Giving to God In The Old Covenant

What God expected then, and what he expects now...

As discussed in the second post in this series- if you believe that God wants you to pay tithes on your increase, then the next important question to consider is, “what is an increase”?

In this post we will examine the scriptures, to see how to determine if you have an increase or not, and how to calculate how much God expects you to give him.

How To Pay Tithes Is Not Clearly Spelt Out By Scripture

Please take the time to read the following scriptures on tithing: Lev 27:30, Num 18:21-32, Deut 12:6-19, 14:22-29, 26:12-14, Malachi 3:8-10.

As you will have seen from reading these scriptures, to whom the tithes were given, and when they were given, is certainly not very clear. So, please don’t get too frustrated about trying to sort out the subject of tithing.

You may also like to read about the tithe for the poor, and another tithe to use for rejoicing at the festivals. (Deut 12:6-19, 14:22-29, 26:12-14) Yet again, if you read these verses, you will see that how these tithes were calculated is not at all clear.

Despite this lack of clarity, some preachers still shout about tithing as if it is obvious as to what was meant by these obscure verses.

It's amazing that the issue of money is so vague in scripture- it was obviously a critical element of how the people worshiped God in the Old Testament. No doubt they understood it better back then, as the nation of Israel operated under this system for at least 1,400 years before Jesus came on the scene.

And importantly, as we have seen in the previous post, Jesus also did not see the need to clarify anything about tithes either.

In the New Covenant, financial support for the ministry is obviously also important. It seems therefore that the traditional understanding of tithing by the Jews of Christ’s time was clear, and it did not need any further elaboration within the New Covenant scriptures.

Most Christian churches who teach tithing, expect a tithe of your income to be given to the church for the work of preaching the Gospel. Generally, in a sermon on tithing, the ministers emphasise that God will bless people if they just have faith, and pay what they should.

The trouble is, that the church members do have faith, but they have it in the ministry, rather than in God.

If they had faith in God, they would read the Bible in some depth, and would see that the requirement to tithe is not as harsh as is often taught.

For despite what most teach, a tithe is not ten percent of your income, but ten percent of your increase- which, as any business owner knows, is very different.

Also, God is very generous with regards to money. God gave the tithe to the Levites in Israel, because they had no inheritance of land. They needed the tithe as they worked in the service of God to teach the people. They did not have any other job, so they needed an income to support them.

Yet, even the Levites inherited houses with small parcels of land, but they just did not have vast areas for grazing sheep or cattle. So, the Levites were certainly not poor by any means, yet God required that they received ten percent of all the other tribes increase as their wages. (Num18:21-24)

While money is needed for the work of teaching people the New Covenant Gospel, there is no directive that this work must be provided for by a tithe, in the same way as it was in the Old Testament.

And nowhere does scripture identify Christian ministers as being equivalent to Levites, despite ministers often saying so. Also, nowhere in the New Testament are the Christian ministers given the tithe.

However, we also need to be aware that a tithe is never specifically stated as not being required under the New Covenant.

Therefore, tithing could be expected to be continued, but within the new administration of the church. (Matt 21:43) It’s therefore up to you to determine what you are going to do- either pay tithes or not.

It’s Your Responsibility To Financially Support God’s Work

God has left the issue of how to financially support his work to be determined by both the ministry and membership in order for:

1. members to search out this issue for themselves,

2. preachers to not covet wealth, and therefore teach about it correctly, and

3. the entire church to not neglect the financial support for the poor, either in or out of the church.  

We will, therefore, continue to take a deeper look at the issue of tithing, as it was practiced in the Old Covenant, in order to understand how we should be giving to God in the New Covenant.

How Was A Tithe Calculated?

What does the Bible tell us about the tithe? It says that we should give ten percent of the increase that we have. (Deut 14:22-28) Any farmer, or business owner, will tell you that an increase is what you get after you have taken out your expenses incurred in making the income.

So, to spell it out a bit more: while a business may get $100,000 income in a year, they won’t be taxed on that, as they may spend $90,000 on the materials and marketing and transport etc. They therefore have in fact made only $10,000 increase, which is what they are taxed on.

Yet we all know that income tax is only a small portion of what our governments tax us on, for we pay many government charges such as sales tax, stamp duty, VAT, GST etc. Yet in Israel, there was only one tithe that was to be paid. This is a much simpler system, and obviously a much lower amount, than our government taxation system.

Yet a tithe was not a tax, and it was not for the government. The tithe was a support mechanism for those who taught the truth of God to the people.

This was the only form of payment that God, who was the King of Israel, required the people to give to him. God’s government was therefore free!

The people in Israel were governed by a system of judges and elders, but there is never any payment mentioned for them.

