In the past twenty years or so, the Word of Faith movement (if you can call it that) has moved away from the finished work of Christ (and who we are in Christ) to a doctrine of works through tithing. Very often I find myself sitting in a meeting hearing that the only way that God can “bless” me is for me to give “tithes and offerings” à la Malachi 3 — I have to somehow “activate” God by giving. That doctrine is not only error, but it’s downright dangerous. It says that Jesus’ work in emptying himself of his preincarnate glory, becoming a man, dying separated from the Father, and faithfully submitting himself to the principalities of the age until every man could be born-again just wasn’t good enough; I have to put greenbacks in the offering plate to seal the deal (Nothing is impossible to the man who tithes?).
Lately, I’ve been reading through Ian Wallis’s The Faith of Jesus Christ in Early Christian Traditions. Wallis is the chaplain and director of Studies in Theology at Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge. Here are two passages from his book (you might have to read them twice):
Thus we may note that for Paul the promise is not simply appropriated by faith (τοις πιστευουσιν [“the believing ones”], Gal. 3.22), but by participating - through faith - in Jesus Christ, who inherited the promise through faith (εκ πιστεως Ιησου Χριστου [out of or of the faith of Christ]). In consequence, the faith of believers can never be dissociated from the faith of Christ. It is his faith which makes the faith of others possible and enables them to participate in its inheritance. Ian Wallis, The Faith of Jesus Christ in Early Christian Traditions 117.
[In Romans and Galatians], Paul develops his understanding of justification and righteousness with the help of a tripartite schema consisting of:
- God promises to bless all people through Abraham;
- Abraham responds in faith;
- God is faithful to his promise by bringing it to fulfillment.
Within this Heilsplan, the law temporarily frustrates the fulfillment of the promise until Christ, the Righteous One, embraces its judgment upon sin by dying on the cross. It is on the cross that his faith-in-obedience is supremely evident as God’s faithfulness to the promise reaches out to the Jews and Gentiles alike. As a result, both the promise and its fulfillment are encountered in Christ - his faith is at once the grounds for human faith and the channel for its fulfillment. Ian Wallis, The Faith of Jesus Christ in Early Christian Traditions 118.
In my mind Wallis has more of a grip on the Word of Faith than many of our famous (infamous) Word preachers.
[Note: Many of our Word preachers use Abraham as a paradigm or example of faith. They say, “Abraham is our example;we are the sons of Abraham. He tithed to Melchisedek so we also should tithe.” Wallis demonstrates that Paul doesn’t present Abraham as a paradigm, but rather as a representative figure. Abraham heard the Gospel (God’s promise to bless all people - not just the Jews) and responded in faith (“Abraham saw my day and rejoiced in it”). We are the sons of Abraham because we are “those out of faith” (Gal. 3.9) — those like Abraham who heard the Gospel and responded in faith. As Wallis says, faith can never be dissociated from the faith of Christ. Tithing or even giving as “activitation” writes Jesus right out of the Gospel.
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