Hebrews Lesson 81 March 8, 2007
NKJ Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword,
piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and
is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
We are in Hebrews 7. Last time I
pointed out that as we begin this section, the shift is to the high priesthood
of Jesus Christ. The high priesthood of Christ is based analogously on the high
priesthood of Melchizedek. The argument in this section on the part of the
writer of Hebrews involves a group of Jewish believers who come out of Judaism.
Many of them it seems came out of a background of the Levitical priesthood, a
background of serving in the temple.
They are questioning the superiority of Christ and the superiority of
Christianity over the ritual of Judaism. The main section that begins here in
chapter 7 extends down through chapter 10 is the focal point of the whole
epistle. This is where the largest doctrinal section is found - in chapters 7,
8, 9 up through 10:17. That is the largest doctrinal exposition in the passage.
Everything in the book up to this point has been focusing on the idea of
developing Christ’s high priestly ministry and the impact that it has on the
individual life of the believer today.
Now the question that would come
into their minds is the question - how can Christ be a priest when He is not of
the tribe of Levi and not a descendent of Aaron? Under the Mosaic Law, the high
priest had to be to trace his genealogy all the way back to Aaron. The priest
who served in the temple had to be of the tribe of Levi and had to be able to
prove their genealogical link back to Levi. There were those who returned from
captivity who came back from Babylon to Judea and were unable to do that. They
were not allowed to serve in the Zerubbabel temple which is the first phase of
the Second Temple. The second phase is the Herodian Temple.
So what the writer of Hebrews is
doing is answering the question ahead of time. One of the things that marks a
good teacher is that a good teacher understands his audience. A good teacher
understands the kinds of questions that people may ask. He figures out what
they are going to be ahead of time and tries to answer them. There are a lot of
times when I as a pastor understand that there are people who come to this
congregation who come from all manner of different backgrounds. We have new
people who come to be a part of this body of believers. They come from many
different backgrounds. Some come from Bible church backgrounds. Some come from
Methodist backgrounds. Some come from who knows what background. They bring a
load of questions with them.
I remember one time when I was
teaching through the spiritual life when I was at one church. There was a lady
in the church who had grown up in a family that was seriously committed by
multiple generations. By that I mean that their great grandparents where the
original Charismatics in this country. So she had grown up in the entire
environment of heavy charismatic teaching. Almost everything that I said as I
was teaching through this even though she had been under my ministry and under
another doctrinal pastor’s ministry for 5 or 6 years before that. The first
time it was really coming together in her thinking. There was a contrast between what she was hearing me teach
and what she had always heard and always been taught coming out of that
charismatic background. So I had to pay attention to that and in my teaching I
had to make a point of contrasting what I was teaching with what Charismatics
taught.
Now that didn’t apply to most of the
congregation.
But you can’t over here on this side
of the congregation and say, “This doesn’t really interest me.”
You don’t know. There may be 5
people over here who are really wrestling with certain things. As part of our
congregation here, I don’t spend a lot of time interacting with what Roman
Catholic theology says. But, 90% of the people up in the congregation at
Preston City came out of a Roman Catholic background. By contrasting truth with
Roman Catholic teaching at times, it helped them get a clearer focus on what
the Bible was saying as opposed to what they had always heard. That is how we
learn – by seeing the truth in contrast with the close counterfeit. That
brings out, puts into relief the differences so that we can learn it
better.
A good teacher anticipates the kind
of questions that people either will ask or ought to ask. So that is what is
going on here. He is anticipating the question: Why should Jesus have a
priesthood and a high priesthood that is superior to or even legitimate? He is
not a Levite and He is not a descendent of Aaron. So the writer argues that
Christ’s priesthood is based on the order of Melchizedek.
NKJ Hebrews 7:1 For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who
met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him,
The first three verses explain that
connection. We learned that he was the king of Salem. Salem was the ancient
name for the city of Jerusalem. Melchizedek means king of righteousness. It was
probably a dynastic title for the ruler of Salem. We don’t know who he was.
There is nothing in the record of Scripture to identify Melchizedek as a
historical individual. Now as I have pointed out in the past, there is an
almost unanimous opinion among the rabbis in the Mishnah and the ancient texts
that believed that Melchizedek was indeed Shem, the son of Noah. That is
possible. But, scripturally there is no record of his family. That is unlike
the Levitical priesthood which emphasizes familial connections. So the point of
verse 2 and 3 is to emphasize that he does not have this kind of family
connection. So he was the king of Salem. He was the priest of El Elyon from
Genesis 17. He was the priest of the most High God. He met Abraham returning
from the slaughter of the kings and he blessed him. Melchizedek went out to
bless him.
