*CHRISTIAN GIVING
How are Christians supposed to give today? Should we be aiming for a 10%
tithe? Or more? Or less? This article will attempt to answer this question
using scripture as far as the New Covenant is concerned. In writing this
article, there are two very important assumptions I am making about anyone
who wants give the New Covenant way:
1. You are a slave of Jesus Christ (aka Jesus is your Lord)
2. You are part of the bride of Christ (aka Jesus is your husband)
If either of the above is not true for you then the steps below won’t work
for you. I will go into detail as to what 1 and 2 mean. Before that, I
would like us to establish the foundation for all New Testament giving. We
find this in
2 Corinthians 8:9
9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich,
yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become
rich.
This verse is talking about hard cash, money, sika, luchi. If you read the
surrounding context, Paul through the Holy Spirit is speaking to the
Corinthians about giving real money to the Christians in Judea. The
foundation for their giving is the money they have to give, where does this
money come from? As the verse says, it is from the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Jesus Christ became poor so that we would become rich. Since we are
rich, we can give. It is very important to understand this foundation since
it forms the basis of all giving in Christianity. As a child of God, you
don’t give to get but rather, you give because you have. The foundation is
grace and always grace. When God first created the world, he put Adam in
charge of everything in it … all the world. In other words, all the money
you see now was once available to man for free from God. After Adam sinned,
he put satan in charge of the earth and the money in it. This is why Jesus
referred to satan as the ‘prince of this world’. After Jesus died on the
cross to redeem us, He made it possible for us to get back to Adam’s state
and more. This means that by His grace, you have access to all the wealth
you will ever need. With this first foundation laid, let us move on to what
it means to have Jesus as your Lord and Husband.
Jesus is your Lord aka You are his slave
This means a lot of things but the aspect of being a slave that is most
relevant to Christian giving is hearing and obeying. Jesus said ‘Why do you
call me Lord, Lord, when you don’t do what I say?’. This means He expects
anyone who calls Him Lord to do what He says. The early apostles referred
to themselves as slaves of Christ. Let us explore some more what this means
when it comes to hearing. Peter calls himself a slave at the beginning of 2
Peter. Now we should remember that Peter had walked with Jesus physically
for years. He woke up every day and said ‘Jesus what do you want us to do
today?’. Jesus would then answer with specific instructions and Peter along
with the other disciples would go out and do them. If Peter was confused,
he just had to ask Jesus ‘Did you mean A or B’? and Jesus would clarify.
Now in John chapters 14 - 17, Jesus told his disciples that he was leaving
soon and they got worried. One of the reasons was that they wouldn’t be
able to speak to and receive instructions from Jesus the way they had been
doing so far. It disturbed them and understandably so since they wanted to
remain disciples of Christ. Jesus then told them that it was *better* that
he left. Better means that whatever was going to replace walking with
Christ physically each day had to at least include the ability to hear
specifically from Jesus at any point in time. We know that Jesus was
referring to the ministry of the Holy Spirit. To put it bluntly, Jesus
expects us to be able to communicate with and hear the Holy Spirit better
than we would be able to communicate with and hear from him if he was
physically present in his post-resurrection body. Another key thing Jesus
said was that the Holy Spirit would only speak what Jesus said. So when
Peter says he is a slave of Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit dispensation,
what he actually means is that he is someone who communicates with Christ
through the Holy Spirit better than if Jesus was physically present with
him and obeys what he hears Christ saying through the Spirit.
One thing worth nothing here is that Jesus also said He would manifest
himself to us and so there is a place for visions, dreams, the presence of
and other encounters with Jesus whilst on earth. The Holy Spirit however is
the one who is in charge of leading us unto all truth and reminding us of
all the things Jesus said. He is also with us forever wherever we go and in
us. The Holy Spirit is with every Christian, literally in your GPS location
as we speak right now. If we could see into the Spirit realm, we would see
Him with every single believer wherever they went.
The key takeaway from all this is that having Jesus as your Lord means that
you can communicate with and receive instructions from Him just as if he
was standing right next to you. You should know that God has a plan for
your life, a very specific one. He cares about every detail including which
school you go to, where you shop, when you sleep etc. Being a slave means
you don’t do anything on your own but that your whole life is spent doing
what Jesus asks you to do. When it comes to giving, this eliminates all
formulas. You don’t give a percentage but rather you give what Christ asks
you to give. You don’t just give to your local church, the homeless or
charities but rather you give where Christ asks you to give to.
