Being in debt and Tithing
I can’t even count how many readers have emailed me asking me about whether or not they should tithe while getting out of debt. Tithing is a fiercely debated topic (read comments on the post I wrote called Tithing in the New Testament for proof) as you would expect with anything that seems to not make sense. I still wonder in amazement at how so many of God’s principles are absolute foolishness to non-christians… I mean who in their right mind would give expecting to have more?
That said, I will use this post as a summary of how I commonly answer the “tithing in times of challenge” questions. I will lay out my thoughts about the subject and what I have found from the Bible about it. The Bible says that we all know in part, so I don’t claim to know the answer for everyone, but this is what I have landed on. If this is a question you are asking for yourself, I suggest you pray and dig into your Bible!
My tithing story
I get a kick out of stepping out in faith. I absolutely love it. When I was 20 I packed up everything I owned an moved to Florida without a job lined up because I felt God calling me. I still remember the uncertainty of my ability to hear from God coupled with the thrill of the faith-walk. Turns out I was hearing from God and that season was a huge turning point in my life. I would have missed out on so much and I would be nowhere near where I am today spiritually had I not stepped out in faith and obeyed that leading.
The reason I bring this up is because we (Linda and I) have taken the same leaps of faith with tithing. As I detailed in a post called my tithing experience, I explained that due to an error on my part I found out that even though we thought we were tithing, we were actually about 1-2% short. With the same anticipation and feelings of uncertainty, we decided to fix the problem and increase our giving up to 10% - even though this would take our expenses higher than our income. Within a DAY we saw God kick our income up over our expenses. I am convinced he was trying to teach us a valuable lesson about His faithfulness - I never want to forget it.
While we have been working to pay off a huge chunk of debt over the last few years, we have been faithfully tithing. It would be nice if I could say that I started tithing and the next week a check came in the mail to pay off all of our debt, but God doesn’t seem to do it that way very often. He seems to be interested in changing us than just making the problem disappear. Honestly, what good would it do if He made all our debt disappear without us learning the discipline of handling our finances properly? If we created all the debt by over-spending, then we would just end up in the same place again.
While I haven’t received a $100,000 check in the mail yet, we have seen numerous large chunks of our debt paid off over the last few years - I thank God for them and am convinced that He was involved in bringing them to us.
So, should you tithe while getting out of debt?
Simply put, I think yes. I would be willing to bet that if we had spent the last 3 years paying our tithe money to our debts, we would not be near as far along as we are.
What about you? I would love to hear your thoughts or stories about tithing…
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If you are like me and a little bit taken back by the high price of replacing the pages in your Franklin planner, I just found a great alternative. It does require a little bit of an upfront investment and some elbow grease, but it should pay for itself very quickly.
This website called DIYplanner.com has tons of free Franklin Planner templates for every size. Basically all you have to do is print them out, cut them down, punch holes and you are good to go.
What you need to create your own planner pages
- Paper - probably a thin stock, to keep your planner from becoming too bulky
- A printer - most printers should work for most planner sizes
- Paper trimmer – this probably will be the biggest expense in this project for most people. You can find some paper trimmers for less than $20, but to get a good quality one, you will probably want to spend a bit more.
- Adjustable hole puncher
I dug around and played with the site for a while because I was intrigued at all they had to offer. They have planner template kits that you can download that include all the pages you need. It looks like the calendar pages are dated back to 2007, but you can get the 2009 calendar pages here – and just like the rest of the site, they are free! If you are just starting out with the whole “print your own planner pages” thing you should read their beginner guide.
All kinds of other free template stuff
- GTD - For all the Getting Things Done fans out there, they have a bunch of GTD planner templates too.
- 7 Habits – There are also templates to help you implement the 7 habits method of time management
- Dieting, health, and exercise tracking templates
Anyway, if you are fed up with the high prices of replacing your planner templates, I suggest taking a look.
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Proverbs 1:32
“…and the complacency of fools shall destroy them.”
I was doing a little bit of studying on this verse and I looked up the definition of complacent. Webster’s definition surprised me – the first definition was “self-satisfied” and the third was “unconcerned”.
I had never thought of this verse in this way. I had always just assumed complacent meant lazy. These definitions of the word shine a new light on it for me. When I think of someone who is self-satisfied, I think of someone who has accomplished something. A truly lazy person probably wouldn’t have much to be self-satisfied with, but what I am getting from this verse is that even if we have had accomplishments in the past, we can not rest on our laurels.
All roads lead to Rome
It reminds me of how Rome fell. It wasn’t because they were lazy – I am sure a lot of energy was spent becoming the powerhouse of the world that they were. But, they fell (some historians argue) because they became self-satisfied or complacent.
What does this mean for me?
I am always amazed at how quickly we can adapt to situations. You know the old story that a frog will jump out of a pot of boiling water, but will keep swimming if you increase the heat slowly? I am keeping my eyes open for the areas in my life where complacency may be setting in. I often find that if I am getting a bit too comfortable in an area, I might need to step it up a bit.
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A week or so ago, I did a review of Jim O’Donnell’s The Shortest Investment Book Ever. In the review I mentioned that I thought the book was perfect for those who haven’t started their 401k or 403b because they don’t know what funds to invest in. In the most simple terms Jim explains to the reader exactly which funds to invest in and why.
If you don’t have a 401k, 403b, or Roth IRA started, you should. And if you feel clueless as to how to invest the money, this book is for you.
Interview with Jim O’Donnell
I have an interview scheduled with Jim for next week and his publicist emailed me the other day saying that they wanted to donate 5 copies of the book to CPF readers! Woo Hoo!
What do I have to do to win one of the books?
- Go to the Christian Finance Forums before 11:59 p.m. CST on January 8th, 2009.
- Sign up, if you have not already. (Don’t worry, it is a very quick process)
- Leave a comment by joining one of the conversations or starting a new one.
- I will randomly select a winner using random.org.
- The winner will be announced on January 9th in the forums!!
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I just saw this article called “My credit card was cancelled” on the money section of CNN.com. In it a reader asks a question about why her credit card company closed her account and how it would affect her credit score. The answer was a new one to me…
Having [...] Continue Reading…
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While the mortgage and financial crisis seems to be old news, Forbes points out that the next industry to have a crisis of it’s own is the credit card industry.
They said, “Capital One disclosed rising delinquencies and loan losses for the month of November because of unemployment and the [...] Continue Reading…
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