Pastor writes expository article on giving, debunks popular assertions

Friends, let us cast a sincere and dispassionate glance at the dynamics of giving in contemporary times in relation to the patterns of the Bible times. You are likely to agree with me that in this century, we have essentially departed from biblical principles to human, and of course, to worldly strategies, except that we have not started spraying currency during church service. The modern trend cuts virtually accross denominations. One only needs to spend some hours by the TV viewing various channels on Sunday morning till afternoon.

It is an impropriety, bothering on witchcraft, for a minister of the gospel to manipulate or coerce people into giving to him or for church projects. Let us see for a start Deuteronomy 16 v 16-17 a scripture each in the Old Covenant and the New Covenant :

“Three times a year all thy males appear before the Lord thy God in the place which He chooses, at the feast of Unleaven Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, at the Feast of Tabernacles; and they shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed. Every man shall give as he is able…..”-Deut. 16: 16-17 [ NKJV ].

 “….Give in proportion to what you have. Whatever you give is acceptable if you give it eagerly. And give according to what you have, not what you don’t have. Of course, I don’t mean your giving should make life easy for others and hard for yourselves. I only mean that there should be some equality”-2 Cor. 8: 11-13 [ NLT].

The above scriptures do not require Scofeld, Leon Morris or Origen to interpret. Firstly, the command in Deuteronomy is not an isolated scripture as it was also stipulated in Exodus 23: 14-15. It is about giving within our means and if we genuinely don’t have to give, nothing debars is from still attending our church or any form of fellowship. Preachers usually announce vehemently, “you must not come to God empty-handed”. Who told you not to come to church empty -handed, if sincerely you lack presently? Who is asking you to borrow from the person by your side to give offering or to put money in the hand of the person beside you? One who makes such pronouncements is oversighting the essence of contextuality in scriptures.

The Deuteronomy account above is about the three Annual Feasts–of Unleavened Bread, of Weeks, and of Tabernacles; not about Sunday or Mid-week services. The Jews were not expected to come empty-handed because they already knew well in advance the dates of the three Annual events, which were in the months of Abib or Nisan, etc. Not having to give on some occasions may even be God leading you to follow the example of Robert Moffat. He was in the church one day and had nothing on him to give. He demanded for the offering plate, stood in it and declared that he gave himself. That was the initiation of himself into a life-long missionary service.

Paul was inspired to counsel us not to give to anyone or for anything to relief others and starve ourselves. That is being holier than Paul or being more catholic than the Pope! A parallel to this is a millionaire giving to a billionaire or a “thousanaire” giving to millionaire or even to a billionaire. Many believers make life easy for others, especially preachers, who may be house-owners at the expense of their house rents, thus making life hard for themselves. In fact there is a scripture that rebukes such, “He who oppressed the poor to increase his riches, And he who gives to the rich, will surely come to poverty” -Proverbs 22: 16 [NKJV].

What is generally happening nowadays, especially with some of the new generation churches tantamounts to rich preachers and pastors oppressing the poor followership. I recall listening to Bro. Zac Poonen of the Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore, India. He said that it is not proper to receive gifts from those who are below your financial status. And when they compelled him, he would later look for opportunities to give such people books or some other equivalent gifts.

After ministering somewhere, the pastor of the Church gave me a cheque enclosed in an envelope. I made efforts to turn it down for obvious reasons but he insisted. Not to create a scene, as other ministers were nearby, I accepted it. When I opened the envelope some days later, I found it not to be a personal cheque, but post-dated church cheque. That gave me the impression that the Church couldn’t afford it in spite of the fact that it wasn’t much. So I resolved not to cash it.

The wise men who gave gifts to Jesus when He was two years old could afford it. From secular accounts, they were Kings of Arabia, India and Persia. And Joseph did not give them any gifts in return. It is the greater who should bless the lesser. The shepherds who visited baby Jesus in the manger did not stretch themselves to give any gifts, maybe in those days carpenters probably had better means than shepherds.

Part of the strategies to coax people to give what they cannot afford is to give an elaborate message, usually up to 15-20 minutes, even for mere offerings during services. Such salesmanship is a complete negation of all the elements of 2 Corinthians 9: 7, “Each of you should give what you HAVE DECIDED in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver”-NIV. In NLT, ‘under compulsion’ is rendered ‘in response to pressure’.

When some men of God stand behind the pulpits and spend about 20 minutes of Kingdom’s time, that could have been utilized for the perfecting [equipping] of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying [building up ] the body of Christ[ Church ], rather utilized to make people go against what they had earlier purposed to give, and put them under pressure, where would cheerful giving then come from? And where is the place of “a willing heart/ freewill offerings” -[Ex. 35: 22/36: 3]? And at times when they skip to the next verse to draw the audience to “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye; always having all sufficiency in all things…..”, it wouldn’t occur to some that the last phrase means “having all you need” according to NIV, and not all you want. What is the problem with this generation when it comes to mammon, that we often read our greed into the texts?

