Money Matters: Devotions from Time of GraceSample

Giving Money God’s Way: Whose Money Is It Anyway?

If you talk to people who dislike church (a.k.a. “organized religion”), high on the list of most-hated features is what they see as institutional money hustling. While most ministries authentically seek to reach out to people’s souls, sometimes all visitors see (or choose to see) is the church reaching out for their wallets.

The real reason why Christian ministries gather offerings of money from worshipers and members is not because God is broke and in need of our contributions. “I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. . . . The world is mine, and all that is in it” (Psalm 50:9,10,12).

The real reason is that giving money (and our time and skills) is an act of worship by which we assert over and over, to the world and to God and to ourselves, that we are thrilled to be allowed to be managers and stewards of money that actually doesn’t belong to us. We love to give gifts back to God because he first loved us so much, that he gave his only Son.