Day 37, April 4, 2007
“…test me now in this” is a rare word in the scriptures. God is inviting us to take this principle He’s articulating, out for a ‘test drive’ as it were. What’s the test? “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse…(and see) if I will not open the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.”
God is speaking plainly here. He’s inviting us to order our financial and material lives according to His priorities, inviting us to offer him that ‘first portion’ of material lives (commonly considered as 10%), trusting that He will respond by pouring out blessing in our lives. Critics and cynics don’t like this little passage because they say that those who give in order to receive blessing aren’t giving for the right reasons. Such reasoning misses the point. God is speaking to us as His children. Knowing that we’re fearful, prone to hording and misusing resources, and fearful of tomorrow, He, as our loving Creator, says this: “Don’t worry! If you can learn to trust Me, you’ll also learn that I’ll take care of you. But you can’t learn unless you actually do trust me, and that trust will be revealed by whether you’re willing to lose that tight grip on your money. Trust me by giving, and watch how I bless your life – providing all that you need for all that I’ve called you to do and be.”
This all boils down to what God has been trying to show us all along: If we’ll live our lives with a sense of dependency rather than a sense of autonomy, we’ll more fully enter into the life God had in mind for us. By ordering our lives according to His priorities, we’ll find the space, the strength, the resources, not to do everything this world tells us we need to do, but everything God calls us to do – and along the way, we’ll recover some blessings. There are too many stories confirming the ‘test drive’ principle to share in this limited space, but I’ll allude to two: A couple begins to tithe, which leads to the canceling of cable TV, which leads to conversations around the dinner table now, rather than around the television. Another couple begins to give in accordance with God’s plan, and an amazing set of circumstances opens up for them, a larger cash flow, and even greater means to give.
In all my years of ministry, I’ve yet to hear someone say to me: “I put God to the test, and ordered my life according to His financial priorities and He let me down.” I pray that we, both individually and collectively, will have the courage to move from a posture of autonomy to that of dependency, so that we might better function as channels of His blessing.
posted by Richard Dahlstrom @ 10:41 AM
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