I am assuming that you are familiar with common teachings on tithing. If not, a search engine will dig up plenty of material on the subject.
This page is under construction. It has been put on line incomplete so that my friends can access it & comment.
Being lazy, I don't intend re-writing what other people have have written.
I'm a sceptic. God performs miracles, but I do not believe that everything touted as a miracle from God really is.
Title of a thought-provoking book by well-known British author, John White. Inter-Varsity Press, ISBN 0-85110-872-5
When the OT talks about tithing, it also mentions the need to help "widows & orphans". Welfare is a topic usually conspicuously absent from Sunday money-raising spiels.
Ten-fold increase. Surely this is the solution to world poverty. I would be interested to speak to Christians in poverty-stricken regions. I don't mean ones with Internet access, I'm talking about basket-case regions with extreme entrenched poverty.
When was the last time you heard this passage preached on?
Eat the tithe of your grain, new wine and oil, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks in the presence of the LORD your God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name, so that you may learn to revere the LORD your God always.
But if that place is too distant and you have been blessed by the LORD your God and cannot carry your tithe (because the place where the LORD will choose to put his Name is so far away), then exchange your tithe for silver, and take the silver with you and go to the place the LORD your God will choose. Use the silver to buy whatever you like: cattle, sheep, wine or other fermented drink, or anything you wish. Then you and your household shall eat there in the presence of the LORD your God and rejoice. And do not neglect the Levites living in your towns, for they have no allotment or inheritance of their own.
At the end of every three years, bring all the tithes of that year's produce and store it in your towns, so that the Levites (who have no allotment or inheritance of their own) and the aliens, the fatherless and the widows who live in your towns may come and eat and be satisfied, and so that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.
At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.
Dueteronomy 14:23-15:1, NIV
See comments on this passage in Tithing or Truth .
I had occasion to visit a variety of local churches in the course of organising a trans-denominational event. It was interesting to compare the "traditional" churches with those I have mostly attended. I noticed the following:
Obviously, any group which does anything will incur costs, which must be met somehow.
Theology has been reduced to a name-it-and-claim-it gospel that sanctifies consumer-oriented capitalism & all it has to offer as an expression of God's grace. 1
.....the gospel interpretation they favour constitutes a theological endorsement of private enterprise capitalism. 1
Under its influence.....generally less concerned with the welfare of others than with their own path to personal salvation and material success. 1
This style of theology has evolved in the USA over the last two or three centuries. Much of it has been in response to churches feeling the need to compete against the world, and against other churches, in a competitive, free-enterprise environment. There are books on this subject.
The emphasis should be on following Christ, not on giving money. If people are truly following God, they will give money according to His will. If the church can't meet its budget, it should harangue God, not the people.
It is probably easier to get people to tithe than to get then to really follow God. Cults have the highest rates of tithing.
Some of the strongest churches are underground. Underground churches have very small budgets, as there is not much they can spend money on. They don't have property, auditoriums, schools or video projectors, and a p.a. system would probably get them arrested. The underground church in Coober Pedy* is an obvious exception. :-)
I do wish we had more comfortable chairs, not those plastic stackables which try to rearrange my spine. :-)
References
1. Jesus loves y'all, Chris McGillion, Spectrum, Sydney Morning Herald, Sept 2, 2000.
* For those who don't know, almost everything in the outback opal mining town of Coober Pedy is underground. Want to extend your house? Grab the jack hammer!