difference between reading the Bible and standing on it. I want to stand on the Bible. A lot of us read but we don’t stand on it. Stand on it, it will hold your weight.

By the way, Henry Ford said to Perry Hayden toward the ends of this as he tracked his experiment, he would say things like, ‘You had faith,’ or ‘God led you,’ and the last thing that Henry Ford said to Perry Hayden was, ‘God is within you.’ I find that very interesting from a tithing experiment.

I don’t want to over-spiritualize this thing but I’m not going to under-spiritualize it either. When the first part of this passage says you’ve wandered away from me, there is distance between us, return to me. How? By re-establishing that tithe covenant. You can’t tell me that the financial and spiritual dimensions of our lives aren’t connected. See, what I’m challenging you to is not just to test God, but to prove God. This is an opportunity to prove that God will deliver on these promises. I believe it.

Let’s do this, for the sake of time, what I’m challenging you to do, those of you who do not tithe, I’m challenging you to do a tithe experiment, but I want to put this in context. Write down Genesis 28:20 because what I’m asking you to do is to begin to practice a ritual that is 4,000 years old. I don’t want to do this thing just to do it, it’s not that God needs our money, He doesn’t, we just need to be in a position of blessing. I want to tie this all the way back, be inspired by then, Jacob made this vow, “If God will indeed by with me and protect me on this journey, and if He will provide me with food and clothing and if I return safely to my father’s home, then the Lord will certainly be my God, and this memorial pillar I have set up will become a place for worshiping God and I will present to God a tenth of everything He gives me.”

I think this is beautiful. Last weekend, we talked about the blood covenant that we’ve entered into, the immunity that is our by virtue of being under the blood of Jesus Christ, it is a covenant. This is also a covenant, it is a tithing covenant. So when should you start? Now! Why wait? How? Ok, next time you get a paycheck, get your calculator, take that amount and multiply it by 10 percent, then write a check and you’re in! You are under that umbrella of blessing. This is not rocket science, you didn’t even have to do that great in math class. I want to challenge you to do it.

Some of you are here and you’re saying thanks for this message because it reaffirms what I’m already doing and I needed to hear that and I needed to be reminded why I’m doing what I’m doing. I want to affirm that. But it’s also just a starting point. I believe God wants to stretch us, and I wonder if we could continue to give more and more and more back to the Lord. If we do that, we put ourselves in the place where God can bless us. That’s the place I want to be.

Let me close with this. A couple of years ago, I had dinner at Rick Warren’s house with Rick and a couple of pastors. Rick Warren pastors Saddleback Church and has written the best-selling, non-fiction book behind the Bible of all time, about 30 million copies, called Purpose Driven Life. Anytime I have an opportunity to have two minutes with someone life that, I always ask the Genesis question. I wanted to ask him from an author’s perspective, like, how’d you do that? Tell me about the genesis of Purpose Drive Life. Here’s the story behind the story. I’ve heard Rick share this publicly, so I think it’s ok to share it. Here’s what he told me. It was during a capital campaign that Saddleback Church was having that he felt prompted to make a financial pledge to the church, and he told me the amount, it was the equivalent to three years’ salary. I’m thinking to myself, how can you pledge three years’ salary? What are you going to live off of for three years? It was during that time, right after making that pledge that he got an advance for that book. Would you like to guess the amount? The exact amount of the pledge!

When you put yourself in a position of blessing, it is God’s responsibility. That’s my heart for you, that you would be in a place where you wouldn’t put any limitations on God’s ability to bless you. That means being in that place of obedience, the financial obedience where we are practicing this ancient ritual of tithing that goes back 4,000 years to Abraham and Jacob, and it gets passed down. For generations, the Jewish people practiced this and God blesses them because of it. And we get grafted into this, and here’s the beautiful thing, no matter how many promises God has made, they are yes in Christ.

Father we come to You today and thank You that we can live our lives in obedience before You. Not because of what we’re capable of, not because of any goodness in us, but because we are redeemed children of God. We thank You for a heavenly Father who wants to bless us and provide for us. Lord, You see our hearts, we are not here playing games. If you see us playing games, I pray You convict us and show the light, but God we are here standing on your promise. I know there are people who need to make tough decisions, decisions that will require a tremendous level of faith and trust and I pray that You would give them the courage to do, that they would stand on this promise. Lord I pray for those who are experiencing financial difficulty, I think most of us have been in that place before. It is such a tough place to be, but I pray that the joy of the Lord would be their strength. I pray that they would realize that they have a wealth, an inheritance, by virtue of being in relationship with You that is beyond measure. God, I pray that as we live in obedience before You, that You would prove Yourself again and again. We thank You for your faithfulness and we give You praise, in Jesus’ name, Amen.

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