Ex Libris 
 C. K. OGDEN < 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 OUR GIVING: 
 
 WHAT IT IS, AND WHAT IT OUGHT TO BE
 
 OUR GIVING: 
 
 WHAT IT IS, AND WHAT IT 
 OUGHT TO BE 
 
 A PLEA FOR INCREASED LIBERALITY ON THE 
 PART OF GOD'S PEOPLE 
 
 BY 
 
 J. FORBES MONCRIEFF 
 
 THIRD EDITION 
 
 MORGAN & SCOTT LD. 
 
 OFFICE OF Cbe Cbrtetfan 
 
 12, PATERNOSTER BUILDINGS 
 
 LONDON MCMXI
 
 sorvwouT 1911 BY 
 
 MORGAN & SCOTT U>.
 
 .JU V 
 
 Hll 
 
 PREFATORY NOTE 
 
 My aim in the following pages is to present the 
 teaching of God's Word on a subject of the utmost 
 importance to the Lord's people, and at the same time 
 to give the thoughts and views regarding it of many 
 earnest Christians who have given the matter serious 
 consideration. Having read much upon the subject, I 
 have endeavoured to give here what I consider the 
 cream, or the most telling portions, of many an excellent 
 book, article, or address, from which I would fain have 
 quoted more extensively. Some repetition has been 
 unavoidable, the same truth or incident (such as the 
 giving of " the widow's mites ") serving to illustrate various 
 aspects of the subject, treated under separate heads, and 
 
 in different chapters. 
 
 J. F. M. 
 
 Sept., ign.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PREFATORY NOTE ;.,.;: 5 
 
 INTRODUCTION ....... u 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I. THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE . . 19 
 
 II. TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS . . 33 
 
 III. How MUCH TO GIVE ..... 51 
 
 IV. How AND WHEN TO GIVE .... 85 
 
 V. WRONG WAYS OF GIVING . . . in 
 
 VI. GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL . . . . 131 
 
 VII. THB RIGHT MOTIVB ..... 143 
 
 VIII. THE POOR AS WELL AS THB RICH, THE YOUNG 
 
 AS WELL AS THE OLD, SHOULD GlVE . . 157 
 
 IXi WHAT SCRIPTURE SAYS ABOUT GIVING. . 177 
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY * 183
 
 INTRODUCTORY
 
 INTRODUCTORY 
 
 THE subject of " Giving to the Lord " is at last receiving 
 from the Church some small measure of the attention which 
 its great importance demands. Roused by the com- 
 parative indifference, the sad want of principle and lack of 
 faith, the glaring anomalies and sinful irregularities which 
 prevail among her members, the Church, in various parts 
 of the world, is making some effort though as yet feeble 
 to teach the Christian's duty in regard to this matter. 
 She cannot as yet be said to have a " deep sense of its 
 great importance, as being in accordance with God's 
 revealed plan for supporting and extending His cause and 
 kingdom in the world, and as being the only way of solving 
 the difficulties that have hindered the success of all the 
 schemes for spreading the Gospel both at home and abroad." 
 Still, as a writer on the subject says, " there has been 
 springing up, here and there among us, stronger conviction 
 than before, that systematic giving to Christ's kingdom is 
 a necessity of that kingdom, is, indeed, a Divine institu- 
 tion ; is a form of Christian worship ; is an exercise and 
 obligation, a test and duty of the -Christian life, and ought 
 to be one of its real enjoyments." 
 
 Dr. Wm. M. Taylor, of New York, wrote many years ago 
 in " The Christian Treasury " as follows : " In his sermon 4 
 entitled ' How to be a Christian in Trade,' a discourse which 
 illustrates the wonderful combination of practical sagacity 
 with spiritual insight, for which he was so remarkable, 
 Dr. Bushnell says that ' the great problem we have now on 
 hand is the Christianising of the money power of the world ' ; 
 
 ii
 
 12 OUR GIVING. 
 
 and again, that ' what we wait for and are looking hopefully 
 to see is the consecration of the vast money power of the 
 world to the work and cause and kingdom of Jesus Christ.' 
 . . . " It becomes us all to pray and labour for the fulfil- 
 ment of the prophecy, that men shall come, ' their silver 
 and their gold with them, unto the name of the Lord our 
 God.' But here, also, the revival must begin in the Church 
 itself. In former times we have had revivals with distinct 
 characteristics. One was remarkable for the blessing which 
 rested on preaching ; another for the spirit of prayer which 
 seemed to be poured out on the people generally ; another 
 for the interest that was evoked in the study of the 
 Scriptures. What we have yet to see is a revival, of 
 which the chief distinguishing feature shall be liberal giving 
 to the cause of the Lord Jesus ; and when that comes, 
 it will be the prophecy of yet grander things. . . . While 
 it is true that a spirit of liberality in the support of the cause 
 of Christ must be a fruit of renewed life in the Church, it 
 is also true that its manifestation by the Church will be the 
 forerunner of such spiritual triumphs as it has never yet 
 achieved. Thus it is of great moment that we should use 
 means for the awakening of Christians to a sense of the 
 importance of this matter." 
 
 " Systematic and proportionate giving for religious and 
 benevolent purposes is gradually assuming its true place 
 in the Christian Church as an essential part of Christian 
 worship. The opinion of the Church itself is, however, not 
 yet fully matured on the subject. Indeed, the majority 
 of her members know little of it. There is, therefore, need 
 for reiterated exposition of the principles on which Christian 
 giving is based." Ministers who give their people, not 
 what they want, but what they need, will not neglect to 
 speak of the grace of giving. 
 
 " Christian beneficence is not only itself one of the graces, 
 but when faithfully practised is one of the most efficient 
 means of grace, tending to the development of all that is 
 lovely and of good report in this lif e ; and we may, therefore,
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 13 
 
 assume that its growth must be promoted by all appliances 
 suitable to its healthful nourishment." 
 
 Our great aim should ever be, not merely to urge people 
 to give more money, not to be constantly dunning them, 
 and forcing them reluctantly to increase their contributions, 
 but rather to educate them ; to enlighten their under- 
 standings, and quicken their consciences in regard to this 
 most important subject, so that the amount of their free-will 
 offerings may be largely increased, the method of providing 
 them greatly improved, and the low standard of giving 
 gladly raised. 
 
 " What is most needed at the present time is to bring 
 home the duty and privilege of giving to the hearts and 
 consciences of the large number of members of the Church 
 who it is to be feared are giving little or nothing for the 
 advancement of Christ's cause at home or abroad. Many 
 of the rich and many of the poor are giving nobly, but it 
 is also true that many of both classes have as yet no proper 
 conception of the obligations which rest upon them as 
 professing Christians in this matter, and the Church should 
 do all in its power to show them how intimate is the con- 
 nection between loving and giving" 
 
 At the World's Missionary Conference held in Edinburgh 
 in 1910, Dr. Zwemer, one of the delegates, said that the 
 motto of the missionary campaign for workers should be 
 that of the highwaymen : " Your money or your life." 
 " It is," he said, " a Christian duty and privilege to make 
 that demand." 
 
 " Not even the new birth will make a man liberal. 
 It implants the germ of genuine liberality " ; but it is by 
 gradual education that a high standard of liberality is 
 generally attained. We " require first to be taught, and 
 then to be constantly stirred up by way of remembrance," 
 in order to be kept up to the point of our privilege in giving. 
 
 " It is a fact, of profound significance, that God has 
 given gold a most important place in the kingdom of His 
 grace."
 
 I 4 OUR GIVING. 
 
 May we not expect that He will, " ere long, consecrate 
 to objects more immediately connected with the promotion 
 of His kingdom and glory a far larger proportion of the 
 gains of the earth." Let us hope that we now see 
 only the day of small things, the beginning of a great 
 change. 
 
 The Rev. E. A. Watkins, founder of the Proportionate 
 Giving Union, wrote : " ' Ample funds ! ' ' The very words 
 seem absurd. Who ever heard of ample funds for Christian 
 works ? Who does not know that all agencies are crippled 
 in consequence of their funds being meagre ? To speak of 
 them as ample seems nothing better than the ignorant 
 boast of an enthusiast.' Such is the language of the 
 majority of people, but notwithstanding this, it is boldly 
 asserted that ample funds are a possibility, and further still 
 that they are a practicability. It is true that in almost 
 every case the funds at disposal are miserably small com- 
 pared with the work required to be done. The great and 
 constant want is money ; and in order to obtain this, a 
 variety of schemes have been devised and put into operation, 
 but the result, though very encouraging in the aggregate, 
 has fallen lamentably short of what has been needed. 
 
 " But is there no means of improvement ? Must 
 ingenuity still be taxed to the very utmost to obtain 
 supplies for the ever-enlarging field of Christian endeavour ? 
 Can nothing be done . . . ? Means in great variety have 
 been tried but one which its advocates maintain would be 
 far more efficient than all others is almost entirely neglected. 
 This is what is commonly known as The System of Pro- 
 portionate Giving a system scriptural in its origin, easy 
 in its application, and marvellously productive in its 
 results. By it is meant the giving of a previously fixed 
 proportion of all income for the purposes of religion and 
 benevolence. What the particular proportion should be 
 is left an open question. Many advocates strenuously 
 contend that it ought to be in all cases a tenth as the 
 minimum. Other persons consider that as there is no
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 15 
 
 definite command in the New Testament upon this point, 
 it may allowably be left to individual decision." 
 
 " Those who acknowledge themselves to be God's 
 stewards, ought to seek some better way of discharging 
 their divinely imposed duty, than merely by parting with 
 some indefinite and unascertained portion of their money 
 in a haphazard manner. Conscience can exercise but very 
 little influence in such an utter absence of method. What 
 is wanted in this, as in other matters, is system" 
 
 Mr. Watkins maintained that the plan he advocated 
 " is Scriptural, easy of application, satisfactory and pro- 
 ductive." 
 
 " The principle (of systematic giving) will make slow but 
 sure progress. Old habits, even in good men, are a great 
 obstacle to its progress, but it will make way with the 
 young ; and the more it is adopted, the more will it 
 commend itself." 
 
 The lack of means is the great hindrance in all depart- 
 ments of evangelistic aggressive missionary work. " They 
 are all limited only by the extent of funds provided to carry 
 them on, and all could be largely extended in usefulness 
 were their treasuries more amply replenished." 
 
 " Immense sums are expended out of the savings, or out 
 of the taxes of the people of this Christian country, on 
 account of commerce, or war, or science. When shall there 
 be anything like a corresponding expenditure from the 
 savings or the self-assessment of the Christian people 
 for the salvation of a perishing world ? " 
 
 If the Church of Christ, and Christians individually, 
 would only take up this matter with more spirit, " they 
 would find it to be the true solution of all } financial 
 questions," and the universal adoption of it would soon 
 result in the provision of ample funds for the carrying on 
 of every good work. 
 
 It would be a great assistance to the cause if Christians 
 would use a little of their abundance for the circulation of 
 sound literature on the subject of Christian, proportional.
 
 16 OUR GIVING. 
 
 and systematic storing and giving, with a view to educating 
 and stirring up the great body of Christian people who 
 have as yet no adequate sense of the importance of then- 
 privilege and duty in regard to this matter. A very little 
 money used thus would go a long way, and who can tell how 
 much good might result from the sowing of such seed ? 
 
