The contemporary church certainly does spend a lot of time trying to convince people that Christianity is rational, that it makes sense once we stop and think about it. But I'm not so sure -- I think once we make Christianity "believable", we remove the element of faith from it. Was it Tertullian who said: I believe BECAUSE it is ridiculous? Certainly Paul understood this -- how else would the Cross be foolishness to the Gentiles (1 Cor. 1.23)?
We try to make our weekly activities for church rational as well, and I think maybe it's time we started to put the foolishness back into our faith. Two activities especially call for such an approach: our tithe and the sabbath. In a sense, they are two sides of the same coin, but it's a coin that the world says has no value! Let's look at why:
Let's start with the sabbath: God tells us to work 6 days and rest the 7th. Now, we can make all sorts of explanations about our need for rest, for worship, etc. But think of how the world sees things: we could use that 7th day to get ahead of the competition! Think about it: while we are deliberately taking one day of the week off, our competitors are getting that much farther ahead of you! If we do this 52 times a year, it's like giving up almost 2 entire months of the year! Do you realize what idiots we must look like? Don't we realize that if we want to get ahead in this world, we have to keep our noses to the grindstone? Besides, we're wasting our days off: we're can't even use these two months as vacation time! And lastly, it's the end of the week, the time when we really need to be pumping things out to get them done on time! If we have to take a day off, isn't the end of the week the worst possible time?
The person of faith, however, rejects this. Not because it isn't true -- oh, it definitely is true! No, we reject this because as believers, we do not rely on our own efforts to get us through life. Rather, we trust in the promises of God, our Provider, who has told us that it is he, and not ourselves, who will make us fruitful. We observe the sabbath precisely because it forces us to have faith that God will see us through every circumstance: God will give us the time and energy we need to get all that we need done, and God will prosper us just as surely as if we had worked that extra day. What God wants is for the world to see the futility of self-reliance: in spite of having much less time to work, those of us who trust in God are no worse off than the rest of the world! Isn't that a slap in the face to the ambitious!
The same idea holds true for the tithe. If we give up even just 10% of our earnings (not including our offerings over and above that), in 10 years we've "lost" one year's salary! Wouldn't it make more sense to save all our earnings for 9 years and then take a whole year's vacation? Or better yet -- work the 10th year as well and think how much extra money we'd have in the bank! Besides, we're giving the FIRST 10% -- how ridiculous! How can we be sure we'll have enough money to see us through until the next paycheck? Wouldn't it make more sense to pay our bills first and then give what extra we have left to God?
Again, the believer says No! We will not rely on our own wisdom to see us through life! We trust only in God to provide for us -- not in our jobs, our bank accounts, our investments, nor in any earthly thing. It is God and God alone who can make the poor man rich and the rich man poor. By observing the tithe, we show our faith that the same God who multiplied the bread and fish for the crowd can multiply our money so that all of our needs will be covered. We will not hedge our bets and pay our tithe only after we're sure we have enough left over. No, we will boldly give the money up front and trust God to take care of everything else.
Seen from the eyes of the world, the tithe and the sabbath are ridiculous acts of foolishness: we "lose" so much time and money! After all, "waste not, want not", right? "A penny saved is a penny earned"? You can only count on yourself in this life, and to give up so much to an unseen God is one of the highest acts of stupidity the world can imagine!
And that is precisely why we must continue to act so foolishly, and to do so deliberately and, yes, defiantly: so that the world may see by our prosperity how wrong they are about God.
Yes?
by grace alone, |