Tuesday 17 January: The Purpose of Tithing

A: God proposes to give the Levites all the tithes in Israel as an inheritance and ‘Among the children of Israel they shall have no inheritance.’ (Leviticus 27:30, Numbers 18:21,24)  

God owns everything (Psalm 24:1) including tithe. God tells us the purpose of tithing is to minister the Gospel.  

The tribe of Levi depended on tithe and also tithed.  

A: The message in Acts 20:35 given by Paul is that he showed how in hard work we must help the weak and remember Jesus said ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ This relates to the question of tithe because we are blessed more when we tithe rather than keeping all our blessings to ourselves.  

Tithing a tenth of our income is an exercise of faith growing our faith when we do so. It is important we’re faithful now because, in the end times, the faithful will be unable to buy or sell (Revelation 13:17) 

When we tithe God blesses us abundantly with so much, we won’t have room for the blessings. In turn, we’re able to bless others.  

A: I’ve experienced the great truth that it is, indeed, ‘more blessed to give than to receive’ when I’ve felt great joy in giving. It’s been joyful to give and then it is joyous to find out how grateful the recipient is. Being a recipient of generous giving in the past I’ve really needed those gifts and when they came when I didn’t expect them, I was very blessed indeed.