NKJ Hebrews 7:2 to whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first
being translated "king of righteousness," and then also king of
Salem, meaning "king of peace,"
To Melchizedek, Abraham apportioned
a tenth of everything. The old English word for that (a tenth) is tithe. It is
from this use of the word a tenth in the Bible that we get this idea of
tithing. There are so many churches today that practice tithing and talk about
tithing. You get a lot of confusion over the whole issue of Christian giving, the whole ministry of
giving and what tithing is all about. So the thing that happens there in that
one event is that Abraham gave a tenth part of everything (not just what he had
taken) but all the spoils from the defeat of the four kings and he gave a tenth
of it to Melchizedek. That is the point of a tithe. A tithe when you look at
the Old Testament was that an individual was paying tribute to someone in
authority over them in recognizing their superior position. We have historical
examples under the reign of Hamurabi in Babylon and others where this was a
pretty standard type of gift or tribute in the ancient world. It tended to be a
round figure like 10%.
The other night in Genesis in our
study of Joseph, we talked about how Joseph at the end of 7 years of famine
took the land, allowed the people to sell land to the government. The
government bought it with grain so that the people were able to survive. Then
it leased the land back out to the people as tenant farmers and they gave 20%
of their produce back to the government.
I pointed out from one example that
I knew about anecdotally that that is a standard example for tenant farmers
even today – to give 20% to the landlord and landowner. They keep the
other 80% of that.
Morgan came up after class and said
that is pretty much the royalty fee to landowners where you have an oil well on
the property. That is an oil lease. They get 20%. These kinds of numbers
– 20%, 10% -- had a tremendous history because they were round numbers
and easy to figure. The giving of a tithe from Abraham to Melchizedek was part
of his recognition of the superior place, superior position of Melchizedek.
That is the point that the writer of Hebrews is bringing out in this section.
Now in the second part of verse 2 it
goes on to read…
Melchizedek means king of
righteousness. Melki is a derivative
of melek which is the Hebrew word for
king. The “i” there puts it in a genitive of relationship. Zedek is the root for righteous. That makes the king of
righteousness. He is also the king
of Salem. Salem derives from the Hebrew word shalom which means peace. As the king of Salem he would also be the
king of peace.
He goes on in verse 3 to explain…
NKJ Hebrews 7:3 without father, without mother, without genealogy,
having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God,
remains a priest continually.
This means that there is no record
of his family. It doesn’t mean that he didn’t have any father. It is not saying
that. It does not say that he didn’t have a mother. There are people that come
along and say that this must have been the pre-incarnate Christ because he
didn’t have any parents. No, he was a human being. He had to be fully human to
function as a priest. If he was the pre-incarnate Christ without being true
humanity then he could not function as a priest. You can’t have the
pre-incarnate Christ functioning as a priest because He isn’t incarnate yet. That
is a real simple argument. There are always people who want to fight and die on
that particular hill and they haven’t thought it through very well.
Genealogy is important if you are
going to prove your Levitical and Aaronic connections.
The Bible doesn’t reveal when he was
born. The Bible doesn’t tell when he died for the purpose of setting him up to
be an analogy, a type for the future ministry of Christ.
But he resembles the Son of God. Now
that very statement that I pointed out last time means that the prototype for
the Melchizedekean priesthood is the Son of God, not the other way around. It
is Melchizedek who resembles the Son of God, not ultimately the Son of God who
resembles Melchizedek.
Then we come to verse 4.
NKJ Hebrews 7:4 Now consider how great this man was, to whom even the patriarch Abraham gave a tenth of the spoils.
Now we are back to the word tithe.
The word tithe is used several times in these verses. From verse 4 down through
verse 10 the word tithe is used several times – 5 or 6 times as you go through
that particular section. That tells us that this tithe is part of the focus of
the writer.
So we need to stop and take a little
time in our study of Hebrews to show what this is all about. There are many,
many churches in America that emphasize tithing. Almost every group emphasizes
tithing. It is completely inconsistent with an understanding of the
distinctions between the Old Testament administration of God and the New Testament
administration of God. It isn’t wrong because it doesn’t fit dispensationalism.
It is wrong because it doesn’t fit the Bible. The Bible teaches
dispensationalism. We start with the Bible, not with an abstract theology.
