Do I Have To Pay Tithe?
Life has been wonderful, and God is good! We have learned so much and found a wonderful church and new community of like-minded believers.
I have found myself really struggling with the idea of tithe and wanted to reach out. When I received the gospel in 2020 I wasn’t attending a “church” for two years but plugged into weekly ministries via Zoom/live streams. I did not give a church tithe from 2020 to July, 2024, but what I did was give money to random ministries and people I knew were in need as I felt more “comfortable” doing so than giving to an Adventist church.
Since attending our new non-denominational church as of July, 2024, my husband has been very convicted in tithing and has done so. I find myself so incredibly resistant to this. When I contemplate why and search my mind, skepticism continues to pop up. The skepticism is this: are we really supposed to tithe 10%? Where did I learn this? Who said so, and where is it in the Bible? I have a sense of tithe being a manipulation. I know skepticism and manipulation are not a spirit of Christ.
I started to realize that perhaps it’s my roots of Adventism that I am still uprooting and unlearning… that perhaps the skepticism is coming from an organization where I was given instruction and not taught the truth. Deep down I know giving your first fruits to the Lord is biblical.
Anyway, maybe I am or am not making sense.
I searched in your podcasts for the word “tithe”, but nothing popped up, so I wasn’t sure if you had any episodes to listen to or insight to give.
Thank you so much for all you do.
—VIA EMAIL
Response: Thank you so much for writing! Your question is so very common among former Adventists!
Tithe was a prescription of the Mosaic covenant with Israel. The details of how Israel was to tithe are explained in Leviticus 27: 30, 31. It receives three mentions in Numbers 18:21, 24, and 26. In Deuteronomy, in the second iteration of the law to the wilderness generation before they went into the Land, God through Moses gave even more specific instruction. In Deuteronomy 14 you will find that the tithe is directly associated with their agrarian increase, and it was to be paid on the basis of their crops and flocks. Interestingly, you’ll see that God even said that if they were not able to travel to the tabernacle to celebrate the three yearly feasts, they were to exchange their tithes of their grains, wine, oil, honey, and produce for money:
“And you may spend the money for whatever your heart desires: for oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink or whatever your heart desires; and there you shall eat in the presence of Yahweh your God and be glad, you and your household.”—Deut. 14:26
In the New Testament—the new covenant—there are no commands to pay tithe. But what we see in the New Testament is that God asks us to submit all that we are and have to Him. He now, by the indwelling Holy Spirit, convicts us what He wants us to give and do. It may be different at different times, but our lives are dynamic as we learn to trust Him and be directed by His Spirit and His word.
The classic chapter about Christian giving is 2 Corinthians 9. In this chapter Paul even states that God blesses people in order to give—and the context is that sometimes there are groups of the body of Christ that are experiencing great need, and God equips others to supply their needs. He’s not saying everyone must give the same amount or percentage but that life brings change and hardships and also times of plenty. God impresses us of what He wants us to do and when He wants us to do it—and He Himself provides for us in the process.
Matthew 6:25–34 is an amazing promise that we are not to worry about what we are to eat, drink, or wear because, if we are seeking the kingdom of God, He Himself will provide all that we need.
Adventism (and to be fair some Christian denominations as well) have saddled their members with tithe requirements. But these requirements are not based in new covenant principles. They are carry-overs from the Mosaic covenant that some churches have used to direct their new covenant denominations.
All to say: many people do use tithe as a principle for guiding their giving, and it’s not wrong to do so as long as one understands that God isn’t asking the church for “tithe”. If you ask the Lord to show you His will, He may convict you to give 10% or even more. Sometimes He will impress you to give more—or less—depending upon your circumstances. The important thing is to be purposeful. Ask God to guide you and help you establish a program of generosity that He wants you to follow. Your giving, like your justification itself, is an act of faith that the Holy Spirit now guides.
I suggest that the two of you read Deuteronomy 28, 2 Corinthians 9, Matthew 6, and perhaps do a word study on “giving”. Giving when we are in Christ is so different from the Adventist “stewardship programs”. When I learned how badly even tithing had been twisted from its original instructions in the Law, I was astonished. God knows how to provide for His own work and for our needs, and He knows how to bless us through giving. Living in the body of Christ is such an amazing new experience as we learn to trust God. I have found that I have to surrender my responses and feelings about the “rules” to God and ask Him to convict me of what He wants, letting go of my own need to control or manage things that have typically been points of obligation and guilt.
It’s good to hear from you. I’m so happy that you are in a church!
Sunday Sabbatarianism?
Well, this is confusing and troubling. I thought [a well-known preacher] was sound, and I didn’t know he was a Sunday sabbatarian.
—VIA EMAIL
Response: He is a really good preacher, but he does subscribe to covenant theology and, as per the Westminster Confession, he believes in an ongoing function of the law including Sunday Sabbatarianism.
This theological model changes many things because it holds onto the law as having a function for believers. Because of this model, eschatology is seen very differently. Covenant theology denies a post-tribulation millennial kingdom in which Jesus reigns on earth and Israel finally receives the fulfillment of the land promises and the king from the line David ruling over them. Covenant theology is based on a more symbolic method of Bible interpretation, and it has incorporated Augustine’s “City of God” model that proposed that the “church” is the city of God which will eventually rule the world. This idea grew out of spiritualizing the Old Testament prophecies to say that they, which were made to Israel, have been fulfilled in Christ and now are received/fulfilled in the Church.
Hence, they see the church as being the current iteration of God’s people, and Israel has lost its personal expectations of the Old Testament promises. Now, if they become believers, they can receive the ultimate benefits of the eternal state and the new earth.
Yet there are prophecies and promises in the Old Testament that cannot be said to be completely fulfilled in the way the first readers would have understood them. Covenant theology assigns new applications to these promises based upon the revelation of the church—yet God made very specific promises to Abraham and later to Israel, and the differences between the spiritualized interpretation of covenant theology and a more literal interpretation leads to different understandings of eschatology.
There are true believers who embrace the covenant theology understanding with its spiritualized interpretations and others who embrace the more literal understanding of the Old Testament promises.
I believe that the covenant theology model creates some confusion by retaining the Ten Commandments as having a role to play in the church. This application of seeing the law not as a temporary document dictating God’s interactions with Israel until the Seed would come (Galatians 3:17–19) but as a document that the church still uses to define sin and to guide Christian practice creates a real “Sabbath confusion”.
I believe that Sunday Sabbatarianism and the concurrent retaining of the law is a stumbling block for people leaving Sabbatarian cults, and it places Christians under a certain level of obligation to the law. †
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