Giving Series Intro - Giving As Worship

Giving is an essential part of Christian worship. Every church is sustained by the generosity of its members and supporters. While the scriptures give us a wealth of instruction on giving, it is often a topic either misused or avoided altogether. This is nothing new to the church. Throughout church history, there are many examples of how giving was taught poorly. Some streams of Christianity taught giving as a means of paying for your sins or helping loved ones get out of purgatory (As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs). More recently, the prosperity gospel has taken root, telling us that giving is a way to get more from God (in a most material sense). The common thread is that giving is motivated by guilt, pressure, or false promises. The result is that false teachers fill their own pockets while church members get scammed. And eventually, people grow skeptical and weary of the topic. A few weeks ago, I talked with a former church planter who shared that he avoided teaching on giving because of how poorly it has been done. He didn’t want people to lump his church in with the false teaching that seems to corner the market on the subject. While the church has mishandled the topic of giving in many ways, we both agreed that it is a vital part of Christian worship.

Thankfully the scriptures give us clear instructions that can help us talk about giving in a way that returns it to its proper context of worship. A quick survey of some key scriptures offers helpful principles for giving. Proverbs 3:9 instructs us to honor the Lord with our wealth and the first fruits of our produce. We learn in 2 Corinthians 9:7-8 that God loves a cheerful giver who gives from the heart. Giving should not be under compulsion or from outward religious pressure. Matthew 6:3-4 reminds us that giving is not meant to impress others. While our giving supports ministries run by people, it’s ultimately not to impress them but to honor God (who sees what we give in secret). So we give without making a show of it to others. I could list a dozen other scriptures, but you get the point.

From the very earliest days of the church, giving has been an essential part of Christian worship. We see in Acts 2:42-47 that the church was radically generous, not because of outward pressure or profiteering preaching but rather hearts filled with the Holy Spirit. There was a spirit of grace-enabled generosity that they were selling possessions to meet the needs of others in the church. Generosity happened in their sharing of ordinary life and within the regular practice of gathered worship. When rightly guided by the scriptures, giving in worship helps form a biblical view of giving. 

I share all this to emphasize that giving is vital to Christian worship. While it has been misused, we can’t neglect it in our lives or gathered worship. If we agree that giving is a critical part of Christian worship, what does that mean for how we structure it in our worship? And how do we handle that responsibly once we begin practicing giving in our corporate worship? How do we steward what is given with integrity and transparency? 

Through this short series of posts on giving, I aim to explore these questions while offering some practical wisdom and resources. In my next post, I expand on how we might incorporate giving into our worship gathering.

If you want to read more on giving as worship, I recommend this article by Tim Keller - https://www.redeemer.com/redeemer-report/article/the_gospel_and_giving