We don’t start with
dispensationalism and say, “That doesn’t fit our system.”
No, the system comes from the
Scriptures. Because the Scriptures draw these distinctions between the Old
Testament and the New Testament between the law related to Israel. It was a
national law and the Church Age, which is multinational and is not limited to a
particular ethnic group and has no set law in the sense of a constitution. When
you are in the Old Testament with Israel, the Law of Moses is their constitution.
That is their body of law. That is comparable to the US
Constitution.
To come along and say, “We are going
to take things out of this body of law that applies only to the nation Israel
and we are going to say that it is mandatory for the Church Age” is like saying
that citizens of the United States are held legally responsible for laws in the
French constitution.
We all know that there are people who
seem to be headed that way. That is another story. You can’t take the laws of
one national entity and apply them to another national entity even if their
constitutions are extremely similarly. You can’t take the laws of Britain and
make a United States citizen subordinate to those laws unless he is living in
Britain. That is the same thing that happens with the church. You have too many
people who don’t understand the distinction between the laws as a constitution
for Israel. It is not just spiritual; it is their political base. It has to do
with their whole civil, legal and spiritual structure.
So we have tithing in the Mosaic
Law. Wait a minute! The concept of tithing antedates or precedes the Mosaic
Law. You have two references to tithing in Genesis. The first is given here in
Genesis 14.
In Genesis 28:20 we read:
NKJ Genesis 28:20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, "If God will be with me, and keep me
in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on,
This is at Bethel. Jacob is coming back or is about to leave the land. He
makes a vow.
NKJ Genesis 28:21 "so that I come back to my father's house in peace, then the LORD
shall be my God.
NKJ Genesis 28:22 "And this stone which I have set as a pillar
shall be God's house, and of all that You give me I will surely give a tenth to
You."
Now this is at the ancient Canaanite city Luz. That is Bethel, which
means the house of God. Now there wasn’t a house of God there. This is a place
where Abraham had also set up an altar to sacrifice. We have studied this not
that long ago in Genesis and the thought never occurred to me. I can’t tell you
how many times I have taught this particular lesson and the thought never hit
me until today. When Abraham paid tithes (gave his 10%) (It was a one time
event as we will see) to Melchizedek, he had someone to give it to. There was a
Gentile priest king that was worshipping the true God. Who did Jacob give it to?
I never thought about that. It was something that just hit me. Jacob leaves and
is gone for 20 years before he comes back. He goes up to Paran. God blesses
him. He comes back with all of these sheep and all of these goats. He has
several millions dollars worth of assets. Let’s just say he comes back with $10
million. When he comes back, he is going to give a tenth to God - $1 million.
There is no structure for it. How did he do that? I don’t know. So I got on the
phone to a couple of my more educated Old Testament scholar friends.
They went, “Hmmmm.”
Nobody had an answer. There is no structure there. So we don’t know how
or to whom he gave it. How did he do this? What is the mechanic? We don’t
know. The only thing that is in
the land at that time is the Canaanites… Now I could speculate and say that
Melchizedek must have had an heir. Just as Melchizedek was the priest-king of
Salem when Abraham was there, he would have an heir that would also be the
priest-king of Salem in Jacobs’s generation. Perhaps Jacob gave it to him. Possibly.
We don’t know. The Bible is completely silent. There is no temple. There is no
tabernacle. There is no priesthood. There is no infrastructure. There is
nothing. So we don’t know how he did this or to whom he gave it. But he did. These
are the only two times in the Old Testament before the Mosaic Law that we have
the mention of tithe – just these two times. What we observe in both of
them is that number one they are voluntary. They are not mandatory. There is no
legal mandate that Abraham should give a tenth of the spoils to
Melchizedek.
There is no legal mandate saying, “Jacob, if you want to be blessed
spiritually you need to give 10% to God.”
There is no legal mandate anywhere. There is no mandate in Scripture anywhere.
Out of the blue they just do it as an act of gratitude and worship to God. It
is purely a voluntary event that is a gracious response to God’s blessing in
their lives. They are not discovering the law of tithing so that they can tap
into God’s miracle spiritual ATM machine in the sky which is kind of
how the health and wealth guys do it. If you give 10% God will bless you and He
will return it 100-fold. You will get wealthy.
I remember some years ago I talked
to an extremely discouraged individual who had given 6 figures to the church
almost every dime he had because the pastor told him that God would give him a
100-fold return. There are hundreds of people who get duped by that. They are
not discovering some law of tithing that is going to tap into God’s ATM
machine. They are responding in gratitude to God. They are not expecting
anything in return. It is simply an act of devotion to someone who is their
superior. It was a cultural thing to do and they knew that God was their
superior.
