How Do We Give?
- from David Plunkett, Stewardship Committee
As I noted in my last blog, Parkwood members give an average of $2,000 per member to Christian ministries and missions. I also asked, why do we give that money away instead of buying a lot of stuff for ourselves with it? Maybe the first thing to acknowledge is that if we are making a choice between buying stuff and giving to advance God’s Kingdom, then we are not thinking right about giving.
To get at why we give, we need to ask what distinguishes Christian giving from secular charitable giving. Said differently — how should we give? “How?” is the right question.
The Biblical evidence is overwhelming that Christian giving is supposed to be about an attitude. We are supposed to give out of love, not making choices among different options.
Human behavior studies reveal that giving is often less than heartfelt. At least three-quarters of the dollars given to causes are due to social pressure, according to economist John List. That means only 25 cents of every dollar given comes from truly charitable motives. As Christians we are called to be different from a world where giving is a response to pressure. Ours should be an expression of love.
Returning an offering to God is supposed to be the first thing we do when money hits our hands. God looks with favor on offerings from our first fruits. (Genesis 4:4) God doesn’t want our second best or our leftovers. (Malachi 1:7-10)
In Exodus 25: 2, God instructs Moses to receive only those offerings from the Israelites whose hearts prompted them to give. That tells us two things. First, God wants our giving to come from the heart. Second, God doesn’t want our giving to come from compulsion. Neither a response to social pressure nor a legal commitment like a tax is an appropriate motive for Christian giving. It’s not supposed to be a mortgage payment – as if the tithe was principle and interest on the loan of God’s creation.
Jesus tells us to give from the heart. (Matt. 6:19-21) He honors faithful giving but demands that it come from the proper attitude. (Matt. 23:23) We are to prioritize giving. (Luke 18:18-29) Giving is a free-will response to God’s gift of salvation. (Luke 19:8-9)
The reaction to the woman who anointed Jesus in Matt. 26: 7-13 shows that it took time, but the apostles finally figured out what Jesus was telling them. (1 John 3: 17) Perhaps the clearest expression of how we are to give is in Paul’s instruction to the Corinthians: “Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” (2 Cor. 8:7).
What distinguishes Christian giving from other giving? Non-believers give to causes. But giving to a cause is an afterthought, a choice among options, and quite possibly a begrudged reaction to social pressure. Christian giving is a first-thought, a reflexive expression of our heart. How we give is far more important than how much we give. Yet, we still must think about the question of how much?