| ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ( A ) RECEIVE TO GIVE Giving to receive, planting a seed to meet ( supply ) a personal need and tithing in order to be personally blessed by God are all unscriptural teachings of the present day prosperity message. These teachings actually oppose the means by which Gods� children of this present day have been scripturally instructed to receive from Him and have all their personal needs and wants supplied in this earthly life. Giving to receive, ( as taught and believed in the prosperity message ), makes the Christians� act of giving the motive and prerequisite upon which the Christian relies for being able to receive from God whatever blessing and supply is needed or wanted by the Christian in this earthly life. The act of giving as taught in the prosperity message is believed to be the necessary pre-condition which the Christian must satisfy in order to activate Gods� ability and effort to give and help supply whatever need or want that the giving Christian may have. The Christian gives and then God the Father in turn responds to that act of giving by Himself providing the things necessary to supply the needs and wants of the Christian giver. However, the scriptures do not teach this type of instruction for the present day Christian. Jesus and the apostle Paul stated these words; [8] Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give. - Matt. 10:8 7. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. - 2 Cor. 9:7 Jesus never taught giving to receive ( I speak in specific regard to the motive and purpose for why the Christian should give, Jesus taught giving and receiving as a reality - Luke 6:38 ). Jesus does instruct that a person can give and receive back from what was given. However, as far as the motive for giving that the child of God should have, Jesus never placed the act of giving as a prerequisite to receiving. Receiving actually comes before giving. Not the other way around. According to scriptural instruction, giving, ( or as it is sometimes referred to as seed-planting ), therefore is the ability and motive based on that which has first been received; [8] Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give. - Matt. 10:8 Not once has Jesus ever made the act of giving the essential condition which the Christian must first satisfy in order to prepare the Christian to in return receive from and be blessed of God. Jesus never taught that the motive for giving was in order to receive something in return again. In reality, Jesus taught the exact opposite; 32. For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. 33. And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. 34. And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35. But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. - Luke 6:32-35 The teachings of the prosperity message such as giving to receive or planting a seed in order to meet a need actually are in direct opposition to the instruction of Christian giving as outlined in Luke 6:32-35 and 2 Cor. 9:7 and other verses of scripture to be shortly reviewed. In 2 Cor. 9:7, Paul writes and clearly states that necessity is not to be the motive and reason behind our acts of giving. Necessity and lack, which a Christian will sometimes endure in this earthly life, are not to be the motive and reason for giving to other people or ministries. Moreover, as shown in the referenced scriptures in section C , the act of giving is not the primary means by which the child of God receives from God. And yet the message within prosperity teaching, ( with regard to tithing, giving to receive and planting a seed in order to meet a need ), in reality makes necessity and lack the very motive and reason for giving. Because of this mindset, such teachings do not present the correct scriptural instruction regarding the act of giving; 7. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. - 2 Cor. 9:7 Notice in Pauls� second letter to the Corinthian Christians that he writes by saying the motive of giving is not to be done because of necessity. Giving should not be done with a heart and mindset which views such action as the necessary requirement in order to receive blessing and abundance from God. Our giving to other people is not to be a grudging requirement. It is not to be a required act or a means whereby our personal lack and necessities get met and supplied. The purpose for giving by Christians is for the sole benefit and blessing to the recipient in need and for the recipients� benefit only. Nothing more and nothing less. That is scriptural, Christ-like giving. Not planting a seed to meet a need and not giving to receive. And in Philippians the scriptures write; 6. Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. - Phil. 4:6 Whatever need, lack or want that the Christian needs supply for simply requires asking God in prayer with thanksgiving. Our motive for giving should be a free and cheerfully offered gift not based on personal consideration in regard to what we, the Christian giver, personally lack and have need of ourselves. Why is this so? Simply because freely giving is the manner in which our Heavenly Father had offered His Son to be our salvation. Even though we were Gods� enemies, God purposely chose to respond to us in a giving act of love in which He was our Savior ( Eph. 1: 3-5 / 1 John 4:8-11, 19 ). God freely responded to the sinful world in an act of giving ( John 3:16 ). An act which could never be in response to something which we as sinners had first offered and given to God ( Eph. 2:1-10 ). Our salvation is a blessing which God freely gave to us while we were yet dead in sins and therefore such a freely given gift could never have been initiated due to something which we as sinners first gave and offered to God. In Romans, the apostle Paul speaks of this marvelous freely offered gift when he wrote; [32] He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? - Romans 8:32 Paul asks a self-evident, a self-answering question. Since God didn�t even withhold His very own Son from a sinful world in order that we could be saved, then doesn�t it stand to reason that in light of that preeminent, matchless and most highly prized gift which God freely gave to sinners that He would now be able and willing to freely give His children everything else? The obvious answer is yes. Paul further discusses this self-evident truth in his first letter to the Corinthian Christians; [12] Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. - I Cor. 2:12 God gave Christ to sinners and when we, the sinner, believe on Christ we are now born again and are now become the children of God and have received the Holy Spirit of God into our lives. That Holy Spirit can cause us, Gods� children, to know the things which God freely gives to us, not just for our spiritual lives but also for our physical lives. No need to satify some prerequisite condition of giving to other people or ministries in order to freely receive things which God our Father freely gives to us His children. No need to plant a seed or give or tithe in order to obtain what God our Father has already determined and desired to freely give to us His very children. No need to first give in order to activate Gods� abiltiy and effort to give to us. The giving of thanks however, is an exception; 6. Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. 7. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. - Phil. 4:6-7 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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