Tithes and Offerings

A Perspective

This tract is intended to clarify the difference between tithes and offerings and at the same time dispel the notion that “all gifts received by the church are the same.” After most Annual Meetings the leaders of each parish field the following list of questions. What does our budget cover? What do we call the deficit? Don’t we have extra money in the Investment account? Shouldn’t we just lump all the money together so we could use if for whatever comes up next? Can’t we use the special gifts from last year to balance this year’s budget? Is it really necessary to balance the budget every year?

Most of these questions arise from a misunderstanding about the difference between tithes and offerings. Perhaps these definitions will help.

Titles are a regular, proportional giving from our regular income as an expression of thanks for God’s daily care and provision and are used for the regular expenses of running the parish.

Offerings are occasional, extraordinary gifts which people give as they are moved by the Holy Spirit and are used for “out of the ordinary” expenses whether for the needs of the church, or outreach to others in need.

In other words, Tithes are a matter of discipline while Offerings are just “for the fun of it.”

Chances are your income at home is split along these same lines, with or without explicit plans in writing. You have a list of obligatory items such as mortgage, utilities, maintenance expenses, insurance, etc. These items comprise a “necessaries” claim on your budget. You have already established that this is a good approach and you do not ask yourself every month whether insurance is a good idea. You made a decision and now you just handle these as a matter of discipline.

On the other hand, you set aside some monies for “non-essentials”. These monies may be used to go out to dinner, buy a new suit, take a great vacation, or saved for future expenditures in the “non-essentials” category. These monies may be set aside each month or they may result from a bonus, tax refund or some other unexpected windfall. They are not required for day-to-day existence so they can be used as the spirit moves you. These funds are kept separate to insure they are not frittered away on necessities. In whatever form, we all track these two types of resources to keep them separate

So Tithes fall under the label of discipline and means having a plan for what you need to do, and doing what you have planned. Offerings fall under the label of Fun and means doing what you are free to do however you want to do it.

For example, in our worship, the Book of Common Prayer gives us the liturgy, a discipline to follow so that we do the things that we planned to be doing, to express our praise, thanksgiving and repentance, and offer the prayers of petition and intercession that we need to be praying for our world. That’s a good discipline, and if we only did the minimum that it requires, we could finish a Sunday morning service in about 30 minutes. Discipline is efficient.

But worship is more than discipline; it’s joyful and fun! Even our Book of Common Prayer provides opportunities to express joy. One of the “fun” parts is the offering of our songs. Music is the largest part of the extra offering that we bring on Sunday, the part of our worship that isn’t required by the Prayer Book. We use Canticles and Versicles to help lighten the transition from one “required” part of the service to the next. We have prayers for birthdays, anniversaries, and personal prayer requests. All of this is optional.

If someone doesn’t exactly put their whole heart into a song we are singing because it just isn’t their favorite style of music, that’s all right. Music is an offering, and offerings come in all sizes, shapes, and styles. Music and song are offered from the heart with joy, not out of compulsion. Our participation can be at any level in the “offering” parts of our service. On the other hand, if someone says, “I cant say the Creed because there are parts I don’t agree with”, then we have a problem. The Creed is not optional.

Why don’t we use money from the investment account to balance our operating budget? We don’t because we want to keep the focus on a discipline, which is important to our regular expression of faith. We wouldn’t skip the Creed in order to have an extra-long offertory hymn, or leave out the Gospel reading because there are too many birthdays this week, and we shouldn’t try to skip over the discipline of committing all of us to a balanced operating budget this year because a few of us gave special offerings last year. Those special offerings are like the surprisingly large bonus you received last year. You do not place it in the checking account and let it be used to repair the washing machine or lawn mower.

These distinctions in our funds help us maintain a perspective and encourage growth. Growth offers another challenge. Sometimes the next step on our growth path is simply too large to be handled by our normal structure. Growth pains beyond our normal disciplined tithing are great and they are much too important to be left to unsolicited offerings.

When a larger need arises as a result of our hard-earned growth, a special fund can be established to accumulate funds as they are joyfully offered. We can and should publicize the availability of the “special fund”. But we must remember, offerings are not something requested and expected as a discipline, they are given as God has moved the giver.

Do you see that this really isn’t so much about money, or budgets, as about trusting God, walking with God, living in a state of constant, total amazement at what He can do when we start to trust Him? All questions come down to this one – How much do you trust God”?