Radiant Church Enotes

Weekly Devotional

I was a greedy kid. We never had much growing up so the times that we would get an “allowance” were few and far between. My dad would hand me a crumpled, old one dollar bill and all of a sudden I felt like I owned the world. I could buy anything I wanted! Dad would always remind us that ten percent belonged to God so before we bought anything else we needed to give that to God.
 
Talk about bursting my bubble! Ten percent? Didn't he realize that was a whole dime? This was not an easy concept for me. I had a hard time giving up my dime but I eventually always did.

Over the years I heard many (many) Sunday school lessons on tithing, and I learned a lot.  For example, did you know that God has always chosen the tithe as a way for people to show their faith in Him? Hundreds of years before the Law of Moses, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob both tithed. The tithe has always been God’s starting point for basic faithfulness in giving. And yet, even after hearing these great messages, I still had a hard time giving away my dime.
 
I remember one day as a teen asking my dad if he ever struggled to give his tithe, knowing we might not have enough to buy what we needed.  I'll never forget his response.  It wasn't one of the usual tithing verses I had heard; instead he pointed me to Matthew 6:25-27 which says:
 
"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"


God used this verse to open my eyes. Here I was worrying about a dime (actually a dollar by then...I was a teenager and my allowance had bumped up a bit) while my parents had the burden of making sure we had a home to live in and food to eat.  They had learned firsthand that tithing was about trust. It shows we trust God. It shows God that we put Him first and trust that he will take care of our needs. I loved that verse so much that I made an acronym to help me tithe (F.L.Y.).
 
Freely give: God doesn’t want us to give with a grudge
Lean on the promise: Trust in God’s promise in Matthew 6:25-27
Yeild to God: Remember that it is not by my power that I wake up every morning. I need to yield to the Creator of the universe.
 
Bring the tithe first to God and he will bless you in the process of getting that priority right!  Join us this weekend and experience the blessings God has for you!

Fernando Amaro
Director of Children's Ministries

Feature Photo

Last Saturday, the Radiant Riders met early in the parking lot before taking a nice ride out to Cave Creek. 

• volunteer
• preschool
• bookstore
• coffee
• missions

• business directory
• jobs

• press
• photos & videos
• past features
• recovery