We are all aware that April 15 here in the U.S. is income tax day. It is settlement time for one more year with Uncle Sam. Of course, he makes it relatively painless for a majority of taxpayers with the current withholding system established to collect taxes at the time a person gets paid, thus transferring a good part of the burden of the collection effort to the employers in this country.
God has a system of collection for funds due Him to be used in carrying out His work on the earth. He calls that system tithing. The big difference in the two systems is that God depends on the honor of the individual, thus allowing the individual to properly pay the funds due Him.
The thing many do not consider is that the obligation to pay God’s tithes is just as binding under God’s system as is the obligation to pay the U.S. Government for taxes due. Most people, today, are not even aware that such an obligation is due from them. But those called of God have been apprised of the truth in this matter. Yet, many have begun looking for any and every reason not to pay God’s tithes. This is a serious error!
Christ tells us in Luke 20: 25 to “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
God told Adam, in the Garden of Eden, that he was not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, lest he die. (Gen 2: 16-17) He and his wife chose to go contrary to that command and established a pattern of death.
Today, God raises the question in Malachi 3: 8 … “Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me. When asked the question, “Wherein have we robbed You?” … The answer comes back … “In tithes and offerings. You are cursed with a curse: for you have robbed Me, even this whole nation.”
This nation is cursed, brethren, because it has failed God in the payment of His tithes. But even more critical, many in God’s Church, today, are suffering from this same curse, because of disobedience. Let us not be guilty of committing this sin against our Creator.