- Mark 11:17, Jesus said, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer for all nations,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves.”
- 2 Peter 2:2-3, “And because of these teachers, the way of truth will be slandered. In their greed they will make up clever lies to get hold of your money.”
- Titus 1:10-11, “For there are many… … teaching things which they ought not, for the sake of dishonest gain.”
- In Matthew 10:8 Jesus commanded His disciples to not attempt to sell what God had given them for free.
- 2 Corinthians 2:17, “You see, we are not like the many hucksters who preach for personal profit. We preach the word of God with sincerity and with Christ’s authority, knowing that God is watching us.”
- Jude 10:11 says of false teachers, “they deceive people for money.”
- In the time of the Old Covenant, in Hosea 4:8 we read about the human nature of some priests, “When the people bring their sin offerings, the priests get fed. So the priests are glad when the people sin!” In Micah 3:11, “Her leaders judge for a bribe, her priests teach for a price, and her prophets prophesy for money.” In Jeremiah 6:13, “From the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; prophets and priests alike, all practice deceit.”
- This passage is quoted humbly and fearfully knowing that I myself am a sinner who deserved judgement, and was saved only by the grace of God, but Isaiah 3:14 says, “The Lord will enter into judgment with the elders of His people and His princes: For you have eaten up the vineyard; The plunder of the poor is in your houses.” Please reread that verse and think about that statement for a minute. The elders have eaten up the vineyard; the plunder of the poor is in their houses. This verse has literally brought tears to my eyes. There’s absolutely no denying that our houses of worship are full of the plunder of the poor. Jesus’s clear and consistent message was that those who are struggling should be helped rather than taken from. The poor shouldn’t be given the burden of being obligated to tithe when God has never placed that burden on them. As previously mentioned, many Old Covenant laws protected the poor from expenses which they couldn’t afford. Are we to use our money to meet the reasonable needs of our family, or is the church to be the “storehouse” for 85% of the money which is coerced from families who are struggling? As we have learned, the New Covenant never requires us to tithe, but rather, Scripture teaches that we are now to give as we are able and as we have determined in our heart, as led by the Holy Spirit. We should remember that in the early church, their giving was only to help those in need. We are clearly called to help those who are in need. My grandmother, who is a widow, who can hardly afford to meet her own needs such as paying her medical bills, has felt pressure to tithe to the church, and therefore, one more verse that we should look at in Isaiah is 10:2, “[woe to those who] take what is right from the poor of My people, That widows may be their prey.” It is a known fact that many American churches, and especially televangelists, gladly take money from widows.
- And now after reading about widows in Isaiah 10:2, this brings us to Mark 12:38-44. Please take a moment to read that passage in the New Living Translation. Jesus said, “this poor widow has given more than all the others who are making contributions. For they gave a tiny part of their surplus.” What is important to see is that Jesus was making a distinction between her, and in the verses right before mentioning this widow, how proud “teachers of religious law shamelessly cheat widows.” In each version of the Bible, Jesus never said that what she had done was the right thing for her to do. Read it and see. He didn’t make one of His typical statements such as “Go, and do likewise.” Of course it was a selfless act out of concern for doing the right thing, and surely she’ll be rewarded for it, but when looking at this text about a widow, you must look back at the preceding verses to understand the point that Jesus might’ve been trying to make. Do religious leaders sometimes cheat people out of money? In both Mark and Luke 21, which are the only gospels that mention this widow, in the passage right before mentioning the widow, Jesus had said “teachers of religious law”… “shamelessly cheat widows” and it appears that He was giving us an example of a widow being cheated out of money. If you remember, even though this was a freewill offering and not a “tithe”; some of the “tithe” was supposed to be shared with “foreigners, orphans, and widows” (Deut. 26:12), not the other way around. This passage wasn’t saying that someone must be like the widow and give their last 2 cents to the “church,” but rather, it might be showing what religious leaders sometimes do to people, when they condition people to give when they cannot afford to give. Even though she only gave a little, it was all she had. I believe Jesus felt sorry for this widow. The main question Jesus seems to be asking is how much of your surplus are you sharing. It seems to be consistent that what bothers Him is how some people have to give up so much, even all they have, while they’re drowning in debt and don’t have a surplus, while the teachers of religious law “love the seats of honor in the synagogues and the head table at banquets. Yet they shamelessly cheat widows.”