 The following remarks are addressed specially to 
 Christians, with the writer's earnest desire that they may 
 prove useful in leading some, who may not hitherto have 
 considered this subject as they ought, to a better under- 
 standing of their responsibility and duty in regard to this 
 most important matter of " Giving to God."
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION 
 TO GIVE 
 
 oc.
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE 
 
 IT is undoubtedly the intention of the great Giver of all 
 things " the Giver of every good and perfect gift " Who 
 has said, " Ask, and it shall be given you " that every one 
 should give of his substance for the purpose of relieving 
 the wants of his fellow-men, and diffusing throughout the 
 earth the knowledge of the truth. To every rank and 
 condition of life rich and poor, high and low, old and 
 young the questions come : " What hast thou that thou 
 didst not receive ? " (i Cor. iv. 7) ; and " how much.owest 
 thou ? " (Luke xvi. 5). If we would do the will of God, 
 and enjoy His blessing, we must learn to get and give at 
 the same time. " Who gives not is not living." " We 
 ought not to be as a stagnant pond, a Dead Sea, which 
 receives from rivers all the year round, but gives forth no 
 stream in return, and so becomes a stagnant, putrid lake. 
 Let us be like the great lakes of America, which receive 
 the mighty rivers and pour them out again, and con- 
 sequently keep fresh and clear." " The Church of God 
 exists as a river, to water the desolate earth, and is God's 
 exponent of liberality here." 
 
 " What obligation rests upon us ! What have we returned 
 during the past year ? Earth received showers and sunshine, 
 and in return has given foliage, flowers, and fruits. Have 
 our hearts and lives yielded fruit to the glory of God for all 
 His goodness to us ? Or have our hearts been like the 
 desert sands, giving no response or return ? God, our 
 Father, righteously demands, as well as graciously deserves, 
 
 19 B2
 
 20 OUR GIVING. 
 
 our thanksgivings. We ought to acknowledge our obliga- 
 tions to His bounty and mercy." 
 
 " What are we here for ? Surely not to gather heaps of 
 money, or even to amass stores of knowledge, but if 
 possible, to make our little world a little better than we 
 found it. It is not the things that we attract to ourselves, 
 but the good that we diffuse among others, that makes our 
 life rich and beautiful ; and we are blessed, not in what 
 we gain, but only in what we give." 
 
 Our possessions and our money are not our own. " The 
 silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts " 
 (Haggai ii. 8). We hold all as stewards for God ; and 
 "it is required of stewards that they be found faithful, 
 not that they vaunt themselves, and deck themselves in 
 their Master's goods." If we appropriate to our uses what 
 should be used for the service of God, we are guilty of 
 embezzlement ; and " there is no stealing so mean or so 
 bad as stealing from God " (see Mai. iii. 8-12). How many 
 holders of wealth there are " who are not using it for .the 
 glory of its Divine Owner, and the welfare of their fellow- 
 creatures " ; who readily admit that all belongs to God, 
 but with whom such a declaration " has no living force 
 to influence the heart no motive power to regulate the 
 conduct." 
 
 " Christ claims our substance as well as ourselves, and 
 ourselves as well as our substance. It is the same with 
 our money as with our time, etc. although God has a 
 right to all, and we must hold all at His disposal, He 
 permits us to use much for ourselves ; although even that 
 we should use with an eye to His glory." 
 
 We do not sufficiently realise the blessing to ourselves 
 which results from a habit of giving. It elevates the 
 character, enlarges the heart, invigorates spiritual life, 
 tends to check in us any inordinate love of money, teaches 
 us to hold our possessions loosely, and to set our affections 
 on things above. It affords happiness, by enabling us to 
 feel that our lives are directly employed for God ; by
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE. 2.1 
 
 enlisting our minds in the progress of Christ's cause ; by 
 raising our esteem for the work of God ; by cherishing our 
 gratitude and love to God, and deepening our sympathy 
 with our fellow-men. It is a " happy privilege, which the 
 humblest may enjoy of thus associating the common 
 labours of life with the grateful service of the Saviour, 
 and of making that which naturally leads the heart from 
 God subserve the highest spiritual good." 
 
 We ought to grow up with a high aim in making money 
 and spending it. We ought to live as the Lord's stewards, 
 counting it a duty and privilege to give, and coveting 
 opportunities for giving. 
 
 The Rev. E. A. Watkins used to advocate storing for 
 God : " Comparatively few persons do this. The great 
 majority of people, even of those who are truly pious, only 
 give for God's cause, but never store for it. Now there 
 is a great difference between the two practices. Storing 
 shows forethought, effort, and plan ; but simply giving may 
 be the result of excitement, strong appeals, or the spur 
 of the moment. By ' storing for God ' is meant the laying 
 aside of money for the purposes of religion and benevolence, 
 thus forming a store from which amounts can be taken as 
 claims present themselves. The plan to be adopted is to 
 have a purse, box, or other receptacle in which to deposit 
 the dedicated sums. The particular proportion to be set 
 aside must be left to your own decision, being such as 
 conscience dictates, whether a tenth, a twelfth, a fifteenth, 
 or any other part. Whatever you decide to give, let it be 
 taken conscientiously from every amount received, and 
 let it be deposited at once as a first claim. Such a plan 
 of acting has numerous and great advantages. It tends 
 to check selfishness ; it effectually destroys avarice ; it 
 engenders a proper sense of stewardship ; it encourages 
 economy ; it provides a ready fund for charitable purposes ; 
 it makes the act of giving a real pleasure ; it prevents all 
 hesitation as to whether or not we can afford to give when 
 cases are urged ; it allows no qualms of conscience when
 
 22 OUR GIVING. 
 
 applications for help are refused ; and it almost for a 
 certainty secures temporal prosperity." 
 
 Mr. Ruskin says that money-making is " nothing but 
 play. To have more money than other people is the game." 
 But surely it is not so to the Christian who works that he 
 may have the more to give away to meet the temporal 
 wants and spiritual necessities of his fellow-men. 
 
 " There is no real use in riches," said Bacon, " except it 
 be in the distribution ; the rest is but conceit." 
 
 Of riches it has been truly said, " There is too often 
 a burden of care in getting them, a burden of anxiety 
 in keeping them, a burden of temptation in using them, a 
 burden of guilt in abusing them, a burden of sorrow in 
 losing them, a burden of account at last to be given 
 up for possessing and either improving or misimproving 
 them." 
 
 Giving is one of the works which should ever be associated 
 with real faith (see James ii. 14-17). " True religion consists 
 in both piety towards God and practical sympathy towards 
 man. What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say 
 he have faith, and have not works ? Can faith (such faith) 
 save him ? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute 
 of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in 
 peace, be ye warmed and filled ; notwithstanding ye give 
 them not those things which are needful to the body ; 
 what doth it profit ? Even so faith, if it hath not works, 
 is dead, being alone " (James ii. 14-17). " An essential 
 element of a lofty piety is a warm generosity." " Whoso 
 hath this world's goods, and seeth his brother have need, 
 and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how 
 dwelleth the love of God in him ? My little children, let 
 us not love in word, neither in tongue ; but in deed and 
 in truth " (i John iii. 17, 18). 
 
 It is told that " a respectable merchant in London, having 
 been embarrassed in his circumstances, and his misfortunes 
 having been one day the subject of conversation in the Royal 
 Exchange, several persons expressed great sorrow ; when
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE. 23 
 
 a foreigner, who was present, said, ' I feel five hundred 
 pounds for him ; what do you feel ? ' " 
 
 " The early Church in Jerusalem answered the purpose 
 of her origin by manifesting her superiority to earth, her 
 intense affection for the redeemed, her self-sacrificing 
 benevolence for mankind, and her entire dedication to the 
 Lord. The Redeemer would have every Church do this. 
 Every Church is to reflect around the light of truth ; to 
 diffuse the knowledge of salvation ; to dispense love, peace, 
 and bliss. To provide means for these objects, pecuniary 
 offerings are required. Who but Christians can be expected 
 to furnish them ? In their limited and reluctant supply, 
 what is the value of professions of devotedness ? The 
 world despises the hollow pretence, often accounting religion 
 a lie, and its professors hypocrites. Large pecuniary 
 offerings will be at once the issue and the proof of real and 
 intense dedication." " He has no part at all in Christ who 
 will not part with all for Christ." At least we should each 
 be able to say : 
 
 " Without a vain, without a grudging heart, 
 To Him Who gives us all, I yield a part." 
 
 How many of us, professing to be Christians, when asked 
 to put our hands into our purses, begin " with one consent 
 to make excuse." What need have we to look to ourselves, 
 for we stand in slippery places. Of course if we have no 
 real love for God in our hearts we shall neither yield " gold 
 of obedience " nor any other kind of gold to Him. 
 
 What shall move us ? What shall kindle the flame of 
 our zeal ? May the infinite love of Christ constrain us to 
 give, not only ourselves to Him, but of our means for His 
 service and glory as we have never done before 1 
 
 " Were it more habitually before our minds how brief 
 this present life is in comparison with eternity, and how 
 bright and glorious and unspeakably precious the blessings 
 are which await the believer in the day of Christ, how gladly 
 should we seek habitually to spend and be spent for Him 1 
 Let the believer only realise the vanity of earthly things,
 
 24 OUR GIVING. 
 
 and the preciousness of heavenly treasure, and he will 
 seek to live for eternity, and, among other things, will be 
 delighted to ' lay up treasures in heaven.' " 
 
 We need more and more to take, hold, spend, and give 
 our money as not our own, but His Who gave it. " Then 
 when it is so, there will be an end of covetousness ; money 
 will be in its proper place, it will be use without abuse ; 
 no root of evil ; no source of discord ; no occasion of 
 stumbling ; no instrument for self-laudation, or rising over 
 others ; no log or chain to burden and warp spiritual life ; 
 no canker ; but a blessing, to be freely used for the Lord's 
 sake, and to His glory." 
 
 In his booklet " Christ's Terms of Discipleship," the Rev. 
 James Hutchison says, " Our Lord meets us with His 
 solemn and absolute demand, ' Whosoever he be of you that 
 renounceth not all that he hath, he cannot be My disciple.' 
 It is implied in this renunciation that our possessions, 
 no more than ourselves, are our own ; our lives are Christ's, 
 for the promotion of the ends of His kingdom, and so 
 are our goods. We hold all in trust for God. We need 
 radically to revise the very foundations of our lives, and 
 to allow God by His Word and Spirit to try us as by fire. 
 Let this battle between the soul and God be fought 
 out in the privacy of the heart. Let Christian men and 
 women think of all they have their savings, their invest- 
 ments, their possessions let them sum it all up, spread it 
 all out in imagination, and as it lies there so precious in their 
 sight, let them think of the claims of Christ ; and, along 
 with their own selves, deliberately, solemnly, prayerfully, 
 and irrevocably assign all over to God, seeking to be made 
 faithful stewards of His manifold gifts. Let these posses- 
 sions pass from them as things owned by themselves, that 
 they may be taken up again as something belonging hence- 
 forth to God as something He has entrusted them to 
 disburse for Him. 
 
 " If this crisis were past, details of administration would 
 be revealed. Necessary personal and family expenses
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE. 25 
 
 would be a first charge on the trust funds, for our " Heavenly 
 Father knoweth that we have need of these things," and 
 the family life is a department of the kingdom of God. 
 Nevertheless all that comes within the scope of the term 
 ' private expenses ' would be regarded as intromissions with 
 trust funds for which account must be given to God. 
 Were these terms of discipleship loyally accepted, there 
 would no longer be need for pressing appeals to maintain 
 reapers for ripe harvest fields. 
 
