Listening to a popular speaker this week on my drive to work, he shared a startling – but not surprising – percentage. He said that Americans, being the richest people in our world today are also very poor givers.  Not talking about giving to a church. Overall giving. The percentages were this:

 

Most Americans give away :

 

                       2.8% of their annual income

                       2.6% if you make over $100,000

He did go on to speak about tithing.  The dreaded message that most church goers hate to hear. This is the message, usually comes once a year, that if Pastor’s announced in advance – there would be very few folks in church that morning.  Be honest!  You’d stay home too.

 

No one really wants “someone” to tell them how to handle their money. This is very personal. I earned it, I get to decide what to do with it.  In fact, money management is one of the greatest reasons for discord in marriage, showing that we don’t even want that “someone” telling us what to do with our money.

This blog post is not about tithing – per say…

I won’t be sharing the biblical references about this topic.

I won’t be asking you to give to anything at the end.

 

The podcast speaker went on to say one very important line in his message, as he “unpacked” the Biblical evidence for tithing and for giving.  He said this:  

When people hear me explain the concept of the tithe, their response is usually ……

Yeah…. I am not doing that one.

Here comes my soapbox. I will try to stay in my lane – but I might step on toes here.

When did it become acceptable to pick and choose what parts of the Word we apply to our lives? How can we decide that one part of scripture “is for me” and another part is “ not for me”?  In other words “I can do that one” but “I am not doing that one”. Christianity is not a buffet line.  You don’t get to pick the “foods” off the table that you love, like or think will be advantageous to you and pass over the food that we simply don’t care for or feel we might not like.  

 

But this is the problem with the church on so many levels.  We offer a buffet line. We tell those who choose to check out our belief structure that you can come when you want, be involved at the level you want and only in the things that you are comfortable doing and we promise we won’t make you do anything that you feel uncomfortable with.  Guess what – I am pretty sure Jesus was uncomfortable with what he was asked to do. So maybe we should feel a bit of discomfort at times as well.

This is not just about giving.  

It is about a lot of things. Prayer, absorbing the word of God, loving those who are different or difficult to love, and so much more.

 

I fault the organized church (of which I am a part so this is for me as well) for this mentality of “I will pick only the desserts from the Christianity buffet and leave the brussel sprouts for someone else”. We have created the buffet. We are afraid that if we don’t offer the buffet people may decide to never return to our church. Therefore, we have made it easy for folks to not be involved to the point that it might make them uncomfortable. It is our fault.

Scripture is hard. Christianity is hard. Living with folks who may have different viewpoints is hard. But that does not excuse us from working at it – working at taking a brussel sprout (I picked this because I don’t like them) and seeing where it leads. See where God leads. After all, these are his words to us. His instruction manual.  Who are we to just pick the parts that are easy for us?  

 

We need to do this in our individual lives and in the corporate organization we call the church- be it a mega church or a house church.

 

Tithing is not a challenge for me. I get this one. I really don’t know how to not tithe. I struggle with other items on the buffet line – pride, gossip, judgement. But that struggle does not excuse me from the table. It does not excuse me from my responsibility to God, others and myself just because I don’t feel like dealing with them. Just because they make me uncomfortable.

 

What is your least favorite food on the buffet of Christianity? Take a small serving. God can make something good out of our discomfort (maybe fear). Don’t let the pick and choose mindset of the buffet line limit your Christian experience. Work through the hard stuff. This allows God to work through you. Make up your mind to wrestle with the whole of the scriptures – not just the parts you think you want or feel you need.

 
So – let’s stop going through the buffet and better yet, let’s close the buffet line down. Let’s all show up to the table and take a serving of everything that God offers to and asks of you.