The only giving amount that is
specifically prescribed by God pertains to the famine in Egypt. In the
interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream, God commanded that a fifth or 20% of all the
grain produced in Egypt should go into the storehouse during the 7 years of
plenty in preparation for the 7 years of famine. So you have 20% there. That
was like more of a tax – federally imposed, government imposed savings
program in order to prepare for the future. So all you have prior to the Mosaic
Law is one type of giving. It is voluntary, free will, grace-based gratitude
oriented giving with nothing expected in return.
Then we come to the Mosaic Law.
NKJ Leviticus 27:30 'And all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or
of the fruit of the tree, is the
LORD's. It is holy to the LORD.
So 10% of your cows belong to the Lord - 10% of your sheep, 10% of your
fruit, 10% of your grain, 10% of your money. Ten percent of everything belongs
to the Lord and was holy to the Lord. That means it was set apart to the Lord.
That is what the word holy means – to be set apart to the Lord.
Now there were three different
tithes in Israel.
I often want to ask people. “Which
tithe is this that you are talking about?”
The first tithe under the Mosaic Law
supported the bureaucracy of the theocracy. The priests and the Levites were
the administrators of the theocracy.
Theocracy is a word that means God
rules. God was the head of the government. You might say God was the executive
branch. God ruled. It was the priests and the Levites who carried out the
administration of the kingdom and their center of focus was around the
tabernacle initially and then later the temple. So the first tithe was designed
to support the bureaucracy of the theocracy, the sons of Levi. Numbers
18:21-30. It was to the sons of Levi for an inheritance in return for their
service which they performed the service of the tent of meeting.
This sets a precedent historically
that those who serve the Lord in a full time capacity have a right to be
supported by God’s people financially. That principle of course was carried
over and in the pastorals. Paul talks to Timothy about the fact that the elder
who teaches well and rules well is worthy of double honor. He talks about the fact
that you shouldn’t muzzle. He uses the analogy of not muzzling the ox. In other
words pastors and Christian workers should be well paid so that finances don’t become
a distraction for them. I can’t tell you how many pastors have to work or they
don’t make enough.
I commend people in this
congregation. We are setting a precedent the way that we are handling the
pastor’s conferences. We are supplying the financial resources for many of
these men to come to subsidize their airfare for students in many cases. We
subsidize their hotel rooms so they can come and stay without being a burden to
them. Some of these men don’t get paid enough and their churches don’t have
enough resources to fly them here and put them up in a hotel and to take care
of them for the time that they are here. We are doing a tremendous job in
subsidizing many of these men so that they are able to come and so that
finances are not an issue. During the conference for those who are pastors, for
those who are students, for those who are missionaries or full time Christian
workers we provide lunch on Monday (just about everybody on Monday). On Tuesday
we provide lunch for all the out-of-towners. We are taking them over to Goode
Company for some Texas barbeque. Then on Wednesday we take them to Guadalajara
and give them Mexican food. Their breakfast is next door at Aunt Pookie’s so
that two meals get taken care of and some of their room and board. That is the
generosity of this congregation because we are trying to establish a precedent
of respect and honor for men who teach the Word and that they should be well
taken care of and finances should not keep them from becoming better students
of the Word and learning more about the Word. That is a tremendous thing that
all of you are doing. It makes me
feel good when I hear about people who come out of the woodwork and say that
there isn’t much they can do. Some give $100, $200, or $300 to help pay for the
room of one of the guys at the hotel. That is just tremendous generosity and
grace-orientation of the congregation. It makes me proud of the congregation. This
is what it is all about - being able to do these kinds of things and support
folks. That is a tremendous thing to do.
So the first tithe was 10% that went
to support the sons of Levi because of their work in the tabernacle and later
in the temple.
A second tithe (I find this
interesting) was for a national celebration of the grace and generosity of
God. It is described in
Deuteronomy 14: 22-24. There were tithes and offerings and sacrifices and free
will offerings that are mentioned in Deuteronomy 14. This second 10% was used
to support this national feast.
I like to have fun with this. God in
the Old Testament was very physical, very graphic, and very literal in the way
He handled things. In the process of revelation as you go from the very
beginning to the New Testament God teaches doctrine in very concrete terms and
illustrations and examples. You have the visual training aids of the tabernacle.
