About the comments on “Tithing My Time” January 30, 2008

My last post was not intended to be a biblical expose on tithing.  I am very well aware that there are many beliefs on tithing and I was not trying to make anyone else tithe or even make them believe the way I do.  I appreciate the comments, but really they made me feel very ill inside.  I feel that my relationship with the Creator of the Universe and His Son, Jesus is so far beyond the milk that we drink when we debate things such as tithing or baptism or such.  My salvation is assured no matter what I do.  If I tithe or not, I’m 100% positive I will end up with God when I die.  I think Jesus is saddened when we spend so much time worrying about the legalism behind every little ‘and’ or ‘thus’ in the Bible.  Because He paid the price for my sin, I do not have to worry about any of that.  If you don’t believe in tithing, don’t tithe.  It’s between you and God, your salvation does not hinge on that issue.  What God wants us to focus on is our intimate love relationship with HIM, not religion and definitely not theology. 

I look at my relationship with God like my relationship with my husband.  I know without a shadow of a doubt that my husband loves me.  Being married is a given.  I no longer have to try to woo him or make him mine; he already is.  So why would I continually go back to courting and worrying if he likes me and if I said the right thing?  What I should be focused on is developing my relationship with him in a deeper and more intimate way.  Unfortunately, my relationship with my husband needs improvement.  Because I know that he loves me unconditionally, I work on all the other little things in my life that seem so pressing because I know that he will still be there no matter what I do.  This is no way to develop an intimate relationship.  No quality time is spent growing and learning about each other.   

I feel the same about my relationship with God.  If I leave Him until the very last, I am too exhausted and my conversations with him consist of dribble.  Or if I give Him what is left over after I pay my bills, then there just isn’t any left to give.  Just as I don’t want my relationship with my husband to grow cold, I surely don’t want my relationship with God to grow cold.  Does a cold relationship mean that I am no longer a Christian or no longer a wife?  Absolutely not.  Does it mean I am not living my life to the fullest?  You bet!  

I do agree that tithe is a sticky issue.  So-called Christian leaders have definitely exploited the concept.  If someone tithes because they feel guilty, then they are doing it for very wrong reasons and are living under legalism, not freedom through grace.  I do not live under guilt.  When I say that I am robbing God, it is not out of fear that I say it, but out of sadness.  I am robbing God of what is His the same way I rob my husband when I do not actively pursue to know him more, or the way I rob my children if I were to plop my butt in front of a movie and only talk to them on commercials.    I am still a wife and still a mother, just not the best I can be.  I don’t want to be just a Christian, but a friend and lover of God and I will do what I think I need to in order to achieve that.   

Sharing the Sun January 28, 2008

On a very frozen day, the girls found the last patch of sunlight!

Tithing My Time January 28, 2008

Yesterday in Church I heard a really good teaching on Tithe.  When I hear the word “tithe” I think of money; usually of some church asking for it.  But tithing is giving our FIRST-FRUITS.  It is giving the first of everything in faith even though we don’t know what is coming next.  In the Bible, it was the first born animal or child that was given to God.  God required the first of the fruits of the field, even before the storehouses were full for the coming year.  He wanted them to give the first of everything out of faith that He would provide the rest.  The best loved and most well known verse about tithing is found in Malachi 3:8-10.  God says, “You have robbed me.  But you ask, ‘how do we rob you?’ In tithes and offerings.  You are under a curse. . . because you are robbing me.  Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse. . . Test me in this . . . and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.”  Tithing does not mean paying all your bills and then if there is any left over, giving it to God.  It is giving 10% FIRST and then trusting God that there will be enough left over to pay the bills.  

 But money is not the only thing God wants.  As I was listening to the teaching, I realized that there are two things we never have enough of: Money and Time.  In the same way we give what’s left over of our money to God when all the bills are paid, we give what is left over of our time after all of our tasks and chores are complete, and there is usually none left to give!  So, if God requires my  first-fruits, then He requires the first part of my day as well!  I have gone through periods where it is no sacrifice to give my first morning hours to God, but not as a rule.  Usually I go to bed at night and ask God to wake me up when He wants to meet with me.  I know this sounds silly, but it has worked for years.  If I need to start getting ready at 5:30, I will open my eyes at 5:00.  This morning, for example, I asked God to wake me up before it was time to leave and I opened my eyes at 7:00.  I groaned and asked God why He didn’t wake me up, then I saw the snow outside and there is a 2 hour delay for school!  God let me sleep in 2 whole hours!  Anyway, God has been faithful to wake me up when He wants to meet with me, but I am not always faithful to listen.  I have many excuses, most of them sound convincing in the wee hours of the morning.  I suffer from horrible fatigue.  It comes with the whole depression/anxiety package.  It is an unnatural fatigue where I literally can sleep anywhere I happen to be.  So, in the morning when God wakes me up, I tell Him that I need to get my sleep so that I won’t be tired all day.  Then I go back to sleep until my back-up alarm wakes me up.  I get up and feed the animals and try to sit down to hurriedly spend a few minutes with God.  I start thinking of all the things I need to accomplish in the day and it all becomes overwhelming.  I end up spending my precious minutes in self-pity and I end up with a rushed, “Thanks God for the day, bless all the people in my life, I will try to spend time with you tonight, amen.”  Then, I am tired all day anyway, despite the extra hour or two of sleep I stole from God.  I am “robbing God” just like He says in Malachi. 

So, if the same principles of MONEY apply to TIME, which I believe they do, if I am faithful in giving my first-fruits of TIME to Him, then He will “throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that [I] will not have room enough for it!”  He will “prevent pests (fatigue, unexpected circumstances, lack of motivation, etc.) from devouring [my] crops (the rest of my day) and the vines in [my] fields will not cast their fruit (my day will be fruitful)!  Can you imagine having more time in the day than you know what to do with?  But oh how hard it is to get up in the morning!  I guess this is where the sacrifice comes in.  But God asked me to test Him in this, so test Him I will!  I will, in faith, give Him the first part of my day and trust that He will carry me though any circumstances that come my way during the rest of it.