Robbing God | Eric Mtimkulu

Malachi chapter 3 we begin reading from verse 6 and I read

Malachi 3 · chapter mention

from the ESV version. For I the Lord do not change.

Therefore all children of Jacob are not consumed from the days

of your father's. You have turned aside from a

statute and have not kept them. Return to me and I will return

to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, how shall we

return? Will man rob God?

Yet you are robbing me. But you say, how have we robbed

you in your tithe and contributions?

You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me the whole

nation of bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that they

may be food in my house, and thereby put me to the test.

That, says the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open the windows of

heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there's no

more need, I will rebuke the Devourer for you, so that it

will not destroy the fruits of your soil and your vine in the

field. They shall not fail to bear,

says the Lord of Hosts. Then all nations will come, will

call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the

Lord of hosts. By the way, to Osama Zuin

nastics NNG city Malingualisuway igamala goba when I unvelle O

pagame final a good bongo, a final a good donis take away to

Siako Tama Pam gazulak XNNG city.

By way to Tetanati. There's been no change.

Amen. This morning I want to look at

the subject of the tide under the theme Robbing God.

I'm going to look at it under 3 headings this morning, Israel

lack of generosity, the reality of the curse, and Israel's

motivation for generosity in verse 10 to verse 12.

I do love the confession of one of the members in our community

group who said, you know, it's so wonderful to do the book of

Malachi because really the only part of Malachi most of us know

is this part because apparently it is the pastor's favorite part

of the text. When you have to talk to members

about money. When preachers handle the Bible,

they normally ask a number of questions before they preach or

communicate the biblical text. And the reason we do that, we

want to make sure that we are communicating the text and it's

right context. And often theologians will say

the Bible was not really written for us, but it was written.

It was written not written to us rather, but it was written for

us. And what they mean by that is

that the Bible is written to a particular audience at a

particular time addressing a specific issue.

And I highlighted this for this particular sermon because I want

you to understand there is an audience here.

There are people to which Malachi is addressing.

And so as you read this and you hear the first part of this

sermon, because the way in which I'm going to tackle the sermon

is how the Lord is speaking to that particular audience.

And then the last part of this message, I'll look at that.

What does this mean for us as people in the New Covenant?

And so please listen to me carefully.

There are few well known pastors and leaders who have said

certain things about the issue of the Tides.

I have few big quotes to hear from them.

From those who are well known pastors and many of them leading

mega churches. They say the following.

I didn't want to actually share their names.

I think I thought let's just protect the names.

Here they say the following. If you don't pay tithe, you will

permanently. You are.

You are permanently A beggar. If you don't pay tithe, God will

never be moved by your tears. The key that opens the door to

your main entrance will not open the door to your bedroom.

The foundational key to prosperity is the Kingdom is

tithe. God will never trust the poor

with money because they are not faithful with the tithe.

This one is a classic one. If you don't tithe, you are not

going to heaven. How many of you are not going to

heaven? So let us look at this text in

its immediate and broader context.

We saw in chapter 1, and Hillary had walked us through the love

of God in the manner in which God loved his people.

It is clear from chapter one that God loves Israel.

He not only loves Israel, but He leads with love.

He does not begin in chapter 1 with an imperative, but rather

with an indicative that my people to whom I love and we

would see them from chapter 1 onwards, in part chapter 2, that

the Lord is not pleased with the priest as I am bringing to the

Lord a wounded and deformed sacrifices and the kind of

worship to which the Lord does not want.

It is a hard hearted worship. It is a cheap kind of worship

where they're giving God leftovers and God is not

pleased. It says in fact you are

polluting my name and the accused God of being unjust.

What we see from chapter one part in chapter 2 is really that

the people of God do not care about worship.

They do not care about how God ought to be worshipped.

And we see that they are failing God.

They are rebelling against God and God charges them.

He charges the preacher that I do not like what you are doing

and in fact there is judgment for what you are doing.