You have the bronze laver. You have the tent of meeting. You have the table of
showbread. You have the candlestick. You have the altar of incense. Inside you
have the Ark of the Covenant. All of these things are designed to visually
teach very abstract doctrine. So God sets up with these concrete images and you
have historical events that are used to teach specific things. So we come to
this particular event and its purpose was to give the nation a barometer to
evaluate their spirituality. Let’s say they go through a period of 10 or 20
years and they are tremendously obedient. They follow the Sabbath, the
sabbatical year law. They are very obedient. The people are responsive to
doctrine. They are very positive. God is going to bless them materially because
that is what He promised them in the contract of the Mosaic Law.
“If you will obey Me I will bless
you abundantly. You will be extremely fruitful. There will be rain, not too
much and not too little. It will be the right amount. Your crops will be
abundant. There will be an overabundance of food and resources. Everything will
be taken care of.”
So 20 years goes by and you come to
your annual feast. You take 10% of the gross national product. You have got all
kinds of money. You can go out and you can get the finest caviar and you can
buy the finest prime beef for steaks and roasts. You can get the highest
quality vegetables – not like the stuff you can get at the grocery
store.
I remember when I was a kid our next
door neighbor was a fruit wholesaler. His name was also Fruit. I thought that
was fun. He would bring us these avocadoes that were like small melons. They
were enormous. You couldn’t buy them at the grocery store. They were restaurant
quality produce. That was when I first learned that there was a quality of
produce that is much better than what you get in the grocery store. So they
could buy the highest quality of produce and the highest quality of meat. If
they had beer, they had microbrews. They didn’t have Budweiser and Schlitz. They
were getting good micro brewed beer. And they had beer. That is what a strong
drink offering was in the Old Testament. They didn’t know how to distill
beverages so they weren’t bringing single malt Scotch. They had good beer. That
is the Hebrew word for a strong drink offering.
I often used to kid a friend of mine
who enjoyed wine.
He said, “When Jesus catered to the
plebian tastes of the people at the wedding of Cana He gave them wine. But when
God wanted something to drink in the Old Testament He wanted a beer.
Strong drink offering! So they would
bring the finest micro brewed beer and the finest of everything. They would
have a tremendous party. Let’s imagine that 20 years goes by and we have a time
of spiritual regression – a time of spiritual apostasy. They worked
through the sabbatical year. They never take the Sabbath Day off. God begins to
discipline them. The rain begins to disappear. They go through a time of
drought and a time of famine.
The next thing you know, twenty years later they are going to
have their feast and they think, “Remember when we were kids – back in
the good old days? We used to have
these great parties and now we are stuck here with Buckhorn beer and Lone Star
and all we can afford is Texas caviar. We can’t get the good Persian or Black
Sea caviar.”
Do you know what Texas caviar is? It
is made with black-eyed peas.
“That is all we can afford. We can’t
have very much. All we can do is go to Luby’s and get some carry out from
there, but that is the best that we can do. I wonder what happened.”
See this is a very visual, very
material barometer of spirituality. All of a sudden, maybe we aren’t doing what
the Lord wants us to do. That is what it was designed to show. So every year
there was a second tithe of 10% for a national celebration sort of like the 4th
of July with fireworks and everything else. It was a celebration of the grace
and generosity of God. So that means 20% now for you national income tax. It
was mandatory taxation.
Then each third year there was
another 10% was to be given for use in supporting the Levite, the alien, the
orphan and the widow. That is those who were destitute, those who couldn’t take
care of themselves, those who were older, those who couldn’t work, and those
who didn’t have any parents. It was a social safety net. There was a level of
welfare in a sense to provide for those who were less fortunate. So, there was
10% every third year. That meant that you have 23-1/3 % taxation. That was
mandatory. So when you talk about tithing, which 10% are you talking about? If
you are going to do one, you have to do all three. That is the basis from the
Old Testament.
But you see the Mosaic Law also
recognized freewill or grace giving. You had mandatory giving and you had freewill
voluntary grace giving. Remember before the Mosaic Law there were two tithes
that were voluntary grace-based gifts. Just because they were 10% doesn’t mean
that they were establishing a hard and fast precedent. Now you also have within
the Mosaic Law freewill and grace giving. So you are going to give 23-1/3 to
the government in order to take care of all of these other things and to the
temple as part of your ordinary taxation. But now you are expected to give
above that a freewill or grace offering to express your personal gratitude
toward God and thanks that all has He had done. This could take you up to 30 -35-
40-50 % of you income. Some of it
was under mandatory principles and some under freewill or grace giving.