When Moses was to collect offerings for the major project, building of the Tabernacle, it took him about 2 minutes, 20 seconds based on the time it took me to read Exodus 35: 4-19. He did not ask them to start “packaging” their offerings. He didn’t instruct the Ushers to guard the doors, so no one should go out. I have witnessed such before. The preacher exclaimed, “Ushers be vigilant, don’t let those big men escape”. Even the “packaging” terminology had become a mantra. I still recall the preacher from whom I first heard this terminology about twelve years ago. Incidentally, the preacher did not provide cartons for us to package our offerings.

Human ingenuity can devise vocabularies to facilitate extortion. Some smart American prosperity preacher must also have coined “seed-faith”, because even though seed and faith appear separately all over in the Bible and is also in the dictionary, seed-faith is nowhere to be found in both. And of course, I have echoed over and over that from the mouth of our Lord Himself, the biblical seed is not money but the word of God [Luke 8: 11]. The “good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over” returns seem to have lost its magic on the audience.

Even it had suddenly become ‘risky’ to sway people with “offering time, blessing time” because the immediate evidence after the preaching is often that the preacher is loaded with the blessings on the spot while the audience’s purses are depleted in the interim. It is now considered safer to chant, “Offering time, sowing time”, without indicating the period it will take for the harvesting. I read in the 20th Century edition of Hank Hanegraaff’s book, “Christianity in Crisis”, how an American prosperity escaped imprisonment by his whiskers. He asked people to sow and promised them 30, 60 or 100-fold return within a specific number of months. The time came and there was not even one -fold return. One of the “investors” headed for the court.

In essence, giving should be essentially to meet needs, not wants or to nourish greed. In Philippians 4: 16, Paul declared, “for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me aid and more than once when I was in NEED”-NIV. The need was rendered “necessities” in NKJV. More often, what we give people may not be necessities. Hence we cannot spread our resources to many who are genuinely in need.

How Jesus Funded His Ministry

In Luke 8: 2-3, there is an account of women who ministered to Jesus and the apostles. Quite obviously, those women were more concerned with meeting their necessities. That was why there was no account of Jesus or any of the apostles riding chariots, the equivalents of Jeeps and Land-trains at that time. Even when the Lord required a 4-wheeled cycle, a donkey, he had to borrow it. I personally have nothing against believers and ministers who embark on exploiting their natural gifts and potentials to enhance their life-style or lot in life. But I am concerned when someone whose only investments are the Bible, a few pairs of suits and makeshift shed aspire to compete with the CEO’s of blue chip companies in lifestyle. Some even take the Arabian Sheikhs as their models for affluence and opulence.

But I will continue to be baffled by the excesses of some modern preachers and pastors. Even concerning secular leaders over the people, God ruled, “The king, moreover, must not acquire great number of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them……”- Deut. 17: 16. Now what does that imply for spiritual leaders. It seems such scriptures as these has been deleted from many bibles. Or how do explain men of God acquiring 10, 20, or more…horses in form of exotic vehicles. And it is they that make their followers to return to Egypt, back to worldliness, back to greed and covetiousness, so that as they acquire those fleet of horses [SUV’s and Land-trains], they will probably drop one out of ten for the man of God.

I was in a large meeting sometime ago, where the man of God was prophesying jets for the people. Virtually the whole assembly ran agog, leaping and rolling on the floor claiming the prophecy. I didn’t bat an eyelid. I was asking myself what I would do with it when as at three years ago, Warren Buffett, one of the top richest men in the world and one who regularly transverses the length and breadth of USA on business trips didn’t see the need for it. A sub-local champion like me! In fact, if Luke 14: 33 in the New Testament does not make men of God to tremble, how would Deuteronomy 17: 16?

Consdering the importance I attach to this topic, I will like to present a summary of key issues by asking and responding to three pertinent questions :

HOW ARE WE TO GIVE? Exo. 25: 1-2; Exo. 35: 4-5, 20-21; Exo. 36: 5-6; Matt. 6: 1-3; 2 Cor. 9: 6-7; 2 Cor. 8: 1-5; 2 Sam. 24: 24. What do we observe?

¶  Under the Law and in the first century Church, the people gave willingly, without pressure, coercion, compulsion or manipulation

¶  Giving was done freely, cheerfully and sacrificially as David demonstrated in 2 Sam. 24: 24; and the widow in Luke 21: 1

¶  The willing givers begged the apostle to allow them to give and not the other way round, nowadays of pastors vehemently pleading with the people to give.

¶  Calling people to the front to pledge is a modern day commercial strategy, which conflicts with Matt. 6:1-3 [ NLT ]. It was not so in the beginning and we have not so learned Christ [ Eph. 4: 20]

¶  The purpose and the need for the major project was explained by Moses in Exo. 35 in less than 3 minutes without any elaborate sermon. No smooth charismatic speaker, with sugar coated-tongue was organised to address the people. Moses was not even an eloquent man then [ Exo. 4: 10].