And Tawanda pointed us last week that there is a glimmer of hope.

It is because there is a messenger that the Lord is going

to send. And we know that messenger, of

course, will be Jesus Christ. These are the people of God who

are breaking the law of God, and yet God loves them.

This is the story of unfaithfulness, but also a story

of a faithful God that regardless of your obedience, as

my people, God says I have chosen you, I have forgiven you,

but also I love you. And how does God show this?

God continues to provide land for them, He provides food, He

protects them. He showed his people that I

indeed I love you. And now we see another charge

from God. This charge is slightly

different because when you read part of chapter 1 and chapter 2,

the charge is against the priest.

But as we read on from chapter 3 is that now the charge is not

only primarily against the priest, but it is against the

people of God. Because the people of God have

also spoken against God, but also they are stealing and

robbing God. He is addressing them from

chapter 3 onwards that you are stealing for me.

And so the Lord here shows us the failure of Israel, God's

people in pain, the tithe. They are not giving the tithes,

nor are they giving the offerings that they ought to

give to God. And God rebukes his own people.

So let's look at the first point, Israel's lack of

generosity, these amazing language here from verse 8.

It's it's quite an amazing language that God use here,

really. He uses the rhetoric question.

The question is, will a man rob God?

That's quite interesting. When you look at the verb there,

the verb gives us a sense in which it is to take something to

mark or to forcibly take something from someone.

And so the question may sound a little bit ridiculous to us in

our daily, in our world, when will a man rob God?

The picture is one who is taking something from God.

And so we would expect the response to be negative because

clearly no man can rob God. But interesting when you look

through verse 8B, God in response through the prophet

says you are robbing me. So that's the answer.

But an interesting answer because it is an expected divine

answer to a Rotary question that indeed you are robbing me.

In fact, it's like God saying to them, you have figured out a way

to rob me and you've done it and say, and, and so they ask

themselves, how have you done that?

How have you robbed your God? Surely no one can rob the

sovereign and supreme God. But yes, you figured it out.

And they asked how, how have we done that?

And the charge is, yes, you have done it because you have kept

the tithe and you have kept your contributions.

Why? Because I have commanded you as

part of the Mosaic law that you give the tithe and you give the

offering and you withhold that and you did not give.

So you have learned how to rob me.

Now the language of God saying you have robbed me possibly to

to the people of Israel at the time sounded unfair to them.

We must remember as we read the book in context that as they

came from exile, we must know that these people came and they

were poor, they didn't have much.

And so for God to them to expect 10 tenth of what they have, it's

probably God that's ridiculous because you know, we don't have

much. We have no infrastructure, many

of us don't have land. The economy is depressed.

How can you want more from us? And yet we have less and God

says I want my tithe. You are robbing me would sound

as though God please give us a break.

You know we are poor. You know we don't have Why would

you expect us to give tithe and then the second question is

being asked. You have robbed me of my a

response from God. You have robbed me of my tithe

and offering. So then we must ask the

question, what is this tide? What is this offering that the

Lord refers to here? And I'm sure many of you would

know that the, the, the tide in the Old Testament was 1/10 of

person's income or, or production of what was given to

the Lord for in service to the Lord.

And often that would be wine, it will be livestock, it would be

oil, or it will be fruit, whatever that was the IT will be

given. And I'm going to tell you who it

was given to. And we see these pictures of

giving and tithe in the Old Testament from Abraham giving a

tithe to Melchizedek, but also Jacob in Genesis 28, verse 22,

Genesis 28:22

vowing to the Lord that I am going to give the tithe.

So what was the purpose of the tithe in the Old Testament #1

The purpose of the tithe was to fulfill and to support the

ministry of the Levites. That was the first purpose of

the tide. So we read in Numbers 1821, I

give to the law. I give to the Levites all the

tides in Israel as their inheritance in return for the

work they do while serving at the 10th of the meeting.

