A Dirty Little Secret About Tithing 10% to the Church

Tithing 10% is something that I've always questioned the truth behind. I've never felt comfortable giving God that 10%. Because of this "check" inside of myself, I decided to start studying the topic of tithing 10%. In all honesty, I was unable to find it in the Bible. But, that's a bold statement because every church preaches it. I decided to take 6 months to study this topic to really learn it. (Here's a great video about why you need to study the Bible for yourself instead of just listening to someone else tell you about it.)

To my surprise, I discovered that the concept of tithing 10% is not in the Bible.

Now before you freak out and get mad thinking that I'm against giving to the church or get excited because you think you don't have to give any longer and you can save that money - keep reading.I'm going to briefly touch on where the 10% tithe concept comes from before explaining myself further. In the Old Testament and the New Testament, the times of tithing 10% were gathered as a tax to all of the people to rebuild/expand the temple. God never considered this to be a requirement to follow Him. (I encourage you to not take my word for this but really do your own research and reflection on the 10% tithe.)So you may be asking, "what makes you think that the 10% tithe is not in the bible?" I'm glad you asked! I found out the truth about tithing 10% through the life of Jesus. You see, Jesus actually talked about money a lot; it seems that a large portions of the questions that people asked Him were on this topic.

So here it is... Ready? Jesus doesn't want your 10%.

He wants your 100%. When Jesus says (throughout the New Testament) that in order to follow Him at the fullest, we must give every part of us, He was wasn't just talking about time and lifestyle. He was also talking about our money. Jesus was talking about everything.At the beginning of this post, I mentioned being uncomfortable giving God 10%. I am not uncomfortable with this because I want to give less, it's because I believe 10% limits God and almost puts a cap on His expectation for our lives.

"God won't give you a 100% blessing for a 10% commitment."

So what does this look like practically?

Years ago I began putting this into practice. I started giving as much as I could, far more than tithing 10%. I was giving 100% of what I could. I have bills just like any other adult, so it wasn't 100% of my income.When my wife quit her job to start her own business, we lost a large portion of our income; obviously things would need to change for a time. However, I felt God tell me to not lower the amount that I was giving. Now, instead is giving 100% of what I could give, I was giving more like 120% of what I could give.

Related Post: Trust and Submit to God When We Really Don’t Want To

My point in telling you this today is not to make myself look good. Instead, it is to share the truth about what God really wants from us when it comes to the "tithe". In all honesty, I don't believe in tithing. I believing in living a life as a cheerful giver who is willing to give everything away for the sake of the gospel; just like Jesus did for us.

Giving is essential to the life of a believer. Limiting what we give to 10% is like telling God we only want part of what He has for us.

I hope this post got you thinking today, that was the point of it. I encourage you to take time to pray, ask God what He wants from you in regards to finances; you may be surprised what you feel and hear from Him.