Tithing or Giving?

[Rumbidzai Chemhere]

i believe in giving as it encourages a grateful and generous spirit and can help steer us away from being greedy or loving money too much.

[Impact Space]

I agree, it’s not one or the other, it’s all the above and more. The reasons we give to the church and the needy remain today. Although the new testament doesn’t mention tithing because there are no appointed Levites (the only ones who were authorized to collect tithes in the old testament), we must continue to give to the church, so there is enough in the storehouse. Regardless of which side of the aisle you stand, you must give to the church and give to the needy. I generally say give above the 10% and it will come back to you a million fold.

Having said that, the church administration must manage funds wisely and be transparent in their use of funds to ensure the that members continue to give to God’s work.

[Olasunkanmi Kolawole]

I choose to give my tithes to my Church, fully confident that the way the use the funds is totally consistent with my values – including not wanting any of my tithing funds to enrich any individual. Then, since the scripture says to brings tithes AND offerings into the storehouse, I interpret that to mean that the tithes are for the Church and the offerings are for the poor. So consistent with the teachings of my Church, my family helps the poor and needy by fasting for 24 hours once a month and donating the amount we would have spent on food for that day to the poor through the Church for the Pastor to administer. We also donate our excess goods to Goodwill. We also serve the poor directly through the welfare program of the Church and via our own initiatives whenever we can, since there is much joy and satisfaction that comes from helping others who can’t help themselves.

In other words, my answer to your question would be that we should give of our tithes and offerings generously to the true Church of Jesus Christ AND to the poor, consistent with the wise counsel of the Bible.