Cheat Sheet on Financial Giving

The topic of "how much am I supposed to give" has come up on more than one occasion in the past week. It got me thinking about how I respond in a variety of situations. The bottom line is that there is a lot of confusion out there around the type of generosity a Christian is called to. Some of it stems from poor theology, some of it stems from a bad experience with a church, some of it stems from hard hearts that want to believe that our money is our money and you better keep your hands off of it.

I'm not sure what it was for the guy sitting behind my wife while she waited for jury duty. "The church is just a business!" he expressed, apparently to whoever was listening. "They said that I had to give 10% of my gross income! All they wanted was my money." There wasn't any arguing with him, so Christi didn't intervene. Unfortunately, he's not alone in his confusion. Even seasoned Christians argue about whether we're supposed to give 10% of our gross or our net income. The problem is, we're arguing about the wrong thing.

What I'm going to do in this post is highlight some New Testament principles on giving. It's not a theological treatise (which you wouldn't read) or a proof-text of why I'm right and you're wrong (which would be ridiculous). It's just principles that can help us understand what God calls us to give, how he calls us to give it, and perhaps most important of all, the context in which we are called to give.

First, 10% is not mentioned as a giving standard in the New Testament.

On top of that, it's a bit of a misleading statement to say that 10% was the Old Testament norm. But before you start putting down your checkbooks and unregistering for your online giving in your unbridled enthusiasm, let me explain. A "tithe" means "10%", but in the Old Testament, but God's people were required to give two tithes and a third one every third year. So yes, 10% chunks. For a total of about 23% a year averaged over three years. In the New Testament, the old manner of supporting the temple and governance structure of the Kingdom-Temple paradigm was done away with, and giving in the New Testament was replaced with the language of "generosity". The principle all along, Old Testament included, was one of generosity. The law of 10% revealed that even God's people were incredibly stingy, and not very generous at all. The good news of Jesus, in which God himself leaves all the wealth of heaven to become a pauper and ultimately to die a cursed death on a cross for the gain of his people, should, in the end, break down our stinginess and burst forth into generosity.

Fast forward a few thousand years to the man's comment about "the church wanting 10% of my gross salary!" Why are we asking about whether or not God wants 10% of the net or the gross? It's rarely because we want to give away more. Usually it's because we want to make sure that we're meeting the bare minimum requirement, and how foolish would we be if we found out that we'd been giving based on our gross income when all God really required was 10% of our net. All that money, wasted!

(For the record, if you are GOING to use a percentage based giving system, you would use your gross salary, especially if you are going on an Old Testament-like principle. Your salary is what you earn pre-tax. The government bases your tax percentage on that salary. If you are basing your giving off some number, it's that one. Not after the government gets theres.)

Second, all that God's people have is given for the good of the kingdom of God. 

Period. This is true in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. God always operates through individuals for the good of communities. If you have been blessed with wealth, God did not bless you so that you alone would be blessed. He blessed you so that you would be a blessing to his community of people. Put another way, if God allows you to make one million dollars next year, the proper perspective is that God has given his church and his community of people one million dollars, and he has made you the steward.

Now plug in your salary.

Next year you are going to earn 65,000. The proper perspective, biblically speaking, is that God, through you, has given his community of people (his church) 65,000, and he has called you to manage that 65,000 dollars well.

Third, you give what you have, not what you do not have. 

When Paul appeals for money in the New Testament, he doesn't use percentages and he doesn't use dollar figures. He uses capacity as the measurement of generosity. What is your capacity for giving? Or, to ask it another way, how much has God given you to manage? All other things being equal, if you have a family of five and you make 65,000 a year, your capacity for giving is probably going to be significantly less than a family of five who makes 250,000.

If you took that scenario and judged based on percentages, say, 10% of gross income, you end up with one family looking somewhat generous and the other not looking that generous. Family one, making 65,000 dollars a year, would "only" have given 6,500. Family two, making 250,000 a year, would have given 25,000! How generous! Except that it's really not very generous at all, since they still have significantly more money leftover to spend on themselves. Neither the dollar value nor the percentage are an accurate reflection of true generosity. (Remember Jesus story of the woman who gave her last two coins? That was more generous than someone who gave 100 coins our of their wealth.)

GENEROSITY

So let's assume that we understand the Gospel, that Jesus literally gives up everything for the sake of his people, the church. Jesus does what the law could never do. He actually frees us from condemnation so that, instead of attempting (and failing) to follow the law to the letter, we are free to live in the spirit of the law. It's not just that the Christian doesn't murder; in the kingdom of God we don't even have hate in our hearts. It's not just that the Christian doesn't commit adultery; in the Kingdom of God we don't even look at a woman lustfully. At least, this is the ideal. It's not the letter of the law, it's the spirit of the law that was the most important thing. What the law, in it's letter, revealed to us, was how far we fall short of the spirit of the law and how much we need Jesus. (We couldn't even give 10%, let alone actually have glad and generous hearts!) And now that Jesus has come, and has transformed our hearts, so our hearts, more and more, daily and progressively, are in tune with the spirit of the law which is the spirit of God.