So the tithe was given to the Levites, OK, For because the

Levites had no inheritance, they were those who had no

inheritance. They were not farming, and so

they were depending on the tide. So the tide was to provide for

the living of the Levites. Because we know that the Levites

had many responsibilities in the Temple, and so because they had

to look after the temple and many other responsibilities

within the temple, they did not have any inheritance.

Though the people of Israel and many other people from other

tribes had to actually support the Levites.

This is how the Levites survived.

Not only that, but the livers would take the tithe, and from

that tithe they would give part of it to the priest as well.

So it was the tithe of a tithe, receiving it to look after them,

but also to give part of that to the priest as well.

So in order for the livers to survive, they were given the

tithe to live off the tithe. So it was to support that kind

of ministry, for them to support their families and to look after

the ministry of the Lord #2 the tide was provided for those who

were economically vulnerable. In Deuteronomy 1428, verse 29,

at the end of every three years, you shall bring out of all the

tide of your produce in the same year and lay it up within your

towns. And the Levite, because he had

no portion or inheritance with you.

And the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow who

are with your town shall come and eat and be filled, that the

Lord your God may bless you in all your work of your hands that

you do so. The second reason that the Lord

had one of the tide was that the tide would be given to support

those who were vulnerable. It was to support the widows.

It was to support the offense. It was to support the poor.

It was also to support the foreigner.

So those who did not have much in the community, the Lord says,

bring the tithe, support the device, but also support the

vulnerable, give to those who don't have much.

There's a third reason why the Lord instituted the tide #3 the

the tide was to facilitate the celebration of the people of

God. In Deuteronomy 1423, the

Israelites were meant to bring and eat together at the temple

as part of that annual feast celebrating their identity as

the people of God. And so the Israel of most of the

time they had to remember a God who had taken them away or

released them and delivered them from slavery.

And so giving a tide was to acknowledge the goodness and the

mercy of God will deliver them in Egypt and had given them a

land. So it was given as a motivation

of gratitude of what the Lord has done.

It was not an obligation in some sense, but also it was a sense

of gratitude, recognizing the graciousness of God.

So the way in which Israel would respond by faith would be to

give a tithe to the Lord. So the purpose of the tithe is

looking after the Levites, but also is to look after those who

are economically vulnerable. But also it was to celebrate the

goodness of the Lord among the community as well, to respond

with a gracious but also a generous heart and giving the

tithe. And so the people of God had had

to remember all the time what the Lord had done.

But here is what is important. It was also for them to remember

that everything they had belonged to the King of kings

and the Lord of Lords, that it was the Lord we actually gave

the fruit of the land. In other words, everything they

were able to produce in their farming in one sense did not

belong to them. The 100% belong to God.

And God says to them, allow you keep the 90, keep the 90.

I just want the 10, just want the 10.

And he says this in Deuteronomy chapter 8 verse 17 and 18.

Deuteronomy 8:17

Beware lest you say in your heart my power and my might of

my hand has gotten me wealth. You shall remember the Lord your

God, for it is he who gives you power to gain wealth, that he

may confirm the covenant that we saw to your Father's.

And it is this day. Psalm 24, verse one.

The earth is the Lord, and the fullness there of the world and

those who dwell therein. And so through the tithe, it is

for Israel to acknowledge that it is the Lord that has given

them the the wealth. It is the Lord that gives the

ability for one to acquire the wealth.

And the Lord reminds them that in fact, the whole world, the

whole land belongs to me. And so whatever you are able to

produce, listen, it's not because you are smart, it is

because I'm giving it to you. It is my doing as confirming my

covenant to you. So what you have, you have it

because of me and the people here of Israel are dodging the

tithe. Now there are implications in

dodging the tithe according to God.

One, they are defunding the religious system because it

means if the people of Israel are not paying the tithe, it

means the the Levites have got nothing to work with.

They can't support their families.

The Levites can't do their job at the temple or look after

their families as well. It also means the social

structures of of the celebrations are also affected.