Jesus is your husband aka you are his bride
The important takeaway from this aspect is similar to the one described
above. A husband has things he likes and things he doesn’t like. On certain
days he wants his wife to wear red, on other days white. On some days he
wants to eat rice and on other days he might want pizza. Having Jesus as
your husband means that at any given moment, you know what your husband
wants. It is also important to realize that you have to be in constant
communication because he might want you to give $10 one day and the next
day he might ask you to give $1000 or not at all. It might mean that he
might ask you to give to a prophet who you haven’t heard anything about or
to give to a really popular ministry or to give your offering to the person
sitting next to you in church! This is what Paul means when he says ‘we
have the mind of Christ’. It means that at any given moment, through the
agency of the Holy Spirit, we know exactly how much our husband wants us to
give, where he wants us to give to, when he wants us to give and how he
wants us to give.
So to quickly recap, when it comes to giving, born again Christians are
supposed to give exactly as Christ wants them to. They can know this
because Christ expects us to be able to freely communicate with Him at any
point in time, regarding any question through the agency of the Holy
Spirit. I’ll illustrate this some more to make it more practical:
It means that on Sundays before going to church, you wake up and ask Jesus
‘Jesus how much do you want me to give today?’. Here are some examples of
how he might respond:
- Don’t give anything to the church, I want you to give $400 to Auntie
Maggie down the street.
- Don’t give anything, you are already in mountains of debt, I want you
to focus on getting out of debt first before giving anything to your church.
- Put a check of $50 in the offertory bin.
- There will be a woman with 2 kids sitting next to you in the church.
Split your collection of $200 into two and give her half of it in an
envelope, tell her I asked you to do it.
- You have $1000 in your bank account, empty it and give it all to the
church.
- You know what, you decide how much you want to give today. I’m ok with
whatever you decide for today.
I think you get the picture. The emphasis here is on the foundation of
grace which gives you the ability to give and then a relationship with
Christ which gives you the ability to know exactly how He wants you to
give. I can’t overemphasize how incredibly important this is. It would to
be better to give only one church offering under direct instruction from
Christ than for you to give all of your money using your own judgement. The
reason for this is the in the former, you will be doing God’s perfect will.
God always does things with eternity in mind. He might ask you to give $1
to a prophet that will yield a harvest of 1 million souls for the Kingdom
whereas your own donation of $1 million to some preacher will get
completely wasted on the world all because you didn’t seek the mind of
Christ before doing it. The $1 from Christ will result in an unimaginable
reward for you in heaven and the $1 million … well who knows?
Because most Christians don’t know how to hear from Christ through the Holy
Spirit, doing the above might be the most difficult thing for them to do.
This happens because they haven’t really developed a relationship with
Christ to where they know His voice. Below are some things you can do to
build that relationship. Remember that it is a gradual process and there
might be some missteps along the way but if you persevere in it it is
inevitable that you will mature to a place where the Father, the Son and
the Spirit will be more real to you than the physical people you see every
day. The steps below will be very practical things you can do.
THE HOLY SPIRIT SPEAKS TO US IN DIVERSE WAYS
Remember that the Holy Spirit is a spirit and he communicates with your
perfect, new, born again spirit. The communication can manifest itself in
various ways but it happens Spirit to spirit. Here is a non-exhaustive list
of how you can hear from Christ via the Holy Spirit. As I already
mentioned, it takes some time to learn where these come from. For almost
all of these, the devil has a counterfeit. In addition, your own fleshly
mind might come up with its own version of what it thinks Christ is saying.
Don’t be discouraged if you make some mistakes, just keep persevering and
the relationship will mature to where you are always sure:
- Thoughts
- A still small voice
- An audible voice
- Dreams
- Visions (there are various types described in the Bible)
- Through other people
- Through the Scriptures
- Your inner witness (this is where your new born again heart which God
placed in you acts as a compass to direct you)
Personally, in my walk right now, thoughts and the still small voice are
the most common way He communicates with me. He does speak to me through
all of the above.
REMEMBER THAT THE HOLY SPIRIT IS ALWAYS PRESENT WITH YOU
Be always aware that the Holy Spirit is present with you. I do this by
having a reminder app on my phone that sends me a notification every 30
mins telling me that ‘The Holy Spirit’ is present with you. You can use
whatever means works best for you. I talk with Him like I would talk to a
real person, sharing thoughts, jokes, asking questions etc. I speak to Him
when I wake up, before going to bed, before starting work, before going to
meetings, when driving etc. This might seem like a game of having an
imaginary friend but it is extremely important. You will find that without
constantly being aware of his presence, there will be times in your day
where you are so busy with other things that you forget He exists. How can
you hear from someone who you don’t even think exists?