NKJ Proverbs 3:9 Honor the LORD with your possessions, And with the
firstfruits of all your increase;
NKJ Proverbs 3:10 So your barns will be filled with plenty, And your
vats will overflow with new wine.
This has to be understood within the
context of the Mosaic Law and God’s promise of blessing related to their
giving.
NKJ Proverbs 11:24 There is one who scatters, yet
increases more; And there is one who
withholds more than is right, But it leads
to poverty.
This is a person who gives, a person
who is grace oriented, a person who doesn’t hold on in a miserly fashion to
every dime that comes in. He shares it to help others.
He avoids his responsibility. He is
too tight to do what is right.
In other words, he may keep the
money but there is no happiness in his life.
Moses raised money for the building
of the tabernacle and to provide all of the gold and all of the jewels and all
of the silver and everything that was used in the construction of the tabernacle
through a freewill offering. Exodus 25:1-2 in comparison with 35:5, 21.
NKJ Exodus 35:5 'Take from among you an offering to the LORD. Whoever is of a willing heart, let him bring it
as an offering to the LORD: gold, silver, and bronze;
The emphasis here is on personal
volition. It is up the individual to make a decision to understand what the
issues are to make a decision that they are going to give at whatever level
they choose. It is comparable to the New Testament principle.
NKJ 2 Corinthians 9:7 So let each one give as he
purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful
giver.
It is an individual decision and not
a mandatory contribution. Then there are
other passage such as Leviticus 22:28, 23:38, 27:30, 31, Numbers 15:3,
Deut 12:6, Ezra 1:4, 3:5. These passages all emphasize freewill on grace
giving.
So you had required giving which is
analogous to national taxation. The state has a right to tax the citizens.
Jesus supported this. When He was asked about the drachma tax He took the thing
and said…
NKJ Matthew 22:21 They said to Him, "Caesar's." And He said
to them, "Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to
God the things that are God's."
Jesus authenticated the validity of
a national entity to tax its people for the support of the government. So that
is required giving. Freewill giving was to be a matter of independent individual
choice and decision. The amount is left up to the worshipper.
Now we come in the Old Testament to
a particular passage that is frequently quoted by preachers when they want to
manipulate people into giving more.
This is in Malachi 3. Now there has to be a little background
understanding or isagogics on Malachi.
Malachi is probably the last book
written in the Old Testament. Malachi is a prophet. He is coming to the people
who are in apostasy and challenging them with their spiritual apostasy because
they are failing to obey God in completing the building of the temple and
fulfilling the rebuilding of Jerusalem. Malachi is about the same time as
Nehemiah. Nehemiah returned to finish the building of the walls and complete
the reestablishment of the nation as it was before the Babylonian captivity. Part
of the problem was the people quit applying the law in a number of areas including
the area of tithing. In Malachi 3:8-10 there is a condemnation for failure to
pay the required taxes, those three tithes that I mentioned already from the
Mosaic Law. Here is the challenge.
NKJ Malachi 3:7 Yet from the days of your fathers You have gone away from My ordinances
And have not kept them. Return to Me,
and I will return to you," Says the LORD of hosts. "But you said, 'In
what way shall we return?'
NKJ Malachi 3:8 "Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But
you say, 'In what way have we robbed You?' In tithes and offerings.
God responds, “In your tithes and
contributions.”
There are your two categories
– mandatory tithing and contributions of freewill offerings.
“You are robbing God by not applying
the law and giving.”
NKJ Malachi 3:9 You are cursed with a curse, For you have robbed Me, Even this whole nation.
NKJ Malachi 3:10 Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My
house, And try Me now in this," Says the LORD of hosts, "If I will
not open for you the windows of heaven And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough
to receive it.
What does God mean “to put Him to
the test”?
That is exactly what the next verse
says.
You can’t understand that verse if
you don’t understand the Levitical laws and mandates. In Leviticus and
Deuteronomy God said that if they obeyed the law He would bless them and
prosper them materially and physically with the abundance of produce. It was an
agricultural society. God uses this extremely concrete, graphic way to
demonstrate how He will bless them if they are obedient.
God is saying, “Why don’t you test
it? You know what the law says to do. Test me and I will pour out blessing from
the windows of heaven. They are going to open. But, where do you understand
that?”
The principle is found in the Mosaic
Law. God is not talking to the Assyrians here. He is not talking to the Romans.
