A Tither Turns 100

    Passage: Psalms 100:1

    Speaker: Stephen Schneider

    This sermon is about tithing.

    This is Consecration Sunday at Grace. It is a special day, dedicated to the consecration of our lives. So on this occasion I hope that you will allow me to speak rather personally.


    Sometimes you feel like you have just experienced a moment in life that will be etched on your mind and in your heart for the remainder of your days.


                This past week on Tuesday evening I experienced just such a moment.


    It happened as our family gathered together to celebrate my father's 100th birthday.


    Several of us had already arrived at the home where my father is now staying when there was the ring of the doorbell.  The sound was a herald announcing that the youngest member of our family was making a long-awaited appearance. 


                As it happened, little Cecelia Grace, our first grandchild and my father's first                  great-grandchild, was celebrating a milestone of her own on this very same day:


    It was the one-month anniversary of her arrival as a sojourner in this world.


    My unforgettable moment came as my father was introduced to Cecilia Grace and their eyes met for the very first time.


                When eyes meet, it is always a holy moment.


    Later that evening as I thought back upon that first encounter across the divide of several generations, I imagined what kind of conversation the two of them might have if she were older and my father was not facing some of the limiting challenges of age.


    I suspect that she would ask about what life was like in the early part of the second decade of the last century when my father was born.


    It was a world before television sets and computers, before space travel and smart phones.


    But beyond that, I'd like to think that she might ask about his personal life.


    And here I'm pretty sure I know something of what my father would have to say, because I know what across he years he said to me.


    I know that there would be stories:


    Stories about life growing up on our family farm in North Dakota.


                            Stories about the little one room school house he attended as a boy.


    I know he would tell of the pleasure of building one of the first radios in North Dakota.


                About the Harley-Davidson he owned with a friend.


    He might also mention the years his family spent away from the farm in San Diego.


    About going to school there with Art Linkletter—later to become a radio and television personality, and about taking classes in painting.


    He would talk about returning to North Dakota, eventually attending college and receiving a degree in electrical engineering.


    He would then mention returning to California to study at Cal Tech only to learn on his first day that there were not many job opportunities at the time for electrical engineers.


    And so he would tell of leaving Cal Tech after only one day to follow a path that would lead him to becoming one of the first Certified Public Accountants in California.


    He would surely speak fondly about the little church in downtown Los Angeles on the corner of 12th and Hope streets where he met my mother who, until her death a year ago, was his beloved wife and companion for 71 years.


     
     
     
    Spiritual Practices


    As he would tell his stories, he would most likely intersperse them with the spiritual principles he used to give direction to his life.


    When referring to that sudden transition from electrical engineering to accounting, he would say simply that, "When God closes a door, God opens another door."


    He would then quote a verse from the book of Proverbs:


                "In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths."  [Proverbs 3:6]


    And if he was telling a story about a friend or relative undergoing a difficult time in life, he would mention sharing with them another verse from the scriptures, one that I know he himself used during difficult times:


                "They that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up                        with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and                   not faint.” [Isaiah 40:31]


    For my father these verses from the scriptures were more than Bible texts recited from memory, they were spiritual principles, foundational for the living of life. 


    They were as basic to his life as the three meals he ate each day—and he never missed a meal!—or his half-hour daily exercise routine.


    Along with these principles came specific spiritual practices:


    There were daily devotions with portions read from the Bible and from a small devotional booklet.


    Each Sunday was a Sabbath. 


    And Sabbath meant not only attending church but seeing the entire day as a day apart from the others.


    No spiritual practice, however, made a deeper impression upon me as a boy and to this day than his practice of tithing—the dedication of 10 percent of his income to what he saw as God's work in the world.


    There was never any question for him about this. 


    His tithe largely went to support the work of his church, but it was also used to support other causes that carried spiritual weight for him, including ministries to those who were homeless.


    This all came alive to me in a vivid way in recent years as I began to assist with his financial affairs. 


    I could see in the rather well-worn check wallet where he kept a running account of transactions and the current bank balance, that there was also a record of his tithing fund—with 10% additions to the fund whenever he deposited income and subtractions whenever he wrote a check to support the church or one of his other spiritual commitments.


    By these notations in the checkbook I saw more than an accountant's careful record keeping, I saw a fundamental spiritual practice at work:  keeping life in focus around spiritual priorities.


    Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount: “Where your treasure is there will your heart be also.” 


    And my father understood that this is what makes the practice “spiritual,” it's about the directing of our hearts.


    Through all of this my father set for me an example of spiritually centered living more powerful than any sermon I have ever heard.


    Consecration Sunday


    Today is a focal day in the life of Grace.  With leadership from our Vestry, we are charting a new direction for stewardship at Grace.


    We are focusing on the question, "What is God calling me to do?" rather than "What does the church need to pay its bills?"


    In a few moments we will take some time at the offertory when we will invite members of the Grace community to consider this spiritual question:


    What percentage of my income is God calling me to give? 


    Fundamental to this question is the spiritual principle of prayerfully reflecting upon and then devoting a proportion of our resources to the work and mission of God.


    For my father this proportion was the tithe (10% of his income), but far more important than the number is wrestling with the question: What portion of my income is God calling me to give? 


                            And we all can begin somewhere.


    We are doing this at the offertory because it is an offering of ourselves, and that after all that what is an offertory is meant to be.
    We will then hear a brief witness from one of our parishioners and receive some instructions.


    An usher will then distribute an “estimate of giving” card.


    This will be followed by a prayerful time of consideration when those of us who are members of the Grace community will be asked to indicate our commitment to the work of God through Grace Parish in 2012.


    We will then have an opportunity to put our card in an envelope and then place it on the altar where “estimate of giving” cards, along with any offerings you have brought for this day, will be consecrated and blessed, set apart for God’s work.


    Following this service, we will then have a harvest luncheon to celebrate together this act of offering


    Of course we all have favorite causes we like to support.


    But today we are not speaking about one more worthy cause, we are being invited to consider a spiritual practice—the devoting of a proportion (a percentage) of our income to God's work in the world.


    As my father understood and as someone has said:


    "The goal of Christian stewardship is the faithful management of all that God gives so that God can use our gifts to transform us spiritually and to extend Christ's transforming love to others."


    So even if you are visiting Grace this Sunday or lingering on he edges of the Grace community—whether you are able to complete a card or not—this is a spiritual practice worth considering.


                What we think most about is what we become. 


    And a spiritual giving discipline is about spiritual becoming.


    If my young granddaughter Cecilia Grace were to ask my father: Is this practice of giving a percentage of your income to God's work the secret how you lived to be 100?


    I don't really know what he would say.


    What I do know and what he showed me over the years is that it can be a way to be spiritually alive all of your life.






    Today is the feast of the reign of God when we envision the world as God intends it to be.


    A world where we are reminded that what “we do to one the least of these our sisters and brothers, we are doing unto Christ.”


    It is the end of the church’s liturgical year.


    Next week we will make a new beginning with the first Sunday in Advent, lighting that first candle.


    What better way for each of us to prepare for the “New Year” than to take a step forward in our spiritual life.


    Even a small step, can make a world of difference!

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