If "Acts of gratitude make you grateful" (Nouwen), a regular, disciplined act of gratitude in worship is the offering. Early in my ministry, I was a bit embarrassed, almost offended, by the attention we give to money in worship. Valuable minutes are used up passing the plates. We haul the proceeds right up to the altar, lift the money up high, say a special prayer... Never do we take the time to gather pledges of holiness, or mission volunteering. Why all the attention given to money, which already gets the lion's share of attention outside worship?
But I have come to understand how crucial the offering can be. In a world where money talks, where the reigning idolatry says "Money is the answer," and we are tutored to believe I earned it, I deserve it, and it's mine to do with as I wish - we need desperately to take some time, to be instructed that it belongs to God. In worship every week, I have the chance to declare "I will not bow down to the idol of money; God alone is the fullness of life." Maybe passing the plates is like handing out a test: you've been in class, you've heard the material - but did you get it? Worship is subversive, and we engage in this delightful matchmaking - between people who unwittingly let themselves get lied to by money and need desperately to give a lot of it away to grow close to God, and the desperate need in the world for the work the Church does which just can't get done without significant funds.
In ancient Israel, when the wheat finally ripened, instead of rushing in to bake the loaf for which your family was desperately hungry, you took that first grain, and burned it on a stone altar, the smoke curling heavenward, an expression of thanks to the One who sent the rain and made the soil yield something good. If your flock of sheep prospered, you expressed gratitude by killing and burning the most stalwart male (not the runt), the one you thought you needed for next year's breeding. Yet if you trusted God, this was the sheep that you gave up -- proving you knew the sheep and your future belonged to God in the first place. To grow in gratitude, we need to be sure our "thanks" are tangible: our stuff offered to God, shared with the poor.
Tithing has been a historic standard in Christendom. John Wesley thought a mere 10% for God was chintzy, since not 10% but 100% of what I have belongs to God! But as a starting point to develop more generous habits, the tithe is a real delight to those who go there. Does my giving reflect the spectacular wonder of God's grace? Am I living for me? or is God at the center? How many of my expenditures are self-indulgent? or do they give glory to God? "You must give what will cost you something. This is giving not just what you can live without, but what you can't live without or don't want to live without. Something you really like. Then your gift becomes a sacrifice which will have value before God. This giving until it hurts, this sacrifice is what I call love in action" (Mother Teresa).
James
james@mpumc.org
Coming up:
eWorship13 - Listening to Scripture
eWorship14 - The Creed
eWorship15 - The Work of the Sermon
The complete eWorship series may be found on our web site.
