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NOW, AND THEN

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 23, 1901

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 78, No. 17.

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NOW, AND THEN

By A. Smith

A. SMITH
(Grandville, Mich.)

THE LEFT HAND

“Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation.” Mal. 3 : 8, 9.
“Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: for I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat.” Matt. 25 : 41, 42.

THE RIGHT HAND

“Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.” Mal. 3 : 10.
“Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat.” Matt. 25 : 34, 35.
“The curse causeless shall not come.” Prov. 26 : 2.
It is evident that if the Lord’s curse rests upon any one of His people for any cause whatever, that curse must be removed by removing its cause before the King can say, “Come, ye blessed.” “But,” you say, “I never can cancel my past indebtedness in the matter of tithes.” Well, if yours is a parallel case, you may find comfort in studying Matt. 18:23-27.
“But,” says one, “I don’t know how to estimate my tithe.” If you had a tenth interest in an estate of ten thousand dollars, consisting of complicated interests, would you be likely to lose any of your just dues from lack of mathematical accuracy in computing it, even if you had to call to your aid an expert accountant? Even so you need have no difficulty in estimating the amount of the Lord’s tithe. All the difficulty in the matter lies on the side of “Don’t want to.” Every Seventh-day Adventist who will finally stand among the one hundred and forty-four thousand will have been approved in the matter of paying tithes, as well as in the performance of all other duties. The tithe, even as the Sabbath, is the Lord’s, and the one is as holy as the other. By paying tithes we minister meat (bread) to the laborer, and by him temporal and spiritual meat to the lost and perishing. And besides all that, the Lord promises to more than return it to us in this life, and set it to our credit in the heavenly treasure. Who can afford not to pay tithes?