 " There must be personal consecration, and that of 
 means. Personal consecration comes before purse conse- 
 cration ; self consecration before wealth consecration. 
 It is not the gold that sanctifies the temple but the temple 
 that sanctifies the gold. A truly consecrated man may 
 give a pound which may be worth millions, whereas an 
 unconsecrated man may give a million, yet it may not be 
 worth a pound. He cannot sanctify himself by his gold. 
 Were a thorough consecration of purse to be universally 
 the case, and all personally exercised in conscience before 
 God about it, holding, spending, giving every penny and 
 pound in direct and conscious fellowship with Him ; His 
 word ruling and influencing all transactions, there would 
 not be the present poverty in the Church of God ; nor the 
 starvation of Gospel labour and Gospel labourers, both at 
 home and abroad ; neither should we see Christian work 
 languishing for want of funds ; or the Lord's poor ekeing 
 out an existence from parish-rates ; nor the sad dishonour 
 done to the name and character of our God by the unsavoury 
 pernicious methods of raising amounts by appeals to the 
 world's pride, fashion, and folly, that now so abound 
 about us." 
 
 Many testimonies might be given in addition to those 
 which have been already quoted, regarding the Christian 
 obligation to give. Rev. F. B. Meyer, for example, writes 
 as follows on " The Stewardship of Money " : 
 
 " One of our commonest experiences is the handling 
 of money. And nothing will sooner show whether our
 
 26 OUR GIVING. 
 
 consecration be a reality or a sham, nor will anything serve 
 more quickly to accentuate and enforce the life of consecra- 
 tion, than to spend our money daily beneath the sway of 
 those principles, which it is so easy to enunciate, and so 
 difficult to practise. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 " We have no right to look on money as our absolute property. 
 On every coin in your possession you may read the letters 
 D.G., by the grace of God. Every coin is yours as the gift 
 of God ; as much so as if He had literally placed it on your 
 open palm. . . . David was amply justified when, as 
 the spokesman of his people, who had just made a marvel- 
 lous offering for the House of the Lord, he said, Of Thine 
 own have we given Thee. 
 
 "Is it not our daily profession that we have devoted 
 ourselves, with all we are and we have, to Him ? Just as 
 many a loving wife, richly dowered, prefers to have no 
 distinction between her own property and her husband's, 
 and makes all over to his name, so we have professed to give 
 ourselves and our all to Christ. 
 
 " Is our daily practice on a level with this principle ? 
 It is a trick with little children, in a spasm of generosity, 
 to give to those whom they love some dear possession, and 
 to take it back again ; or at least to use it without reference 
 to the ownership they had conferred. And it is thus that 
 too many Christians act towards Christ. They ask Him to 
 consider all their possessions as His. But within an hour 
 they are spending them as if they were as much their own as 
 ever. ... If our money is really His, by His gift 
 originally to us, and by our subsequent dedication to Him, 
 surely He ought to have a voice in its expenditure. And 
 the concession of that right to Him would speedily make 
 our consecration real. . . . Though I do not plead that 
 consecrated Christians should give all away, I do insist upon 
 it, that they should regard all their money as Christ's, and
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE. 27 
 
 spend every penny of it beneath His direction, and in 
 harmony, with His will. 
 
 "Do not we use the bulk of our Lord's money for ourselves, 
 giving to Him and His work the chance coins which we 
 may be able to spare, or the subscriptions which we are 
 obliged to give, to maintain a character amongst our 
 fellows ? 
 
 " Sometimes let us make a special offering to the Lord 
 Jesus. We can only give Him what is His. And yet, 
 though a wife has nothng of her own, she can make pre- 
 sents to her husband of what he gave her, and which she 
 might have legitimately used for herself, but which she has 
 saved until it grew into a worthy gift for her spouse. Love 
 must give of that which costs her something. There are 
 no gifts so precious in the eyes of the loved one as those 
 which mean planning and self-sacrifice. And think you 
 not that it delights the heart of our Lord to receive at our 
 hands love-tokens ; precious ornaments and jewels ; ala- 
 baster boxes reserved once for self-adornment, but now 
 gladly surrendered ; articles of beauty and value which we 
 had hidden from the light of day, but which we present to 
 Him to show that our love is strong, personal, and self- 
 forgetting ? He is worthy to receive riches. And the chief 
 zest of such gifts is in their secrecy from all human eyes ; 
 a personal transaction between the Master and the loving 
 heart. ' That thine alms may be in secret.' " 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Duff (speaking on the same subject), in an 
 address on Missions, said : 
 
 " When I look abroad over this "land I ask myself, is 
 there not plenty of money there ? Yes, even to overflowing, 
 but it does not find its way into the Treasury of the Lord. 
 Such being the case, we must come to the question of 
 Stewardship, and we insist upon it, that every farthing 
 which God gives to an individual, is a farthing for which 
 he must account, as to how and why he spends it, and until 
 that doctrine be enshrined in the soul and conscience, we 
 need never expect to have fulness of means.
 
 28 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " To me, who have had sore travailing and wandering 
 over many lands, it has often been a matter utterly over- 
 whelming to the spirit to see such redundancy of means, 
 in the possession of professing Christians, and to be told in 
 reply to earnest pleadings on behalf of a perishing world, 
 ' Oh, we have nothing to spare.' How depressing has it 
 been to hear this said, and then to look at the stately man- 
 sions, the gorgeous lawns, the splendid equipages, the 
 extravagant furniture, the costly entertainments, besides 
 the thousands that are spent upon nameless idle and useless 
 luxuries. It is as much as to say to God, the great Pro- 
 prietor, Who has given it all, ' Lord, pray excuse me, as I 
 wish to spend all this upon myself, but if I have a little driblet 
 remaining over, after I have satisfied myself, I will give that 
 driblet back to Thee.' " 
 
 Giving is a Sign of Spiritual Life. Rev. Dr. William 
 Morison, Edinburgh, says : " The Church would always 
 manifest enthusiasm in this grace wherever there was a 
 high tone of spiritual life. A Church that was timid in 
 making demands upon the people, whether for their gifts or 
 their labours a Church that offered cheapness and general 
 accommodativeness to human weakness as an attraction 
 would soon lose its power. The very essence of our religion 
 was self-denial and self-sacrifice." 
 
 So many Collections. " How many members want to 
 escape the unceasing cry of ' Give ! give ! ' But is ' giving ' 
 not the very condition of existence ? The clouds give rain. 
 What else are they for ? The flowers give their scent, the 
 cows give their milk, and the bees honey. The sun gives 
 light and heat as the very reason of its existence ; and a 
 Church has been purchased by Christ, and established in the 
 world, for the purpose of giving of showing forth God's 
 glory, and imparting to the dead world the blessings it has 
 received. Who ceases to give ceases to live." 
 
 Among the many interesting and useful booklets issued 
 by the late Rev. E. A. Watkins, was one entitled, " THE 
 CONVERSION OF THE POCKET," in which he said that there
 
 THE CHRISTIAN OBLIGATION TO GIVE. 29 
 
 were many who were converted in heart, but not in pocket. 
 Their givings were very small compared with their incomes, 
 and they failed in the performance of a plain Christian 
 duty. This calls for serious investigation and reflection. 
 Some say they do not give a fixed proportion, but give 
 up all for Christ. But this may be " but a cover for a very 
 convenient conscience-lulling indefiniteness." He con- 
 cludes with some interesting testimonies from those who 
 had practised systematic and proportionate giving and 
 proved its blessedness. Let me quote only a few words 
 from the last of these : " I am 70 years old and have been 
 a proportionate giver ever since I had any money to call my 
 own, and no words can express the comfort and happiness 
 I have found in it." 
 
 It is not often that the ability to give and the willingness 
 go together ; but when they are combined how great is the 
 amount of good which one consecrated soul can do. But 
 the blessedness and reward are to the poor man as well as, 
 or even more than, to the rich man, if he has the heart to 
 give, and does give really up to the measure of his ability. 
 A very earnest call to " PERSONAL CONSECRATION AND 
 OFFERINGS " based on the text, " What do ye more than 
 others," by the Rev. Canon McCormick, D.D., is published 
 by the C.M.S. He begins by saying that a deep-seated 
 conviction is spreading abroad that real Christians must 
 give far more to their Saviour's cause than they have done 
 or are doing. This is entertained by the ungodly and 
 unbelieving world, even by the heathen and Jewish world, 
 and is a matter for serious self-examination with many of 
 God's people. He proceeds to ask why Christians do and 
 give so little, and replies as follows : i. Because of the 
 domination of fashion. Christians do as others do, though 
 their consciences are wounded and their hearts made sad. 
 
 2. Because current ideas about giving are so unsatisfactory. 
 
 3. Because of the low standard of devotion and of obligation. 
 
 4. Because the state of the heathen and godless is not realized. 
 
 5. Because there is no deep-seated conviction concerning
 
 30 OUR GIVING. 
 
 Christ's Second Coming. 6. Because there is no deep-seated 
 desire to stand well in the Judgment Day. How can a 
 Christian ask God to send forth labourers to the harvest, 
 if there is no desire to be a labourer ? Or how can one pray 
 " Thy Kingdom come," if no personal effort is made to 
 hasten it ? Let us be real, and not play with religion. 
 " There is reality in the activities and pleasures of life. 
 Men are not half-hearted in getting money, or in gratifying 
 their special ambitions. Oh ! why should not Christians 
 be more earnest and devoted ? " 
 
 " For souls redeemed, for sins forgiven, 
 For means of grace, and hopes of heaven, 
 What can to Thee, O Lord, be given, 
 Who givest all ? "
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER 
 LOSERS
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS 
 
 IN this matter of giving, our duty and our profit lie in 
 the same direction. We are never losers by giving to the 
 Lord. To use money aright is one of the first principles 
 of prosperity. 
 
 " Just because our worldly means and substance are more 
 liable than our spiritual gifts to be regarded as merely 
 secular things to be devoted to worldly objects, there are 
 very special promises attached to the consecration of them 
 to religious ends, including, of course, charity to the poor 
 and helpless." 
 
 " There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth ; and there 
 is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to 
 poverty. The liberal soul shall be made fat : and he that 
 watereth shall be watered also himself " (Prov. xi. 24, 25). 
 " Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the first- 
 fruits of all thine increase : so thall thy barns be filled with 
 plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine " 
 (Prov. iii. 9, 10). " Give, and it shall be given unto you ; 
 good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and 
 running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with 
 the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured 
 to you again " (Luke vi. 38). " He which soweth sparingly 
 shall reap also sparingly ; and he which soweth bountifully 
 shall reap also bountifully " (z Cor. ix. 6) that is, " if the 
 sowing be done to the Lord, and not from earthly motives," 
 not merely for the sake of being thanked or repaid. The 
 repayment will be in kind. " Give, and God's reward to 
 O.G. 33 c
 
 34 OUR GIVING. 
 
 you will be the spirit of giving more . . . Love, and God 
 will pay you with the capacity of more love." 
 
 " The true relation between giving and receiving is 
 characteristically inverted in the world's philosophy. 
 The world acts on the principle that it is more blessed to 
 receive than to give. Few men hesitate to receive. Yet 
 receiving is increasing one's liabilities for the future. He 
 who receives much has much interest to pay and much 
 capital to return. Much will be required of him. On the 
 other hand, for the same reason that few hesitate to receive, 
 many hesitate to give. Yet giving is both lessening liability 
 and also putting out at interest. God's bank is safe and 
 profitable. After many days the gift shall return. Good 
 measure, pressed down, and running over, shall be given 
 into the bosom of the giver. Receivers are less blessed than 
 givers." 
 
 . There are not a few who have made conscience of liberal 
 giving who have verified these promises in their own 
 experience. 
 
 The money given to the Lord reflects a blessing on the 
 fund whence it comes the blessing of the Lord, which 
 maketh rich and addeth no sorrow. 
 
