May 11, 2019: Day 14 – Deuteronomy 14

We normally skip right to the verses that deal with tithing in this chapter.  If you want to skip right there they begin in vs.22ff.  But look at the verses before this.  We see a directive on what we can eat and what we cannot eat.  We read here for the first time that we are not to eat pork simply because it does not chew its cud.  The same it true for the camel, do not eat it, it does chew its cud but it does not have forked hoof.  If you have ever seen a camel I’m not sure you would want to eat it anyway.

But all of these directives are for the purpose of reminding us that God has set us apart to be a special people, people who are not like everyone else and set apart to do the will of God.  I’m grateful that we have Acts 10:9-16 where God tells Peter, tells us as well, that whatever God has made is clean.  Back then it wasn’t easy to be selective with your diet.  But there must have been also some “scientific” understanding that some of these animals were unclean simply because if you ate them you could get sick, really sick.  We don’t read that here, here we read don’t eat them because you are set apart.

Now on to tithing.  The reason for tithing is given here in vs.23, we tithe so that we may learn to fear the Lord your God always.  Part and parcel of this fear is knowing that all that we have is the Lord’s.  Look at Psalm 24:1 and we read: “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it.”  We can claim no ownership in this world.  As the youngest of 4 boys I’m very comfortable with that.  I always had hand me downs, I always knew that what I had was a gift from someone else.  But can we take that to the next level as adults.  That what we have, our jobs, our homes, our relationships, our families, all that we have is God’s and a blessing and a gift from God.  Tithing reminds us of that.