Let me just give some tips to people who don't tithe.
Here's tip number one, try it and see what happens.
Try it and see what happens.
Try it and see, you say well I don't know if I can afford to tithe, well just try
it and see what happens.
Try just making it the primary expense on your budget, just at the very top of the list
before you write any other expense you have that month, tithe.
And you know what you'll find out is that you actually can afford to pay the tithe.
When you make it the primary expense, because look when people get in a bind financially
when they get into a tight spot one month or things come up short, there's always
a release valve, you know what I mean, there's always something that goes unpaid
that month.
But you know what, it should never be God, it should never be the tithe.
That would be the last person you ever want to short that month.
It should probably be your cell phone bill, or your cable bill, or your internet bill,
all these other things that we think are necessities, those are the release valves.
Maybe we don't go out to eat that month, maybe we don't have steak every other
night at home or something.
But don't make God the release valve in your finances.
Make him a priority and see what happens.
I mean this is, do we believe the word of God, do you believe the promises of God?
He's saying prove me, try me, and see if I won't pour out a blessing upon you.
Make the tithe your primary expense and you'll be able to afford it.
Now I want to just kind of close by giving a few tips just to people about tithing
because these are things that, you know, we always talk about tithing, we talk about
how it's the Lord's and prove it from the Old Testament and the New and so on and
so forth.
But just some practical tips about tithing that sometimes people have questions about.
I know I had, this question in particular came up, was do you tithe on the gross
or do you tithe on the net?
Do you tithe on your gross income or do you tithe on the net?
Now I'm an advocate of tithing on the gross because that is your increase.
Say well I didn't get that money, that's not God's fault.
God's not the one that said, you know, took it out of your paycheck before you ever got
to sod.
That was, you know, the federal government, the state government, you know.
God doesn't, just because they rob you, don't go turn around and rob God.
That's kind of how I look at it, you know.
And I bring that up because I didn't know that.
Someone had to tell me that when I first got in church and started tithing, you know,
and I, and so I've always done it that way.
And you know the other thing that people ask about is, you know, do you tithe on your
tax return?
And he, you know, because, and we're, you know, we're coming into that season, right?
He's getting excited, you know, do you tithe on the tax return?
Well if you've been tithing, think about this, if you've been tithing on the gross,
you already have tithed on the taxes.
You've already tithed on it.
That's money you've already tithed on.
So you know, my take on that is if you've been tithing on the gross, there's no need
to tithe on money that you're being refunded for money that you paid and tithed
on.
You make, does that make sense?
Everyone knows how this works, right?
They send you, you get a check, the federal government takes a portion, you tithe on the
gross, then the feds send you back something and as a refund on money that you've already
tithed on.
So there's no need to tithe on the gross.
And you know, the other thing I would mention is just tithing about, tithing for business
owners.
People who, you know, own a business.
And let me just come out and say I'm not a, obviously I'm not a business owner,
I've never been a business owner, I'm not the expert, but I know people who are.
You know, Pastor Anderson owned a small business for many years, so he knows about this.
And you know, if you have questions about it, I could definitely, if you want more clarification,
I could direct you to people that I've talked to about this and I know have, you
know, sound wisdom in this area.
But you know, tips for tithing for business owners is tithe your personal increase and
not the business savings.
Tithe your personal increase and not your business's savings.
People that have a small business, sometimes what they'll do is they'll think, okay,
the business took in this amount, the business has a bank account and it has X amount of
dollars.
Okay.
It has, let's say it has, you know, just keep it simple.
It has a hundred dollars in the, in the savings account.
They got to the end of the month, the end of the week, whatever.
And they said, you know, the business brought in a hundred dollars.
So they'll write a check, they'll tithe on a hundred dollars of the business's
money.
Okay.
And you shouldn't do that because one, not all that money is profit.
A lot of, because correct me if I'm, I know I've never owned a business, but I'm pretty
sure the businesses, they don't just take a hit on expenses.
They usually kind of pass that along to the customer, right?
They build that, they work that into the quote often, you know, they make sure that
their goods and services help pay for the expenses.
So a lot of that money that came in was just paying off expenses.
First of all, it was paying for supplies for a job.
It was paying, you know, some bills, some tax bill that you had to pay.
What all the many expenses that a business has to take on, you know, part of that hundred
dollars goes towards that.
