6 “I
the Lord do not change. So you, the descendants of
Jacob, are not destroyed. 7 Ever since the time of your
ancestors you have turned away from my decrees and have not kept them. Return
to me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord Almighty.
“But you ask, ‘How
are we to return?’
8 “Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me.
“But you ask, ‘How
are we robbing you?’
“In tithes and
offerings. 9 You are under a curse—your whole nation—because
you are robbing me. 10 Bring
the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. 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
there will not be room enough to store it. 11 I will prevent pests from devouring your crops,
and the vines in your fields will not drop their fruit before it is ripe,” says
the Lord Almighty. 12 “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for
yours will be a delightful land,” says the Lord Almighty.
This passage continues with the seriousness of the sin of the people of
God, but it gives an amazing insight into who God is and how He works in our
world. The people were withholding from God, they were not bringing their whole
tithe—be it money, food, cloth, whatever—as an offering to the Lord. This
should not come as a surprise to use today. Previously God incited them for
bringing blemished animals to His temple to sacrifice when the law clearly
forbade such a thing (Malachi 1:8)[1].
Now, finding out that they were withholding their tithes, well, it continues
with the pattern of behavior that had been ongoing for centuries.
That’s right, this is not the first generation to behave badly towards
God. It goes back to the beginning, during the Exodus with the fiasco of the
golden calf (Exodus 32). The tithe requirement was the responsibility of every
Israelite, not just the priests and wealthy. Everyone was to bring in their
tithe regardless of how big or small it would be as an act of faithfulness and
trust in God. By not doing so they were robbing God.
The problem, once again, was that they had forgotten who God is and how
He operates. They had bought into the world’s wisdom and were now under a
curse. 1 Corinthians 3:19 says, “For the
wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight.” What was this wisdom? It’s
the same stuff we are taught today: budget your finances; live within your
means; start a savings account; have an emergency fund; save for retirement;
etc. The hard part about this is that these are all good things because God calls us to be wise stewards of our money
and other resources. So what’s the problem?
The Israelites had bought into the idea that if you tithe and give some
away, then you will have less. What lay behind this was the fear that God would
not provide, and there would not be enough. God was challenging this lie, and
this worldly wisdom that says to save selfishly. God was saying that if the
people brought in their offerings, they would have more because God would bless them and multiply what they already
had so they could give more and more.
This is what it means to be faithful then, to trust God to provide when it
seems foolish by our standards.
So continue that savings account, retirement account, investment
account, but make sure you are doing it for the right reasons. Do you funnel
money away because you don’t trust God to provide? Or do you put money away
because He has already provided enough for you and your household to live and
give away much? By the same token, we are not to live outlandishly as the
Prodigal Son did (Luke 15:11-32). Tithing is a sign of order in our faith. God
calls us to be prepared and willing to give freely to others because that is
what He has done for us. Again, God is a God of order, and trying to order our
finances and resources reflects His character. Trying to control everything is
what gets us into trouble.
Carrying on, we learn two important things about God in this passage.
First, He is the provider, and giver of all prosperity[2]
(Malachi 3:10-11). The way to receive His blessing is not to hold on tight and
try to control everything, but to be willing to give to Him and trust that He
is ultimately in control of everything we have anyway. God’s kingdom doesn’t
work like our world does today. We think that we can only give out of our
plenty, but Jesus praises the woman who gives out of her poverty (Luke 21:1-4).
God is waiting for our faithful obedience to Him, so that he can in turn shower
us with more blessings than we could ever hope for. But blessings don’t always
equal money. God’s presence is a blessing, and probably the greatest blessing,
because when He draws near to us, He brings with Him is peace, comfort, and
glory, and we can bask in them.
The second thing we learn about God in this passage is that He is
unchanging. Say you had a friend who had an abusive job. You helped them to get
out of that job and into a better, more stable one, but then they had problems
with their living situation. So you help them to find a better place to live in
a safer neighborhood. You gave them advice about how to keep their finances and
life in order and they smiled, nodded, gave you some lip service, and then did
the exact opposite. This meant that they lost that good job you helped them to
find, and had to move out of their apartment. So you go back again, thinking
that this time they will have learned their lesson. You help them find another
good job, and get into a different apartment. But it’s the same story, over and
over and over again: they make bad decisions which cause them to lose their job
and their home. When would you give up helping that friend? That’s what God has
been doing for His people for thousands of years.
But, as verse 6 says, God doesn’t give up on us and His love for us
doesn’t change. So he can rebuke and punish us justly, and then lovingly
restore us time and time again. He will not destroy us, because He is patient
and kind, just and merciful, the highest authority but ultimately graceful. So
we fail again and again, we give to Caesar what is God’s and leave nothing for
God. We fear poverty and neglect to bring the whole tithe into the Temple and
therefore do not give God ruling control of our entire lives. And God will
remind us, harshly and gently, that we are wrong and need to try again. For when
we truly relinquish control of everything and let God determine our lives,
being, worth, and identity, He will bless our courage and faithfulness so much
that others will look upon our lives and have no choice to acknowledge that
Christ is Lord, because only He can bring about such a change in us
(Malachi 3:12).
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