Is God a Mob Boss?

Tithe or die? Is God a mob boss, 10 off the top, or I'll bust your knees, miss too many payments, and I'll kill you?

Tithing is not liberality. It's how we keep alive. It's how we stop God's hand from killing us, repossessing our lives. Tithing is not liberality. May I disabuse you of that notion? I'm a giver. I tithe.

You haven't begun to give. You have simply preserved your life and that of your children and your wife. And God said, okay, I won't kill you.

The man in this video is Scott Lamb of the Potter's House, founded by Wayman Mitchell in 1982, after he and his disciples were removed from fellowship with the Foursquare Church Network for rebellious and divisive behavior.

Tithing is not giving anything. That belongs to God. Just give him back what he wants and what he requires and what will keep you from going to hell if you give it.

This was the beginning of a cult, as Mitchell often applied verses like 1 Samuel 15, 23 to anyone who would dare question his ministry. He gradually introduced twisted doctrines that he used to control the people, such as 1 Corinthians 12, 16, which according to him meant that God has a plan and destiny for you at the Potter's House, and so to leave the church would be to go against the will of God, who would give you a terrible life as punishment.

Now, there's a host of other abuses involved in the life of this cult, and I had the pleasure of speaking with one of the former members who left at the age of 25, thus losing most of his friends and everything that he knew, and really had to rebuild his life, which, you know, is consistent with the testimonies of those who come out of environments like these.

They often don't even know how to make friends because the cult kept them isolated from anyone who wasn't involved in it, and the cult was the foundation of the friendships they had before they left. Now, the brother I coordinated with to make this video has a message that he would like to share.

Tithing and the New Covenant

Now, let's turn our attention to the claim in the video. Does tithing keep God from killing you and your family? It's hard to even ask the question with a straight face. But this is an easy question to answer when we realize that tithing 10 is not a requirement for believers in the New Covenant.

It is true that under the Mosaic Covenant, those who didn't tithe were threatened with a curse, and those who did were promised blessing, but the tithe was tethered to the Jewish nation and the land in which they dwelled, and Israel is no longer the particular place of God's people, and we are not under the Mosaic Covenant.

Now, someone might push back and say that Jesus affirmed the tithe in Matthew 23, 23, which is true, but you have to understand that the New Covenant had not yet been inaugurated with his body and blood.

Besides that, Jesus also affirmed offering sacrifices in the temple in Matthew 5, but no one would argue that Jesus meant sacrifices should continue after his sacrifice and the inauguration of the New Covenant.

We should also notice that in all of the commands to give in the New Testament, whether in reference to the support of the church, its officers, or helping those in need, tithing is never mentioned. So if tithing is not a requirement for New Covenant believers, then it certainly cannot be the means by which you repossess your life from God who would otherwise kill you.

Now, don't hear what I'm not saying. I'm not saying that you should stop giving to your church. Giving 10 may be what you do, and there's nothing wrong with that. You might give less, you might give more.

Christians are instructed to give generously and not under compulsion, but from a cheerful heart. 10 does not belong to God. All of it belongs to God. All of it is his money. But maybe you're watching and you disagree about tithing.

Fine. Whatever. Let's, in Unity on the Essentials, agree that even if tithing was a New Covenant requirement, teaching that it is the reason that God doesn't kill you is an abominable manipulative heresy.

The Blood of Jesus and the End of Divine Wrath

What stays the hand of God's wrath against the Christian? Well, what keeps God from killing the believer is the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for him. We all deserve to die for our sin against God.

But in his great love, and to demonstrate his glory, he sends his son to live a sinless and positively righteous life, who then lays down his meritorious life as a sufficient sacrifice and substitute to die the death that I deserve to die.

The wrath of God which was otherwise reserved for me was thrown down upon the head of Christ so that for the believing sinner there is no more wrath. Not one drop remains, and there is now therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

And when the angel of death passed through the towns of the Israelites in the land of Egypt, their instruction was not to lay 10 of their resources outside their doors so that the angel of death would pass over them.

It was to paint their doorposts with the blood of the lamb. I'm good. I'm good. I'm calm. We're good. We're alright. God is not a mob boss threatening you with eternal or even temporal physical death unless you pay up.

Final Rejection of the Teaching

Flee this kind of holy no

Nope.

Mm-mm.

I feel like I'm losing my mind. Is everybody in the world blind? Please, Lord, give me a sign. A sign.