But it also means if they are, they are they are they are

dodging the tide. It also means that you cannot

support the vulnerable as well. And so the Lord is against this

kind of worship, which is a wrong kind of worship, a kind of

worship that is not obedient to that which the Lord expects them

to do. And the Lord had warned them

before that the kind of worship you're giving to me is polluted.

In other words, your hearts are not in this.

The point here is this. It is not because the Lord

wanted their money, to use our language of our deck.

It is not because the Lord wanted their money.

The Lord does not need our money.

But more importantly, the Lord longed for their hearts.

And the reason for that is where your treasure is, that is where

your heart is also. And the question here is, who do

you love first? So Israel, who do you love

first? Who?

Who do you prioritize Israel in your budgeting?

Because the Lord knows, and we know too, that money has a

spiritual power. And hold on us if you don't

believe me, go and visit the casino.

If you don't believe me, look at believers who are playing Lotto

every day. Money generally has a hold on

one's heart. Yes, that is why we see many

warnings in the biblical text as it relates to money.

Because of possessions, because of having nice stuff, whether

it's nice clothes, it's a nice phone, it's a nice car.

Whether it is to impress people. Often money has that kind of

hold in US and it wants to enslave us and the times it may

even destroy us. Why?

Because when we love money that much, we can actually end up

worshipping money as well. And so there's a warning to the

Israelites. Give what we had promised to

give to me as per. My law, Billy Graham says the

following Tell me what you think about money and I will tell you

what you think about God. For these two are inseparable.

And the whole point here is show me your bank account and I will

show you what you worship. The Kingdom of God has rewards.

And when I say the Kingdom of God has rewards, it's not a

promise to say if you give money, you're going to be rich.

That's not the point of the text.

But also part of that giving is that it frees us from being a

slave by money. And so the question I think we

have to ask ourselves is can I trust God with every aspect of

my life? Because.

Because when that salary hits the bank account on the 20th,

the 20 fee through the 31st or whatever the date may be

already. As you think about your budget,

a number of questions run to your mind.

The first one is, will I survive with this?

Will I be able to pay all of my expenses and all the things that

I need to do? And already the money's hitting

the bank account and you're already paralysed by fear and

anxiety. Or will I make it?

And yet Jesus, quite interestingly in Matthew 6,

reminds his audience, being there with the disciples and the

samoon on the mount that listen to me guys, I feed the birds.

And guess what? If I feed the birds, are you not

much more worthy than the birds? Therefore, why are you worried?

You are made in my image and I care about you, therefore I will

take care of you. He does not promise to give us

our luxuries. He does not promise to give us

our Gucci's. He does not promise to give us

an expensive brand, but he promises to give us what to eat

and to wear. That is the promise of Scripture

and that often anxiety over money can lead to greed, but

also it can lead to wanting other people's stuff felt like

that like Psalm 73 kind of first Lord, I'm seeing the prosperity

of the wicked and can we can feel like that You see the

prosperity of others think, oh, I wish it was me and because

when money takes hold of us, that's what it it does.

And so here's the question ask the people of Israel.

It says to them, return to me. The question is how, how Lord

are we ought to return to you? The Lord said it's simple, give

to me, stop robbing me, stop stealing from me.

That's the way for you to return.

That's what it says. And the Lord also speaks here

about offerings that they were not only holding the tithe, they

were also holding the offerings of the contributions.

And normally these would be the the free will offerings that

would be given for the add many purposes.

One of the purposes it was for the temple as well.

So people would come and give free will offerings to the

temple and others would come and give gold.

And there were many other things that the people of Israel were

expected to give beyond just the tithe #2 the, the, the reality

of the curse. And so the Lord says, if you do

not do this, there is a reality of the curse.

If you don't stop robbing me, I'm going to curse you guys.

And it says to them, you are under a curse a whole nation

because you are robbing me. Look at that verse.

Look at that warning. Feel the weight of that warning

to the audience. This was written too.

It says if you don't obey, I'm going to curse you.

