Mammon and the Heart

Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High, and he blessed Abram, saying, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth. And blessed be God Most High, who delivered your enemies into your hand.” Then Abram gave him a tenth of everything. Genesis 14:18-20 “Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me. “But you ask, ‘How do we rob you?’ “In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse—the whole nation of you—because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit,” says the Lord Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the Lord Almighty. Malachi 3:8-12 “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money. Matthew 6:24 Tithing: it's not about the money, folks, and never has been. There is a long standing debate about whether we should pay tithes on net or on everything, the gross income. It's not about God needing our money because He owns everything, including what you might think is yours. It's all about the condition of our hearts, and the level of real faith, the actual measure of who is really first in our hearts, and our lives. It's about learning to get ourselves out of the way, crucifying our selfish desires and making the Lord preeminent in all things. We can't serve two masters. We aren't fooling anyone, not ourselves, and especially not the Master/Father/ Creator by splitting hairs, by paying tithes on what's left after taxes, and payroll deductions, reasoning that "God understands because I have all these bills". I will tell you that everytime I've done this in my walk I could not escape the voice of the Holy Spirit, way down deep, letting me know I was robbing my God- and more than that-myself. We serve a mighty God who knows every situation, every needs, and meets them, always to a greater measure in accordance with our faith. I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread. Psalm 37:25 Beloved, He asks us the question, often, and in many different ways: "Do you love me?" Consider today what He has done for us, never short changing us, or throwing us leftovers. Our Bridegroom is an extravagant lover, who has withheld nothing from us, not even His only begotten Son. How can we do any less?