'from a fan to a follower'

 15

 

Most Frequently

 

Asked Questions

 

& Answers

On Tithing

 

  Jesse V. Bottoms Jr.

 

Beulah Baptist Church Poughkeepsie, NY  

 

1.                  Should I tithe on the gross or on the net?

 

The Bible says bring ye all the tithes, not what's left after you've paid the government and paid retirement plans and 401K plans and the Credit Union and all that other stuff. Bring ye all the tithes. God specifically complains about government getting gross and God getting what's left. You'll read in Malachi 1:6-10, you'll see that there they were not bringing money but they were bringing lambs and doves and what have you. If the governor had to be considered they would give him the best. But when it came to the church they would give tem lamb that was cripple, bruised and not worth much money and they would give that to God. And God said if I am your father, where is my honor. Why would you give me something with less consideration than you would give your government? Is it the government that blessed you or is it God? So, they way you put the government at the top, God says do me that same way. "Bring ye all the tithes….."

 

On April 15th you don't tell the IRS I don't fell like sending you what you are supposed to get, so I'm just sending you what I feel like sending. Neither do you say that to your State Taxation Department.

 

Is God better than George Bush? Is God better than your State Governor?

 

Really, you don't tithe on the gross or the net, you are to tithe on the increase according to Proverbs 3:9.

 

 

 

2.                  If I tithe on the gross, do I need to pay tithes on all monies that I receive in my income tax return?

 

No. You have already paid Tithes on it. You are not required to tithe on it again.

 

 

 

3.                  If I own a business do I pay tithes on  all monies received?

No, your overhead cost is not profit. The business has overhead expenses, the cost of doing business. The overhead cost is not profit. You pay tithes on the profit. You pay taxes on the profit and you pay tithes on the profit. You pay tithes on capital gains, not capital looses and capital expenses. If it is taxable income, then it's tithe-able worship.

 

Example: The business had an income of  $ 1000.00. You had to pay your employees $200.00, rent $100.00 and to get the product that you sold cost $200.00. Your cost of doing business was $500.00. Your tithe is on the $500.00 profit. You don't pay tithes on what you paid somebody else. That's between them and God.

 

If you own a business and it's an S Corporation. In an S Corporation all profits eventually flow through to you anyway, and you are taxed at the end of the year on the S Corporation. You should be able to take your tax statement and your tithing amount statement and see similarity in the two statements.

 

 

 

4.                  What if I give my tithes to someone in need? Does that still count as tithing?

 

No, it doesn't. Helping those in need is a good thing and we are not against that. But giving them the tithe is like taking that which belongs to God and giving it to someone else. Help them if you can but not out of your tithe. God said bring it to "His House" that there may be meat in the house. You can't take Sears money and pay it to K-Mart. However, the church does have a responsibility to help people and should do so. Unfortunately the church cannot help endlessly and cannot help extensively.

 

The government is finding it difficult to help people when they are getting 33% of everybody's income and the church is getting 10% of a few people's income. If the government is going in a hole, then you know we would go in a hole.

 

One member said, I paid my tithe and now my house is going into foreclosure and I need $5,000.00 or $10,000.00 to get it out. Others have said I'm three months behind in my rent and I want the church to catch it up. Still others ask us to make car payments. They get mad at the church when we don't. We've had several to get mad and leave the church when we didn't do these things.

 

Multiply your need by the number of members of our church, and you will see that we just can't do it. It is impossible for us to do that. - If we do it for you, we got to do it for others. If the church pays one person's rent, then others will hear about it and want theirs  paid also.

 

Additionally, to those of you who do help people, and it's a great thing to do, but you need to know this. - If it is a temporary problem and your help will straighten out the problem then it's a good thing to help them out. But if they are debt heavy and the expenses are more than the income, you are just delaying calamity. You are just postponing the foreclosure or eviction.

 

Sometimes it's better to lose and start over again than to enable somebody who is living beyond their means because they are going to need you again next month and the month after that and after that.  You don't need to throw good money after bad money.

 

God just may being saying to that person that you need to downsize and reprioritize your life so you can live responsibly and be blessed additionally.

