God's Gift of Money: Devotions from Time of GraceSample

Who, me? A thief?

Theft is one of the most discouraging of all crimes. How your hearts sinks to discover your car stolen or your home broken into. How the victims fantasize about sweet revenge on the thieves. We despise them.

Do you know any thieves? Is it possible you are one? Perhaps you’ve never stolen a car. But is God talking to you along with the Israelites that the prophet Malachi addressed? “Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. But you ask, ‘How do we rob you?’ ‘In tithes and offerings.’ Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse” (Malachi 3:8,10).

God thinks that the entire earth belongs to him and that all our material possessions, including our income stream, come from him. God thinks that he has spectacularly blessed each one of us. When people refuse to return to God an honorable portion of that God-given income, he views it as robbery.

This would be a great moment to pause and review your charitable giving plan. Would God call your offerings to him honorable? pathetic? mediocre? robbery? admirable?