There are a number of things that get people riled up about at church. Money is definitely one of them. People get uncomfortable when they hear the preacher teach on the topic of tithing. I’ve heard on numerous occasions the response to this teaching is “the church just wants our money”. This topic was actually addressed at our church this past Sunday and to be honest I think the Sr. Pastor did a really good job of addressing this
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. I’ve done alot of thinking on this topic since YC. At YC they took an offering for funds to go towards running YCs in Malawi and Belize. There were approximately 17, 000 youth that attended YC and they raised $57,000 for this cause, which works out to about $3.40/person. Though the people on stage seemed impressed by this-I was not. Look at it this way, most of the kids there spent over $100 buying CDs, T-shirts and the like. Even lunch costs more than $3.40! Couple this with the $125 registration fee, you are heading towards $150-$300 for this conference all up and yet they only give a meagre few bucks? Are our youth taught about tithing from both parents and youth leaders alike? To be honest, I myself have not really talked to my youth about this. Part of the reason why I haven’t done this is that I just assumed that teens know about tithing (my parents taught me about tithing), or perhaps I assumed that they have no money to give. But the more I look at it, my assumptions were wrong. The spiritual discipline of tithing is rarely brought up (though some churches/parents do) and obviously in seeing how much was spent over the weekend, the youth have a lot of expendable income!
As parents, do you talk about tithing with your children and teens? How do you set the example?
As pastors/youth pastors, do you talk about tithing with the children and teens? How do you encourage them to give?
Also see my first lot of thoughts on YC in Free Hugs and Modesty