WHAT CAN WE GIVE? Ex. 25: 3-7; Deut. 16: 16-17; Acts 4: 34-37

Giving is to be sacrificial within one’s means. In Acts 4, it is clear that one can sell what he has to raise money to give on one’s volition. Some has suggested giving one’s bus fare. Such a ‘step of faith’ without God’s leading may be over-righteous, presumptuous and foolish. There is no lower or upper limit or any form of prescription of what to give in each situation. It is according to what one is able to give. I still think God will be pleased more with someone who contributes to the needy N100,000 once a month than someone of the same status who gives N1,000 daily. However, the major emphasis is first giving oneself primarily as a burnt offering and secondarily, gifts of money and things.

WHO CAN GIVE? 3 John 7; 2 Cor. 8: 5; Mark 15: 40-41

Let’s read 3 JOHN 7, “For they were travelling for the Lord, taking neither money, nor food, nor clothing from those who are not Christians even though they have preached to them”-The Living Bible. Only believers are privileged in the New Testament dispensation to contribute to Kingdom purposes. Bro. Witness Lee said it is a shame and an insult to God to receive from unbelievers for church needs. Mark 15: 40-41; Luke 8: 3 states that it was the female followers of Jesus who supported his ministry, not Herodias or the wife of Pilate. 2 Cor. 8: 5 was specific that it was those who first gave themselves to God in the Macedonian Church who gave for the need of the Church. How come then that some evangelists collect offerings on crusade grounds jam-packed with about equal mix of believers and unbelievers.

I want someone to please let me know how much was collected during the two ‘crusades’ at which Jesus preached in the wilderness. Rather be fed them free after ministering to their physical, emotional and spiritual needs. He fed the flocks, rather than feeding on the flocks as prevalent today.

I recall an evangelist friend who told me of a popular prophet, who told his church members to bring money for the Church project, if even it was stolen money, that he would sanctify it. I can give two vivid similar examples from my personal experience. I will start with the ‘lighter’ one. A sister in a church where I served long ago brought a fat brown envelope as a gift from her father to the Church. The father was appreciating God as according to him, he had been receiving answers to his prayers through listening to our prayers transmitted through the horn speakers. On further inquiry, I learnt that her father had not been into any church or fellowship for 20 years but permitted her and her mother to attend church. I took the envelope and thanked her. The following Sunday, I went to the man’s house with some ministers, prayed for the man and returned the envelope. I told him that he needed to give himself to God before he could be privileged to give to God’s work. The man was conspicuously sober but the message of giving oneself to the Giver before giving to the Giver registered.

The second went like this: I went to pray for the father of a member of our church who was critically ill. The man was a Muslim, with other confidential issues, not converted, from ‘visible’ evidences before he passed on. The member of our church told me that the father wanted to will to our church one of his buildings, a block of four flats on a strategic location, about the longest and busiest road to my church. I declined the offer, even though one of our ministers advised that we should accept it and by prayers, we would set on fire whatever negative things were associated with the building. I stuck to my decision, because logos-wise, it was not biblically acceptable and I had no rhema in favour of acceptance. The man later passed away. Even Father Abraham, an Old Testament saint, before Christ, refused gifts from the king of Sodom-Gen. 14: 22-23.

However, any believer, whether pastors or any other “rank”, who has unresolved issue or animosity with spouse or any other persons is disqualified from giving gifts before the Lord for that period. Matt. 5: 23-24, “Therefore if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there…..First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift”

But before I draw the curtain, I want to raise an observation that may attract “stones”. At times, when I hear ‘offering time-blessing time’, my mind registers some reservation. I believe Offering/Offerings were under the Law and has no pronounced reference in the New Testament.

A few days ago, I drew out my Concordance and Vine Dictionary to find a basis for my reservation. What I saw in Vine Dictionary were quite alarmingly different from my acquired perception. Now to the Concordance. In the Old Covenant, Offering appears about 701 times and 11 times in the New Testament. The eleven times are essentially about offering of vinegar, Offering of the body of Christ, Offering for sin, Offering up of the gentiles, Offering of himself, twice sacrifices and Offering, a passing reference quoted from Psalm 40: 6-8, etc with no remote reference to money. As for Offerings, this was mentioned about 241 times in the Old Covenant and 5 times in the New Testament. In the New Testament, it was in reference to burnt offerings, to sacrifices and Offerings- even stating in Heb. 10: 6-8 that it was according to the Law. Again there is no iota of reference to money.

The mood and dynamics of the New Testament is not about offerings per se but about liberally giving gifts, which can be cash or kind, as exemplified by Barnabas. Besides, the 21st century recourse to first born, last born, head of family redemption offerings especially by contemporary youthful general overseers, etc are alien to the book of Acts and the epistles. In fact what is rendered as offerings in Luke 21: 4 are translated as gifts in NIV, RecV, NET, etc. In essence, giving under New Testament dispensation is not essentially ‘offering time-sowing time oriented’, but voluntary, uncoerced, unmanipulated giving of gifts in cash or in kind for Kingdom projects and to the needy, generally with the haves giving to the have-nots, the richer giving the poorer, the greater giving the lesser, with no exterior kick-starting but as one has purposed in his heart and after having first given oneself to Christ. My wish for you all is a joyful end-of-year season and a glorious New Year ahead. Shalom!-Concluded