 " A Christian worker relates the following of the late Mr. 
 J. D. Alcroft : He had given her a substantial sum of 
 money in answer to her appeal. But when she, in thanking 
 him, remarked how joyful it was that he could, and good of 
 him that he did, thus generously help on the Lord's work, 
 he replied with much emphasis : ' You make a mistake. 
 It is no generosity. I am certain, by years of experience, 
 that / am not one penny the poorer for anything I have ever 
 been able to give. What is called Giving is GETTING when 
 it concerns God's work ! ' Oh that more of the Lord's 
 people realized the truth of this a truth too much un- 
 realized, because too much untried ! " 
 
 A sum which has been reduced by giving to the Lord is 
 not at all the same as a similar amount off which nothing 
 has been taken for the Lord. " In the sight of the godless
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 35 
 
 it seems the same, it counts the same. But to the saint 
 it has not the same value, and what is more, it has not the 
 same value in the sight of God." 
 
 " It was the experience of a godly Glasgow merchant, 
 in other days, that the liberal man is the man whose riches 
 are likely to continue with him. He quaintly remarked, 
 in allusion to Prov. xxiii. 5, that ' clipping the wings ' was 
 the only way to prevent riches flying away as the eagle." 
 Another writer remarks that this operation is necessary to 
 prevent them flying at its ! 
 
 Says a writer on the subject, " Search the annals of the 
 world, show me the record, or find me the instance of a 
 man who became poor by giving as a Christian. I'll find 
 you murmurs and regrets from human hearts for every 
 other way in which money can be sunk, but never a 
 murmur from the soul of a saint for having given for 
 Jesus." 
 
 " The yoke of Christ is easy, and His service is light to 
 those who love Him. They cannot do too much for Him 
 who did so much for them. They have their enjoyment 
 and good times in what others call self-denial. Duty 
 becomes privilege when love moves to it." 
 
 " This truth I will speak," says Baxter, " for the encour- 
 agement of the charitable, that what little money I have by 
 me now, I got it almost all, I scarcely know how, at that time 
 when I gave most ; and since I have had less opportunity of 
 giving, I have had less increase." 
 
 " A man there was, tho' some did count him mad, 
 The more he cast away, the more he had." 
 
 There is a book published entitled, " God in Business," 
 which consists largely of letters from business men and 
 others written in answer to the question, Does God assist 
 the Christian in Business ? It is a question which does 
 not need to be asked, but the testimonies given will tend 
 to the increase of faith. 
 
 Mark Antony, when depressed, and at the ebb of fortune, 
 
 C2
 
 36 OUR GIVING. 
 
 cried out that he had lost all, except what he had given 
 away. 
 
 " What we give we have, and what we keep we lose." 
 
 Bishop Taylor says, " No man is a better merchant than 
 he that lays out his time upon God, and his money upon the 
 poor." 
 
 " He who bestows his goods upon the poor, 
 Shall have as much again, and ten times more." 
 
 " When Carlyle was a boy of about six years of age, 
 being left alone in the house one winter's day, an old man 
 came to the door to ask for something to eat. There was 
 not any food in the house ; but the boy bid the man wait 
 while he dragged a form in front of the dresser so that he 
 might get his ' penny-pig ' off the shelf ; this he broke and 
 gave the old man all the money in it. ' And,' said Carlyle, 
 ' I never knew before what the joy of heaven was like.' 
 When Dean Stanley heard this story he exclaimed, ' Had 
 that happened in the Middle Ages the old man would have 
 turned out to be Some One else.' ' 
 
 There is such a thing as laying up treasure in heaven, 
 and making an " investment for eternity." 
 
 " Sell that ye have, and give alms : provide yourselves 
 bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that 
 faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth 
 corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will your 
 heart be also " (Luke xii. 33, 34). 
 
 It was well said by Augustine : " Poverty is the load of 
 some, and wealth is the load of others, perhaps the greater 
 load of the two. It may weigh them to perdition. Bear 
 the load of thy neighbour's poverty, and let him bear with 
 thee the load of thy wealth. Thou lightenest thy load by 
 lightening his." 
 
 " We are wont to say that giving does not impoverish 
 God ; and it does not impoverish those who are God-like 
 in their giving." 
 
 " No mistake could be greater than to assume that all
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 37 
 
 expenditure involves loss, and that giving entails poverty 
 and exhaustion of resources. Whether there be loss and 
 exhaustion depends upon the objects for which the money 
 is expended. There is expenditure which means loss, and 
 something worse ; but there is also expenditure which means 
 great gain. And this, though not exclusively, is yet 
 emphatically true of expenditure in the cause of Christ." 
 
 " There is that maketh himself rich, yet hath nothing : 
 there is that maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches " 
 (Prov. xiii. 7). " He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth 
 unto the Lord ; and that which he hath given will he pay 
 him again " (Prov. xix. 17). 
 
 The Rev. W. B. R. Wilson, of Dollar, in his illustrations 
 from " The Life-Giving Word of God," which appeared in 
 " The British Messenger," writing on Acts xx. 35 : 
 " I have showed you all things, how that so labouring ye 
 ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of 
 the Lord Jesus, how He said, It is more blessed to give than 
 to receive, says : 
 
 " This was among the texts marked by George Muller, 
 of Bristol, in his Bible, as having been specially blest to 
 his soul, and as influentially operative on his life and 
 character. The famous Bristol philanthropist fervently 
 believed in the truth of what Jesus is reported by Paul here 
 to have said, and by God's grace he was enabled through 
 a prolonged life to act in conformity with the principle 
 here enunciated. It is a suggestive fact in this connection 
 that again and again in his diary Mr. Muller records that 
 he had verified the truth of the Lord's saying. For he had 
 himself been blessed abundantly, and his peace and joy 
 in the Holy Ghost increased more and more. 
 
 " Another scarcely less distinguished Christian philan- 
 thropist, the late Sir Francis Crossley, Bart., had a similar 
 testimony to give. He used to attribute the origin of his 
 own liberality to a sermon preached on this text by the late 
 Dr. Enoch Mellor, of Halifax. It is a certain fact, not 
 without deep significance, that when Auguste Comte, the
 
 38 OUR GIVING. 
 
 founder of the naturalistic religion called Positivism, 
 sought to condense his own moral teaching into a single 
 maxim ; he could find no better than the words of the 
 Lord Jesus, ' It is more blessed to give than to receive,' 
 though he does not seem to have been aware of the source 
 from which he was quoting. Another incident connected 
 with this verse, illustrating its motive power on Christian 
 action, was told lately by Mr. Baynes, the secretary of the 
 Baptist Missionary Society. " A working man," said Mr. 
 Baynes, " once entered my office, and laid down four 
 five-pound notes. He then said : ' I am a London scaven- 
 ger, and I have saved that out of my wages for the Congo 
 missionaries. Please put it down in your ledger as an 
 anonymous gift, but insert alongside of it the text : 
 " Remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, 
 It is more blessed to give than to receive.' " 
 
 " Mercy is so good a servant," said William Dyer, 
 " that it will never let its master die a beggar. Though 
 mercy make your pockets lighter, it will make your crowns 
 heavier. It is greater honour to give like a prince for 
 Christ's cause, than live like a prince for self. Give, and 
 it shall be given you. Your charity should seek God's poor, 
 before they seek your charity. Blessed are the merciful, 
 for they shall obtain mercy." His advice was, " Do good 
 in the world, with the goods of the world." It is a happy 
 thought to the Christian giver that money, which is so often 
 a source of evil, may yet, when rightly used, " go about 
 doing good," like Him Who gave it. 
 
 Dr. Hudson Taylor, the founder of the China Inland 
 Mission, tells how, when he was a young man, he was called 
 one night to visit a poor woman who was dying and in great 
 destitution. All that he possessed was a half-crown, in one 
 coin. The circumstances were so distressing that he felt 
 constrained to help ; but he could not bring himself to part 
 with his all. But while he hesitated he felt that his prayer 
 was a mockery, and, after a conflict with his own feelings, 
 he gave the half-crown, trusting to God to supply his own
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 39 
 
 need. He tells how joy at once came back in full flood tide 
 to his heart, and the hindrance to blessing was gone. 
 Also how next day he received anonymously, by post, 
 half a sovereign. " Praise the Lord ! " he exclaimed ; 
 " four hundred per cent, for twelve hours' investment 
 that is good interest ! " This incident was very helpful 
 to him when considering his decision to cast the whole 
 burden of the Mission in China on the Lord, Who has sus- 
 tained and provided for it without public collections or 
 solicitation of funds from its small beginnings until this 
 day, when it employs its many hundreds of missionaries 
 and Chinese helpers. God has proved faithful to His 
 promises in this case, and in all cases where He has been 
 honoured by the simple trust of His faithful servants. 
 
 " Giving is a wide channel of blessing. . . . The 
 promise 2 Cor. ix. 8 ' God is able to make all grace abound 
 toward you ; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all 
 things, may abound to every good work : ' is found in 
 connection with liberal giving. . . . It is in the same 
 connection that Paul is led by the Holy Ghost to exclaim, 
 ' Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift.' If we always 
 keep in mind the ' unspeakable gift,' how can we but be 
 willing to give to the Lord abundantly, cheerfully, and 
 prayerfully ? That is the pattern of our giving, and the 
 motive for our giving." 
 
 " O that men would accept the testimony of Christ 
 touching the blessedness of giving ! He Who sacrifices 
 most loves most ; and he who loves most is most 
 blessed. Love and sacrifice are related to each other 
 like seed and fruit ; each produces the other. The seed 
 of sacrifice brings forth the fragrant fruit of love, and 
 love always has in its heart the seeds of new sacrifice. He 
 who gives but a part is not made perfect in love. Love 
 rejoices to give all ; it does not measure its sacrifices. It 
 was Judas, not Mary, who calculated the value of the ala- 
 baster box of ointment. He who is infinitely blessed is the 
 infinite Giver ; and man, made in His likeness, was intended
 
 40 OUR GIVING. 
 
 to find his highest blessedness in the completest self-giving. 
 He who receives, but does not give, is like the Dead Sea. 
 All the fresh floods of Jordan cannot sweeten its dead, salt 
 depths. So all the streams of God's bounty cannot sweeten 
 a heart that has no outlet is ever receiving, yet never full 
 and overflowing. 
 
 " If those whose horizon is as narrow as the bushel 
 under which they hide their light could be persuaded to 
 make the principle of Christian giving regnant in their 
 life, their happiness would be increased as much as their 
 usefulness." 
 
 " The more that giving is made a practice of the 
 Christian life, the stronger and happier will that life 
 become." 
 
 Is God not delaying His blessing because we are not 
 giving as we ought, and cannot be trusted with blessings ? 
 " Are we not abusing His gifts already conferred upon us ? 
 Is he not waiting with clouds laden with blessings till the 
 thanksgivings are laid at His feet ? " 
 
 " Is not this the fast that I have chosen ? to loose the 
 bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to 
 let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke ? 
 Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou 
 bring the poor that are cast out to thy house ? when thou 
 seest the naked, that thou cover him ; and that thou hide 
 not thyself from thine own flesh ? Then shall thy light 
 break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring 
 forth speedily ; and thy righteousness shall go before thee : 
 the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward. Then shalt 
 thou call, and the Lord shall answer ; thou shalt cry, and 
 He shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst 
 of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speak- 
 ing vanity : and if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, 
 and satisfy the afflicted soul ; then shall thy light rise in 
 obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon-day : and the 
 Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in 
 drought, and make fat thy bones : and thou shalt be like
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 41 
 
 a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters 
 fail not " (Isaiah Iviii. 6-n). 
 
