Reflections on God and Money: Giving & Funding (28)

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross…

Philippians 2:3-8

By examining what the Bible says about giving , I hope to have provoked reflection on at least two broad issues. First, how easy it can be for attitudes to giving, and how much to give, to fall outside the ‘Christian’ belief system, making modern fundraising tactics seem inevitable; second, how everything the Bible teaches about giving points us to a lifestyle where the teaching becomes redundant.

I have, for example, met Christians who believe strongly that they are saved by faith and are not required to keep the Old Testament ‘Law’ – the Torah – but who nevertheless think they have an obligation give 10% of their income. I have also come across churches and other ‘Christian’ organisations that state they are wholly dependent on God, and trust him to supply all their needs, but who nevertheless fundraise as if they rely on nothing but money.

My fear is that the fundraising does more to undermine the message of Jesus of Nazareth than individual Christians who hold with mandatory tithing. After all, whether tithing is mandatory or not, it is usually the case that they tend to be far more generous with their money than those who believe they do not need to tithe and give very much less than 10%!

But what should we think of a group of Christians that say, collectively, it serves God and is wholly dependent on him to meet all its needs but issues mailshots trying to provoke emotive responses? At one level, outsiders who can see the discrepancy between word and act may consider those Christians to be either hypocritical or pragmatic, depending on their own view of money. But at a more profound level, what does God make of their split loyalty – of their trying to serve both God and money? Is he likely to favour their activities?

It is tragic when Christians compromise their actions and their beliefs by taking funding from people and organisations that do not share their vision, and so engage in activities they would not otherwise have considered doing and agreeing not to speak of their faith while they do it. Worse of all, therefore, are ‘Christian’ and ‘church’ organisations that offer funding and place those same sorts of constraints on other Christians seeking to serve their communities!

But it seems to me to be a still greater tragedy of fundraising that it succeeds in persuading Christians to give money they could easily have given out of simple devotion to God and love for people.

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Handling money and dealing with debt can be complicated and neither the author nor anyone else involved in the production of these Reflections is responsible for any action you take, or fail to take, based on what is written here. You are invited to put a link on your website to these Reflections. You are welcome to copy these Reflections for personal study or for circulation to family and friends on a non-profit basis. For any other purpose, whether or not for profit, you will require written permission in advance from the author before copying, reproducing or transmitting extracts in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or using any information storage and retrieval system.

Friday, 24 May 2013

Giving & Funding (28)