Sunday, March 10, 2013

STOP THIEF!

God has given us so much. He has blessed us with our health, our family, our home, our dogs. He has blessed us with our church and our congregation. He has blessed us with food to eat and the means to keep warm even though it is cold outside. He has blessed us. We have clothes to wear and a vehicle to drive in. Not only does God delight to give us good gifts as it says in Matthew 7:11 but He also promises to give us the desires of our heart (Psalm 37:4) if we delight ourselves in Him. The person who follows after God can actually have a pretty blessed life. That's not to say that trouble doesn't come our way but, all in all, God takes care of us and provides for us and blesses us more than we could ever imagine. 

So why would we rob God? After He has given us so much, why would we cheat Him? I can hear the tires squealing to a stop in your mind right now. Hang on a minute, I wouldn't rob God! I don't cheat! I'm not a thief! Yes, you are. You are a thief and you are robbing God right this minute if you have held back the tithe. No, don't tune me out and don't stop reading because maybe you need to hear this (I know someone does because God has laid this on my heart, He wants you to hear). 

God, Himself, calls you a thief and a robber if you are withholding the tithe. Malachi 3:8-9: “Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me.“But you ask, ‘How are we robbing you?’“In tithes and offerings.

You are under a curse—your whole nation—because you are robbing me.

Can you afford to live under a curse? I know I don't want to. 

God says in His Word that 10% of our income belongs to Him.(Leviticus 27:30Numbers 18:26Deuteronomy 14:242 Chronicles 31:5). Its not ours to begin with. It's His money and yet we choose to keep it for ourselves. He lets us keep the 90% to live on and even promises to continue to bless us IF we don't rob from Him. 

Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse... Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. Malachi 3:10


Not only are we robbing God of what is rightfully His to begin with, but we are actually robbing ourselves of a blessing. God says in Malachi 3:9 that we are actually placing ourselves under a curse when we rob Him. A curse! I don't know about you, but I can't afford not to tithe! I don't want to be under a curse; I'd much sooner have God's blessings in my life. 

There are quite a few reasons why people don't tithe: they may not like the pastor, or how the church is being run so they withhold the tithe thinking that they're hurting the pastor or the church when in actual fact they are hurting God because they are stealing from Him. Some people don't tithe because they feel they can't afford to tithe; they barely make ends meet as it is and giving that 10% would be just too hard, or so they think, but God tells us to honor Him first and TEST Him in this and see that He will pour out more blessings than you can handle. 

I find it so strange that born again Christians who are in church every week refuse to tithe, they willingly rob from God. They sit in church services each week expecting to be blessed while they are robbing God.  And yet I have seen unsaved people, ones who rarely darken the door of the church understand the principle of tithing and will send in their tithes to the church. Isn't that amazing? Somehow these unsaved people understand that the tithe belongs to the Lord. Maybe they had a mother or father who taught them by example. 

I know from personal experience and by the example my parents set out for me, that when we honor God first by giving Him our first fruits, the 10% off the top plus offerings which are given freely from our heart, He does bless us. He makes the money stretch and gives us more. Test Him and see. He has never failed to bless those who don't rob Him, who honor Him with the tithe.

If we don't tithe how can we enjoy the blessings we have been given knowing that we robbed God to get them? Oh, maybe its a new dress or a new car or new furniture that we purchased with God's money, but how can we use those things without having our conscience pricked? We stole from God. 

Many of you reading this will have a twinge of guilt in your conscience, if you are not tithing and are robbing from God. Some of you will begin to tithe and repent of not doing so sooner. But sadly there will be some who have had their conscience seared beyond any feeling whatsoever and will feel no remorse. Scripture is filled with warnings concerning our conscience. Jeremiah spoke about his people having, “forgotten how to blush” (Jer. 8:12) they were no longer ashamed of their sin. Furthermore, he said that when wickedness was done in Israel, “my people love to have it so” (Jer. 5:31). Paul speaks of those who, “suppress the truth in unrighteousness” and therefore do not pay attention to God’s will (Rom. 1:18). Later, Paul again mentions people who had spent so much time in sin that they were, “past feeling” (Eph. 4:19). Jesus Himself spoke of those whose, “hearts have grown dull, their ears hard of hearing, and their eyes closed” (Matt. 13:15). Talk about 'turning a blind eye to sin'. 

All those passages point to one frightening truth: it is possible for people to get to a point where sin no longer pricks their conscience and causes them to feel guilty (hence the term, “seared” — 1 Tim. 4:2). When we become numb to the presence of sin, it becomes impossible to please God (Rom. 8:8). That is a dangerous place to be found in! And we place ourselves there every time we knowingly sin. We have all been taught from the pulpit how God wants us to act and what He expects us to do. We can read His instructions in His Word, but when we knowingly do wrong, commit a sin, such as withholding the tithe from God, our conscience becomes a little more seared to the point where, unless we repent and change our ways, we will be past feeling and become numb to the presence of sin. Sin will no longer bother us. 

I pray it is not too late for you. I know God has instructed me to write this today for someone who will be reading it. Maybe its you. Listen to what the Word has to say concerning tithing and if you have not been doing so, begin today. Repent of your stealing from God and make it right by beginning to honor God with your first fruits. May God bless you abundantly.

the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless. Psalm 84:11

“Honor the LORD with your possessions, And with the first fruits of all your increase; So your barns will be filled with plenty, And your vats will overflow with new wine” (Prov. 3:9-10).







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