 " The central idea of the Gospel is that of sacrifice. 
 Those that receive it are urged to sell and to give, to suffer 
 and to serve. The Founder of the Gospel ' came not to 
 be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a 
 ransom for many,' and all His disciples are expected to 
 imitate His example. But the Gospel is careful to tell us 
 that sacrifice is not loss, and giving up is not ruin. The 
 profound truth is strongly emphasized, that it is by sacrifice 
 we are really made rich. In the lexicon of Christ, where 
 words have their true and perfect definition, to give up 
 is to keep, and to save is to lose. If we would have our 
 gold cankered, let us keep it ; if we would keep it bright, 
 let us give it away. A man's wealth is estimated in Heaven 
 by what he sacrificed on earth ; the millionaires of eternity 
 are the givers of time. He that has the right grasp of the 
 Gospel will never grieve over what he has to give up, for 
 what he thus parts with he really invests, to receive again 
 with larger increase." 
 
 " We lose what on ourselves we spend, 
 We have as treasure without end 
 Whatever, Lord, to Thee we lend, 
 Who givest all. 
 
 " Whatever, Lord, we lend to Thee, 
 Repaid a thousand-fold will be ; 
 Then gladly will we give to Thee, 
 Giver of all ; 
 
 " To Thee, from whom we all derive 
 Our life, our gifts, our power to give 
 Oh, may we ever with Thee live, 
 Giver of all." 
 
 While the blessing of God is promised to those who give 
 freely for Christ's sake, hear what is said in the Bible of 
 those who withhold and retain that which should be given : 
 " Whoso stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also 
 shall cry himself, but shall not be heard " (Prov. xxi. 13). 
 " If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death, 
 and those that are ready to be slain ; if thou sayest, Behold,
 
 42 OUR GIVING. 
 
 we knew it not ; doth not He that pondereth the heart 
 consider it ? and He that keepeth thy soul, doth not He 
 know it ? and shall not He render to every man according 
 to his works ? " (Prov. xxiv. n, 12). " The righteous 
 considereth the cause of the poor : but the wicked regardeth 
 not to know it " (Prov. xxix. 7). " There is a sore evil 
 which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for 
 the owners thereof to their hurt " (Eccles. v. 13). (See 
 also James ii. 13.) 
 
 Money may hurt us in three ways. It may hurt us by 
 the way we try to get it, and that even in a good and lawful 
 calling. " When a man will work so hard and so long that 
 he can only yawn over his Bible for a few moments, and 
 then fall asleep on his knees and call it his ' prayers,' that 
 man is suffering from a deadly hurt." Woe to those who 
 set their hearts upon money, and make haste to be rich ! 
 " How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the 
 kingdom of God ! " (Mark x. 23). How many Achans have 
 been ruined by their love of gold ! Let us beware of " the 
 deceitfulness of riches," which " choke the word," and cause 
 us to become unfruitful (Matt. xiii. 22). 
 
 But money may also hurt us by the way we spend it, 
 and by the way we keep it. The spendthrift is better in 
 one way than the miser he gets something out of his 
 money. " The miser is a Lazarus in this world and a Dives 
 in the next ; he has his evil things both ways. However, 
 there is not much to choose between them, the spendthrift 
 and the miser they both keep all then- money for their 
 own selves, and that is keeping it to their hurt. Hurt 
 indeed ! No poor slave ever had such a hard time as 
 money will lead a man if once it gets the upper hand of 
 him." 
 
 The late Dr. Theodore L. Cuyler said : " The continual 
 conflict with every Christian is between self and Jesus 
 Christ. Self is the old owner who does not like to be 
 dislodged, and disputes the right of Jesus to be enthroned 
 in the heart. Self has abundant uses for the purse, and
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 43 
 
 ' cannot afford ' to give money away that might buy a 
 fine equipage and rare pictures, and other creature-comforts 
 that make life agreeable. It keeps a sharp eye on the 
 cheque-book, to see that too much is not bestowed on objects 
 of charity, and it whispers artfully, ' remember how our 
 expenses are increasing and charity begins at home.' Self 
 watches the weather on Sunday morning the one day in 
 all the week when health is of paramount importance and 
 hesitates about the risk of wet feet or sitting in damp 
 clothing. Self comes home late and mutters, ' I am too 
 tired for prayer meeting to-night,' although it is never too 
 tired for a party, a concert, or the opera. And so smooth- 
 tongued self has an oily plea always ready ; and if 
 Christ's sentinel, a living conscience, is not there to 
 challenge and silence the cunning seducer, self carries 
 the day." 
 
 " Dr. Gordon, of Boston, told of a boy in the Roman carni- 
 val who was covered all over with gold leaf, and who died 
 from stoppage in the perspiratory system. There are many 
 men undergoing a process of spiritual death, because they 
 are gold-leafed all over with hoarded riches. Of doing 
 good at once to themselves and others they give themselves 
 no opportunity." 
 
 " Talk of the yellow peril," said the Hon. W. Jennings 
 Bryan at the Missionary Conference in Edinburgh (1910), 
 " Christians believe there is only one yellow peril the 
 lust for gold." 
 
 The first thing a man has to do with money is " to think 
 about managing it." " It does not. do to be left to itself. 
 . . And the right way to manage money is to give 
 rightly. ... If you want to keep money from hurting 
 you, you must think as much about giving as about getting. 
 God confers gifts that they may be put to profitable use, 
 and when they are not occupied, they are either withdrawn 
 or become a curse to their possessor. Out of men's luxuries 
 and comforts creeps the old serpent indolence, forgetful- 
 ness of God, self-indulgence, pride ; and it has coiled round
 
 44 OUR GIVING. 
 
 and round till you see them fall down dead in soul and 
 spirit," unless by God's help they can free themselves. 
 
 " Great riches hedge up the way to eternal life ; and 
 God has shown His mercy in providing an outlet for them, 
 so that they shall not drown us in perdition." Let us 
 beware, lest, by neglecting the natural channel, we compel 
 Him to open for them a mighty waste-gate, as He has done 
 in times past. " Liberality takes the poison out of riches." 
 
 We see how, when a nation derives any of its revenue 
 from a traffic in that which destroys bodies and souls, 
 God blows upon it with the breath of war, pestilence, or 
 famine, and it melts away ; and just so is it with the worldly 
 substance of the individual who derives his income from 
 an evil source, or withholds that which he should give away. 
 God may dispose of it in a way the possessor little expects 
 or intends. 
 
 " He that by usury and unjust gain increaseth his sub- 
 stance, he shall gather it for him that will pity the poor " 
 (Prov. xxviii. 8). 
 
 We look upon the man who misappropriates funds as a 
 dishonest man. But there are many who are in God's sight 
 guilty of this sin, who yet pass in the world as honest and 
 respectable people. We have no right to spend the trust 
 funds which we receive from God in needless luxuries, 
 undue comforts and unnecessary extravagancies. In view 
 of the world's sorrow and need, and the urgent calls to 
 spread the knowledge of Christ's love, anything like needless 
 and selfish spending or hoarding may come under the ugly 
 designation of " misappropriation of funds." Not only does 
 such harden the heart, but it brings a spiritual blight, 
 fosters a spirit of selfishness and pride, and brings many 
 a curse. 
 
 A certain Bishop says : " One man only has ever 
 expressed to me the fear lest he should become covetous, 
 and it is a suggestive fact that he was the most generous 
 man that I have ever known. We would talk the matter 
 over frequently. He would say : ' I have noticed that
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 45 
 
 covetousness is the prevailing sin of old people I fear it 
 for myself as I grow older ; and I know of but one remedy 
 giving giving giving ! ' The most liberal are the most 
 fearful of selfishness." 
 
 " Just as any spiritual gift increases by the habitual and 
 faithful use of it, so men are enriched by the consecration of 
 their wealth to Divine uses. And on the other hand, it is 
 true of both kinds of gifts, that unless they are devoted to 
 the ends for which they were bestowed, they tend to 
 corruption. The bread which God sends from heaven, if it 
 is not used, stinks like the unused manna, and becomes an 
 offence. We cannot doubt, moreover, that there is a double 
 blessing in the sacred use of worldly wealth. There is not 
 only the promised blessing of the increase of it, when the 
 Lord is honoured with our substance, but there is besides 
 an increase of spiritual blessings." 
 
 It would be a great curse to men " to have all rich and 
 no poor. It is a blessing for the rich that truth of our 
 Saviour's, ' the poor ye shall have always with you.' " 
 People say they can't afford to give, but, if they saw things 
 in a truer light, they would say that they could not afford 
 to keep. 
 
 " Proportion thy charity," says Quarles, " to the strength 
 of thy estate, lest God proportion thy estate to the weakness 
 of thy charity. Let the lips of the poor be the trumpet 
 of thy gift, lest in seeking applause thou lose thy reward. 
 Nothing is more pleasing to God than an open hand and a 
 close mouth." 
 
 " Money, if we use it right, may be a strong right arm in 
 God's great world, to help, to defend, to uplift, and to save. 
 But use it wrongly, and it is a strong arm still, to injure, 
 to curse, and to destroy ; whose evil deeds shall return and 
 gather with a ten-fold greater hurt upon the owner 
 thereof." 
 
 The Grip of Avarice. " A distinguished capitalist of 
 New York said to a friend, when speaking of subscriptions 
 to a certain charitable object : ' Don't expect much
 
 46 OUR GIVING. 
 
 of men after they have got to be millionaires.' His 
 meaning was that by that time the love of money- 
 getting would have become a passion, a craze that would 
 shrivel and wither all benevolent impulse. There are 
 noble exceptions to this rule, but the general fact remains. 
 Every person of large acquaintance can enumerate many 
 who, while still young and prosperous, were liberal givers, 
 but who, as they became rich, sank into a sordid, grasping 
 spirit. 
 
 " A pastor of New Jersey not long ago called upon an 
 aged Christian man of this class, then lying on what seemed 
 likely to prove his death-bed. The old man appeared con- 
 scious of his terrible avarice. ' But oh ! ' said he, while 
 the tears ran down his cheeks, ' I cannot give away my 
 money, I haven't the power.' 
 
 " The clutch of the soul, like that of the hand, may 
 become at length rheumatic and stiffened, a very death 
 grip. Beware of covetousness, which is idolatry." 
 
 With all our giving, however, we must ever remember 
 that our first duty is, to " owe no man anything." We 
 must be just before we are generous ; and there are times 
 and circumstances in which patient submission under the 
 pain of withholding may be as acceptable to God as the 
 costly gift that enriches His treasury. Yet, thank God, 
 we are free at all times and in all circumstances to give what 
 is of far more value than money loving thoughtfulness, 
 time, and trouble. If we give love, we give what is worth 
 more than gold and silver, and that without which all our 
 giving is vain (see i Cor. xiii.). The good Samaritan did 
 not give much money, but he showed somewhat of the 
 spirit of Christ. He had compassion, and loved " in deed 
 and in truth." The Lord knoweth the " willing " heart ; and 
 to him Jehovah says, as He did to David, when he would 
 fain have built the Temple, and was not permitted, " Thou 
 didst well that it was in thine heart" (i Kings viii. 18). 
 Let us see to it, however, that it really is in our hearts to 
 give to the Lord, and that we are earnestly striving by
 
 TRUE GIVERS ARE NEVER LOSERS. 47 
 
 economy and self-denial to be in a position to do so as soon 
 as we possibly can. 
 