He is not talking to the Greeks. He is not talking to the Egyptians. He can
only say this to the Jews because only the Jews have a contract with God which
stipulates that “If you obey Me, I will pour out blessings on you.”
So you can’t take this out of
context and apply it to the Greeks or the Romans or the Babylonians or the
Egyptians or Americans in a Baptist church in the South or in a Methodist
church in the North or the Episcopal or Anglican church in England because they
are not Jews living in the land under the Mosaic Law. It is a total
fragmentation of Scripture to try to interpret it that way.
When we come to the word storehouse,
the word storehouse is the Hebrew word that refers to the temple. That was in
the ancient world the local bank. They didn’t have a Comerica or Wells Fargo or
Wachovia or whatever. You didn’t have that in the ancient world. You had the
temple. That often served as a place of banking because the priest served as
the guards. So the temple was the treasury. When people brought their money to
the house of the Lord, they were not building a church. There is no application
there. They are taking it to the temple because that is where the tithes were
to be taken in terms of the Mosaic Law. You can’t interpret this any other way.
If you don’t understand Leviticus and Deuteronomy you can’t properly interpret
this. That is what we have today. People take this completely out of
context.
So the national bank for storing
tithes was the house of God which is referred to by the term the house or in
this case the storehouse. God had chastised them already because they had
failed to bring their tithes to the storehouse.
In the Church Age we are no longer
under the Mosaic Law. Romans 16. Christ is the end of the law. The Old Covenant
(which we will see in Hebrews 8) has been superseded or replaced by the New
Covenant. Hebrews 8:13ff. When he said a new covenant, he made the first
obsolete. It doesn’t mean he made the first in reference to sacrifices obsolete
because Christ has now died on the cross. It doesn’t say that he made the first
obsolete in reference to the ritual in the temple because Christ has come and
replaced that. It is the whole law. It is all or nothing.
If you go down to your mortgage
company or to another mortgage company or a bank and you redo your mortgage,
are they going to take pages 1 and 2 and keep those in affect, and just modify
3 and 4? Is that how it works? No, they write a whole new contract. You replace
the old one with a new one. Since you bought that house 20 or 30 years ago, the
laws have probably changed. You are going to have to get a whole new contract. You
can’t just replace two paragraphs. That is what is happening here.
You can’t go back into the Old
Testament and say, “Well, part of the Mosaic Law continues and part of it
doesn’t.”
It is an all or nothing proposition.
So let’s look at some key principles.
First of all, giving even und the
Mosaic Law was not a part of the spiritual life or the means of spiritual
growth. That is how that should be understood. Even under the Mosaic Law it was
not part of, or a means to, spiritual growth. It was a result of spiritual
growth. I don’t give to grow. I grow and I realize what God has done for me and
express my gratitude to Him. It is the outworking of genuine grace orientation
and gratitude in the soul for everything that God has provided. Giving isn’t a
means to grow. It is the result of growth.
Second, grace does not mean you
don’t have an obligation or responsibility to give. I understand this. People
who come out of a legalistic, tithing-based church go to the other extreme when
they go to a grace oriented church.
“They never talk about money. Isn’t
that great? I don’t have to give anything. I go to this church. They have a box
in the back and if I come in the side door I never have to deal with the fact. I
can keep all of my money now. Isn’t that great?”
Grace doesn’t mean that you don’t
have an obligation. Grace doesn’t mean it is free either. Salvation is free to
you, but it cost God something. There is no free lunch. It is always amazing. Most
of you are conservatives. You believe that there is no such thing as a free
lunch. How many Christians are conservatives? There is no such thing as a free
lunch. Let’s get rid of welfare. Let’s emphasize personal responsibility. Then
they go to church and think it is a free lunch. There is no such thing. Grace
isn’t free. It is free to you. There is obligation. There is no mandatory
payment. You don’t have to come in and pay $10, $20, $100, $500 in order to get
the Word. It is free. But that doesn’t mean that there is no obligation or
responsibility as God has prospered you to participate in the financial
responsibilities of local church and missions and various ministries so that
you can have a sense of personal blessing and promise. You are involved in that
ministry. You are part of God’s means of letting that happen. Grace doesn’t
mean it is free - just that there is no obligation.
We have come to tithing in the New
Testament. Tithing is mentioned in the gospels only in reference to the
legalistic practice of the Pharisees. That is the only time you have the word
tithe. They were legalistic. Now when you and I look at the Pharisees, we look
at the Pharisees through the lens of the negative critique of the New
Testament. But if you were a Jew living in the first century, nobody was
better. No one was more moral, righteous, or upright than the Pharisees.