 

Note: When a person asks you to assist them, ask him/her if they are a Tither. If they are not, then their finances are cursed and there is no way you can get them out of their mess.

 

Continue to be benevolent but don't be foolish. We love to help people but at a certain point, you just can't do it.

 

Lastly, let me say that I have not had any tithers to ask the church for money. My experience has been that's it has always been the people who are not real tithers to ask to church for assistance.

 

 

 

Discussion Items -

 

*** If a member asks the church for money, should they be assisted if they are not tithers?

 

*** If a person asks the church for money, should they be allowed to borrow back what they have given that year?

 

*** If the church gives money to a non-tithing member, is the church buying into the curse?

 

*** If the church gives money to a non-tithing member, is the church really helping the member in the long run?

 

*** Should all members of the church take the class the church offers on Biblical Principles of Financial Management?

 

*** Should the church give money to members who have not taken the class on Financial Management?

 

 

 

5.                  What if the church is mishandling money?

 

This is a valid significant and acceptable question. - Just as God did with  Hophni and Phinehas, sons of Eli, God judged wicked leadership for their unrighteousness, not the faithful worshippers. He didn't judge the people who gave the tithe, he judged the leadership who misused the tithes. That's God's business. Once you have done it, given it, as unto the Lord, you don't have to worry about policing the leadership. God will judge the leadership if corruption is there.

 

Also, we live in a country that brings to justice those who misappropriate funds.

 

Our church has Financial Integrity. We have in-house checks and balances and we have an outside accountant who audits the book annually. Additionally, financial reports are given quarterly and are available upon request to any member.

 

Additionally, our CPA sees to it that we are kept current and compliant with the ever-changing laws of the land.

 

We want to be faithful to God's Word and compliant with the law.   2 Corinthians 8:21 "For we are taking pains to do what is right, not only in the eyes of the Lord but also in the eyes of men." (NIV)

 

We must do what is right with the money in the sight of God and in the sight of the people who read the finance reports.

 

 

 

6.                  What if I'm tithing and do not seem to be getting ahead?

 

There can be many reasons why this is happening, from bad business choices to living above your means to not acting your w-age.

 

May be you are progressing but you just don't see it and may be it doesn't not feel like you thought it would feel. Progress brings with it more challenges. For each new level there is a new Devil.

 

May be as your income increased you also increased your outgo and you are for all practical purposes in the same spot. - With that bigger house come greater expenses, more issues, more jealousy, more hatred, more envy and more everything. You can come up several levels and still feel like you are at the same spot because everything has increased. When you get that new position at work, your responsibilities increased but also your headaches. Also more people will be out to get you. More shots will be taken at you. You have become a larger target. When your Bless increases so does your Mess increase.

 

You need an Income Plan, a Spending Plan, a Debt Reduction Plan, a Saving Plan, and Investment Plan, a Retirement Plan and a Dying and Burial Plan and you need a Will with a Pass-It-On Plan.  Plan your work and then work your plan.

 

Those persons who have told me they are tithers and not getting ahead have not been able to show me their Plan and their Budget.

 

If you track it, you can trace it and if you trace it you can place it.

 

 

 

 

7.                  What if my spouse is not in agreement with tithing?

 

Agreement enhances success. Talk it over with your mate. If they do not want to tithe on their income you may want to tithe on your income only. If you do not have an income, you cannot make the providing spouse walk in faith. Don't even try to make your Spouse walk in faith. They cannot walk in something that they don't have. You can PUSH, not your Spouse, but you can Pray Until Something Happens.

 

The Husband is the head of the Home for purposes of order and should be the spiritual leader. The Man is to be the Priest, Provider and Protector of the home. So the woman, the wife is under the authority of her husband. If the husband forbids the wife to tithe, the wife is to follow the husband's direction. God understands and judges the wife's heart. He will also judge the husband's heart.