So here's what generosity requires.

First, it requires that we understand the Gospel. You can't just ecide to be generous. Maybe by the world's standards you can, but not by God's. Generosity is a heart issue. It's giving with gladness. And that only happens when we understand the transforming power of the Gospel.

Second, it requires that we understand what God requires. Answer: everything. It's not yours to begin with. It's his. You are called to be a steward of it for the good of his Kingdom.

Third, it requires that we understand our capacity. Not everyone can give the same amount, but I know from experience that most people assume they are on the lower end of the scale rather than the higher end, and they are almost always wrong. My guess (and a fairly educated one) is that most of us could give substantially more than we are currently giving. The only way to know, however, is to have a realistic perspective on our capacity.

Here's the thing: it requires money to live. That's reality. We have a job and earn money for two reasons: first, to provide for ourselves and our family, and second, so that we can give money away. God ants you to provide for your family, and he does not want you to go into debt so you can give. You must take a realistic assessment of what it requires for you to provide for your family, and recognize that you will only have a certain capacity for giving. 

In the example above, one family of five found out that they could live on 57,500/year, because that's what they had after giving to the church. The other family was living on 225,000/year. Why the discrepancy?

Let me be clear: Jesus was not a socialist and the New Testament church was not a socialist utopia. Anyone who argues that has an agenda and they are being ridiculous. There were wealthy people in the church and poor people in the church and some of them owned mansions and others were servants in someone else's home. Yet each of them was called to give what they could, according to their capacity. The system worked because the Holy Spirit had moved in people's hearts to such a degree that everyone wanted to give whatever it was that they had to give. Some gave more and some gave less. But all gave according to the same spirit. That is generosity.

We don't all have to drive white Honda accords and wear one-piece silver v-neck jumpsuits. We don't all have to have the same size house on the same kind of street with the same length driveway. The lower-income person can rob themselves of their capacity for giving by buying the most expensive cell-phone, and the higher-income person can rob themselves of their capacity by buying the biggest house on the block. It's okay to have differing levels of income, it's not okay to fool yourselves into thinking that you don't have more capacity for giving.

(And for the record, lower income people in the American church give a substantially higher percentage of their income than higher income people. The statistics for actual dollar amount given per household look a little better, mostly because there are some people who give massive dollar amounts that bump up the average.)

Here is how you will know that you are striking the right balance between what you need and what you are giving: when you look at your bills, and think, "I genuinely wish I could give more", you've probably got a good balance, and quite frankly, it will motivate you towards good financial stewardship. If you think, "thank God I don't have to give more" or "there's no way I could give more" or "I'm giving plenty as it is", you've got some heart work to do.

None of us are perfect, and we're not going to get there tomorrow. I'm just saying that if we're more concerned about what we have to give away than we are with what we get to keep for ourselves, we've probably got the wrong perspective. Whatever you have is given to you to steward for the good of the community around you. It doesn't always feel good, but that's when we need the Holy Spirit to change our hearts. Overtime, slowly but surely, he'll turn us into a generous people after all.

Variable Tuition & The Cost of Christian Education

My wife and I send three of our five children to Eastern Christian School. As a pastor, I'm often extra conscious of the schooling choices that we select for our children. I recognize that there is no "one-size-fits-all" and try hard not to make someone else feel that they have to make the same decision that we've made; in fact, even before I arrived at my church, which strongly supports the Christian school, this was one of the values that was inherent in the culture–the Pastor wouldn't have to send their children to the Christian School unless he chose to. Yet we recognize that any schooling decision that we make for our children will be scrutinized and potentially followed by the people in our church and in our community.

Not long ago I was meeting with a group of pastor's and the school administration and we raised the question that many of us pastor's had confronted at times within our own congregation. The assumption that people had was that we all had received "sweetheart deals" because of our position. That is, because we were pastors, the school had treated us differently than it would any other family who wanted to attend EC. To be honest, most of the pastor's there weren't really sure if that was true, so we asked the administration.

They said, unequivocally, "no". The conviction of the administration was that they would work with any family who has a desire to attend Eastern Christian and was serious about their commitment.