That is why when Jesus said, “If you
are going to get into the Kingdom of God, your righteousness must exceed that
of the Scribes and the Pharisees.”
It wasn’t condemning them for their
legalism in that statement.
He was saying, “You think of them as
the best that human beings can be. You have got to be a whole lot better to get
into heaven.”
They had a reputation for morality
and for being spiritually mature. But in Luke 11:42 and in 18:12 God condemns
the legalistic way in which they are handling tithing. It is not that tithing
was wrong. That was in the law. Paul said the law was holy, just, and
righteousness. There is nothing wrong with tithing in the Mosaic Law. What they
did with it though was they made it a sign of spirituality. That’s when it
became a work and that’s when it became wrong and legalistic. It became a means
of getting God’s blessing. That is when it shifted. Giving 10% was the same,
but their motivation was by tithing God would bless them.
The Lord taught in contrast that
giving was to be a private matter, between the believer and God. Once that
dollar, once that check for $1,000 or $10,000 leaves your hand, you don’t have
any right to talk about it anymore. You are giving it to the Lord. How this
church uses it, how this ministry uses it, how that ministry uses it, whatever
they do with it, you turn a blind eye to it and walk away. It is amazing how
many people - especially people who have more money to give - can’t get passed
that.
They will give $10,000 or $50,000 or
$100,000 then if that ministry or the church doesn’t do what they think they
ought to do and they say, “Well, you know I gave you that money and I have some
say in it.”
You may look at it and say, “Well,
you are changing your philosophy of ministry. You are not doing the things you
used to so I am not going to give any more.”
That is your responsibility. But the
person who gives doesn’t have a string attached to that money so that they can
come in with the money and dictate policy and procedure. That happens a
lot.
I know of a case recently where
someone who was extremely generous and large giver was challenged on that
particular point and went ballistic. He didn’t understand it. When you give as
unto the Lord that means that once it leaves your hand, it is gone.
I remember a church that I attended
for many years, had a split back in the 70’s. There was a man that sat in front
of me.
I remember my mother asking him,
“Are you leaving?”
He said, “No. I have given so much
money to the church I have got to stay here and make sure it is used right.”
I was about 19. I thought, “Hum. That
is not grace giving.”
NKJ Matthew 6:2 "Therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet
before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they
may have glory from men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward.
This is why I personally do not
think that it is a good idea to have name-plates. This is a good time at the
beginning of a church to talk about this. You go to a lot of churches and they
say you have a plate on the back of a pew. This was given in memorial to
so-and-so or this is Miss Sally Wainright Sunday School room. They have plaques
around the church when people give money.
The first church I ever pastured in
got in a hole financially in the depression. They had the church about half built
and they ran out of money. There was one couple in the church. Her husband had
died. She said, “I will come in and I will pay for the rest of the building of
the church. The only requirement is I want you to name the church after my
husband.”
I am just glad the guy’s name wasn’t
something like Adolph or Frank. The guy’s name was Paul so it sounded biblical.
Nobody really knew that. They thought the church was named after the Apostle
Paul. But, it wasn’t. It was named after Paul Naskey down the street. Just
imagine what his name could have been. It could have been Claude Union Church.
You never know. So, people do these things. There should be a policy from the
beginning that you don’t do any of that. Giving is supposed to be between the
individual and the Lord. There shouldn’t be any mark or any plaque or any
recognition. The only recognition that matters is from the Lord. According to
this passage is that if you get your reward from people, that’s it. The Lord is
not going to give it to you. I would rather get my recognition to the Lord
rather than people.
NKJ Matthew 6:3 "But when you do a charitable deed, do not let your left hand know
what your right hand is doing,
NKJ Matthew 6:4 "that your charitable deed may be in secret; and
your Father who sees in secret will Himself reward you openly.
I make it a policy. I have no clue
what anybody gives. I don’t ever look at anything. I don’t know what anybody
gives to the ministry. I don’t know what anybody gives to the church. It is
none of my business. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to ever know. I don’t
have a clue. But I know pastors who know exactly, to the penny, how much (It is
on their computer at church) every person in the church gives. That is standard
operating procedure in many, many churches
We will stop there and come back to
it next time. We will come back to the New Testament teaching on tithing. There
is no tithing in the New Testament. It is all grace.