A nephew of ours is a pastor to members of the Cherokee nation in northwestern North Carolina. He recently shared a personal testimony that, with his permission, I’d like to pass along in hopes that it may help others. I was struck by this post of his, because a very similar incident happened to me, some of the details of which I will rehearse at the close of Aaron’s article:
“I’d like to share a personal story if I may. About six years ago, we had just gotten married and were in a very difficult spot financially speaking. I wasn’t pastoring at that time, but I was an ordained minister and active in a different type of full-time ministry that only paid a part-time salary.
Christmas was tough that year. I was going through a season that seemed like everything was breaking and tearing me up. I received a $200 bonus for Christmas about two weeks before the holiday, and I’d already made up my mind that week to bypass paying tithes so I could afford everyone’s Christmas presents. After all, I reasoned to myself, ‘It’s just one week. It won’t hurt.’
I was convicted in my spirit for even thinking that way, but I decided to do it anyway. So, I went to the mall in Gastonia and spent a few hundred bucks and got my family’s Christmas presents. On the way out of the mall, I curbed my tire, pinching it, immediately hearing that dreaded sound. Literally, I looked up, and across the road from the mall was an NTB Tire shop that was still open. Guess how much the new tire with installation was? Yep. You guessed it. $200.
I got home that night, and because I was getting out of the car in a hurry, I dropped my cell phone in a few inches of puddled, melted snow that was now a mud hole. So. My cell phone died. In my hurry, I left the gifts in the car.
Next morning, I came outside and discovered that ALL 3 bags of gifts had been STOLEN! Now, I am not saying this is how God always operates, but this is one instance that I believe I heard the voice of God directly to my spirit. He said to me, ‘Aaron! We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. All this would’ve been prevented if you’d simply obeyed what I’ve commanded you to do with the tithe.’
Honestly, I’ve not missed a single week of tithe since then. I’m hard-headed, and God sometimes has to wake me up with a little harder shake or lesson than He has to use with others. That day I learned my lesson. The tithe is His. Don’t touch what belongs to Him!”
Thanks, Aaron, for your transparency and willingness to be a blessing and challenge to others who may be spared learning “the hard way!”
When Ellen and I were on our honeymoon—traveling with a small camper trailer that my folks had loaned us, pulled behind Dad’s ’59 Chevy Impala—we spent about two weeks moving from (first) the Cumberland Gap National Park to various camping sites, enjoying the summer days of August. When we got to the town of Keokuk, Iowa, not far from where I grew up in the southeastern corner of the Hawkeye state, there happened to be a roadside carnival going on as we drove by. For something to do, we pulled in, parked, and wandered through the small “fair,” stopping at a booth where, for a quarter, you could throw a ball at several props, such as stuffed animals, and win whatever you hit or get another chance at a bigger and better prize. I got sucked into the moment and made some good throws until, in a matter of minutes, I was going for a “big” prize (I forget now just what!).
Well, just married and “macho,” I wanted to impress my new bride and win the big prize for her. But, I did not win. I lost! And, leaving that “sucker trap,” I had to face the awful pain of realizing that I had gambled with $200 of our precious money. We were heading for Minneapolis in a couple of weeks without a place to live, without a job, and not knowing a soul there. I was enrolled as a first-year seminary student at Central Baptist Theological seminary. I knew immediately what God was teaching me that evening.
I had not been practicing any form of stewardship—not tithing, tipping, nothing. I had worked in a Christian camp all summer before our wedding and did not make a great deal of money, but I had never yet begun to give God a portion of my income. I wept with my new bride, prayed, confessed to God my sin, and covenanted with him that we would give a tithe and more of what He entrusted to our stewardship. We have kept that promise from that date for the past 58 years, and could not begin to tell you how God has blessed us.
I got a job the first day we were in Minneapolis and God gave us a fully furnished apartment to live in for $50 a month for the four years we were in seminary there. We left the Twin Cities with two children, all bills paid, and $1,000 in the bank. I have never shared this story with anyone except a handful of people. It was so very painful to experience. But I am deeply grateful that God so graciously drove that lesson home to me that evening. I had not been under conviction about it, nor had it been on my mind. But believe me, my heavenly Father did not have to send an angel to tell me what I needed to hear at that stage in my Christian walk. When I left the roadside park that evening I had immediately heard, in a not so still and not so small voice, “This is the way, walk ye in it.” Thank you, Lord!
“Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the first fruits of all thine increase: so shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine.” (Provs. 3:9, 10)
YOU and GOD 