The 10 Percent Issue
You have heard it.
Once you become Christian, you have to pay.
No matter how poor you are, you have to give 10 percent.
The church will take your money.
They convert you, then they collect from you.
You hear it.
You nod.
Because money is sensitive.
Money is where the heart is.
If someone takes your money, you feel cheated.
So you feel you must warn others.
Wait.
Stay with that feeling for one minute.
Not to argue. Just to look.
Imagine a poor woman.
She has no job. She has two children. She has one meal a
day.
She goes to church on Sunday.
She sits in the last bench. She prays. She cries. She goes
home.
Who asks her for money?
Who stops her at the door and says, “Where is your 10
percent?”
Who checks her purse?
Who knows how much she earns?
Think slowly.
In a church, when the offering box goes around, what
happens?
One man puts something. One woman puts nothing. One child
puts a flower. One old man just folds his hands.
Who is watching?
Who is writing names?
Who is counting who gave and who did not give?
No one.
Because the church admin does not know who is paying how
much.
There is no list. There is no bill. There is no tax
collector at the door.
If there is no list, how can there be force?
Force needs a list. Force needs a threat. Force needs a
punishment.
Where is the list?
Where is the threat?
Where is the punishment?Y
ou have never seen it. Because it does not exist.
Now think of the second lie inside the first lie.
10 percent is compulsory.
Is it?
Open the New Testament.
Not what someone told you. What it actually says.
It does not say, “You must pay 10 percent or you will be
punished.”
It says something very different. Something very quiet.
It says, Each one should give what he has decided in his
heart.
Not reluctantly.
Not under compulsion.
For God loves a cheerful giver.
Read that again.
Slowly.
What he has decided in his heart.
Not what the pastor decided. Not what the church decided.
Not what the crowd decided.
In his heart.
Not reluctantly.
Not under compulsion.
If it is not under compulsion, can it be forced?
If God loves a cheerful giver, can God love a forced giver?
Think.
A forced gift is not a gift. It is a tax.
A cheerful gift is not a tax. It is love.
Which one does the New Testament ask for?
Love.
Not tax.
So where does 10 percent come from?
It comes from the Old Testament.
From an old system.
From a time of temple and priests and sacrifices.
Very few anointed Christians even today choose to follow
that as a personal discipline.
Not because they are forced.
Because they want to.
Because they feel, “God gave me everything, I want to give
back.”
It is their choice. Their heart. Their decision.
Not a rule for the poor.
Not a rule for the new believer.
Not a rule for the woman in the last bench.
Now ask yourself the deeper question.
If the church wanted money, would it go to the poor?
Would it go to the village?
Would it go to the woman with one meal a day?
A businessman who wants money goes to the rich. He goes to
the city. He goes to the place where money is.
Why would a church go to a poor hut to collect 10 percent of
nothing?
10 percent of nothing is nothing.
10 percent of hunger is hunger.
What kind of business is that?
It is not business. It is not collection. It is not tax.
It is something else.
It is a place where a poor woman can sit, cry, pray, and go
home without paying anything, and no one will stop her.
Have you ever seen a place like that?
A temple where you can enter without money? A baba who will
bless you without a fee? A function where you can sit without a ticket?
Many places ask for money first, then give blessing.
The church gives blessing first, then says, “If your heart
wants to give, give. If not, don’t.”
Which one is forcing?
And here is the paradox.
The person who says, “Christians are forced to pay 10
percent,” is often the person who has never sat in a church offering.
He has never seen the box go around silently.
He has never seen the woman who gives nothing and is still
hugged, still prayed for, still welcomed next Sunday.
He is repeating a story he heard, not a story he lived.
And the hidden cost?When you believe that every Christian is
paying 10 percent, you miss the real change.
You miss why that poor woman keeps coming even though she
gives nothing.
You miss why that rich man keeps coming even though he could
keep his money.
You miss that they are not coming for money. They are coming
for something money cannot buy.
Peace.
Righteousness.
Humility.
Love.
A heart that says, “Papoham, Papatma. I am a sinner. I need
to turn.”
A heart that finds rest, not because it paid, but because it
was forgiven.
That is the real offering.
Not 10 percent. 100 percent of the heart.
So ask yourself, not as a Hindu, not as a Christian, but as
a human sitting alone:
If I go to a place for twenty years, and no one ever asks me
for money, and no one ever checks my purse, and no one ever stops me at the
door — was I forced?I
f I give something one day, because my heart wanted to give
— was that force? Or was that love?
If I give nothing, and I am still welcomed — is that a tax?
Or is that grace?
Leave that question there.
Do not answer it tonight.
Let it sit in you.
Because forced giving makes a man poorer.
Cheerful giving makes a man freer.
And the church was never built to make men poorer.
It was built to make poor men free.
