Family!

This last Sunday we had “the Talk.”

In most families, having “the Talk” means talking about sex. However, when it comes to religious dialog in our culture, sex is not really the most forbidden or awkward topic.

For churches or religious institutions in our society, it’s money that’s taboo to talk about.

The taboo on religious speech about money represents a kind of schizophrenic outlook within American culture. For, as the cultural narrative has demonstrated in the last year, money, the economy and finances are pervasive topics in American conversation. In our world, we understand money to have significant social implications. Recent high-profile fraud, embezzlement, credit and bankruptcy cases have shown that the ways in which we handle money are broadly recognized to have legal and moral aspects to them.

At the same time, strangely enough, addressing money and its uses is generally frowned upon in the religious sphere, which happens to be the primary arena for moral discussion in our society!  Somehow, every other organization and institution is expected to make money a key part of its communication, except the church. At the least, such a stance is not consistent; at the worst, it’s prejudicial and selectively oppressive to religious institutions.

The Bible does not avoid addressing money any more than it avoids addressing other areas of moral, social and spiritual activity. The Bible sees the use of money as an area of spiritual concern that has deeply significant social, ethical and moral features. Money is a fairly neutral tool in itself, but as a tool it easily and quickly takes on the values, characteristics and intentions of the person who is wielding it. This is what gives money its other, “higher” qualities. As Christians, our money should carry the characteristics of Christian life. We need to heed what the Bible instructs us in financial concerns as much as we heed it in any other aspect of human life.

Last Sunday, as we looked to the scriptures for how to relate money to the church, we examined four basic principles. We started at the “lowest” or most base principle and moved to the “highest.”

The first or lowest principle of money and the church is pragmatic exchange. This is the idea of quid pro quo, or “bang for the buck.” It means that something like money is given in exchange for something else, like a product or service. This is the biblical principle that “a workman is worthy of his hire” (Mt. 10.10)

On a practical level, certain services, such as health insurance, auto insurance, memberships or retainers give money for a service presence whether or not specific services are rendered. As members, few people want to use their health insurance or auto insurance more. Most want to use them less. In these instances, we do not pay for direct services rendered; we pay for the institution to be there for when we need those services to be rendered.

As an institution, the church functions as a kind of Spiritual-Health Maintenance Organization. It uses resources constantly to maintain a high level of availability and standard of care. Its members “pay” to keep its functionality high whether or not they receive or see direct benefit from that giving. We tend to have very high standards for the quality of care available from a church. If we have those standards, we need to remember that those standards are being maintained whether or not we are “using” them and we need to support their maintenance. Just as we expect and pay for hospitals to be open and ready, with everything running and skilled personnel at hand, whether we are sick or not, we should be ready to pay for the church also to be open and maintained.

Questions for consideration:  

• How much do I pay for various insurance services every month compared to how much I “pay” for church?
• If I were to pay a non-religious organization for “24-7″ support and readiness services similar to what the church provides (counseling, emergency response, life-coaching, personal development, social events and activities, adult and youth education, for example) how much might that cost me?

Moving “up” the scale of principles, the second principle is participation or solidarity.  This is the principle that “we are members, one of another.” Its basic premise is that if one participates in a group or society, one is responsible for contributing to group function. This is the principle that undergirds the idea of taxation. Every participant in the society benefits from the overall operation and infrastructural presence of the group and the group in turn has some right to the production of every participant. Every participant is thus obligated (socially, legally and morally) to give the group its “due.”

In the Old Testament, the principle of solidarity was expressed through tithing. The levites and priesthood functioned on behalf of the whole group toward God and performed the religious functions that upheld Israel’s social identity and that brought cohesion and order to the nation. In return, the people were obligated to give ten percent of their gross (called “firstfruits”) production to sustain the levites and priests (Prov. 3.9,10; Mal. 1)

We do not decide if we want to pay taxes that are used for diffused societal purposes such as social welfare, national defense, scientific research, justice, environmental care and other ends. Sometimes tax funds are used in ways that we don’t particularly agree with. We do not have the option to decide where these taxes go or how much to pay; we only have the choice of whether or not to be a part of the group. If we are part, we pay.

Questions for consideration:

[The average believer gives about 2.7% of income to religious institutions and spends about 6.9% on entertainment.] 

• How much does what I pay in taxes on every purchase (8.75%) compare to what I give to God on every transaction?
• If taxes were as optional as religious giving is considered to be, what would our society look like?

The third principle that we looked at on Sunday was the principle of fruitfulness. Jesus taught that “concern for riches and the cares of this world” are things that strangle one’s response to the gospel and make one “unfruitful” (Mt. 13). He also taught that “it is better to give than to receive” and that riches made it “impossible” for the rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Paul wrote to the Philippians (Phil 4) that he sought for them to give money so “that fruit might abound to your account.” 

The Bible associates giving money to God with personal growth and freedom. If we want to grow and get past blockages in our personal development, giving is a critical discipline to maintain. 

Question for consideration: 

• Am I free with giving my money to God or am I anxious about it?
• How much of my life’s anxieties and efforts are centered around money?
• Do I want to grow in freedom, spirituality and in discipline?

The fourth and highest principle is very simple. It is the principle of the New Testament church described in Acts 2 and summed-up by Paul in Gal. 2.20,

I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless, I live.

Yet not I, but Christ lives in me,

and the life which I now live in the flesh,

I live by the faith of the Son of God,

who loved me and gave himself for me.

The New Testament principle is stewardship. Stewardship means that we are custodians of another’s funds. If one holds funds in trust as a steward, one cannot treat those funds as one’s own any more than a banker can take from the till or a fund manager from the capital. Spending them as one’s own constitutes fraud and embezzlement.

In this highest principle, since all we are has been purchased by Jesus’ blood, all that we have is held in trust on God’s behalf. Its first and primary use is to be for worship, in God’s service and for his glory. From our stewardship funds we request of God a part for our own maintenance.

Question for consideration:

• If I treated all of my income as a non-profit fund that I managed on behalf of a religious trust, how would I spend it?
• What percentage would I expect a financial manager to receive from a fund that s/he managed?

May the Lord meet us all with conviction, responsibility, courage, freedom and joy of thanksgiving as we live in Christian relationship to money!