The Good News of the Judgment
| Tithing of 10% in the Judgment Hour William Diehl Tithe paying was never imposed upon the Christian church by the apostles. Paul and the other apostles never appealed for the believers to pay them a tithe to support the ministry. Only under the Levitical system did God require the Israelites to bring to the Levites the tithes to support the priesthood and the temple system. The Levites were in charge of enforcing the civil and criminal laws within the community of Israel and the tithe was to pay for the support of the priests who had no inheritance as a tribe of Israel when the promised land was taken from the Canaanites. If we read Acts and the epistles of Paul and the other apostles, there is no mention of paying the ministry from a "tithe" imposed upon the believing community. The apostle Paul was supported by the Philippian believers from their freewill offerings to support his missionary journeys. It was the judaizing Gnostics who wanted to put the gentiles Christians under the obligations of the Levitical temple laws. The Old Testament references to "robbing God" in Malachai, when the Jews were not paying tithe, were so severe because the Jews had forsaken the worship of God and the temple had fallen into disuse. The Jews were worshipping Baal and building temples to his name throughout Israel while the tithe which was to support the Temple and the priests of God was withheld from the treasury of God. In the Christian era all believers are "priests" of God who offer up spiritual sacrifices through our great High Priest, Jesus Christ. The "priesthood of all believers" declares that all believers are all equal and that the ministers and activities of the church of Christ are to be supported from the liberality of the cheerful giver, not from an imposed system of law which declares that those who do not pay at least ten percent are "robbing God". The mandatory tithing system which some are trying to impose upon Christians is a return to the temple system which has been swept away in Christ.
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