Why do we give to the local Church?
Jesus said that where your treasure is, your heart is there also. What He means is that if our money is our treasure, our heart belongs to our wallets and not to Him. The Bible also speaks about being a good steward of all the blessings God has given you, including your money. Unfortunately, the Church and money have not always had a good history, many times because of how the church has handled money. We believe generosity is an attribute and culture of the Christian life and something the Lord desires us to grow in. In order to ensure we as a church reflect what we see in scripture, we have developed 5 statements that help guide us and how we teach on generosity.
1. God’s vision is worth our investment.
We believe that God’s vision of filling the earth with his glory is worth our investment! This allows us to invest in something eternal that will last forever. If we’re not willing to put our money where our mouth is, then maybe our heart isn’t where we say it is. God created us to make an eternal impact, so we should use what we have to accomplish His purpose. Hab. 2:14
2. Giving our first, grows our faith.
We believe what gets our first and our best determines the rest. We don't want to give God our leftovers or feel like our giving is an after thought. Trusting God with our first requires us to trust him with the rest. This discipline grows us in being dependent on God and not ourselves.
3. Everything I have, is God’s to give.
The reality of it is that everything we have is already God's (Psalm 24:1-2)! When we give, we are giving him what is already His. We are just managers of God's stuff, but everything we have is to be used for his purposes. It is also important for us to seek God's leading in what to give since it is His to begin with. (1 Corinthians 16:1-2).
4. We give because God gave.
God gave us the greatest gift we ever could have received in Jesus! All of our blessings come from God and our giving is a response to what He has done for us. We see that the character of generosity best displayed in God and Jesus, therefore, as Christians we respond by doing the same. (2 Corinthians 9:7)
5. Our giving is spirit led, not law driven.
So what about the tithe? There are different beliefs on the subject of whether the tithe was just a requirement in the Old Testament, or if it is still required in the New Testament. We believe that our giving should come from the overflow of our heart, not because we are “required” to do so. We desire each person to seek the Lord on what they are to give. We see in the book of Acts that generosity was often times the catalyst that moved the gospel forward. We see the disciples giving generously to those in need, supporting the poor and the suffering in the body of Christ, and giving generously to support those who labored in preaching, teaching, and discipleship (Acts 11, I Corinthians 9, Luke 10:7, I Timothy 5:3-16).
If our giving comes from a place of “have to” instead of “get to,” we have missed the entire point!