- One commentary on this passage in The Catholic Biblical Quarterly says, “Jesus is condemning both the social system that renders her poor, and the value system that motivates her action, and he condemns the people who conditioned her to do it. The irony is that after discussing the widow, Jesus’ next statement was that the Temple would be destroyed [which it was in the year 70 AD], and therefore the widow’s gift was not only misguided, but was for nothing.” Again, the order in Scripture that we see here is: Jesus tells us that Pharisees cheat widows, then Jesus tells us that a widow gave all she had to the Temple, and then Jesus’s very next recorded statement is that all of the Temple will be destroyed. He sees the big picture and the impending destruction of the Temple, and that is why He most likely felt sorry for this widow’s seemingly futile sacrifice.
- Jesus taught in Matthew 7:15, “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.”
- Paul taught in Acts 20:29, “I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock.”
- Jude 12 warns of, “shepherds who feed only themselves.”
- Ezekiel 34,“What sorrow awaits you shepherds who feed yourselves instead of your flocks. Shouldn’t shepherds feed their sheep?… you let your flocks starve. You have not taken care of the weak…Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock, therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am against the shepherds and will hold them accountable for my flock. I will remove them from tending the flock so that the shepherds can no longer feed themselves… I will rescue my flock from their mouths, and it will no longer be food for them.”
- Paul, as a traveling missionary, gave himself as an example to our leaders of how they should be working to support themselves, and in 2 Thessalonians 3:10 he even provided the rule that those who don’t work to support themselves don’t get to eat.
- Paul gives us this lesson in 2 Corinthians 11:9-15, “I have kept myself from being a burden to you in any way, and will continue to do so. As surely as the truth of Christ is in me, nobody in the regions of Achaia will stop this boasting of mine… I will keep on doing what I am doing in order to cut the ground from under those who want an opportunity to be considered equal with us in the things they boast about. For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. . It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness.”
- These are words from Paul specifically to leaders: “For you yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you, nor did we eat anyone’s food without paying for it. On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you. We did this, not because we do not have the right to such help, but IN ORDER TO OFFER OURSELVES AS A MODEL FOR YOU TO IMITATE,” (2 Thess. 3:7-9).
- Also, when Paul gathered the leaders together, he gave them these words, “You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak,” (Acts 20:34-35).
- Romans 13:8 tells us, “Owe nothing to anyone.” People who owe tens of thousands of dollars of debt, which they are unable to repay, shouldn’t feel pressured with guilt by the “church” to feel the obligation to meticulously tithe before paying off their debts. Christians who are trying to live within their means shouldn’t be drowning in debt with medical bills, yet bouncing checks after having spent decades tithing to the “church” and continuing to meticulously tithe to the “church.”
- Why is it that many denominations throw out all the laws of the Old Covenant except for tithing; we can’t pick and choose what laws to keep and what to throw out. James 2:10 tells us that “whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.” (Also see Nehemiah 10:29). If they want to teach tithing food again, then they must obey all of the Old Covenant laws. But now that the Old Covenant law is gone, the New Covenant doesn’t teach tithing. Jesus is our high priest and there is no evidence that Jesus came to give us a new twist on Judaism. Jesus came to usher in His Kingdom. It is a totally new thing, described as new wine skins. If we try to put this new wine into old wine skins, they will burst. Scripture shows that Jesus and his disciples, as well as Paul, had to constantly confront those who were “religious” and wanted to add things to religion that were never instructed by our Lord. 2 Corinthians 3:6 teaches us that preaching the “letter” of the Old Covenant “kills,” but preaching the “spirit” of the New Covenant “gives life.” Tithing wasn’t just a small part of the Old Covenant, it was a major part, and Scripture clearly shows that the Law was “weak and useless,” “has been set aside,” “was nailed to the cross,” we have been “released from the law” and we now live by the “new way of the Spirit” that is in us.
- It would now appear that modern day strict teaching about tithing money to a church, regardless of someone’s financial difficulties, seems to be like the work of modern day Pharasees. “They [Pharasees] tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger,” Matthew 23:4.
- Matthew Narramore states, “Bringing the law of tithing over into the New Covenant is wrong in itself. Creating a new hybrid law, out of tithing and firstfruits, and adding it on top of tithing is the same as what the Pharisees did. The Law wasn’t extensive enough for them. They had another body of law that they had created and added to God’s law.”
- In contrasting the heavy burdens that Pharisees place on people, in Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” THANK YOU KING JESUS!!!
“Helping People See Jesus and Exploring All That He Has Fulfilled” 