Regarding the Tithe and "Generational Curses"

Questions

1/9/2002

Hi,

Hoping you might be able to answer a few questions that seem to arise here occasionally as we fellowship with different groups and people.

Question #1—Tithe?? We understand that the Lord now owns us 100% as bond slaves. All we have and are, are His—it is not merely the 10% tithe. The questions are coming from a church background, but people want to know how they are to give, and an explanation of where the money should go. Your input would be appreciated.

Question #2—The sins of the forefathers visited to the third and forth generation?? People are blaming generational curses for family and uncontrolled behaviour, and although that may be legitimate, we feel that a lot of this is to excuse the flesh, e.g. ‘spirit of anger,’ ‘alcoholism,’ etc. Do you have a teaching on this?

Thanks,

Hi...... A computer crash ate my last response a couple of paragraphs into it, but I’ll try again! Do Australian computers crash, too? : )

As for the “generational curses”—that is primarily nonsense. Genetic tendencies, in the flesh, passed down? Sure. Environmental situations setting the next generation up for similar sins? OF COURSE. If you “grew up” around seething sin, hidden or otherwise, it would have an effect and require that you be especially vigilant in those areas of your life, since your unholy environment was creating a hardening and deception within you, if satan has his way.

AND YET!, “A man reaps what he SOWS!” means that the choices we make are what it is all about. We are tempted, ultimately, by the sins we are sowing towards (whether by the environment imposed upon us in the home, or by the environments we choose for ourselves). Ezek.18:19 and the verses around that verse speak of God’s view of “generational sins”—HE will not hold the children responsible for the sins of their fathers!!! So, much of the “doctrine” of “generational sins” is excuse-making, or diverting responsibility from the one sowing the seeds. “Be not DECEIVED. GOD IS NOT MOCKED. A man reaps WHAT HE SOWS.” Apparently, with such strong language, God was aware that someday people would attempt to divert attention from their own responsibility and rebellion, and steal hope from those who could KNOW that they CAN BE FREE! (And not by “hocus-pocus” and séances and “prophetic words” and going to a holy man/witch doctor for exorcism. THAT is not the New Covenant, which is PRIMARILY Internal, “now, through the Son”—not about external things. “No longer will a man say to his neighbor, ‘Know the Lord, know the Lord!’—for they shall ALL know Me, from the least to the greatest.” Certainly, we have to deal with BEINGS named demons or the devil at times—but this is a convenient hiding place for multitudes who just flat BUILD WRONG and then say, like one old-time comedian used to say, “The DEVIL made me do it!” Back to Ezek.18. Even in the OLD Agreement, every man was responsible for his OWN sin, and “HOW MUCH MORE” are we FREE of outside mandates and dictates in THIS Agreement. How can “EVERY MAN BE WITHOUT EXCUSE” (Rom.1)—if things that happened a hundred or a thousand years ago are such influences on us? That makes God a liar. And I’m not going for that. : )

I know I haven’t covered every angle (you should have seen the letter that the computer ate! ;)) but there are SOME thoughts for you. Do you have the video, “Consuming Zeal for the Father’s House: Questions and Answers”? That video speaks to the “tithing” subject. There really are two parts: 1) Is “tithing” (10% given to a “pastor” or otherwise) a NEW Covenant mandate, as it was in the Old? And, 2) What DO we do, in an ORGANIC BIBLICAL environment to respond to what clearly IS the case, and even “Beyond” in the New Covenant—“giving” sacrificially and with FAITH required?

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Practically speaking, we do make available places to “lay by in store” at several different neighborhood locations—for meeting immediate needs in other countries or locally. There are three kinds of New Covenant giving:

One is the daily things we all do.

The second is for a particular Purpose that we are “connected to”—as in the saints in Macedonia giving SPECIFICALLY for the needy Believers in Judea due to the famine there. Or, in Phil.4 where Paul thanks the Saints there for participating in the Work God had given him, “again and again.” These things, and a hundred others today, are where a Believer plugs into a SPECIFIC thing that they desire to serve God’s Purposes in.

Thirdly, there is the “at the apostles’ feet” sort of giving that would be distributed “as anyone had need.” It allowed some quick responsiveness, without having to make special requests for every new thing that comes up. We have no “bank account,” but a couple of brothers oversee that area of things and make sure that the money gets to whatever folks have designated it for—whether printing, or overseas folks in need, or general future needs if those who are giving have no burning conviction about anything specific. No one seeks that the pagan government, Caesar or Nero or USA, “reimburse” them for their gifts to God and His Work—so “deductions” are unnecessary, if not absurd, viewed correctly. We can use worldly logic to try to justify the common practice (“But then we’d have MORE money to serve GOD!,” and other reasonings that the God of the loaves and fishes did not Teach), but attempting to get pagans to reimburse us for our gifts to God will always be just that, in plainest language.)

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Hi,

What about tithing? Where is the storehouse? Is tithing truly an Old Testament law that applies, or is it something different in the New? Jesus only spoke of tithing to rebuke the Pharisees.

Tithing? We have a translation problem again, of course. It means 10%, and can mean nothing else. SO, is there a New Testament application of this? No, there isn’t. Acts 2 and Acts 4, of course, point towards EXCEEDING the righteousness of the Old Testament leaders. If the Old Testament “visual aids” of animal sacrifice, temples and tithing show us the way, the New Covenant is CLEARLY about LIVING SACRIFICES (and Jesus as the ultimate Pascal Lamb), the Body of Christ, the Church as the fulfillment of “temples” (Eph.2:19-22, etc.), and “tithing” as a starting place for realizing that “we are not our own—we are bought for a price.” (You must also incorporate temple worship and 10,000 other “visual aids” of Judaism into your walk, if you wish to incorporate tithing. They are inseparable.)

The point and intention of the “visual aids” of Heb.4-5, 8-10 is this: We own NOTHING, and He is our all in all. Ten percent? No way! Doulos (slaves) don’t make decisions about how much to give to their Masters, of the Master’s own money! So, yes, we live that way. So many stories I could tell you about how IMPOSSIBLE needs were met and things accomplished, because “no one counted their possessions as their own.” Everyone gives as God prospers and leads (no one under compulsion, and everyone decides THEMSELVES with Father), but 10% is surely no more than a guideline, and is exceeded CONSTANTLY.