 

This is how Peter says the wife is to respond to and win the husband:

 

1 Peter 3:1

1    Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands, that even if some do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won by the conduct of their wives,  (NKJ)

 

1 Peter 3:1

1        Wives, fit in with your husbands' plans; for then if they refuse to listen when you talk to them about the Lord, they will be won by your respectful, pure behavior. Your godly lives will speak to them better than any words. (TLB)

 

I have never had a wife to complain to me about a husband tithing. It has always been the husband not wanting the wife to tithe. Peter tells us how to handle that.

 

 

 

 

8.                  I have no income, is it possible to tithe in some other way?

 

Yes, I have known people who have tithed on their Free Time, volunteering, serving the church's mission needs is still a way of giving back to God.

 

 

 

9.                  I thought tithes were just under the law?

 

That's not true. Tithing was before the law and after the law, 430 years before the law. It occurs first in Genesis Chapter 14.

 

Jesus who came to fulfill the law said in Matthew 23:23

"Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." (KJV)

 

Jesus said, you should have paid the Tithe but that does not dismiss the other things that you were supposed to do. - In Hebrews 7:8  "And here men that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth." (KJV)

 

That is Jesus who liveth. It is actually the Lord who receives the Tithes. He receiveth them there. He is Jesus.

 

If you don't think that God cares anything about giving, then why was He sitting by the table watching. As each person came to give, the text says that He saw. When He saw the widow give He said she has given more than all.

 

Understand that her more than was not a larger than.

 

Mark 12:41-44

41  And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury: and many that were rich cast in much.

42  And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing.

43  And he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That this poor widow hath cast more in, than all they which have cast into the treasury:

44  For all they did cast in of their abundance; but she of her want did cast in all that she had, even all her living. (KJV)

 

 

 

10.             I was told that if I do not tithe that I am going to Hell. Is that true?

 

Absolutely not. Your salvation was purchased with the blood of Christ, not the tithes of men. We should never confuse God's grace with our responsibilities. Tithing is one of your responsibilities as you give back to the God who saved you. You are not trying to buy salvation.

 

The Bible is clear you were purchased with the blood of Jesus. You are not purchased by tithes. You are not saved by works.

 

Ephesians 2:8-10

8    For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

9    Not of works, lest any man should boast.

10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.  (KJV)

 

Your salvation is not based on tithing. Tithing unlocks God to work in your finances. It is a promise to you, it is a blessing to you, it's God way of getting totally involved in your life.

 

It's not a salvation issue. Just as healing is not a salvation issue. You don't have to believe in divine healing to be saved. You can live physically sick and die coughing and be overweight and eat all to wrong stuff and mess around and die early and go right on to Heaven.

 

You find in the word of God that healing is the "children's bread." But if you choose to ignore that promise and rather be sick that does not mean that you are not saved.

 

The same with tithing. God says that if you do it, He'll open the windows of heaven and pour out to you. You can have it poured out or not. It's up to you and you are still saved.

 

He did not say that if you pay tithes I'll save you.

 

John 3:16

16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him and pays tithes should not perish, but have everlasting life.  (JVB)

 

 

 

11.             I'm on a fixed income. Am I still supposed to tithe?

 

Yes. If you are on a fixed income you surely need God to fix your income.

 

You are required to tithe because the tithe is not based on the amount but on the percentage. It's ten percent. Let God fix your income.

 

 

 

12.             Tithing is Old Testament and I'm a New Testament Christian.

 

Tithing is Bible; It's Old and New. Tithing is the first Doctrine taught in the Bible. The first doctrine taught in the Bible is the Doctrine of God's Divine Portion, that all First Things belong to God.

 

Gen 2:16-17

16  And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

17  But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. (KJV)

 

We do not see in scripture, Cain and Abel, Abraham and Jacob being told what to give. Yet, they gave and Cain’s was not accepted. - One of the earliest attributes we see of God is that He receiveth Tithes and desires His portion.

 

When God appeared on the scene in Genesis as a part of the eternality of His being is that He receives Tithes.

 

Hebrews 7:8 "In the one case, the tenth is collected by men who die; but in the other case, by him who is declared to be living." (NIV)

 

Jesus is still receiving Tithes.

 

Tithes are always unto the Lord, not to the church, not to the bills, but unto the Lord.