What the Bible Says About Giving and Tithing

Jesus said something striking in Matthew 6:21: 'For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.' This is not a religious platitude; it is a psychological and spiritual observation. Money is the most concrete measure of what you actually value, as opposed to what you say you value.

A few verses later He adds: 'No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money' (Matthew 6:24). The word He uses for money, mammon, was the Aramaic term for wealth as a competing object of trust and allegiance. Jesus is not saying money is inherently evil. He is saying it functions like a competing god, demanding trust and control in ways that directly rival the trust that belongs to God alone.

Paul's famous statement that 'the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil' (1 Timothy 6:10) is similarly precise: it is the love of money, not money itself, that corrupts. The issue is always heart orientation.

Tithing, giving a tenth, was a formal practice in Israel's covenant life. The first clear instance is Abraham giving a tenth to Melchizedek (Genesis 14:20), before the Mosaic law. The Mosaic law formalized multiple tithes: a tithe to support the Levites (Numbers 18:21), a second tithe for national celebrations (Deuteronomy 14:22-26), and a third tithe every three years for the poor (Deuteronomy 14:28-29). The total giving required under the law was closer to 23% than 10%.

Malachi 3:10 is the most famous tithing verse: 'Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse... Test me in this... and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.' God here makes an extraordinary offer: test Me in generosity. This remains the only place in Scripture where God explicitly invites a test.

The principle behind tithing is acknowledgment that everything belongs to God; giving a portion back is a concrete act of recognizing that you are a steward, not an owner.

The New Testament does not explicitly command the tithe as a binding legal obligation. The early church's giving was characterized by something more radical: voluntary, Spirit-led generosity that in some cases went far beyond a tenth. 'They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need' (Acts 2:45).

Paul's instructions to the Corinthian church capture the New Testament spirit: 'Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver' (2 Corinthians 9:7). The standard is not 10%; it is cheerful, decided-in-the-heart generosity.

Jesus's encounter with Zacchaeus (Luke 19) is instructive. Zacchaeus, a wealthy tax collector, encountered Jesus and spontaneously pledged half his possessions to the poor and fourfold restitution to those he had defrauded. Jesus did not set the standard. Gratitude did. When someone truly encounters the grace of God, generosity tends to follow, not as obligation, but as the natural overflow of a heart that has received much.

In Mark 12:41-44, Jesus is sitting in the temple watching people put money into the offering boxes. Many rich people put in large amounts. A poor widow puts in two small copper coins, a fraction of a cent. Jesus says to His disciples: 'Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything, all she had to live on.'

What God notices in giving is not the amount; it is the proportion and the posture. The widow's two coins represented complete surrender, everything she had to live on, placed in God's hands. The wealthy donors gave significant amounts that cost them nothing of their security.

This passage permanently reframes the conversation about giving. The question is not 'How much should I give?' The question is 'How much does this cost me? What am I trusting God with? Does my giving reflect my stated belief that He is my provision?' Those questions are much harder than calculating ten percent, and much more spiritually formative.

Here is a practical suggestion from the Sermon on the Mount's extended teaching on generosity: give in a way that costs you something, and give in a way that remains private. 'When you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you' (Matthew 6:3-4).

Private generosity is a spiritual discipline because it removes the social reward, the approval, the recognition, the sense of being seen as generous, and leaves only the vertical dimension: a transaction between you and God. This kind of giving is remarkably clarifying. When you cannot show anyone, the only motivation left is love for God and love for the person being helped.

If your giving has become a line item on a budget that you automate and don't think about, it may be worth considering: is it still spiritually alive for you? Is there an element of trust, of sacrifice, of choosing God over security? Generosity is not a tax. It is a spiritual practice, one that, taken seriously, reshapes your relationship with money, your trust in God, and your capacity for love more than almost anything else you can do.