The Levites taught the Law of God, but they were not the judges. The judges were the leaders of the families, and leaders of groups of people being 10’s and 50’s and 100’s and 1,000’s. (Exo 18:13-26)

How such leaders were chosen is not spelt out in scripture, but it seems they were appointed either by the people themselves, or by a leader, but it is not clear. Again, as this system of elders and leaders of groups lasted for hundreds of years, there is no doubt that they knew the practical details of how it worked.

God Is Generous

A tithe is not something that God expects to send us broke. The way the Bible tells us to calculate a tithe is very clear:

And concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, even of whatsoever pass under the rod (when counting the sheep), the tenth (sheep) shall be holy unto the Lord. (Lev 27:32)

First, you need to realize that this is not one tenth of your flock, but one tenth of the increase of your flock.

Also, if you, as an Israelite, had nine more sheep than you had from the previous year, then you wouldn’t pay any tithe at all, as it's the tenth one that is holy to God.

God does not take the first ten percent, but the last ten percent.
Yet, I have often heard ministers say “the first tenth is God’s, then you have the other 90 percent”.
But God doesn’t say that!

God says the tenth (sheep) shall be holy unto the Lord. So if you have twenty-nine sheep, over and above what you had last year, then you need to give only 2 sheep to God, not 2.9.

God does not expect you to cut up the 29th sheep, to give him His 0.9 of a sheep!

God is not picky about exact amounts. He is generous to us in giving us an increase, and he expects us to be generous to him, in giving not only the 10 percent to him, but to also in giving offerings over and above the tithe.

Offerings, however, are not calculated in any way, they are something that you voluntarily give, as you determine.

Tithing is not intended to cause financial difficulty. Yet for many harassed church members, it’s been an unnecessary burden and trial of their faith, which the ministry, to a large extent, were not willing to help them with.

Such an attitude was also obvious in the self-serving religious leaders of Israel: For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not (help to) move them with one of their fingers.(Matt 23:4)

The religious leaders could not be bothered to so much as lift their little finger, to help those burdened by their false interpretations of the laws of God.

What Is An Increase?

While God tells us that having ten extra sheep constitutes an increase, which you are expected to tithe on, other types of increase, such as money or inheritance, are not stated in scripture. We therefore need to figure this out for ourselves.

If you are a business person you will, hopefully, have your expenses and income sorted out. But how does one calculate what the increase is for a wage earner?

What are legitimate expenses from our ‘increase’, that may be deducted when earning a wage?

The Bible has left this calculation largely up to you.

We know that, generally, the tax office does not allow a wage earner to make deductions such as rent, travel to work, or clothing worn at work, from his taxable income. But, if these really are essential expenses for making an income, then why wouldn’t God allow you to deduct such legitimate expenses in your calculation of what your increase is?

Under God, Israel was set up as a very generous society.

Israelites owned their own houses and farm land, interest on loans was not allowed, every seven years all debts were cancelled, and every 50 years all land was given back to the original land owners, if they had sold it. (Lev 25:1-55)

So, if you, today, have no debt and own your home, then perhaps you are in a similar situation to the ancient Israelites. For the rest of us, however, before we calculate our increase and pay our tithes and give our offerings, we need to consider if such expenses, such as rent, house repayments, electricity, water, rates, food, clothing etc. are legitimate deductions from our ‘increase’, or not.

While some churches “allow” you to take your taxes out of your calculations before you pay your tithes, others don’t. Some will even check up on you, and tell you exactly how much you should pay.

Paul ridicules the members of the church in Corinth, for being tolerant of such abuse by authoritarian, greedy ministers:

For you tolerate it, if any one enslaves you, lives at your expense, makes off with your property, gives himself airs, or strikes you on the face! (2 Cor 11:20)

Even today, Christians will put up with this kind of mistreatment from their ministers. These people are supposed to be our ‘servants’, which is what the word ‘minister’ means, yet they act like callous, merciless overlords.

They put themselves in the place of God, and make pronouncements for their own benefit, while ignoring the clear directives of God’s word, and in the process make the name of God stink! (Rom 2:24)

 God set up ancient Israel without any tax office, or tithe police, checking how the people made their calculations.

The tithes are something that you must calculate, and determine in prayer, without someone else looking over your shoulder, telling you what to do.

Like offerings, tithes are something between you and God, and if you feel they are necessary to give today, then you should do so in a spirit of good will and generosity.

But this I say, He which sows sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which sows bountifully shall reap also bountifully.
Every man according as he purposes in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver.
And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work. (2Co 9:6-8)

In the next post in this series we will examine the tricky subject of who God wants us to give his money to, and who he doesn’t want you to financially support.