 I have seen an article upon the " Love of Money," in 
 which attention was drawn to the fact that covetousness 
 does not seem to have been a besetting sin of the eminent 
 saints of Scripture Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, 
 Gideon, Samuel, David. On the other hand it is a remark- 
 able fact we do not read in the Bible of almost any lovers of 
 money being delivered from that terrible snare Balaam, 
 Gehazi, Ahab, the rich young ruler, Demas, Judas. Let 
 us examine ourselves and see that we are free from this 
 insidious evil. We may love money although we have very 
 little of it. Let us see to it that we hold all at the Lord's 
 call and ready for His use.
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE 
 
 O.G.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE 
 
 How little the great majority of men even of Christian 
 men give ! and how little pleasure they appear to have 
 in giving ! Their selfishness, like the sand drinking in the 
 rain, quickly appropriates all, and exhales upward almost 
 naught. It was the saying of an old divine, " What would 
 have become of us if Christ had been as saving of His blood 
 as some men are of their money ? " 
 
 Surely, if any should give freely it is we, who profess to 
 be followers of Christ, to Whom we owe so much. We 
 admit that, as those for whom He gave His life, we are not 
 our own, but His Who redeemed us ; and that, therefore, 
 we, and what we possess, should be devoted to His service. 
 Such is our theory ; but our practice how different 1 
 How little comparatively of our time, our work, or our 
 money is set apart for God ! At the best, what do we 
 give ? A little cold-hearted, self-gratifying service, and 
 the merest fraction of our substance. And this to Him 
 " Who, though He was rich, for our sakes became poor ; 
 that we through His poverty might be rich." We ask 
 ourselves not, " How much can we give ? " but, " How 
 much will do to save appearances ? " " How little can we 
 possibly get off with giving ? " And few are really aware 
 how little it is that they make to suffice. It has been truly 
 said that " There are many who give meanly because they 
 do not give accordingly to their means." 
 
 In our giving we must be honest. Alone with our con- 
 science and our God, we must ask ourselves how much we 
 
 51 D2
 
 32 OUR GIVING. 
 
 can give. " God is not mocked." " God, Who sends 
 our income and knows our income to the last penny, is the 
 only One to Whom we are to give, and the only One Who 
 knows our proportion of giving. But may we all realise 
 that certainly with Him we have to do, and with Him 
 exclusively ! " 
 
 A minister was about to go to London to beg on behalf of 
 his church, but, previous to his departure, he called to- 
 gether some of his congregation, and said to them, " Now, 
 I shall be asked whether we have done all we can. What 
 shall I say ? " When they came to look at it in that way, 
 they could not conscientiously say they had, and all that 
 was required was subscribed, and there was no longer any 
 need for their pastor to go upon such an unpleasant errand. 
 
 " It is better not to acknowledge God's claim, than to 
 slur it over with a species of moral eye-service." We must 
 give a proportion of ALL not only of our regular income, 
 but also of any other sums we may receive. If covetous- 
 ness and love of money are our besetting sins, and it is a 
 hard and painful thing for us to do this, then let us strive 
 the more earnestly against these, and pray for deliverance 
 from their power. Let us lay aside the proportion at 
 once, " and, by always making this separation our first step, 
 a habit will be formed that will be curative in its progress." 
 
 Mrs. Graham, of New York, made it a rule to appropriate 
 the tenth part of her earnings to be expended for pious 
 and charitable purposes. On one occasion, having made a 
 profit of 1000 on a certain transaction, she said, " Quick ! 
 quick ! let me appropriate the tenth before my heart grows 
 hard." 
 
 We should never diminish our giving " because others, 
 equally able, are not giving up to their measure." What 
 have we to do with what others give ? Our part is to 
 consider what we have received at God's hands, and what we 
 owe to Him. We must each account for the talents en- 
 trusted to us, and let us not lose the blessing, because it is 
 not said exactly how much we are to give. Zaccheus gave
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 53 
 
 the half of his goods to the poor ; but a much poorer one 
 gave God the whole \ And if our givings are not to be 
 " of that which doth cost us nothing," and if the only real 
 giving, worthy of a Christian, ought to be sacrificial, it is 
 evident that those who are wealthy, or even well-to-do, 
 would need to give very largely indeed even to come up to 
 the standard of some of their poorer brethren. The pro- 
 portion of income which each should give is left to the 
 individual conscience ; but if, in every case, it should be 
 large enough to involve self-denial, there are vast numbers 
 of well-to-do Christians who would need to devise things on 
 a much more liberal scale than hitherto. 
 
 It would have been easy for Abraham to have given to 
 God his flocks and herds, but it was real giving when he 
 gave his only son to die the son in whom all his hopes 
 were centred ; and that is why God honoured him so in the 
 future. Let us seek in faith to be made willing to give to 
 God not only of the money which He has intrusted to us, 
 but what is much more precious, our children, and if need 
 be our own lives. 
 
 There is a kind of systematic giving which does not 
 receive the attention that it ought, and that is, " the 
 systematic giving up of superfluities." 
 
 Mrs. Isabella Bishop says : 
 
 " We pray God to give the means to send forth labourers. 
 Has He not given us the means ? Have we not the means 
 to send forth missionaries, have not our friends the means ? 
 And when we pray God to give the means, may we 
 not rather pray Him to consume the selfishness which 
 expends our means upon ourselves ? . . . Our style of 
 living is always rising. We are always accumulating. 
 We fill our houses with pleasant things. We decorate our 
 lives till further decoration seems almost impossible. 
 Our expenditure on ourselves is enormous. . . . May 
 we not hear the Lord's voice saying to us in regard to our 
 treasured accumulations, ' Lovest thou Me more than 
 these ? ' It is time that we should readjust our expenditure
 
 54 OUR GIVING. 
 
 in the light of our increased knowledge ; and not in the 
 light of our increased knowledge alone, but that we should 
 go carefully over our stewardship at the foot of the Cross 
 of our Lord Jesus Christ, in the light of those eyes which 
 closed in death for our redemption. 
 
 " Let us be honest in our self-denial, and not think that 
 we are carrying the burdens of this great, perishing, heathen 
 world by touching them lightly with our fingers, but let us 
 bear them till they eat into the shrinking flesh, and so let 
 us fulfil the law of Christ. Let us entreat Him, even with 
 strong crying and tears, to have mercy, not only on the 
 Christless heathen, but on the Christlessness within our 
 own hearts, on our shallow sympathies, and hollow self- 
 denials, and on our infinite callousness to the woes of this 
 perishing world, which God so loved that He gave His only 
 Son for its redemption." 
 
 " Will a man rob God ? " Yes, indeed. Every man 
 who does not render to God that obedience, reverence, 
 and glory which is His due is a robber. He robs God of His 
 honour, and of the time and effort which should be devoted 
 to His service. So also do those rob God who withhold 
 and appropriate to their own uses the means which He 
 has intrusted to them to use as His stewards. 
 
 " There are too many Achans in the camp, hiding the 
 silver and the gold which ought to be devoted to the Lord ; 
 and the army of the Lord, which ought to be conquering 
 the world for Christ, is held back from many a victory, 
 and kept lying under defeat and disgrace. Were the Church 
 but purged from the covetousness that hides within her 
 pale, she would put on her new strength ; before her the 
 idolatries of the world would speedily fall. 
 
 " A new Reformation is needed in Christendom . . . 
 one which will unlock the Lord's money that men are 
 holding as their own, and let it go, consecrated to its proper 
 use, in sustaining the divinely appointed agencies for 
 evangelizing the world. One of the greatest practical ques- 
 tions before Christendom is How can Christians be induced
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 55 
 
 to consecrate their substance to the service of the Lord ? 
 To help to bring about this great Reformation, every 
 teacher of the Word must faithfully expound and inculcate 
 the Law of the Lord on this matter, until the people are 
 convinced that they must be ruled by God's Word in this 
 as in other duties." 
 
 " Is there no hope of the return of the spirit of giving 
 that Moses needed to restrain in the wilderness ; that 
 prompted the grateful Temple offerings which marked the 
 age of David ; that animated the unselfish, generous 
 donations of the earliest days of the Christian Church ? 
 Does that spirit not sorely need to be revived to-day, 
 when the whole world seems providentially opened up for 
 the spread of the Redeemer's Kingdom ? " 
 
 The expenditure of Missionary and Bible Societies and 
 Agencies of all kinds for sending the Gospel to the heathen 
 at home and abroad is greatly increasing with the increase 
 of opportunities and open doors ; but there is not a pro- 
 portionate increase of contributions. It becomes a serious 
 question what this will lead to, and how professing Christians 
 can justify their apparent selfishness and indifference. 
 God's people must rise altogether into a higher conception 
 of what is required and expected of them in the way of 
 giving especially in the way of giving money, which is 
 really the very least they can give. God is, of course, 
 the Owner of all the wealth in the world. He could lift 
 with one grasp of His Almighty hand every ounce of gold 
 and silver from the hoards of both rich and poor, and place 
 all in the treasuries of His own work ; but that is not His 
 way of working. It is His will that Christians everywhere 
 should act as His stewards, and He intrusts them with much 
 or little as He sees best, and requires that they should use 
 all for His glory. 
 
 The following paragraphs dealing with this point appeared 
 in a well-known monthly some little time ago : " We do 
 not despise a penny when it is consecrated to God, and 
 represents the ability of the giver ; but we are profoundly
 
 56 OUR GIVING. 
 
 assured that there is no proper relation between the mass 
 of pennies which find their way into the offering-plates 
 and the well-dressed worshippers (?) from whose ample 
 hands they are dropped into the plates. From a little 
 child and from the hands of the poor, a penny may have 
 some significance as an act of worship ; but from the hand 
 of an able-bodied man or a well-dressed woman a penny 
 dropped into the offering-plate at a church service may be 
 an abomination in the sight of God and man. Yet the 
 number of those who contribute a penny on the Sabbath 
 day to the ' worship and work ' of Christ, is in excess 
 of those who contribute more than that sum. We have 
 been at some pains to verify this statement by a careful 
 inquiry into the facts as shown by the collections taken in 
 various churches and religious assemblies. 
 
 " The instinct of meanness is more apt to show itself in 
 connection with a church collection than in any other place. 
 There are men who will almost quarrel with a neighbour 
 for the privilege of paying his car fare, or some other 
 courtesy of like value, who will persistently select the 
 pennies from the other loose change in their pockets in order 
 to put it in the collection-plate. And these are not worldly 
 men, but professing Christians. 
 
 It has long been a baffling question to us why it is that 
 this streak of meanness comes out of men and women so 
 habitually in connection with the service of God's house. 
 Shillings for personal pleasure, little extravagances and 
 indulgences, and pennies for God. Surely it must be either 
 that the heart is closed with ingratitude, or else it is pure 
 (bad) habit and thoughtlessness. 
 
 " It may be well to raise the question as to the meaning 
 of the collection at all. Why do we take collections in our 
 churches, and with what spirit and intent does the offerer 
 give his penny or his pound ? . . . Let us first consider 
 the offering as representing the obligation resting on men 
 to support the cause of Christ and the work of the Church. 
 Is it possible that that obligation can be measured and
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 57 
 
 confessed by a penny ? We speak now of the average 
 church-goer's ability. Nor do we forget that many of the 
 offerers are among the number who have hired seats, and 
 thus contributed to the support of the church. But, after 
 all said and done in that direction, can it be said in fairness 
 that a penny does represent an honourable portion of 
 obligation ? If this obligation does not imply something 
 more than that which a penny represents, we must be 
 mistaken as to the general character and worth of Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 " But, in the second place, the offerings on the Sabbath 
 day ought to represent a worshipful sense of thanksgiving 
 to God for all His goodness to us in temporal as well as 
 spiritual things. Is it conceivable that a man who is 
 thankful at all, can give any expression to his thanksgiving 
 by selecting a penny out of his loose change and deliberately 
 offering that to God ? What does it mean ? . . . If it is 
 the offering of a Christian man or woman who has been 
 bought with the priceless blood of. Christ, and is intended 
 to express either obligation or thanksgiving, then God holds 
 these robbers and mockers who rob and mock God with 
 their pennies." 
 
