Offering - Why Should I Give, Anyway?

Offering

—Why Should I Give, Anyway?

I’ve said it, so I imagine you at least have thought it. You are sitting in a large congregation of fairly well-off people. There are television cameras recording the preacher, a large sound system and new carpet in the foyer. At some point a bowl or plate is gently passed down your row. It moves through the church, row by row, by row. Sometimes there is even what appears to be an entire 2nd sermon shared during the collection. They beg; they cajole; they remind; they ask. But in my mind, I think, “Why should I give money to a place that seems to have plenty already?”

Back in the 1960s in the US, I used to see adverts inviting us to help feed starving children in deepest Africa. There always seemed to be a child with an extended belly, and they wanted me to send $5 or $500 to feed the malnourished children. Those photos said that there were real needs out there, and my donation might assist in meeting those needs. Against that backdrop I simply couldn’t compare the mostly white pastors asking for funds to add to the swelling coffers and maybe to increase the speed of the coffee machine during the half-hour teatime between the two or three services.

 Maybe you have felt something similar. And then, maybe not. Maybe I’m the only one who considers ‘needs’ that I can see. And this therefore prevents me from listening honestly to real sharing by the pastor or preacher of the day. If I had listened, I might have heard of all the outreaches that church performs. I might have heard about the people they helped during COVID-19 and all the years previously. I might have heard of the hurting people in the neighbourhood of the church who popped by the building and found any number of folks ready to help them in their need. I might have heard that the television camera needed repair and the people watching it have recently sent letters and emails indicating how the broadcasts are building their faith community significantly. But no, I missed those comments due to my own pride and my closed ears. God forgive me.

Speaking of closed ears, the psalmist and the writer of Hebrews say something about this.

Psalm 40, a psalm of David says, “Sacrifice and (meal) offering You have not desired; My ears You have opened; Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required. Then I said, “Behold, I come; In the scroll of the book it is written of me. I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your Law is within my heart.” (verses 6-8)

Speaking to Lord, King David prays and reaffirms what God wants. It’s not the multiplied sacrifices that could have abounded in the tabernacle. God didn’t require all those. David then prophetically voices the words of Messiah, “Behold I come…I delight to do your will”

 Various translations of the verse show “My ears you have opened.” Or “you have given me an open ear.” One commentary says, “Literally, Ears hast thou dug for me, which can hardly mean anything but “Thou hast given me the sense of hearing.”[1] Even Edersheim weighs in and is helpful here.[2]

No wonder the writer of Hebrews changes the Hebrew rendering to match the Septuagint verbiage of “a body” and the verb from “boring or digging out the ear” to “prepare a body.” It might even be like a synecdoche, that is the figure of speech where a part is used for a whole. For example “The White House” instead of saying “The United States” or “Australia lost by 3 wickets” meaning the “Cricket team of Australia lost.”  So we could say that the ear, and thus hearing or obedience to the Lord, represents the body that carries out the will and the words of God.

 As I ponder that God doesn’t require ‘sacrifice and offering’ but instead is interested in our whole body’s response to his love and invitations, what can I say but “here am I. Ready to do your will, Oh God.” If I really understand the psalmist and the writer of Hebrews, David was not writing about himself, but rather about someone, or rather Someone to come who would have his ears bored out, like a servant who indentures himself to the master for a season of significant length.

 “But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife and my children; I will not go out as a free man,’ then his master shall bring him to God, then he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him permanently.” (Exodus 21.5-6)

Of course permanent doesn’t mean after the Year of Jubilee, nor the end of a man’s life. But rather it means “for a significant length of time.” However, Yeshua has indentured himself to the Father forever. Even so, He is not as a slave. He said, “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever.” (John 8.35) Yeshua has let his own ear be dug; he has given his body to the Romans for crucifixion and was buried. Then in that same body, albeit a resurrection one, he rose and ever lives as the Son forever. Behold, he came, to do the will of the Father. That was the ‘sacrifice and offering’ that God desired. And with that sacrifice, all of us can be set free from our own sin and shame.

Back to that church and my listening, or rather my not listening. Offerings should be the result of hearing and of recognition, not of need, so much as of what God requires. Does God want me to be faithful to my local congregation? You betcha. Then I ought to support it financially. What if they don’t really need my money? That doesn’t matter. There are times when congregations have plenty and times when they are in dire straights. Our responsibility is to be faithful and serve the congregation faithfully. What about missions? Should we support various short or long-term outreaches? Of course, we should. As the Lord leads us, we can send large or ongoing regular gifts to a mission so that they can keep up the ministry they believe God wants them to perform.

Behold I come.

Written by Bob Mendelsohn

11 June 2020

If you would like to know more about a Messianic Jewish perspective on offering, contact us at [email protected]

Footnotes:

[1] Even in Edersheim we read, “Gen. 4:25. The language of Eve at the birth of Seth: ‘another seed,’ is explained as meaning ‘seed which comes from another place,’ and referred to the Messiah in Ber. R. 23 (ed. Warsh. p. 45 b, lines 8, 7 from the bottom). The same explanation occurs twice in the Midrash on Ruth 4:19 (in the genealogy of David, ed Warsh. p. 46 b), the second time in connection with Ps. 40:8 (‘in the volume of the book it is written of me’—bim’gillath sepher—Ruth belonging to the class מגלת).” (Edersheim, A. (1896). The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah (Vol. 2, p. 711). APPENDIX 9 LIST OF OLD TESTAMENT PASSAGES MESSIANICALLY APPLIED IN ANCIENT RABBINIC WRITINGS)

[1] The Hebrew verb to pierce (כָּרָה = H3738) in Psalm 40:6 is the same triliteral root for the Hebrew verb to prepare (כָּרָה = H3739). For example, this second verb (כָּרָה = H3739) appears translated in 2 Ki 6:23 as "prepared." In other words, both verbs have the exact same triliteral root, but have different meanings. The LXX translators had thus understood the verb in this verse not as H3738 ("pierced"), but as H3739 ("prepared").Additionally the LXX translators understood the word "ears" as metonymy for obedience. Thus the proper rendering in Hebrew would be that the Lord prepared the ears of David for obedience to the Lord. In contradistinction, the ears of King Saul were unprepared: 1 Sam 15:22 (NASB)

In the passage of Psalm 40:6, the LXX translators did not limit the idea to the unstopping or unclogging of the ears of David, which would have been the translation of (כָּרָה = H3738), which means to pierce (or to dig into, as if unstopping of unclogging the ears). The LXX translators went farther: they understood that the Lord had prepared (כָּרָה = H3739) the ears of David in order for him to hear the voice of the Lord, and thus to obey. If and when the ears obey, then the whole person follows, and in this regard King David as a person (his whole body) was a type of living sacrifice to the Lord.