If you don't obey, you will be under my curse because to rob

God is to shoot yourself in the foot.

It says you can't rob me. If you do fail to obey this

command, I am going to curse you because you've gone away from

obeying My law, but also you've gone away from obeying My

ordinances that establish with you as my people.

You are cursed as a nation because you are robbing me of

the tithe, You're robbing me, and you are refusing to honor

Me. Proverbs 11/24 says there is one

who scatters yet increases all the more, and there is one who

withhold what is justly due, but the result only in want.

These are the outworkings of the curse because when we when they

disobey God, when they don't give the 10th to God, they are

robbing God of his glory. That's what disobedience does.

It robs God of his glory. And so the consequences of

keeping the tithe, eating the tithe, not giving the offerings,

it's simple. You'll be under a curse.

And now the Lord is so gracious, he, he, he wants to motivate

Israel to giving. It's wonderful.

I love when I read this text like this.

You can see the Lord's heart, the Lord's love, the Lord's

forgiveness, and how much he loves his chosen people.

And then it says, OK guys, I'm just going to motivate you.

Let me motivate you in giving. And we can see that from verse

11:50. This is the Lord's motivation.

And the Lord promises 3 things to them.

One, He promises them a blessing #2 and assurance of protection

#3 the promise of fruitfulness. I want you to notice for me from

verse 10, that promise of a blessing, that Israel, if you

are faithful to me, I in fact, the Lord, I am going to bless

you. And these Israel's already poor.

As I've said to you before, these were poor people.

And the Lord says, I'm going to bless you.

Trust me. If you give your 10th, if you

give the offerings, I am going to bless you.

I know that your fields are not yielding much crop.

I know that I'm the Lord. I know that I know that you

don't have much. I know that you have a lot to

complain about because you simply don't have everything you

need. But it says to them, I want you

to do something for me. Bring the whole tithe into the

storehouse so that there may be food in my house.

I love the next part. Test me in this and see if I

will not open the windows of heaven.

Pour out a blessing until it overflows.

And the wonderful thing here is whether I can I trust myself or

can I trust God. But it says I we don't have much

I could find but test me. Isn't that wonderful?

Those test me and see if I will not open the windows of heaven

and pour out a blessing because in difficult times and in times

of lack, often for the people of Israel as well, is that we want

to skip giving what we have to give to the Lord.

This is the temptation for the people of Israel because they

were of course struggling with this, and the Lord gives them a

wonderful promise. If you give, I'm going to pull

out a blessing and they'll be food in my house.

Here's the second promise. He promises them protection that

if you give, I will rebuke the devourer for you, that you will

not destroy the fruits of the ground.

And so he says to them, listen, if if you give to me, I promise

to spare, I promise to mitigate, I promise to alleviate the

curse. This is what I'm going to do,

people of Israel, if you do that and, and, and I promise you

what, what, what a wonderful motivation for generosity to say

to them what you don't have. If you do give, you will have

it. This is a, this is a, this is a

protection to Israel to say, I will cause your ground to give

much fruit. I will, I will cause for you not

to lose profit, rather to gain more income.

I will increase the fruitfulness of your labour and I will keep

the locust away. I will protect what destroys the

ground. I will protect you from the

devourer, the only thing I want from you if the tank, and this

is what I do. And so if you're not making

profit, test me, Maybe you'll make profit because I will

rebuke the devourer. The third motivation from the

Lord, he says, if you give. So the first one is I promise

you a blessing #2 I promise you protection, and #3 I promise you

fruitfulness. So the assurance of protection,

but also I promise you fruitfulness.

It says to them, I will bless you and all nations will call

you blesh, for you will be the land of delight, says the Lord

of Host. It is as though the Lord saying

all nations will recognize Israel because of what I have

done in not cursing Israel, but also in blessing my people.

The Lord does not leave them in their wonder.

It still motivates them to be generous and to give to him.

And I think that's the challenge that Malachi brings to us today.

