A STATED PROPORTION OF OUR INCOME.
By WILLIAM ARTHUR, A.M.1
(Continued from page 26.)
BUT though we do not believe that the letter of our Lord’s precept was ever meant to prevent His servants from accepting such increase of their goods as His bounty might give them while they glorified Him with their first-fruits, we deeply feel that in the spirit of that precept many weighty lessons lie. It seems to say, “Do not resolve to be rich.” To you, young man, it seems clearly to say, “Do not make up your mind to die worth thirty thousand or a hundred thousand pounds.” Any such resolution is evil, and out of it woes will come. “They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.”—(1 Tim. vi. 9.) It also says:
Do not make haste to be rich; even without formally resolving to win a high prize of wealth, do not follow after riches eagerly, or long to see yourself encircled with abundance. “He that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent. He that hasteth to be rich hath an evil eye, and considereth not that poverty shall come upon him.”—(Prov. xxviii. 20, 22.)
Do not adopt selfishness as a means to wealth. Our natural reason and the carnal mind prompt us to say, “If I am to be rich, all that I get I must keep. Holding, nursing, guarding all that comes into my hands, it must grow to be of some account at last.” Such a mode of calculating is confronted by the spirit of faith and love which breathes all through the Bible. Viewing a Power infinitely above the petty advantages of hoarding, it cries, “There is that scattereth and yet increaseth; there is that withholdeth more than is meet, and it tendeth to poverty.” Take this proverb to your heart. There is joy and glory in it. It links your hope of personal comfort with the Father of all benevolence. Say, “If there is wealth to be gotten by greed, by holding, by shutting my heart against gushes of generosity, and my hand against self-forgetting acts of goodness, then such wealth be to others, and its fruits be far from my children!” Say, “Wealth so gotten is no wealth: it is but a metal coffin for the affections. If wealth come to me, let it come from the Great Giver, at whose bidding I cast my bread upon the waters!” “The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it.”
Do not trust in riches. In the forms of popular speech we may often trace real and important distinctions. Nothing is more common than to hear persons speak of a man idolising various objects of earthly affection. Yet of many such objects we never hear it said they are made gods. We often hear of a man making an idol of his child; but people do not say he makes a god of his child. With regard to money, however, it is quite otherwise; they readily say, “He makes a god of his money.” Yes; for he not only loves the money, and doats on it, but he puts his trust in it. All the faith he has centres in it. It is his Providence; on it his future depends; it is his hope for his children; his hope of name and honour after death. Assail it, and you assail his rock, his strong tower, his reward. Take it away, and in his own feeling you have bereft him of all his dependence. Surely this is idolatry! “Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not high-minded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us all things richly to enjoy; that they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate; laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life.” —(1 Tim. vi. 17-19.)
These seem to me to be some of the chief lessons taught us in this precept of our blessed Master; and he who cordially follows these, glorifying God, and benefiting man with liberal first-fruits of all his increase—on him, for my part, riches and plenty may freely come. In his progress all good men will rejoice; the poor will bless his riches. If, like Abraham, he has an old servant, he will say, with smiles, “The Lord hath blessed my master greatly; and he is become great; and He hath given him flocks, and herds, and silver, and gold, and menservants, and maidservants, and camels, and asses.”—(Gen. xxiv. 35.)
We do not mean that Christians are bound to draw a line, and say, “Beyond this limit, no matter what the bounties of Providence may be, my possessions shall never go.” Oh, what a blessing it had been to thousands had they adopted such a resolution! Many who prospered up to a point which they would have once thought affluence, not then content, pressed forward, and by a few errors dispersed the gatherings of a lifetime. Many for years employed their growing wealth to do good; but at length they had outgrown their religious strength, and, like a youth falling under his own stature, their virtues died of decline. Happy would it be for many did they set a limit to their aims, and add nothing beyond! Whenever this is done in the spirit of humble faith, surely it is good and acceptable to God. But I cannot undertake to teach that it is laid down in Scripture as an incumbent duty.