SPEND TIME WITH GOD (FATHER, SON & SPIRIT)
Spend lots of time with God (Father, Son and Spirit). You can’t get to know
someone without spending time with them. It is best to set aside some time
each morning (no matter how small) to do this. I personally try to commit
to 3 am - 6 am every morning to do this. Remember again that there is no
formula here. I rely on Jesus or the Spirit to wake me up based on our
commitment, once I wake up I ask Him what He wants us to do for the
morning. The answer is almost always different. Here are just a few of the
responses I have received so far (I’m paraphrasing most of this)
- Go back to bed (He usually speaks to me through a dream when this
happens)
- Pray
- Pray in tongues
- Read the Bible
- Worship and enter into my presence
- Listen for a prophetic word I am sending you
- Pray in tongues whilst listening to an audio Bible
- Meditate on the things I have taught you
- Send an email to so and so person
- etc.
You get the picture. It is a relationship so it makes sense that He will
have something on His mind for you to do each day. One other benefit of
spending time with God is that He sharpens you like iron sharpens iron so
that you become more like Him. Fears and sins you have struggled with for
decades will suddenly disappear without your doing anything about them. We
see an example of this in the Bible when Jesus went into the temple and
drove the money changers, sellers and thieves out. After that, he taught
and then people came to the temple for healing and blessings (Matt 21: 12 -
14). He said “It is written ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,
but you make it a den of robbers.” Under the New Covenant, your body is the
temple of God. When you spend time with Him in fellowship and prayer, you
allow Him to drive out all the selfish, greedy roots in you. Once He does
that, the blind and the lame can come to you and Jesus will heal them
through you.
PRAY WITHOUT CEASING (IN TONGUES AND ENGLISH)
Pray in tongues … a lot … without ceasing. When the Bible says that we
should pray without ceasing and be in prayer at all times, it means it.
There are two main benefits for this. When you pray in tongues, your spirit
is speaking mysteries with God. These are obviously not mysteries to God,
but rather, God is revealing those mysteries to you. At some point once
your spirit understands those mysteries, it communicates them to your
physical man. I have experienced this multiple times where some revelation
knowledge exploded in me after a season of speaking in tongues. The second
benefit is that when you pray in tongues, it is the Holy Spirit that gives
you those tongues. It is that same tongues voice that speaks to you on
behalf of Christ in another language like English so you are actually
developing your spiritual hearing by long hours of praying in tongues. I
personally pray in tongues every chance I get, under my breath, all day
whenever the time, place and people allow. This is interspersed with
speaking in English to God.
SPEND TIME IN THE WORD
Spend time reading, hearing and meditating the Bible. This is also very
important because it reveals more about God to you. It is also the milk and
meat that the Holy Spirit digests in you to produce your spiritual food
which will help you grow. Your spiritual food as a Christian is ‘rhema’ aka
a word from God (Matt 4:4) and doing the will of your Father(John 4:34).
There are various ways to do this that we all know of:
- Read scripture
- Memorize scripture
- Listen to an audio Bible (I like to do this when going to bed so that
throughout my sleeping the Word of God is playing)
- Reading certain sections of scripture over and over again 50 - 100
times till they become a part of you
- Be sure to never take verses out of context. If you are not sure of
what a verse means, read the surrounding context and ask the Holy Spirit to
reveal the meaning to you.
- etc.
Again, there should be no formula here. Personally, there have been times
when God has asked me to stay in the Gospels, at other times He has me
reading the whole Bible or just a single chapter. This should be as the
Lord leads. One other major benefit of reading and knowing the word is that
it protects you from false doctrine and counterfeit ‘words from God’ that
satan will try to trick you with. If you hear anything from the Holy Spirit
that is not in line with the Word of God then you know that it is not from
God.
SPEAK WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS IS TRUE ABOUT YOURSELF
Spend time speaking what the Bible says to be true about yourself. This
sounds like a game but it is also extremely important. If the Bible says
that ’No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in
him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God’ (1 John 3:9) then you
should say of yourself ‘I am born of God and I don’t practise sin because
God’s seed abides in me; and I cannot sin because I am born of God’. By
‘say of yourself’ I mean literally spend time saying that aloud. It doesn’t
matter if you steal every day, you still speak those true words about
yourself if you have been born again. An example of this from the Bible is
Abraham. While still without a child from Sarah, God asked Abram to call
himself ‘Father of many nations’. You see in today’s world, it would be
like a poor person changing their legal name to ‘Rich’. Every single day
Abraham, his family and other people called him ‘Father of many nations’
they were lying in the physical but they were speaking the truth because
they were speaking words from God and God cannot lie. These words you speak
are what the Holy Spirit will use to bring transformation into your life.
