Bring your tithe into the storehouse!
By Richard P. Joseph
Perhaps the favorite verse that pastors use to squeeze more money out of their parishioners is 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 preacher will usually get up on his soap box and tell the people that if they tithe then God will bless them with all sorts of material rewards. Then they explain that tithing is 10% of your GROSS income, not your net. This of course would cause most of us to lose our homes. I just got done reading the book of Malachi and, surprise, surprise, I got a slightly different view.
The prophet Malachi was the last recorded prophet before the New Testament. The book was actually written to the priesthood, not to the people in general. It was aimed at the sons of Levi. The priesthood was established by Moses to serve in the temple and was a picture of what the messiah would do in reality. A type and antitype. However, like anything else humans get their hands on, it became corrupt. The priests would actually bribe the sitting king with large sums of money to gain the coveted position of High Priest. Like modern politicians, they would line their pockets with the revenue that was squeezed out of the common man through heavy and burdensome taxation. This is the money that Malachi said never got to the storehouses. The money from the common worker was never in doubt as we are quite familiar with the ruthless methods of the tax collectors and the money changers in the temple courts. The money flowed in but for some odd reason never made it to the storehouses for
proper usage.
“A son honors his father,
And a servant his master.
If then I am the Father,
Where is My honor?
And if I am a Master,
Where is My reverence?
Says the Lord of hosts
To you priests who despise My name.
Yet you say, ‘In what way have we despised Your name?’
Mal 1:6-7
Malachi has strong words for the priests of his day and warned them of the coming doom which finally occurred when John the Baptist began quoting from Malachi during his mission.
So while it is good to support your church, it is the leaders of that church that is responsible for bringing the tithes of the people into the proper storehouses; not in their pockets or in baseball diamonds or into any other ridiculous man made scheme. The storehouse is not necessarily even the church organization like they make you think, it is to be used to advance the kingdom of God and to serve the hurting people.
Tithing is not a New Testament principle as is the case for any law. The old civil law gave way to the personal law. Things of the old covenant are now converted to a personal covenant between the believer and the saviour (see my article “the end of the law”). As far as the book of Malachi is concerned, he warned of the pending doom that Jesus brought with him at his second coming. The evil priesthood ended when the true High Priest overthrew their city and leveled it to the ground and out of the ashes rose the everlasting kingdom of Jesus Christ.
