Tithing Versus Giving Generously
Tithing Versus Giving Generously 
A couple weeks ago I posted What’s Your Opinion on What the Bible Says about Giving? and got several opinions on what people think is the standard of giving for Christians. In addition, I’ve been having an on-going discussion with a reader on the subject of tithing. It seems that there are some things Christians can agree on about giving and some that we can’t. First, here’s what we can agree on:
Every Christian should be giving something of their income.
After that, it starts getting murky. 
Seriously. People disagree on how much should be given, where it should be given, who should give it and on and on. I was going to do a listing of the various suggestions/thoughts people have on giving, but if I did that, I’d need to start a new blog to contain them all. So I thought I’d highlight the two most popular lines of thought and discuss them a bit. Here goes:
- Tithes and offerings. This group says that the tithe (10% of income) is to be given (usually) to the local church. The 10% is taken from gross income (usually) before taxes or anything else is taken out — this is the first money to go out when a paycheck is received. Above the tithes, Christians are called upon to give offerings to help others, fund various ministries and the like.
- Give generously. This group says that the tithe is an Old Testament principle and not applicable to Christians (by the way, tithers will say Jesus came to fulfill the law, not destroy it, but that’s for a different post.) However, this group does recognize that Christ does call us to give generously (some refer to it as "giving by the Spirit") to fund the work of the church, help those in need, and so on. There’s no set standard to "giving generously" — each person seems to have his own standard — and while some may give 2% and be generous, another may give 30% and be just as generous.
Is this a fair representation of the two main perspectives Christians have about giving or am I missing something? I really would like to identify the major thoughts Christians have on giving so we can discuss and debate them. Let me know if I’m on the right track or not with these. 
