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ily purchases is a whopping "dis–
hones ty tax." lt adds up to severa!
hundred dollars a yea r. We don't
think of it this way. but each one of
us shells out up to 15 cents on the
d o ll a r to pay fo r thefts, s tock
"sh rinkages." management corrup–
tion, kickbacks. bribery and an end–
Jess variety of "accepted" dishonest
busi ness practices.
As Jo hn Ly nch further com–
mented : "Management is seldom in
a position to discover disloyalty
among its employees
until serious.
somerimes irreparable damage oc–
curs."
In other words. businesses go
fl a t broke; employees lose their
jobs : and even the GNP is hurt - to
say nothing of incalculable damage
to a person 's character, which is
vastly more important than mere
economic loss. ·
God is nor pleased!
He sta ted the
eighth of the Ten Commandments
in very simple terms: "Thou s halt
not steal." There is no way to mis–
understand th e intended meaning.
Both of the accounts of the T en
Commandments - in Exodus 20
and Deuteronomy 5 - use jus t
these four little words: "Thou shalt
not stea l." The most the apostle
Pa ul cou ld add was: " Let him tha t
sto le steal no mo re" (Eph. 4:28).
Stealing is just no t all that com–
plica ted a concept to understand .
Ye t millions can't seem to grasp the
fact th a t the theft of
anyrhing
tha t
belongs to another human being
or
ro God
constitutes a serious moral
crime against God and man. You
ask: " But what could God possibly
have tha t 1 could steaJ?"
The Connection Between
the Commandments
The Ten Commandments canno t be
isolated one from another. J ames
says th a t if you break one, you have
broken all of them. John says th a t
there is no way that you can !ove
God and hate your brother at the
same time. Paul says twice in his
various epistles: "Covetousness is
ido la try." There is an inextricable,
unbreakable. totalty binding inter–
rela tionship betweeen loving God
and loving neighbor. and there is no
greater irony than fo r a hypocritical
human being to claim to do one
while he is obviously completely
omitting the o ther.
The
PLAIN TRUTH March 1977
"Bring ye all the tithes
into the storehouse,
that there may be meat in
mine house, and prove
me now herewlth, saith the
Lord of hosts, if 1wlll
not open you the windows
of heaven, and pour
you out a blessing, that
there shall not be
room enough to receive it."
And, believe it or not. both na–
tions and individuals can steal from
God -
direct!y!
The ft from God is
every bit as serious as robbing an–
other human being - if not mo re so.
Eli. an Old Testamen t priest. asked
an inte resting ques tion in l Samuel
2:25: " lf one man sin agains t an–
o ther. the judge shall judge him :
but
if
a man sin againsr rhe Lord, who
sha/1 intreat
[intercedel.for
him?"
Sinning against God - stealing
from God - is a very scrious mat–
te r! lt is not to be tossed off with a
casual shrug of the shoulde rs, while
continuing on our merry way.
Withholding God's Tithe
Most people either don' t paya tenth
of their income to God or thcy with–
hold it in a bank account with the
idea of paying it at a later time to
any organization that ever measures
up to their " holier-th an-thou" stan–
dards. But millions would say: " I
simply can't afford it a t a ll."
Listen to this stinging indictment!
" Even from the days of your fathers
ye are gone away from mine o rdi–
nances.
and have nor kepr them. Re–
turn unto me,
and I will return unto
you. saith the Lord of hosts. But ye
sa id, Wherein [how] shall we re–
turn?" (Mal. 3:7.) ("To return," as it
is used in this verse, is an archaic
English express ion that s imply
means to start obeying God's laws
again.)
Have you ever noticed tha t these
people who don't obey God a lways
seem to have something to say?
They pretend th ey don ' t know
they' re not keeping God's com-
mandments. lt 's a comple te myste ry
to them!
So God
narrows down
the in–
dictment :
" Wi/1 aman rob God?
Yet
ye have robbed me. But ye say.
Wherein have we robbed thee?' '
(Verse 8.) Same approach! People
pretend they haven't the fa intest
idea about anything they might be
doing to offend God.
So God explains exactJy what He
mea ns in very explici t terms:
"In
rithes and o.fferings."
Then God says we a re financially
cursed because we're breaking a
fundamental financia! law: "Ye a re
cursed with a curse: for ye have rob–
bed me, even this whole nation"
(verse 9). Does anyone who lives in
America, or Britain , or Australia
doubt tha t these Western nations
are, in fact. under sorne kind o f
horrible curse in spite of their com–
parative wealth? It's a lmost a con–
tradiction in terms - cursings and
blessings a t the same time - ye t
news of our la tes t financia) debacles
are regular headlines in the United
States, Britain and Australia. For a
wh ile it looked like the bottom was
going to drop completely out of th e
British pound. Only the prospects of
a substantia l 1nternational Mone–
ta ry Fund loan in the offing. and
s u pport from o ther NATO a nd
Common Market nations. prevented
possible economic ruin for the
United Kingdom. In the United States.
leading economic indicators have
flattened out and economists now
talk of "getting the recovery going
again." In Australia, Canberra's
17 .5 pe rcent devaluation of the
Aussie d o lla r does n ' t speak too
well o f th e economic situation
there.
To spend the next few paragraphs
elaborating on the personal fin an–
cia! difficulties of prívate Ame rica n
citizens and British subjects would
waste bo th my time and yours. You
yourself are probably in debt all the
way up to your lower lip! And that's
another reason you might claim that
you cannot afford to tithe!
Simple Solutlons
Our Creator does not offer us com–
plex. hard- to-unders tand. puzzling–
in-themselves solutions to our fin an–
cia! problems. He simply states:
"Bring ye al/ the tithes
into the store-
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