And so I know probably the question that you have in your

mind now is, Eric, that's the old covenant.

Should Christian in the new covenant tie?

I think that's the big question in this room.

Let me be specific with you that the new the in the New Testament

there is no specific command for believers to tie.

The biblical text does not actually mention that in the New

Testament as they command in the new covenant for believers to

tie. There is no instruction in the

new covenant for believers to tie.

In fact, the apostle Paul, who was largely focusing on the

Gentile churches, Corinthians, Galatians, and and and and and

and and and Colossi, would have spoken about the tithe if you

wanted to, if you needed to, rather than want to do if you

needed to, because these were gentle believers.

They did not know much about the law of Moses.

And yet the apostle Paul in all of these churches does not speak

about the tithe, nor does Jesus himself encourage or command

these disciples to tie. So we don't see that sort of

language in the New Testament. However, there is something that

we see in the New Testament which I think is important for

us to note. There is some evidence in the

New Testament that not not not encouraging tithing, but they

encourage generosity. And the Africa Study Bible says

is the following. Giving is an act of worship,

holy and pleasing to God. And so in the New Testament we

don't see much of the language of the tithe, but we see a

language of generosity. In other words, it is a language

that does not limit us to a principle of tithe, but a

language that seems to speak to us about giving beyond the

tithe. And that often other pastors

will say we ought to see the tithe as the floor and we see

generosity as a ceiling because we are giving to God.

In 2nd Corinthians 9, verse 7, it says each of you should give

what you have decided in your heart, not reluctantly, not

under compulsion. For God loves a cheerful giver.

New Testament, the Lord loves a cheerful giver.

So we're not going to manipulate you to give.

We're going to force you to give that it would be against the

Bible, but we would encourage you to give 2nd Corinthians 8

verse 2 says in the midst of a various year via trial via

overflowing joy and the extreme poverty world up in rich

generosity. Here is a poor church, here a

poor, and yet what is being highlighted about this church is

their generosity as the poor as they were, they were so generous

in their given the the New Testament makes no prescription,

but the New Testament encourages generosity and giving.

But perhaps it may be a suggestion that perhaps the the

starting point for some of us may be a tie there as a starting

point, but also is part of our discipline, but not under

compulsion, giving generous, generous and cheerfully as well.

Now I want you to notice three things in the text that we've

read. I'm nearly done.

I want you to notice three things that the tide was used

for in the context of Malachi and think about the same things

in the context of the New covenant in the New Testament,

The Old Testament, the the the the tide was fulfilling specific

purposes in the Old Testament, but think about the same things

about fulfilling the Old Testament.

Think about them in the New Testament because verse 6 remind

us that the Lord does not change.

I I think this thing still remain with us that in some

sense, when we are generous, we are still supporting the work of

the ministry. When we are generous, we are

also we live in poverty because we're able to give to many

initiatives that our congregation has in relation to

live in poverty. But also as we are, when we're

generous, we are also sharing in hospitality to use that the Lord

has given us to steward it within this congregation and to

meet the needs of this congregation because the Lord

does not change the same three things in the Old Testament.

I think in fact, they still apply to us today.

So I want to suggest to you 6 things.

I'm just going to put them up there and we're going to explain

them. Number one, we give because of

the grace of God. We give in tough times.

We give joyfully and cheerfully. We give out of the love of the

Lord. We give sacrificially, meaning

we give beyond at times. The last one we give generously.

Weinberg should be gospel motivated in giving, not under

manipulation. Just like the Malachi addresses

this community, we are too commanded to be generous.

Generosity that is rooted in our heart, acknowledging the fact

that the Lord has been generous to us and using all things that

the Lord has given us to acknowledge that He is the one

who owns all things, but also the what we has given us the

ability to own or to earn whatever we have.

And so the issue here is not to tie the law around your neck,

but to encourage you to be generous in your gift.

I think that's the main principle that we learn from

this text. God bless you.