Give Cheerfully

*Disclaimer- I apologize if I don’t have the correct citations, please contact me if I may have inadvertently quoted someone inappropriately. I give anyone anywhere full use of this sermon in any format for any application with or without citation of me. Its all God’s word. If it blesses you and you want to use it- please do. Would love an email or a facebook connect to let me know, but not required. If you’re a tired pastor having long week- preach this thing word for word with no citation. I don’t care. I just want to help other pastors.

Give Cheerfully (2 Cor. 9:6-8) Tithing sermon *All verses in NKJV*

2 Corinthians 9:6-8, But this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity (or compulsion); for God loves a cheerful giver. 8 And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work.

- Tithing is a spiritual discipline and it is biblical, so we should talk about it.

- A church talking about money doesn’t make it “the prosperity gospel”. There may be some televangelists who want you to pay for their Leer jet or million-dollar home, but “THE church” and the bible don’t support that!

- Before you “check out” thinking this is another self-serving “the church wants my money” type of sermons, I should let you know:

1. It was MY idea to preach on tithing, not Pastor Matt’s.

2. Shelly and I don’t get paid by the church, but we do tithe, so I believe in its purpose, and I have seen the fruit in my life.

3. Faith and Victory Church doesn’t “need” your money. God is our provider. The church finances are just fine. The benefit of tithing is for your life more than anything else.

4. We already took up the tithes. We aren’t taking up a 2nd offering.

- Let’s take a look at tithing in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, and for today:

1. Tithing in the Old Testament.

- Malachi 3:10, Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My house,

And try Me now in this,” Says the Lord of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven

And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough to receive it.

- The prophet Malachi is writing to confront a once great nation that has been struggling with its identity as Children of God for the last several generations.

- The people have been neglecting God’s requirements and have been doing the bare minimum.

- The priests and leaders have become lazy in their duties, and they don’t hold the people accountable to God’s word. Everyone is just going through the religious motions out of obligation.

- They are NOT giving God their best, they are giving God their rest.

- God’s people want His blessings, but don’t want to walk in His commandments.

- The prophet Malachi is trying to motivate God’s people to return to a place of giving cheerfully and with right motives. God wants to bless his people, but first they need to be bless-able!

- Tithe: Literally means 1/10. Always used in context of an offering unto the Lord of some kind.

- The Law of Moses required it, “1/10 belongs to the Lord and is holy.” (Leviticus 27:30)

- The tithe was to support the ministry and honor God:

- Numbers 18:26, “Speak thus to the Levites, and say to them: ‘When you take from the children of Israel the tithes which I have given you from them as your inheritance, then you shall offer up a heave offering of it to the Lord, a tenth of the tithe.”

- Levites were the people chosen by God to dedicate their lives to ministry. They had no other inheritance, and had their needs taken care of through the tithe.

- Levites even “tithed off of the tithe”. That was THEIR first fruits of their increase.

- Typically, a tithe of produce and livestock was given once a year, so there would be food in the temple for the servants of the Lord, and enough to sustain the ministry until the next year.

- Why? Farmers and ranchers only see the “fruits of their labor” once a year.

- This was more valuable than money, because food would sustain them in the present, and the best of the young livestock would sustain them into the future.

- Not just 1/10 of the total, but also the “first fruits” implying their best, the top 10%.