 Oh ! how dishonest we all are. We so easily deceive 
 ourselves and others that we are apt to forget that we cannot 
 deceive God. When we say that " we can't afford " to give 
 to this and that, let us remember that if our neighbours do 
 not know what we do afford money for, God does. When a 
 man says, " I haven't time " to do this or that, you must 
 see what he has time for before you know whether he is 
 speaking the truth or not. And the same rule applies to 
 giving. Is it a pleasant thought to us ? Let us emulate 
 the honest and generous conduct of Barnabas, and fear lest 
 we should have anything of the spirit of the rich young 
 ruler, or of Ananias the dishonest giver. 
 
 It is neither safe nor wise to make rash and unfounded 
 statements, but we believe there is sufficient evidence to 
 justify the assertion that probably about one-half of the
 
 58 OUR GIVING. 
 
 members of the Church are giving absolutely nothing (or at 
 least nothing more than a few coppers) for the support of 
 Christ's cause on the earth. 
 
 Now if that is true, as we believe it is, and making every 
 allowance for the cases of wives and children who are 
 dependent and unable to give individually, it points to a 
 very serious state of matters. It indicates that in the 
 minds of thousands of professing Christians there is an utter 
 misconception of the obligations laid upon, or rather the 
 privileges conferred upon, those who belong to Christ. 
 
 Many of the rich, and many of the poor, are giving nobly. 
 But many of the rich, and many of the poor, are giving 
 miserably in fact, are practically giving nothing. And 
 what we desire to bring home to the members of the Church 
 is the fact that every member of a Christian Church, to whom 
 God has entrusted any means at all, should not only feel 
 bound to give for Christ's cause to the very utmost of his 
 or her ability, but should count it one of the highest privi- 
 leges to be permitted in this way to help to spread the 
 knowledge of Jesus and His love. Bishop Hall said : 
 " Well may we think our substance due where we owe 
 ourselves." 
 
 Of course, before people give money (at least give from 
 right motives) they must give themselves to the Lord ; and 
 when they give themselves, it implies that they are willing 
 to give their money, as well as their time and talents, to 
 promote Christ's cause. When people are found to be not 
 giving their money for Christ's work, it becomes a question, 
 which should concern them deeply, whether they have 
 really given themselves to Him or not. Money lies so near 
 to our hearts, that it seems scarcely possible for any to give 
 their affections without giving of their means also. Loving 
 and giving always go together, and " duty becomes a 
 privilege when love moves to it." 
 
 The Wise Men of the East first presented themselves, 
 falling down and worshipping the infant Jesus, and then 
 presented their gifts. " If we be sincere in the surrender
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 59 
 
 of ourselves to God, we shall not be unwilling to part with 
 what is dearest to us," when it is required for His service. 
 
 " No man enjoys giving until he first gives himself, and 
 then he gives largely, and gives with a will. We all delight 
 to spend on what we love and thoroughly believe in. When 
 we come to possess a Christianity which we can and do 
 thoroughly believe in, we shall offer in a manner which 
 would have shamed even the donors at the consecration 
 of the Temple. Ye are not under the Law, but under 
 Grace." 
 
 In the Memoir of the late Mr. William Gadsby, Baptist 
 pastor in Manchester, the following passage occurs : 
 
 " Mr. Gadsby always insisted that if the truth took 
 possession of a man's heart, it would make his hand find 
 its way into his pocket. He was in the habit of preaching 
 for a friend in the ministry who was very poor, and who had 
 in his flock a wealthy member. This man sometimes 
 went to the vestry after service, and professed to have been 
 much blessed under the sermon. Mr. Gadsby at last 
 inquired who he was. The pastor replied, 'He is the 
 greatest mystery I have in the place ; he is always saying 
 how much he profits under me, and yet, though he is worth 
 thousands, all he gives towards the support of the place 
 is eighteenpence a quarter for his sitting ! ' On Mr. Gadsby's 
 next visit, this brother went into the vestry with his usual 
 tale. ' I don't believe it,' said Mr. Gadsby. The man, 
 surprised, assured him it was true. Mr. Gadsby replied, 
 ' Then the Bible cannot be true, for it says, " By their fruit 
 ye shall know them," and if all your fruit is one shilling and 
 sixpence a quarter, the root cannot be worth much.' " 
 
 Those who grumble or complain of the constant appeals 
 made to the members of churches which are dependent for 
 the support of ordinances upon the free-will offerings of the 
 people, forget that giving is properly an act of worship and 
 a means of grace, as well as an important evidence ; and 
 the appeals are only rendered necessary because so few 
 appear to realize that " Christ's service means complete
 
 60 OUR GIVING. 
 
 consecration of life, talents, money, for the purposes of His 
 kingdom." 
 
 If Christians gave spontaneously and willingly (we might 
 almost say eagerly), as they ought to do, they would not 
 require to be begged from or collected from, but they 
 would, as God's people in Bible days did, bring their offering 
 as a part of their worship. Too many Christians seem to 
 forget that " we are quite as accountable for sins of omission 
 as for sins of commission." 
 
 It is pitiful to see how, among certain classes, even in the 
 Christian Church, whenever GIVING is required, the people 
 all with one consent begin to make excuse ; and such 
 miserable excuses they often are ! Some are too rich, and 
 " are expected to give to everything," and some are too 
 poor, and don't expect to have to give to anything. Some 
 are too old, and some too young. Some want to know what 
 others are giving. Some are " to think about it," and 
 perhaps give at a future date, and so on. No doubt there 
 are a few who have absolutely nothing to give, but they 
 are very few compared to the numbers who are not 
 willing to give, and who see no reason why they should 
 give. 
 
 There are numbers of professing Christians in all our 
 churches, who greatly dislike sermons on Giving, and will 
 not listen patiently to anything on the subject. Why ? 
 Because God's Word, if faithfully applied, condemns their 
 own covetousness, and exposes the hollowness of their 
 professions. The love of money is a desperate evil, and far 
 commoner than men care to admit. 
 
 It is easy to deceive ourselves and our fellow-men in 
 this matter ; but if we are withholding what God requires 
 of us, how shall we answer to Him Who sees all things, 
 and to Whom every thought and desire and motive of our 
 hearts is known ? 
 
 How must the hearts of those appear in God's sight, 
 who are cold, grasping, and selfish, and who care only for 
 their own things. How many there are who give " the half-
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 61 
 
 offering of Cain," or even dare to repeat " the fatal financial 
 falsehood of Ananias and Sapphira." 
 
 " You must look into a man's heart to find out how much 
 he is worth not into his pocket." 
 
 It is hard to imagine how any one can be even an intelli- 
 gent, much less a loyal, member of a Church of Christ 
 without contributing at least something to its funds. Still 
 more difficult is it to conceive how any one professing to be 
 a true disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, can refuse to do 
 anything at all to send the glad tidings of salvation to the 
 heathen, who sit in darkness and perish by thousands every 
 day without Christ. 
 
 Yet the books of the Churches show that a large proportion 
 of the members are giving absolutely nothing either for the 
 work of the Lord at home or abroad. The result is that the 
 real giving for the whole Church is done by a minority. 
 Perhaps that is all that might be expected in a community 
 largely composed of worldly and selfish people, but that it 
 should be so in a professedly Christian Church is sad indeed. 
 
 " When one throws a piece of money into an empty box, 
 it makes a great noise ; but if the box were full, one would 
 not even notice it. So if the mass of Church members 
 faithfully fulfilled this Christian duty of Giving, the generous 
 donors would not be regarded as rare birds, and their gifts 
 would be less observed." 
 
 There is no absolute or universal rule in the New Testa- 
 ment for giving to God to which all are required to conform 
 no solemn law which all must obey. " New Testament 
 institutions appeal to a willing heart, more than to a legal 
 mind." 
 
 " That God refrains from imposing a stringent tax is one 
 thing : that we should take advantage of His having so 
 refrained to leave the whole matter comfortably loose, and 
 save our conscience all trouble from inquiries as to whether 
 we are giving in due proportion to what we receive, is quite 
 another thing." " There is a loose way of handling money, 
 without thinking of the purposes it ought to serve, which
 
 62 OUR GIVING. 
 
 some people mistake for liberality, but which is nothing but 
 wastefulness. There is also a grasping way of withholding 
 it which is mistaken for frugality, but which is only miserli- 
 ness. The wise man values money for certain ends which 
 it will serve, and, striving to promote these ends, he is too 
 intelligent to be either miserly or wasteful. He systematises 
 his means, whatever they may be, and by wasting nothing 
 in unprofitable ways he can afford to be liberal, while in 
 being wisely liberal in the right direction he is most truly 
 frugal." 
 
 We serve no Egyptian taskmaster, no grasping usurer, 
 no hard husbandman who expects to reap where he has not 
 sowed, but ONE Who is just in all His ways. We are left 
 at liberty to decide for ourselves to do each "as he pur- 
 poseth in his heart," and to determine, " in the light of 
 Scripture, and in the exercise of conscience, justice, and 
 love," how much it is our duty to devote to God. " The 
 whole genius of Christian giving is, that it is excited by, 
 and is commensurate with a principle of grace, and not of 
 demand." We are told, however, that our giving should be 
 proportionate to our means " as God hath prospered " 
 us (i Cor. xvi. 2). " Unto whomsoever much is given, 
 of him shall be much required " (Luke xii. 48) and we 
 must admit the justice of this. It is also clearly indicated 
 for our guidance that, under a dispensation of inferior 
 privilege, God claimed as His portion one-tenth at least of 
 every man's means, besides what he might choose to give as 
 voluntary offerings. 
 
 The whole question of the Tenth, or Tithes of the old 
 Testament, has been most learnedly and exhaustively dealt 
 with by Rev. Dr. Lansdell in his book, " The Sacred 
 Tenth." 
 
 It has been said that if only a tenth of the Christian 
 people of our land gave a tenth of their means, it would 
 revolutionize the amount given for religious and charitable 
 purposes. 
 
 The law of giving a tenth to God would appear to be not
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 63 
 
 merely Levitical, but " a f ar older rule, running all through 
 the Bible " (see Gen. xiv. 20 ; xxviii. 22 ; Heb. vii. i-io). 
 
 " Under the old dispensation, the Jews were only required 
 to care for their own nation ; but under the new dispensation 
 the command is, ' Go ye into all the world, and preach the 
 Gospel to every creature.' " Therefore, a tenth is, in most 
 cases, little for Christians to give. It might almost be said 
 that a tenth is the very least that a disciple of Christ ought 
 to give. Over and above that, he should give as God 
 prospers him. 
 
 " Suppose we grant that the definite proportion, one-tenth, 
 is not obligatory upon us ; nothing is gained, because the 
 weight of the argument would be in favour of a larger 
 proportion in the new dispensation than in the old. Granted 
 that there is larger liberty in the matter of giving now than 
 in the days of Abraham or Jacob, it is not liberty to give 
 less, but more." 
 
 " Inasmuch as Gospel privileges, Gospel light, Gospel 
 liberty, far surpass those under the dim and shadowy 
 dispensation of Law, so the gifts of God's people ought to 
 surpass those formerly rendered to Him." If God is 
 pleased to increase our means, we must at once proportion- 
 ately increase our offerings. " The tenth in straitened 
 circumstances may be much to give, while the tenth in 
 prosperity may be very little." God looks to what is left 
 behind, as well as what is given away ; and He may see 
 that the " much " given bears no proportion to the much 
 still retained. "If we want to know how much the Lord 
 has prospered us, let us ask ourselves how much we have 
 got that God could take away." 
 
