Truth About the Tithe
Today’s Focus: Foundation for the Concept of the Tithe: Covenants and Promises
Scripture: Deuteronomy 5:1-5; Hebrews 7:13-20
Greetings Kingdom Citizens
Now to understand the concept of tithing we must get the foundation and structure of it and it begins with understanding the covenants. Now God established two covenants. The first covenant was a covenant between God and Himself (Hebrews 7:13-20) and we will dig into both of these deeper. The second covenant was between God and Israel at Mt. Sinai (Exodus 20).
Let’s see the framework for the first covenant.
Hebrews 6:13-20: For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, He sware by Himself, Saying surely blessing I will bless thee and multiplying I will multiply thee. And so after He had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath: That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.
Now even though this is a large set of scripture we will dissect this and show you how this works throughout the series. The covenant that God made with Himself is that He would have sons and He sealed this covenant with Himself. In addition, knowing that mankind would sin against Him the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8). This covenant was established before the foundation of the world. When God presented the covenant to Abraham, he made Abraham a third-party beneficiary of the covenant. Since Abraham was the third-party beneficiary that means there was promises attached to this covenant to full guarantee the fulfillment of the covenant and the promises to the heirs and beneficiaries.
Now the second covenant is framed this way:
Deuteronomy 5:1-5: And Moses called all Israel and said unto them, hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak in your ears this day, that ye may learn them, and keep, and do them. The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day. The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire, (I stood between the Lord and you at that time, to shew you the word of the Lord: for ye were afraid by reason of the fire, and went not up into the mount;)
This scripture refers to the covenant where the children of Israel received the Law instead of the first covenant at Mt Sinai after coming out of Egypt. The Law was given to order and preserve Israel until the seed came. Who is the seed? Jesus Christ. Now here we have two different covenants that God made. He made one covenant between Himself and one with Israel at Mt. Sinai.
In the next message we will look at the concept of promises as it pertains to covenants. This is very important structure to lay down before we get to the tithing because they are directly related.
At Our Father’s Service
Elder Calvin Calhoun, Jr.
