By David Phillips
Recently, a gospel preacher’s popular blog site featured an article under this title: WHY WE NEED TO STOP TELLING PEOPLE THEY’RE COMMANDED TO GIVE. That’s surely an attention-grabber. However, two separate members of our congregation have come to me, asking my thoughts on the article. After talking with them, it was apparent that they were left with an impression from the article that made them a little bit uncomfortable. After reading the article, I too was left with the impression that the writer wanted me to conclude that there is no New Testament command to give, and that if one doesn’t want to give, it’s okay. Let me quickly say that I believe that if the question were put to that writer in this very simple and direct way, he would likely say, “No, it’s not okay not to give.” At least I hope that would be his position, because I believe the New Testament makes it clear that generous and sacrificial giving is an essential part of the Christian life, without which we cannot go to heaven.
There seems to be an unreasonable idea going around that says we need to stop seeing anything related to New Testament Christianity as “things we are commanded to do.” I understand the reluctance to represent Christianity as being nothing but a legalistic lifestyle of ‘commandment-keeping’, or rule-following. Such a view would pretty much remove the role of God’s grace in our salvation. But you’d need go no further than Romans 6:1-7 to clearly see that as important as grace is, it is not all that is involved. Without obedience to the command to be baptized, one cannot be saved. At the same time, Jesus makes the point in Luke 17:10 that obeying commands is also not everything, for if we obeyed every single command given, God would still not be in our debt for anything, especially for salvation.
It is true, we must understand giving to be far more than just something we do in order to comply with a command. But we also need to understand the other half of the matter: giving is one of a whole multitude of things that make up the business of ‘pleasing God’. These are things that, in the New Testament, He has commanded us to do; things such as singing, and forgiving, and praying, and growing, and teaching, and loving, and on and on. Indeed, we ARE commanded to give. 1 Corinthians 16:2 is the most familiar passage on this, which, as the blogger says, does address the specific issue of the contribution being given for the poor saints of Judea. But it is a passage which is based on NT principle ranging from the Lord’s instruction to …give and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together ye mete it shall be measured to you again… (Lk.6:38) to the practice of the early Jerusalem church of giving into a treasury, described as …at the apostles’ feet (Ac.4:35,37; 5:2). Later, as Paul wrote to the Corinthians about the same matter again, his inspired words included several general principles of righteousness, such as He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully… and God loves a cheerful giver (2 Cor.9:6-7); These are among the many reasons” for Christians, both then and now, to give.
The blogger states concerning our giving on the first day of the week, “Doing so is a blessing in and of itself; but if someone’s heart isn’t in it, they shouldn’t be forced to participate.” Two things: 1) I’m not aware of any occasion when we’ve forced someone to participate in anything here at Redland Road, certainly not giving. But 2) if someone’s ‘heart isn’t in it’ (giving), it is fairly easy to see where their heart is. …for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also (Matthew 6:21).