So that's not, that's not an increase.
That's not profit.
Okay.
So don't tithe on that.
What you should tithe that, you know, good business practices, as I understand it, is
this, is that if you own a business, you have a separate account for your business
where all that money comes and goes out of that account.
And then you are an employee of that business, even if you're the owner.
This is good business practice that if you're the owner, you cut yourself a check as an
employee of that business, right?
That's what you tithe on.
Not how much money is in the business's bank account, but how much money you took
from the business personally to pay yourself a salary or whatever.
That's what you tithe on.
And that's important because people, they don't know that.
They get into these things and they think they have to tithe on all that and I don't
believe that's true.
Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 16 and we'll wrap it up here.
You need to tithe on your personal increase, not the business's savings.
The Bible says in Deuteronomy chapter 14, thou shalt truly tithe all the increase of
thy seed that the field bringeth forth year by year.
So what does God say you have to tithe on?
The increase, right?
And when you read increase, think profit, right?
1 Corinthians chapter 16 verse 1, now concerning the collection of the saints as I have given
order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye upon the first day of the week, let every
one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered him that there be no gatherings
when I come.
So what we tithe on is not, you know, just for small business owners in particular,
it's not just, you know, whatever money comes into the business.
It's whatever you have prospered from that business.
It's your increase.
It's what God has prospered you.
So don't tithe on income that is reserved for expenses.
And again, you know, if you have, these are just some practical tips I kind of wanted
to make here at the end and give to people.
And if you have more questions about that, you can come see me.
I want to, you know, vast majority of people in here probably aren't small business owners,
but you know, hopefully you got something out of that tonight.
And if anything, you know, if you're not tithing, you know, I would encourage you
to start, not because we're up here begging for money or we need it or something.
I would encourage you to do it for your sake, you know, because you don't want
to be the person that's robbing God of what's rightfully his.
And you say, well, I don't know about, well, think of, and I love this.
This is something that's always stuck with me.
Someone said this to me once.
Because I kind of, one time I kind of made a, you know, a smart remark about tithing.
Kind of like, eh, you know, I dissed it or whatever.
And the guy said, well, think about this.
God asks for 10% and lets you keep 90.
And again, the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof.
So, you know, it's not just the tithe is the Lord's.
You know, all of your income is God's.
You know, the Bible says in Deuteronomy that, you know, he is the one
that has given us power to get wealth.
And of course, I'm paraphrasing.
But the only reason you can even get up and go to work is
because God has given you breath that day.
The only reason you even have the ability to make that money is
because God has given you the strength and the wisdom to do so.
And so we're already indebted to him.
And however, in whatever way we prosper, it's all because of him.
All of that money is his.
And God is generous enough to only ask for 10%.
And let you keep 90 of what's his.
Think about it that way.
You know, if you're having a tough time with this,
if you're struggling with this topic, that's a good way to look at it.
At least God's not saying, I'll take 90% and you can have 10.
That would be hard, right?
That would be, I might have some gold teeth up here at that point.
I'm kidding.
Bad joke, right?
But it's not that way.
God says, you know what?
I only need 10.
I'm only asking for 10.
He doesn't need it.
He's saying, just give me the 10.
We learned so many lessons from it about being generous people,
letting go of the things of this world a little bit,
not holding so tightly to things like money,
and getting to see what that, when everyone's pitching in,
everyone's doing their part in giving God what's his,
we can accomplish a lot more.
Like I said, we can have church without a tithe.
We just might do it outside the parking lot.
There won't be any SD card ministries or Indian reservation trips
or all these other things that we get to do as a church.
There's not going to be the church picnic and all
these other things.
So I would encourage you, if you haven't done it, do it.
And if you are doing it, just stay faithful in that.
And we can all just sit back and watch
God bless us and our church.
Let's go and pray.
Dear Lord, again, thank you for the great love
we're with you.
You loved us.
Lord, you've given us so much, Lord, in your son
and his death for us and salvation.
You've given us a great church, great friends,
a great ministry, Lord.
And Lord, you give us what we need every day.
And Lord, help us to trust you for our needs day by day.
And Lord, help us to not rob you.
Help us to be a people that are generous.
And Lord, help us to be an obedient people that want
to please you in this area of tithing.
We pray and ask these things in Christ's name.