SEE MISSIONS RALLY PROGRAM F o SABBATH, MAY 21
The Church Officers’ Gazette
Vor. XIX
JUNE, 1932
No. 6
The Church Officers’ Gazette
Issued monthly
Printed and published by the
BEVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION
at Takoma Park, Washington, D. C., U. 8. A.
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EDITORIAL COUNCIL
J. L. McEruany OC, K, Meyers I, Kerz M. I, Kren
Entered as seeond-clasz matter, January 20, 1914, at the post offiee at
Washington, D. C., under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1879.
Church Officers’ General
Fugtruction Department
Special Appointments for the Month
of June
. June 4
.. June 25
Home Missionary ..
Thirteenth Sabbath ‘Sehool Offering ..
“Bring Ye All the Tithes In”
THINKING men, churchmen and statesmen alike, are puzzled
as to the cauge for the general world depression that has so
well nigh universally “settled down from out of the skies,” as
some have expressed it, during reeent months, affecting as it
has all classes of people, every line of industry, even to seriously
curtailing incomes to chureh and mission board treasuries.
Various and many are the reasons cited as to the cause for
these serious and sudden financial reverses, as well as many
panaceas offered for bringing about the return of the more
normal prosperous times. Quite widespread is the expression
of belief by sober-minded, thinking men that God has had
something to do with bringing about this situation, yea, even
more than is eommonly admitted. The thought is seriously
expressed that hecause prosperity had come to be taken as a
matter-of-fact blessing, something by right due men, no matter
what might be their course in life, God was making it known
that with His blessings withheld all man’s efforts to maintain,
or, when lost, to restore, prosperous times would he in vain,
Man's silent Partner in earths affairs having been ignored, He
was letting it be known that much more depended upon His
part than man was wont to acknowledge, or perhaps the will
ingly ignorant knew, And who dare say these conchisions
are not truthfully and accurately drawn? “Except the Lord
build the house,” we are told, “they labor in vain that build
it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but
in vain.”
Every Man's Tithe Belongs to God
God still holds supreme claim to the earth. The very land
composing the territory on which the nations dwell belongs to
Him. To Israel, to whom God promised the land of Canaan,
He said, “The land shall not be sold forever: for the land is
Mine; for ye are strangers and scjourners with Me.” Fathers
could pass it on in their legacies to their children as an in-
heritance, yet, notwithstanding all this, the land still belonged
to God. He plainly says so. And God as well has had more
to do than men are wont to think in setting off by themselves
and fixing the boundaries of nations. God “hath made of one
blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth,
and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds
of their habitation.”
All this being true, is it to he accounted a strange thing
that God should require in actual monetary values a portion of
man’s prosperity vouchsafed him in God’s continuously poured-
out blessings, bound up with Hie sunshine and showers and
His fruitful seasons, “seeing He giveth to all life, and breath,
and all things”? And has the Lord in actual faet stipulated
in cash values a part of man’s income, bis increase, that ‘He
claims as His own in all of earth’s remunerative businesses?
Clearly so. To every business man on earth, to every farmer
tilling His soil, to every wage earner using the strength He
has imparted, around the globe, the great Owner of all the
land, all the gold, all the silver, with every other valuable sub-
stance, God says, One tenth is Mine. .
Whether a man acknowledges it or not, does not detract onc
iota from the stubborn faet still rsmaining, “All the tithe
{one tenth] of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or
of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord's.” Not may be the Lord's;
no, the word is mandatory, this tenth “4s the Lord's.” Not
simply the Christian's one tenth, but one tenth of everybody’s
increase “is the Liord’s.”
True, the great majority may not even know it, while many
may have been told, yet knowing or not knowing, the truth still
remains that the tenth helongs to God.
Think what revenue would come into God’s treasuries if all
the tithe belonging to God, of all the nations, should he turned
over to Him in cash value or in kind, for extending ihe in-
terests of His kingdom into all the world! Would there he a
dearth of means for the support of missionaries at home or
abroad?
Either Mount Gerizimp or Mount Ebal
And does God have anything to say regarding the payment
of this His money to Him{¢ “Ye have robbed Me,” He says,
“even. this whole nation” People “rob” Him, He says, in
keeping His tithe as though it belonged to them. And in the
continuance of this robbery, were there actual and definite re-
sults aecerning therefor? “Ye are cursed with a curse” is
God’s answer. !
To determine what thig curse involves; we have but to study
the blessings vouchsafed a man, or any group of men, who
should faithfully pay over into the Liord’s treasury this one
tenth He elaims as Ilis. “I will open you the windows of
heaven,” is the great Pariner’s promise, “and pour you out
a blessing, that there shall not be room enoligh to receive it.
And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, ‘and he shall
not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine
cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of
hosts.”
To cheat God out of His part, would bring the reverse of
all these enumerated blesgings, eomstifuting no small eurse,
indeed. And should this language be interpreted into present-
day terms, could if not be set forth as eonstituting very vahd
and sufficient reasons for bringing on sueh serious business
depressions as we see almost everywhere today?
But to us, a people knowing these requirements of God,
with double foree do these truths apply. If all the tithe of
the lands over which Seventh-day Adventists are given pil-
grimago control, came into the treasury, there would he ample
means for sending the needed missionaries and workers into
both home and foreign fields ripened for harvest—it being
understood freewill offerings would algo flow in with the tithe.
It is not enough to pay some tithe. It is “all the tithe’ of
all of us, children and grown-ups, rich and poor, all those
engaged in small or big businesses, that God claims, Why
not bring it all in to Him? Think of what might come down
out of those opened heavenly windows!