HERESY OF TITHING

aarkhipov · Seventh-day Adventist Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 16

Actually, the OT tithing system was to support priests and poor. Some tithes and offerings were to be spent for Israelite on themselves for feast days. Here are the texts from Deutoronomy :

22Thou shalt truly tithe all the increase of thy seed, that the field bringeth forth year by year.

23And thou shalt eat before the LORD thy God, in the place which he shall choose to place his name there, the tithe of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the firstlings of thy herds and of thy flocks; that thou mayest learn to fear the LORD thy God always.

24And if the way be too long for thee, so that thou art not able to carry it; or if the place be too far from thee, which the LORD thy God shall choose to set his name there, when the LORD thy God hath blessed thee:

25Then shalt thou turn it into money, and bind up the money in thine hand, and shalt go unto the place which the LORD thy God shall choose:

26And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth: and thou shalt eat there before the LORD thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou, and thine household,

27And the Levite that is within thy gates; thou shalt not forsake him; for he hath no part nor inheritance with thee.

28At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates:

29And the Levite, (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee,) and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest.

So, as you can see the tithe that Israelites paid .... they ate it themselves... in fiestly manner. It is VERY different to what the Church makes out the tithe to be today. It was to be paid in the product of your labor, and if it is too hard to carry then people would sell it, turn it into money and buy whatever they wanted ( Including strong drink, so there goes the argument against it) and they would consume it, while inviting all of the levites to partake in these.

So they brought forth every year the tenth of their grains increase, and tenth of all of the lifestock. Then they would congregate and eat and stock up for the Levites and ppor... ONCE A YEAR.

Today you are COMMANDED to tithe once a week ... in cash. If are a farmer and bring grain once a year, I don't think the church would be satisfied. You are told very little how church spends the money, and the local church budget comes out of your offerings. Percentage of the money goes to help the poor. Much of the money is spent on the buildings, salaries and operational expenses.

Tithing in New Testament is presented in form of Offerings. Oferrings means just that... you offer because you appreciate people. If you appreciate your pastor... you will make sure he gets his living. It's voluntary, and it is direct (original tithe was direct, it was not indirect as it is today, churches did not invest in stocks, bonds and CDs as they do today). God does not require 10%, he requires a 100%. That's what Jesus told the rich young ruler. He could not stand the thought of loosing his possesions.

So to sum up. Yes, Christians are responsible to support the Church efforts in congruence with the recources that they have. No, it does not seem that we are obligated to pay tithe every week (I don't see any Biblical support for it). No we should not deceive people into thinking that they should under pretence of sin and guilt trip.

Let me know if you can find any support for paying weekly TITHE.

Also, for people asserting that Abraham's gift to Melchizedek :

18 Then Melchizedek king of Salem [d] brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High, 19 and he blessed Abram, saying,
"Blessed be Abram by God Most High,
Creator [e] of heaven and earth.

20 And blessed be [f] God Most High,
who delivered your enemies into your hand."
Then Abram gave him a tenth of everything.

21 The king of Sodom said to Abram, "Give me the people and keep the goods for yourself."

22 But Abram said to the king of Sodom, "I have raised my hand to the LORD, God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth, and have taken an oath 23 that I will accept nothing belonging to you, not even a thread or the thong of a sandal, so that you will never be able to say, 'I made Abram rich.' 24 I will accept nothing but what my men have eaten and the share that belongs to the men who went with me—to Aner, Eshcol and Mamre. Let them have their share."

Abraham did not keep anything for himself. He gave everything up.

hobie · is under review Joined: 14 Mar 2007 Posts: 31

So we just give what we want and that is fine?

aarkhipov · Seventh-day Adventist Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 16

If you don't give what you want... then what's worth is that gift to God? God does not want you to act out of duty, but out of love. If you love ... you will give what you want and it will be above and beyond 10%. You need to stop thinking in terms of what's "the minimum" you can do to be Christian. That's pharaseic theology. Christianity goes way beyond standards of 10 commandments... Paul states "Against such things THERE IS NO LAW".

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such there is no law. 24

So there is no law against fruits of the Spirit. Law is just a mirror for you to realize who you are and that you need God and a change of mind paradigm. If you cling to the law as the minimum of the Christian behaviour... you miss the point. True Christian goes above and boyond the Law. It is embedded into thinking. It is common sence and an obvious truth. Just like physical laws of the Universe... if you jump out of high building you will be hurt. Self evident. Killing is wrong, worshiping someone other than the creator is wrong. Pretty obvious stuff. But show me the law against not being joyful? There is none? Why... it's a result of transforming mind by way of Christian thinking. You would not expect non-christians to have these in a true form of it.
So the same goes for tithing. If you view it as an obligation... a duty... then it becomes such. God does not want your tithes. He does not need money. HE WANTS YOU... to get back to Him and he wants you to CHOOSE so on your own. If you love your parents, you support them in time of need. Giving IS a test of love, BUT it's not an 10% obligation that you can whipe your hands off once you fullfill it. Many of us spend more than 10% on entertainmetn alone. So the mentality that we have now is... if I pay 10% of my God Taxes... then I'm off the hook with everything else. Church is not IRS. Church is a community of believers. Original tithe system was instituted to be as such. In Acts the believers shared EVERYTHING in common. EVERYTHING.
The original intent of the tithe is to support Priests and the poor. What is the today's purpose of tithing and where does these funds go? The go to the conference and are used to support the conference workers and some missionary activities. Fair enough. Unfortunatly there is no command to do so in Bible. We have men getting together and fear that there will not be enough money to run the organization... and to get enough money, the tithe will be collected every week in cash and it will be mandated as a solid doctrine based upon the guidlens for Nation of Irael tithes. So we are conforming our belief system to the economic standards of this world. If I tell you that money today is nothing more than debt passed around... you wount believe me... but watch this. It's pretty important for you to understand before grasping the concept in its entirety.

Money As Debt

So as you can see. Money is a virtual concept. It is not a Godly economy. God never demanded for us to tithe in money, but this is the world that we are living in, and this is a way to support those who preach gospel. I hate the term "full time Christians" because there is not such thing as a part time Christian. But in a way I support people who do God's work through giving... and I want to do so.

So to answer you original question: Give what you want to give. If you don't want to give... then you need to get back to Christ and change your mind about certain issues... and money being one of these. If you give what you don't want to give, that means you give it coersively. God does not want that. There's no love in coersion.

aarkhipov · Seventh-day Adventist Joined: 26 Jun 2007 Posts: 16

That's the type of stuff I also talking about. Total perversion of what tithing meant to be:

http://www.entrepreneur.com/blog/entry/168158.html