The Holy Spirit needed God’s words before starting to create anything,
before God spoke, He was just hovering. Much in the same way, He is
hovering over you know waiting for you to speak about yourself what God
says is true about you. The Lord currently has me speaking 1 John about
myself. He might have a different scripture for you. From time to time,
when the Spirit reminds me I pull out my paraphrased version and begin
speaking it.
IMAGINE, PICTURE AND DAYDREAM WHAT YOU SPEAK (above point)
Spend time day-dreaming, picturing, imagining, doodling, drawing, writing
what the Bible says is true about yourself. In addition to speaking, it is
important to focus your thoughts and imaginations on the truths you speak.
Again with Abraham, God first gave him the stars to count and the land to
see in addition to changing his name. Both of these were equally important
else God wouldn’t have done it. If the Bible says you are healed, picture
yourself healed and say it aloud. By doing that you are walking together
with God by agreeing with Him (Amos 3:3). As the Lord leads, I personally
spend some mornings and nights just daydreaming myself doing and living
some things God has personally promised me. I picture my reactions, how
they will happen in minute detail, how they will affect others around me,
the tears of joy that will result etc.
FAST
Fast. Again do this as the Lord leads. Fasting helps you to make your body
subject to your spirit and also builds your faith. When you fast, you have
to subject the physical reality of the hunger pangs to the superseding
spiritual reality of getting more sensitive to God. Once you are used to
that, the next time God asks you to pray for someone with a really severe
condition, you won’t be moved by the sight of that condition because your
body and senses are used to having spiritual reality supersede physical
reality. This is what Jesus meant when he said ‘This kind can come out only
by prayer and fasting.” (Mark 9:29).
WORSHIP, PRAISE AND ADORE YOUR GOD
Spend time in worship, praise and adoration of the Father, Son and Spirit.
You do this on church every Sunday. Worship is one of the most effective
way of entering into the palpable presence of God. You can sing, listen to
worship music, play it in your head etc. I personally do this as the Lord
leads. I have literally felt the Lord’s presence (a perceptible warm glow
in my chest, or a calm wind washing over my body) when I was completely
consumed in worship and adoration of the Lord. After you do this for some
time, you will start perceiving in the Spirit realm when you worship. The
Bible refers to this as worshiping ‘in the Spirit’. (Revelation 1:10).
Being ‘in the Spirit’ means exactly what it says. It means that you are in
a state where the Holy Spirit allows you to perceive with your spiritual
senses (see, hear, touch, taste, smell etc.) This is something every
Christian can experience on a regular basis if we spend time worshiping
God. It is also what Jesus meant when He said that ‘God is Spirit and those
who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth’ (John 4:24).
Personally, I have seen and felt my spiritual hands being lifted in praise
to the Lord. There have been times where the Holy Spirit opened my
spiritual ears so that I could hear praise music in the Spirit and worship
along to it without needing an mp3 player or anything of that sort.
OBEY WHATEVER HE ASKS YOU TO DO, NO MATTER HOW CRAZY IT SEEMS
Finally, and this is the most important thing … obey whatever the Lord asks
you to do. The things listed above are not difficult, they mostly boil down
to spending a lot of time with God. As you do start doing them you will
definitely hear from Him on how, where, when, who and what to give. If you
are not sure, seek and wait upon Him till you are. When you finally hear,
obey. If you don’t obey you would have been better off not hearing at all
because you will be in rebellion against the Lord which He considers the
equivalent of witchcraft (1 Samuel 15:23). The list above is also not
exhaustive. I am fairly certain that there are other things to do to build
this relationship so that we can hear directly from Christ through the Holy
Spirit just as if He was physically present but what I have listed is what
I know of so far.
In conclusion the question we set out to answer was, how should Christians
give today under the new covenant? The answer we came up with based on
scripture was that they should give exactly how, where, when, to whom and
the amount Christ wants them to at any given moment. The follow up question
was, how do Christians get to know this information? They get to know this
by hearing it directly from Christ through the Holy Spirit. This requires
having a relationship with the Father, the Son and the Spirit and we
outlined some practical things to do to build this relationship.
Notice that I didn’t mention anything about tithing, or ‘give and it will
come back to you’ etc. The reason is that all of those things become moot
points when you are giving exactly as Christ wants you to give based on
direct instructions from Him. My prayer is that this message blesses you
and leads you into a deeper walk with our infinite Father who has chosen to
reveal Himself to us through His son Jesus Christ.
Blessings and Regards,
George Anothen Armah.
Sources:
The Holy Spirit
The Bible
http://www.garycarpenter.org/media.html
http://daveroberson.org/series.aspx
Numerous other sources through whom the Lord has taught me
*
Blessings and Regards,
--
George Anothen Armah