Fast forward a year or so, and our school has just announced what they are calling "Variable Tuition". In short, everyone who has a serious commitment and desire to attend the school will pay what they can afford, up to 80% of the tuition. That 80% is correct, by the way. No student at the school pays 100% of the cost of tuition because of the endowment, financial gifts, and other ways that the school raises money to reduce the cost of tuition across the board.

This isn't a post on why Christian Education is the right choice for your child. As I mentioned, I don't think there is one solution that is correct for everyone. What this is about, however, is why I believe Eastern Christian is doing all that they can to remove finances from the equation when you are making the educational choice for your children.

THE EQUATION OF SCHOOL

In my experience the greatest hurdle towards people considering Christian education is the finances. I talk to Christian School graduates who know what the school offers, who look positively on their experience, who are considering schooling options for their children, and yet, the number one thing standing in their way is the finances. I get it. Christian school ain't cheap.

The assumption here is that there is a Christian school option available to you in your area, that it is a decent school, that it is a part of your consideration, and that you would seriously consider sending your children there if the finances really weren't an issue. In other words, I'm making the assumption that you already agree with me that Christian education is a good idea, if you can afford it. I'm not trying to convince the unconvinced, I'm trying to encourage the convinced. You can do this! And here's why.

First, Christian School is not the same as private school

Okay, okay. It is a private school. I get that. But it's not a private school the way that private schools are private. You with me?

I graduated from a Christian School in Miami and our athletic league consisted mostly of other private schools in the area. When we went to those schools, there was a distinctly different vibe. The vibe was, "we are an exclusive club. We pay to be here." The parking lot looked like a luxury car dealership. The thing is, no one argued that there was a benefit to those schools or that they would like to send their kids there if they could. That stuff was assumed. But you could only access it if you could pay for it, or if you had a special talent or ability that the school deemed worthy of a scholarship. It remained an elite school because it was only for the elite.

And that's the chief difference between a Christian school and every other private school.

If a Christian school is an elite school that only some people can afford, then it's functionally a private school that has bible classes. It's not a Christian school. If it's a Christian School, that believe that the Gospel is relevant to every area of our life, and that there truly is "no square inch" of the universe that God does not control, then it also has to assume that it has value to every Christian parent and every Christian student. It must also gladly operate under the assumption that every student should have the opportunity to learn in an environment that upholds God as the Sovereign Creator and Jesus as the Savior and King.

I'm reminded of the quote, perhaps by Abraham Kuyper, that no education is religiously neutral. That is, your education will either come from the perspective that God exists–even when studying things like evolution or sub-atomic particles–or it will come from the perspective that God does not exist. The content ought to be the same, but the perspective matters.

If Christian School is important, we must be of the conviction that it is important for all Christians. And if it is important for all Christians, then it must be accessible to all Christians.

This is what distinguishes Christian School from other private school options. I know of no other private school that believes that it ought to be universally accessible. Christian school, and Eastern Christian in particular, does believe that

In fact, this is the belief that makes variable tuition possible. Variable tuition only works when we believe that Christian education is valuable and should be accessible to all Christian parents.

Most people know that some–maybe even most–families at Eastern Christian receive some sort of scholarship. What Eastern Christian is doing is just calling it for what it is. Some people pay more than others. That disparity is justified, as long as we recognize that everyone has a different financial capacity, and that Christian school should be accessible to anyone who values it and wants to commit to it with their family.

If we really value Christian education and believe it should be accessible to all, then variable tuition is the obvious choice.

Which leads me to a final point.

Variable tuition only works when everyone is being legit about what they can afford.

The truth is that if you believe that Christian education is valuable and should be accessible to all, and you are committed to it, you will make the necessary sacrifices. But how do you know?

This is one of the reasons that Eastern Christian uses a third party to help determine how much someone can actually afford. The application, if it's the same as in past years, includes questions about what kind of cars you drive, credit card debt, etc. It's a basic financial application, but it's the same across the board. That third party is processing everyone's request and making determinations about what they think you should be able to afford. Sometimes that may work for your family, other times you may need more assistance than they suggest, but it helps to provide some sort of metric.

It would be easy for those who pay full tuition–and those who don't–to wonder about their respective sacrifices. There are times when I show up in my old vehicles and someone else shows up in their new vehicles and I think to myself, this is harder for me than it is for him. But my guess is, he might feel the same way, knowing that I probably get a scholarship and he doesn't. 

Variable tuition, especially as monitored by a third party, removes that second-guessing from the equation. Instead, it allows us to say to one another that...

My tuition and your tuition may be different, but our sacrifice is the same.

My tuition and your tuition may be different, but we value the same thing.

My tuition and your tuition may be different, but we need each other.

If you are seriously considering Christian Education for your children, do not let finances stand in your way. There may be good reason to choose a different path, but "the money" is no longer one of them.