by Fr Gabriel-Allan Boyd
The OFFERING of Thanksgiving: The very word, “Eucharist,” means “Thanksgiving.” Throughout all of the Eucharistic prayers, we are constantly referring to this giving of thanks. The priest says, “Let us give thanks unto the Lord.” Everyone replies, “We lift them up to the Lord.” & “It is proper and right.” Those moments embody the central theme of *why we all exist*…to lift up every part of our lives to the Lord in continual acts of worshipful-thanksgiving. Relatedly, Saint Paisios of the Holy Mountain talks about a Greek word, φιλότιμο “philótimo.” Holy-philótimo is having so much gratitude, that we feel a great and humble indebtedness to God…and even to the created-image-of-God in our neighbor. This is at the heart of Orthodox Christianity. When we feel this holy-philótimo, we’re so filled with joy in offering, that the only thing we regret is that we can’t offer more. Our deepest need is to become so aware and grateful for what God is doing in our lives, that we see God’s image in our neighbor and feel indebted even to them.
The OFFERING of Worship: At the very beginning of every Orthodox Christian’s life (at our baptism), God gives us a brilliant symbol of Orthodox life and worship—we’re tonsured. Little pieces of our hair are cut from our head, while the priest recites from the baptismal service, “The first *offering* of the hairs of your head.” It’s an odd ritual in that it begs the question, “Why does God need an offering of your hair?” The answer is, “God doesn’t *need* anything.” And likewise, God doesn’t need our money any more than He needs our hair, or anything else for that matter, because He created it all and thus, it all belongs to Him anyway. As Orthodox Christians, He’s simply given us care over the things in our possession to use it *all* in worship of Him. So why do we offer this hair at our baptism? Because for babies, it’s practically all they have to offer. In their first act, as someone newly baptized and chrismated, they make an offering to God. Thus, it demonstrates to the Godparents and the parents that this is central to what they should be teaching the child as they train them up in the Lord. Being an offeror is vital to a right relationship with God and to worshipping Him. Why?...Because, Christ is the ultimate offeror of Himself—self-sacrificially pouring Himself out as an act of love for His Father, for us, and for our neighbor. Each of us who were baptized, were united to Christ in that baptism. And every Christian is called to grow in His likeness…to be Christ-like. So self-sacrificial offering simply becomes an essential part of worshipping and being united to God.
The Tithe Offering to our Church: In the Old Testament, God taught His people to offer a tithe—which means 10%—of their entire year’s income. Since they were a farming society, this included ten percent of their fruit and grain harvests and ten percent of their flocks each year, but it wasn’t just any ten percent. They were supposed to tithe the first and best ten percent—the first fruits—as sacred and set apart to the Lord. In other words, they were supposed to offer to God first, before they took any for themselves and before they paid any of the rest of their debts. For the ancient Israelites, it wasn’t an option. It was a part of Jewish Law, because God was trying to teach them that they could trust Him to care for them, even when they gave this significantly. Now this will blow your minds: For Israel, there wasn’t just one tithe. There were actually three tithes that they were commanded to give. The first was the sacred tithe to the Lord, that went to the care and ministry of their place of worship (Numbers 18: 21, 24). The second tithe went toward a kind of yearly, shared Thanksgiving feast, praising God in gratitude for His blessings (Deuteronomy 14:22-27). It was a sort of family recreation/renewal & festal savings system. And then there was a third tithe (given every third year), which went to the poor (Deuteronomy 14:28-29)—a community project for the sake of widows, orphans and to offer hospitality to poor visiting travelers.
OBJECTION: The common objection from lawyer-type Orthodox Christians regarding these tithes is that we’re no longer under the Old Law…that in the New Testament, we’ve been set free from the Law. Yet Christ Himself didn’t shirk His responsibility to the Old Testament law when it came to such matters. He says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17). What’s important to remember here is that God didn’t give the Israelites these laws on tithing to make their lives unbearable, but rather for their own spiritual and mental health and for the blessing of the world, “On behalf of all and for all.” He wants us—as people who are called to grow in Christ-likeness—to become offerors after the manner of God. As people who are united with Christ, we’re called to be obedient to the Law of Christ…which is merely a Law of Love. Christ voluntarily, lovingly, and self-sacrificially gave Himself for us. He took the form of a servant, even though He was God by nature. So, God gives us this gift of choosing with our finances whether we actually want to be united to Him—to faithfully choose to participate with Him in His way of offering.
Thus, if we want to be united to Christ, we can’t give God our leftovers: We have to give Him our first-fruits. That’s the only way to really acknowledge, and teach ourselves (and our children) that everything we have belongs to God. When we become such offerers it affects our salvation, because it reflects the degree to which we have become united to Christ. Do you want to be saved? Then, in an act of worship, trust God (not your money) to take care of your needs
This is important to emphasize. Our offering to God was never supposed to be about paying the Church’s bills & budget (even if the Church does use it for the care of its ministries and place of worship). Reflect on the poor widow’s story, who offered only two small copper coins to the Lord (Luke 21:1-4)? It was all she had, yet she offered them anyway. Jesus said that her offering was far greater than the impressive gifts given by the rich people around her because what she gave was self-sacrificially substantial for her, exercising an enormous amount of faith—trusting that God was the one taking care of her. A rich person might give a large sum of money, but if it’s not really a self-sacrificially generous amount of money for them, then it’s not given with any trust in God…and thus, it’s not transformative for them. Sure, the money might be put to good use, paying the Church’s bills, but that’s not why we offer! The best way to offer, is to offer the way God taught us to give: proportionally, in other words, a pre-planned percentage (10%) of our income. This way our offering will be significant enough to really teach us that everything we have belongs to God…and that we really do trust Him to care for us, because our money isn’t God…He is.
Remember the holy-philotimo of Saint Paisios that I mentioned at the beginning of this article? Can you imagine what would happen in the life of this parish, if the kind of holy-philótimo that Saint Paisios talks about became our central, most recognizable virtue? Our witness of having such transformed lives of holy philótimo is the number one evangelical tool that we have. When we become very faithfully and seriously focused about our transformation in Christ (offering every part of ourselves to Him), that will become the best means for spreading His Good News.