Away, on the very horizon of sacred history, in the glory of its dawn, we see—shall I say a group?—three personages; the first, shrouded with that excelling light which no man can approach unto; the second, dark with that darkness which, thank God, neither our words nor our imagination can picture; the third, a man of like passions with ourselves. To this man, the Maker of all points the tempter of all, and says, “Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like Him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil?” And who is this of whom we have such testimony as never was borne to other man—who is held up to the accuser of saints as a triumphant instance of the redeeming power of grace? He is one of those whose wealth is almost countless, who has distanced every contemporary, and is the greatest of all the men in the East. It is plain that his immense possessions were no stain upon his “record,” which was “on high.” But ere you exult, in the belief that you may innocently accumulate to an indefinite amount, carefully mark how he employed his wealth.
While his children were holding family feasts, and the joy of abundance was in all their homes, he was “continually” rising early, going to the altar of God, and offering up offerings in large number. And how did he live among his neighbours while thus honouring his God? “When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy. I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor; and the cause which I knew not I searched out.”—(Job xxix. 11, etc.)
Go thou and do likewise. Thus continually and liberally offer unto God; thus bountifully and actively distribute to man; and so long as we see you so doing, “may your garners be full, affording all manner of store!” I, at least, will cheerfully leave it to Providence to fix the limit of your increase. But one word: as you proceed upwards, one earnest word: Walk warily on those heights! Heads are often turned up there; and fearful gulfs yawn under you if you fall!
While, however, we do not contend that to let “riches increase” is forbidden, or even that to permit that increase to an indefinite amount is contrary to clear Scripture, we do contend:—
That not to give away any part of our income is unlawful;
That to leave what we shall give to be determined by impulse or chance, without any principle to guide us, is unlawful;
That to fix a principle for our guidance by our own disposition, or by prevalent usage, without seeking light in the Word of God, is unlawful;
That when we search the Scriptures for a principle, the very lowest proportion of our income for which we can find any show of justification, is a tenth of the whole;
That, therefore, it is our duty to give away stedfastly, for the service and honour of our God, at the very least, one-tenth of all which He commits to our stewardship.
These are my views as to the duty for which I am now pleading; and are, I presume, however shades and points may vary, in substance the views of the gentlemen by whose call I stand here.
AS TO THE GROUNDS ON WHICH THIS DUTY RESTS. Let us suppose that it does not rest on any grounds whatever; that the idea of such a duty is without foundation; that we are each at liberty to choose what proportion of his possessions he shall give away, from the nearest approach to nothing, upwards; so that if one give a tenth, another a ninetieth, and a third one thousandth part, they differ not in this—that the one is liberal, the other covetous, and the third a wretch; but in this—that the one is liberal, the other less liberal, and the other less so still; each of them practising a virtue, a voluntary virtue, only in various degrees. This is the plain meaning and practical application of a notion which floats in undefined thought, and is often expressed in vague language by many excellent people—a notion about Christianity leaving the amount of liberality to the private will and disposition of each individual.
If this view be correct, then it follows that in Christian morals we have one virtue which has no minimum limit, no expiring point; which continues to be a virtue down to within a hairbreadth of nothing, no matter how largely mixed with the opposite vice. Shall we apply this principle to the other virtues?—for instance, truth? Are we not apt to think that, however much truth may be in a statement, if mixed with a little deception, the virtue of it is gone? And as to honesty, do we not feel that whatever amount of honesty may be in a transaction, if mixed with any cheating, the virtue is destroyed? And are we to hold that any miserable gift, somewhat short of nothing, which a covetous man may give, is yet an act of liberality, though in a low degree? Is liberality the one virtue which Christianity has abandoned, in this cold world, to every man’s whim, and never pronounces violated, so long as it is not totally renounced and abjured? Surely there is some point far short of nothing, at which gifts cease to be “liberal,” and begin to be “vile;” at which a giver ceases to be “bountiful,” and deserves to be called a “churl!”
