In our last issue we were looking at I Kings 17: 1-16. God gave Elijah specific instructions that he would need to follow if he were to receive the blessings God had in store for him throughout this famine.
You and I have not lived under anything like that. Consider the following statistics (thank you Candy for the e-mail):
1. If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep, you are richer than seventy five percent of the people in the world.2. If you can attend a church or synagogue meeting without fear of harassment, arrest, torture or death you are more blessed than three billion people in the world.3. If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of starvation, you are more blessed than five hundred million people in the world.4. If you have money in the bank, in your wallet and spare change in a dish, you are among the top eight percent of the world's wealthy.5. If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed than the million who will not survive this week.
Waking up every day with more health than illness is a special blessing because health makes it possible to enjoy the other good things in life. Since optimal health is our most valuable possession we need to remind ourselves frequently that the choices we make help to determine not only the quality of our daily lives but also the length of our lives.
So, to say that we are not wealthy as individuals and as a country is flawed because our perspective is flawed. However, even in a situation of apparent wealth, people can go without their needs being met. Let's go to Haggai and see what happened to some people who were shirking in their duty to give to God. There were consequences.
Haggai 1:5-10 5Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. 6Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages [to put it] into a bag with holes. 7Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. 8Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the LORD. 9Ye looked for much, and, lo, [it came] to little; and when ye brought [it] home, I did blow upon it. Why? saith the LORD of hosts. Because of mine house that [is] waste, and ye run every man unto his own house. 10Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed [from] her fruit.
So you can live in the midst of plenty and not have your needs met. So let's talk about giving from a perspective of a person who has been faithful in tithing for 30 years. Now, I am not living the New Testament lifestyle of living on a need basis and giving everything else to the family of God.
Just giving the tithe is not even the Old Testament standard, because the Old Testament didn't stop at the tithe. You gave of the first fruits of every harvest -- how about giving the first paycheck of every year to God? No one has asked you to do that. I won't even talk about the sin offerings and the special feasts.
Just doing the tithe, God has been faithful to meet my every need. I have never lacked. In Knoxville, Tennessee in 1981 I was six weeks essentially living on nothing: no income. Every morning I would get up, look for a job, come home and go to bed. I didn't even have bus fare and eventually there was no heat in my home.
I did not miss a meal. I would hitchhike into the city and go from business to business filling out paperwork looking for work. Someone different would bless me with breakfast, lunch and dinner. This happened every day. My landlord was very patient.
Once I got work, I still had to wait for a first paycheck. God made sure I didn't lack.
Psalms 37:25 I have been young, and [now] am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.
In 1992, in Seattle, Washington, I lived very frugally on minimum wage for a period of time, still giving my ten percent. I had my own place, a bicycle and plenty of thrift shop clothing and I couldn't afford meat at every meal, but I didn't suffer at all. In fact, I was healthier then than I am today.
Most of my life I haven't had health insurance, but I haven't been very sick either -- especially once I quit cigarettes. No, I have not been rich and I have tithed faithfully. God is the only thing I can fall back on.
I've never been married, it's just me. I've never been in the hospital as a believer, nor have I needed health insurance. God's been better to me than ten husbands, he's taken very good care of me. You need to have respect for God and do what He wants you to do.
I fall short in many areas and there are still things I am working on, but I've got that tithing thing down. Am I tempted not to give? Sure I am. Things come up in my life. Just a week or so ago, I was tempted to cheat on giving because I looked at the dollar amount -- it seemed so high. I looked again, and sure enough, I had made a lot of money the past couple of weeks.
There were a few instances where I forgot to give and had to make up what I forgot the next week, or where I calculated wrong or whatever, but they were few and far between. The biggest temptations were the times when I knew that if I gave the ten percent, that I wouldn't have enough left over for my other bills. Every time, however, God came through and I was never short.
Everybody wants real security in this world. It isn't in the stock market and your 401 K. It isn't in your health plan or some hypothetical bailout plan. It isn't in getting married or in having children who might be inspired to support you in your old age. Your real security and mine is in doing things God's way and living the way God wants you to live.
GOD'S BANK AIN'T BUSTED YET By Mrs. Bessie Tichelaar The bank had closed; my earthly store had vanished from my hand;I felt there was no sadder one than I in all the land.My washerwoman, too, had lost her little mite with mine,And she was singing as she hung the clothes upon the line."How can you be so gay?" I asked. "Your loss, don't you regret?""Yes, ma'am, but what's the use to fret? "God's bank ain't busted yet."I felt my burden lighter grow, her faith I seemed to share;In prayer I went to God's great throne and laid my burden there.The sun burst from behind the clouds in golden splendor set;I thanked God for her simple words: "God's bank ain't busted yet."And now I draw rich dividends, more than my hands can hold,Of faith and hope, and love and trust, and peace of mind untold.I thank the Giver of it all, but still I can't forgetMy washerwoman's simple words: "God's bank ain't busted yet."Oh, weary one upon life's road, when everything seems drear,And losses loom on every side, and skies are not so clear;Throw back your shoulders, lift your head and cease to chafe and fret.Your dividends will be declared; "God's bank ain't busted yet"ÿ
GOD'S BANK AIN'T BUSTED YET
By Mrs. Bessie Tichelaar
The bank had closed; my earthly store had vanished from my hand;I felt there was no sadder one than I in all the land.My washerwoman, too, had lost her little mite with mine,And she was singing as she hung the clothes upon the line."How can you be so gay?" I asked. "Your loss, don't you regret?""Yes, ma'am, but what's the use to fret? "God's bank ain't busted yet."I felt my burden lighter grow, her faith I seemed to share;In prayer I went to God's great throne and laid my burden there.The sun burst from behind the clouds in golden splendor set;I thanked God for her simple words: "God's bank ain't busted yet."And now I draw rich dividends, more than my hands can hold,Of faith and hope, and love and trust, and peace of mind untold.I thank the Giver of it all, but still I can't forgetMy washerwoman's simple words: "God's bank ain't busted yet."Oh, weary one upon life's road, when everything seems drear,And losses loom on every side, and skies are not so clear;Throw back your shoulders, lift your head and cease to chafe and fret.Your dividends will be declared; "God's bank ain't busted yet"ÿ