Stephen
Terry, Director
The
Tithing Contract
Commentary
for the January 21, 2023, Sabbath School Lesson
"Ever since the time of your ancestors you have turned away
from my decrees and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to
you," says the Lord Almighty.
"But you ask, 'How are we to
return?"
"Will a mere mortal rob God?
Yet you rob me."
But you ask, "How are we
robbing you?"
"In tithes and offerings. You
are under a curse--your whole nation--because you are robbing me. 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.
Malachi
3:7-11, NIV
Although I am not one to support
vain repetition, our quarterly this quarter is about pouring money into the
church through various offerings and tithes and this verse is hammered home
during the denomination's demand for money more than any other proof text on
enriching the church found anywhere else in the Bible. So in honor of the occasion,
let us wash it over our beings and immerse ourselves in it totally until it
stinks in our nostrils and comes out our ears and maybe we can finally move to
a more mature relationship with God, wealth, and social responsibility than we
have known until now. For those who accept that everything derives from the act
of a loving Creator, there is no quibble about who actually
owns it all. And every good thing comes down from the Father of Lights.[i]
Where we get into trouble is how this blessing is to be handled. Is it truly
all supposed to be heaped up in the church as a wealthy storehouse surrounded
by impoverished worshippers giving their last dime to push the work forward?
(Defining what that work actually is is only part of the problem.)
Even Jesus was beset by those
who felt he and his followers were not giving enough to the temple. He complied
with the demand by instructing Peter to catch a fish and take the coin from the
fish's mouth and give it to the temple.[ii]
Though presented with something far greater than the money they hoped to gain that
day, the people spurned Jesus in favor of the money he might provide. And we also
continue to track those revenue streams comparing last year's river of gold with
this year's and make our plans for how all that money is going to "finish the
work" and bring us home to Jesus. For a people who claim to be founded upon the
prophecies of the books of Daniel and Revelation, we seem to easily forget that
an abundance of gold has tended toward corruption, and loss of life, not toward
redemption. It was gold on the Plain of Dura that led Nebuchadnezzar to cast
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego into a fiery kiln to purify his kingdom of
dissension over worship. Unfortunately, where the gold resides, worship often
follows. Humanity seems little able to resist.
Tithing supporters like to point
out that Abraham paid tithe to Melchizedek long before there was a sanctuary
set up by Moses so that the tithing system predates the Levitical priesthood as
a means of support for the clergy but basing an entire doctrine on this one
instance of patriarchal generosity is stretching. When Moses set up the priesthood,
they were to have no inheritance in Israel. Instead, Israel was to sustain them
through the sacrificial system. The idea was for them to be independent with
their ministry, but this did not prevent corruption as the greed of Eli's two
sons illustrated. Not content with the sacrifices being offered as ordered,
they demanded more and corruption grew in their hearts as they equated the lust
for power and control in their hearts with the will of God and demanded their
will determine what is appropriate. It is a dangerous thing to assume that when
we speak we speak for God in these things, for in this case it led to the
deaths of these men who had been so easily ensnared by the wealth and power of
their positions. Their father, unable to restrain them, also went down to the grave
in grief over their deaths.
When it has such power over us,
why do we continue to pray at that golden altar of greed and power? Do we think
we cannot survive as a denomination without it? Is it because it causes others
to think of us as successful and blessed by God because we have millions of
dollars flowing through our coffers from over nineteen million followers around
the world? That is a strange belief for a church that often refers to itself as
Laodicea as a cautionary warning. Nonetheless, it is why a steady stream of
individuals from the world church traipse over the threshold of the General
Conference seeking funding for various projects across the globe. The choices
made in funding of those projects steers the political direction of the denomination
from the helm. Transparency of that helmsmanship is not always evident. Even in
local church boards, off-budget items are often carried as items of personal
interest as opposed to being items popularly supported with funds and effort.
This goes all the way to the top. A person has money and a burden but does not
want transparency, only control of the outcome. They propose to fund a project
at their expense but run it through as a donation and since the church has tax exempt
status, they get the tax write off, their special project, and control of the
outcome without it ever being a transparent budget item that a majority would
need to back to get passed. There are many of these kinds of projects in the
denomination, and each defers to the other's right to exist, so the system is
not hindered in functioning as somewhat opaque tax write offs.
While this example is common. It
skirts the real reason for this quarter's topic. The goal is more money to the
church. However, most may not realize that the church struggled with finances
for decades before they adopted Systematic Benevolence (a euphemism for
tithing) in 1858. This was after the failure of Ellen's visions setting the
date for the Second Coming even after the 1844 Great Disappointment, calling
for Jesus' return in October, 1851. For four years her
husband, James, refused to allow her visions to be published in the Review and
Herald due to that failure. As a result of that marital strain, it became clear
that in order to survive the denomination needed money, not just prayers and
visions. The tide was turned and as money began to flow in, the lot of the
pioneers changed, they built and prospered in Battle Creek. But it begs the
question. Has prosperity supplanted gospel in our drive to seek validation of
dogma from our Creator? If so, how many more church buildings, how many more
schools, how many more hospitals, how many more millions flowing into our
coffers will mean we have arrived?
In a time of universal priesthood,[iii]
is there still a case to be made for an indolent clerical class given to prayer
and fasting instead of a mundane career to support themselves, seeing there is
no longer a temple or daily sacrifices being offered? Today, scores of
thousands of dollars are spent to pursue a theological degree and an appointment
as a cleric. It is no longer a calling as much as a career choice based on
hopes of job security and career advancement. It is not Saint Francis
ministering to the needy poor. It is the well-heeled pastor catering to the wealthy
and powerful in church boards and private meetings to steer corporate
Christianity through a business maze of conflicting regulations and pet
projects. If they handle their political aspirations well and do not offend
those moneyed interests, they will advance in career and gain power and prestige
over others that will facilitate still further advantages even as far as the
first chair of the denomination. But beware, for many have fallen on the sharp
stones along the shore where the sirens sing about the wealth and power to be
found in its shoals.
These are the dangers we face in
pursuing ever more wealth and power for ourselves or the church, but they do
not reflect the often unseen damage that results from our dangerous seeking of denominational
validation through our greed. For every one who says God is blessing me because
I pay tithe or gave a particular offering, there are many who are not
experiencing such blessings. They put their last dollar in the offering plate,
and the rent still cannot be paid. Shoes still have holes in them. A
prescription cannot be filled. A warm coat remains only a dream. But at church
they hear constantly, only hang in there and the blessing will come. It is a simplistic
view that God is some kind of vending machine that dispenses wealth to you if
you only put wealth in. In fact, it is a common heresy that often becomes little
more than another means to transfer a trickle of wealth from those who do not
have it to those who do. Maybe if we can learn to look at the church as a corporation
whose sole purpose is to perpetuate itself as opposed to "finishing the work," we
can finally move to a point where we stop fleecing the sheep and start feeding
them.