Stewardship Part 4 Tithe Series

Into this type of problems God says, “You are robbing me.” Can’t God see that these people have nothing? They are scrounging for food wherever they can find it. They can’t pay the rent. They can’t buy new sandals for the kids. They can’t buy enough grain to make a decent loaf of bread. God says, “You are robbing me.” The argument comes back, “I can’t afford to give anything.” Have you ever heard that claim? Have you ever made that claim? The truth is that no matter what our level of income or wealth, God expects us to give back to him a portion of what he has given us. They didn’t have much, but they had something. Last week, we look at the account of the poor widow’s offering of two little copper coins. Jesus said that she gave more than the wealthy that piled in money. It’s not the amount of the gift, but it is the motive and sacrifice behind the gift.

In verse 9, we find…

B. The CRITICISM of God.

Verse 9 is an interesting verse. It says, “You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you.”

Sometimes that word “curse” troubles us. We associate curses with witches and the like. We think of wizards and magic potion when we think of curses. There is a difference here. Those curses are intended to be harmful. They are malicious in nature.

What we have here is not God saying, “I don’t like those people over there, so I am going put a curse on them.” This is a matter of consequences. The consequence of their actions is what this is talking about. There are consequences when we do things. If I beat my head against the wall, the consequence will be a headache or a concussion. The consequence of their actions, or inaction, was that they received less and less.

If at your job, you continue to give less and less effort, you will receive less and less in the way of pay. You may even lose your job. I have seen that happen to people. They just quit giving effort on the job. They get bad reviews and no pay raise. They ultimately either quit or get fired. There are consequences to our actions.

The consequence of failing God is that he removes his hand of blessing from our lives. That’s what the Jewish people were facing. Their poverty deepened because they were unfaithful to God. On top of that, the whole nation was implicated in the sin. There were probably some who were faithful. There were some that may have been partially faithful. The majority was unfaithful. Partial faithfulness is also being unfaithful. If I am faithful to my wife 364 days per year, I am still unfaithful. Those that were unfaithful were ruining it for the whole nation.

We see how God is robbed. The second this is…

II. Robbing the CHURCH.

The Church is robbed. God is God, and, as the Bible says, he owns the cattle on a thousand hills. God doesn’t need our money to be God, but the Church needs the money to be the Church.

In order to fulfill the mission of the Church, there has to be some financing behind it. The city doesn’t give us free electricity or water. Sunday school material and Friends Club material isn’t free. The church has to pay for these things. I realize that raising money to pay the light bill isn’t exactly thrilling, but it has to be done. We in the first phrase of verse 10…