One more comment on tithing & new blog

Through the course of recent reading and so I have come across two scriptures that I believe set a foundational grounds for giving from your wealth/profits/income.
One is the story of Cain and Able. Giving back to God seems to be an obvious response to God's provision to both Cain and Able. And even though they seem to have decided to give on their own God finds one offering acceptacle and another not. God didn't say "you shouldn't have!" nor did he find just any gift acceptable. Giving from a pure heart seems very important. I don't claim to have a pure heart, but I'm trying.
The other passage is from the Proverbs. In 3:7-10 Solomon tells his son not to be wise in his own eyes (which strangely is exactly the mistake Rehoboam makes) but to fear the Lord and shun evil. He then shares two things that the son should do presumably to carry this out. Honor the Lord with your wealth and accept the Lord's discipline.
My point in bringing these two passages up is that neither is based in trying to keep the Mosaic law but rather in trying to relate to God correctly. I don't believe one can make the argument that giving from your income is an idea that "died" with the old covenant. Giving from what God has given to you is evidently a primary principle of how we are to relate to God. It is how we show our "trust" in God as demonstrated in both passages. I would agree that we should not give to uphold the law because that is a wrong motivation, and the motivation for the gift is evidently quite important to God. But if we can't give this way then it appears that perhaps our trust/faith in God is not what it could be. Perhaps we assent to the "facts" of the gospel but have yet to really let them "screw up" our priorities.

I haven't written in a little while because I have been working on another blog to help my DARE students work on a assignment to create mock tobacco advertising. Check it out if you like. www.tobaccoadvertising.blogspot.com