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One of the more persistent myths about money that circulates in some Christian circles goes like this….

Myth Five:  ‘Money is
the root of all evil’ hence the nick name ‘filthy lucre’ or unrighteous
mammon’. Ergo, it’s better for Christians just not to get too involved with
focusing on making money, if it is at best a necessary evil.

What Paul actually says in 1 Tim. 6.10 is
that “the love of money is a root of
all sorts of evil.”  In other words, it is
the heart attitude towards money that is being critiqued, including the sin
called greed.  Money in itself is just a
means of exchange.  It is no more
inherently evil than any other material thing God created.  The warnings in the Bible however remind us
that fallen human beings find things like money a great temptation to
indulgence of various kinds that are unhelpful to one’s Christian life.  This being the case, a very cautious approach
to money, and the making and saving of it, is in order, with one being
reflective about how and why one is wanting to purchase this, that or the
other.

I was once watching TV while stuck in a hotel in New York, and Reverend Ike came on the TV– his subject “the lack of money is the root of all evil”.  I kid you not. The sermon went like this— ‘is money too much of a temptation for you? Let me help you with that— send it to me!  Do you find that when you have money, you spent it unwisely— well let me help you with that— send it to me to support my ministry.”  I was appalled, not merely by the blatant twisting of Scripture to say the opposite of what it says, but the brazen appeal for money based on that distortion.  Too many TV preachers and local preachers have been guilty of twisting the text in order to bring in the financial resources they need.

And even when we are dealing with ministers with Christian principles, they may be working with the wrong principles— take for example the ever-present exhortation to tithe.  Tithing is a practice enunciated in the OT. It is specifically connected to the Mosaic covenant, but one could as readily find the principle in other contexts as well.  And Jesus does indeed say to his fellow Jews, in particular the Pharisees, that it is fine for them to tithe dill, mint and cummin, but they should not neglect the weightier aspects of the Law when it comes to giving.   But here is the issue— Jesus is talking to those already under the Mosaic covenant. This is an inter-Jewish discussion.  Nowhere in his instructions to his fledgling disciples does he urge them to tithe.  Indeed when he talks about giving and is addressing the disciples he sets up examples of sacrificial giving, usually more than a tithe, though in the case of a poor person it could be less than a tenth.  Consider for example the story of the widow giving two lepta into the Temple treasury (Mk. 12.41-44). She gave all her liquid assets. This is not an example of tithing.  My point is simple.  Jesus inaugurated the new covenant, and with it new rules.  Tithing was not one of those rules, sacrificial giving was.  Of course the phrase sacrificial giving will mean different amounts of giving for different persons. For the rich, giving a tithe would be no sacrifice at all in most cases– it would just be a tax write-off.  For the poor giving a tenth might be financial suicide.  In other words, under the new covenant we have the duty to examine our own lives and figure out what sacrificial giving looks like— whether more or less than a tenth.