One thing is certain, that if Christianity has set no minimum limit to generosity, it has set a maximum limit. If we are at liberty to press down our generosity to the lowest discernible point, we are not at liberty to push it up without check. Christianity commands plainly, “Owe no man anything;” so that I cannot give away money while I am unable to pay my debts, without violating the laws of my religion. She also plainly declares, that if any man provide not for his own, and especially for those of his own house, he has denied the faith, and is worse than an “infidel.” Therefore, I cannot give away money while my own are unprovided for, or left to be provided for by others, without violating the laws of my religion. Is it, then, probable that Christ’s good gospel, while marking points in the upward progress of generosity at which it would pass into injustice, has marked none in its downward progress at which it would pass into selfishness?
If Christianity has left benevolence entirely to private decision, it also follows that, while those branches of expenditure which regard our self-interest are regulated by fixed circumstances, that which is for the glory of God is at the mercy of chance. The three circumstances already named—family, locality, station—decide for each of us, to a great extent, the scale of most items of our outlay. Your rent is tolerably well fixed from year to year; your board is not very uncertain; your dress, and every other claim of self-interest, has its proportion not ill-defined; and is it probable that while every outlay that nourishes self is regular, that only outlay which tends to free you from earth, and connect your hopes with a better country, is precisely the one which the religion of Jesus has left to be the football of passion or of accident?
“I do not mean,” you say, “that we are at liberty to give by mere chance, without fixing some principle; I only mean, we are not bound to a tenth.” Not bound to a tenth! No, most surely we are not bound to a tenth. If that be your meaning then thy heart is as my heart. No principle of the gospel, no precept of the law, ever glances in the direction of binding us to a tenth. But is it possible that you mean something you do not say? Is it possible that when you speak of not being bound to a tenth, you mean we are at liberty to make up our minds not to give a tenth, but to give something less? Well, so let it be. Suppose that a Christian, without offending against his religion, may spend on self-interests more than nine-tenths of his income, then it follows that it is lawful for a Christian to be more selfish than was lawful for a Jew. This conclusion may not be agreeable, but it is clear. Every Jew was blessed with a religion which checked his downward, earthward tendency, at the very least to this extent—that, of his all, one tenth went to sacred things, and thus connected with them his affections and his hopes. Less than that he could not consecrate to the service of his God, without a trespass against his religion. If, then, a Christian may give less, his religion elevates him in a lower degree, leaves him to be more earthly without guilt, and less noble without reproach.
One other consequence follows. If a Christian may, according to his religion, lawfully devote less than a tenth of his income to holy purposes, then CHRISTIANITY HAS LOWERED THE STANDARD OF A VIRTUE, and that the virtue of liberality! The Jew who gave less than one tenth was branded by his religion as a sinner. That system, which we regard as very much more earthly, so much less spiritual and heavenly than ours, ever held the standard of pecuniary self-denial up to that point at the very least. And is it come to this, that our Christianity, our religion of love and sacrifice, let down the standard of this special virtue below the point where it stood when she came to warm our world? We know the thousand contrivances to escape from this conclusion. But, however often you cite the difference between an agricultural and a commercial people; however much you talk of Levites, tribes, rent-charges, and adjustments; however many lanes you enter from your starting-point, if you follow any one of them to its end, it will land you in front of this conclusion: CHRISTIANITY HAS LOWERED THE STANDARD OF A VIRTUE.
But I will not further follow the supposition that the duty of giving away at least a tenth of our income has no grounds; for the conclusions to which it leads are not satisfactory. I will now assert that it has grounds. They may be thus stated:—
GIVING IS AN ESSENTIAL PART OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. This position needs no special argument. In support of it the whole New Testament cries aloud. The system of redemption is from first to last one prodigious process of gift. God loved the world, and GAVE His only begotten Son. The Son loved us, and GAVE Himself to death “for us all.” This giving does not rest at the point of bounty, but passes on to that of inconceivable sacrifice. Every man on whose spirit the true light of redemption breaks, finds himself heir to a heritage of givings, which began on the eve of time, and will keep pace with the course of eternity. To giving he owes his all; in giving he sees the most substantial evidence he can offer that he is a grateful debtor; and the self-sacrifice of Him in whom he trusts says, far more pathetically than words could say, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”
(To be Continued.)
1 This excellent address was delivered about fifty years ago in the Victoria Hall, Belfast, the Bishop of Down, in the chair.—Ed.