 Many get into the habit of giving stereotyped sums, 
 and never think of increasing them according as they 
 prosper in the world though perhaps ready enough to 
 find an excuse for diminishing them. One writer says : 
 " The proportion of giving must vary according to circum- 
 stances. As the income rises or falls, so is the amount to 
 be. It is much to be feared, however, that many professing
 
 64 OUR GIVING. 
 
 Christians adopt the falling and not the rising scale, and 
 thus they lose sight of the principle and privilege of giving 
 as God has prospered them. Some have adopted the 
 proportion of one-tenth or a tithe of their income, as what 
 is due to Christ and His cause, in accordance with the 
 practice under the Jewish economy ; but a more careful 
 study of the Bible would teach them that two-tenths, or 
 about one-fifth was nearer the proportion of Jewish offer- 
 ings." 
 
 " What a contrast to this is supplied in the cases of others, 
 living obscurely amongst us, but millionaires in the sight of 
 Heaven ! I have been credibly informed of one whose 
 income is 2,000 per annum, but who lives on ^200, and 
 administers ^1,800 for the Lord's service ; of another whose 
 income is ^8,000, but who lives on 250, and gives away the 
 remainder ; of yet another, a governess, who, out of the 
 ;ioo that she earns, keeps ^50, and gives away the other 
 ^50 ; whilst another, who earns ^1,500, lives on ^100, and 
 exercises a wise stewardship over the rest. A friend of 
 my own, who has long since made a comfortable competence, 
 is remaining in business for the purpose of devoting all his 
 profits to the cause of Christ. . . . Many Christians, 
 directly their income begins to increase, launch out into 
 increased expenditure ; whereas it may be that the increase 
 is to be devoted to the cause of Christ. Ah ! what moral 
 ruin has come to families because of the lavish waste of 
 Christian homes ! 
 
 " Give away a stated proportion of all you own or earn. 
 It may seem needless to insert this caution to those who 
 should use all for Christ. But it is really most important. 
 And for this reason. Our hearts are weak and fickle ; 
 and we are in danger of making so good a provision for 
 ourselves that the Lord's surplus will be next to nothing. 
 We remember so vividly the amount we give away that 
 it bulks up largely before our minds ; and we imagine that 
 we are generous until we see in figures how small a propor- 
 tion our charity bears to our income. To guard against
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 65 
 
 this it is well always to put aside a certain part for the Lord 
 before we begin to divide up the rest, so that His share 
 may be as safe as our rent. This will not prevent us from 
 still considering that the whole is His, or from administering 
 the overplus for the furtherance of those objects that lie 
 near His heart. 
 
 " It is not within my province to say what proportion of 
 our income we should statedly set apart for God. The 
 patriarch gave a tenth ; and surely the noon of Christianity 
 should not inspire less benevolence than the twilight (Gen. 
 xxviii. 22). And it has been calculated that the Jews 
 gave in all at least one-fifth of their income to the mainten- 
 ance of their religion. But of course the proportion we 
 can statedly set apart for Christ must vary with our 
 circumstances." 
 
 The late Mr. Thomas Farmer, who for a quarter of a 
 century acted as Treasurer of the Wesleyan Missionary 
 Society, was " a princely giver to the cause of missions. 
 When he began business, at the age of twenty-two, he took 
 upon him Jacob's vow, ' I will surely give the tenth unto 
 thee ; ' and as Providence added to his property, he increased 
 his scale of giving proportionately. At sixty years of age, 
 all the profits of his business went in his benevolent purse." 
 
 Mr. Cobb, an American, who died in 1834, in his thirty- 
 sixth year, " resolved at the commencement of his religious 
 life, that he would serve the Saviour with all his power in 
 that sphere which seemed to be particularly assigned to him. 
 He had not an opportunity to acquire extensive learning, 
 and he could not serve the Church, to any considerable 
 extent, by his voice or by his pen. But God endowed him 
 with very unusual talents for business." These he justly 
 regarded he ought to employ for the glory of his Saviour. 
 Accordingly he drew up and subscribed the following 
 statement : 
 
 " By the grace of God, I will never be worth more than 
 50,000 dollars. 
 
 O.G.
 
 66 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " By the grace of God, I will give one-fourth of the net 
 profits of my business to charitable and religious vises. 
 
 " If I am ever worth 20,000 dollars, I will give one-half of 
 my net profits ; and if I am ever worth 30,000 dollars, I 
 will give three-fourths ; and the whole, after 50,000 dollars. 
 So help me God, or give to a more faithful steward, and set 
 me aside. Novr., 1821. N. R. COBB." 
 
 " To this covenant he adhered with conscientious fidelity. 
 He distributed the profits of his business with an increasing 
 ratio, from year to year, till he reached the point which he 
 had fixed as the limit of his property, and then he gave to 
 the cause of God all the money which he earned." 
 
 " He did not wait till he had acquired 50,000 dollars 
 before he began to devote his money to religious uses. It 
 was in 1821, while he was yet young, and comparatively a 
 poor man, recently established in business, that he resolved 
 to give one-fourth of the net proceeds of his business to 
 benevolent purposes. It was then uncertain what would 
 be his success ; but he felt it to be his duty to begin then, 
 with the resolution to increase the proportion, if God 
 should prosper him. There are many Christians who 
 think that, if they could accumulate a certain sum, they 
 would then be generous. They say that they must first 
 make provision for themselves and their families, and then 
 they will distribute their money liberally. Mr. Cobb did 
 not act thus. He, from the beginning, gave a large 
 proportion of his income, and trusted in God that whatever 
 should be necessary for himself and his family, would be 
 supplied." 
 
 " Too often it is found that as our worldly means increase 
 there grows a desire for display and luxury, while the 
 willingness to give for Christ decreases. Can anything be 
 more sad than that our willingness to give to God should 
 be decreasing as His goodness to us is increasing ? " 
 
 " We are not under the law, far less are we under a more 
 lax law, but we are under grace that teaches us to imitate
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 67 
 
 God in giving. If as Christians we really believed and 
 realized this, would there be that constant need of pleading 
 for money, often so like trying to pump water from the 
 flinty rock ? Would it not rather be like the days of the 
 gifts of the children of Israel to the Tabernacle service, 
 when Moses had to tell them to stay their giving ? " 
 
 What a grand example that was of liberal and hearty 
 giving, and of a sermon practically improved. Immedi- 
 ately God's will was made known to these people, they 
 brought offerings to the Lord in such profusion that they 
 actually had to be restrained from bringing more, as there 
 was " much more than enough for the service of the work 
 which the Lord commanded to make," " for the stuff 
 they had was sufficient for all the work to make it, and too 
 much " (Exodus xxxv. and xxxvi. 4-7). Would that our 
 congregations, in these Gospel days, departed from the 
 hearing of the Word of God, with as full a resolution to be 
 doers of the same. 
 
 What splendid gifts the twelve princes of Israel brought 
 to the Lord on the day when the Tabernacle was set up 
 (see Numbers, 7th chapter). Then we have King David, 
 who was a very prince of givers. Or, coming to New 
 Testament tunes, we have " Joses, who by the Apostles 
 was surnamed Barnabas," of the country of Cyprus, and 
 who, " having land, sold it, and brought the money, and 
 laid it at the Apostles' feet." 
 
 Would that we all shared the noble, generous spirit of the 
 Philippian saints ! or those early Christians who, having 
 sold their possessions, had all things common, and dis- 
 tributed unto every man according as he had need 1 " And 
 they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. . . . Neither 
 said any of them that ought of the things which he 
 possessed was his own " (see Acts ii. 44, 45 ; and iv. 31-35). 
 But may God grant that we be preserved from the spirit of 
 that unhappy pair we read of, in the same connection (Acts 
 v. i-io), who " agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the 
 Lord." We should be prepared to part, not merely with 
 
 E2
 
 68 OUR GIVING. 
 
 one-tenth, or even one-half, but with our ALL, if need be, and 
 to say, 
 
 41 Take my silver and my gold ; 
 Not a mite would I withhold." 
 
 " There is no bondage in consecration. The two things 
 are opposites, and cannot co-exist, much less mingle. We 
 should suspect our consecration and come afresh to our 
 great Counsellor about it, directly we have any sense of 
 bondage." If we find ourselves wishing that the duty of 
 giving had not been put quite so strongly before us, depend 
 upon it there is something wrong. 
 
 " There is always a danger that just because we say 
 ' all,' we may practically fall shorter than if we had only 
 said ' some,' but said it very definitely. God recognizes 
 this, and provides against it in many departments. For 
 instance, though our time is to be ' all ' for Him, yet He 
 solemnly sets apart the one day in seven which is to be 
 specially for Him. . . . So, as to money, though we 
 place it all at our Lord's disposal, and rejoice to spend it all 
 for Him, directly or indirectly, yet it is a great help and 
 safeguard, and, what is more, a matter of simple obedience 
 to the spirit of His commands, to set aside a definite and 
 regular proportion of our income or receipts for His direct 
 service." 
 
 Our liberality should stand out in bold relief far above 
 that of the many who merely give from custom, or for 
 fashion's sake. But is it so ? Ah, no 1 We fix a low, 
 mean standard of liberality or, it may be, the world fixes 
 it for us and we think that all who go beyond do well. 
 Alas ! how cold and selfish we are ! How feebly we realize 
 what Christ has done and suffered for us 1 How little we 
 do to sustain His honour before men I and how little do we 
 exhibit of the power and beauty of godliness, and of real 
 devotion of heart and life to God 1 
 
 Many subtle arguments for selfishness are advanced. 
 " The privileges of grace are dragged down to a lower 
 level than even the demands of the legal dispensation."
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 69 
 
 But " the liberty of grace is manifested, not in how little 
 we can give, but in how much we are honoured to imitate 
 the great Giver." 
 
 Think of " the vast disproportion between the income 
 of our mighty empire and the portion of it devoted to 
 religious purposes. Is it not worthy of the deepest con- 
 sideration, whether each of us may not, unconsciously, be 
 contributing towards this deficiency, from want of some 
 proper standard in these matters, or from want of due 
 consideration of the responsibility of our stewardship ? " 
 Alas ! that the attainment of a high standard of liberality 
 should be hindered only by the want of willing minds. 
 Thank God, we are not altogether without examples of 
 those who have somewhat of a true estimate of what they 
 owe to the God of all grace, and " are pledged to die to self 
 and gain, and never to be rich while the cause of Christ is 
 poor." But why are they so rare ? "Is some Christian 
 Worthy to be thought the wonder of an age, because he 
 approves himself faithful in the least of the talents which 
 God has committed to His servants ? " 
 
 It has been calculated that the annual British expenditure 
 on tobacco alone is upwards of six times more than the 
 amount contributed for religious and benevolent purposes. 
 And if such is the case with tobacco, what would the pro- 
 portion be if the amount spent on strong drink were taken 
 for comparison ? 
 
 " Few have any idea of the small proportion of their 
 gifts to Christ's cause, as compared with what they spend 
 on themselves." 
 
 Thousands of pounds are spent on vanity and folly, 
 while millions of souls are perishing for lack of saving 
 knowledge. 
 
 The last item of personal expense which many Christians 
 calculate on is their share in the expense of advancing 
 God's kingdom. Whatever is left after satisfying all other 
 demands makes up the purse from which men give. It is 
 in these other demands that the waste occurs, and the
 
 70 OUR GIVING. 
 
 residuary purse will not be filled until this waste is 
 stopped. 
 
 It would be a very easy matter to tell about the extrava- 
 gant waste of those who use liquor and tobacco, and how 
 full the Lord's treasury would be if we had what is thrown 
 away in these directions. But the vast bulk of this money 
 is spent by those who would not use it for Home Missions 
 if they never drank a drop. 
 
 The following address on " The Money Question," 
 in relation to Christian giving and ministerial faithulness, 
 delivered by the Chairman (Andrew Common, J.P., 
 Sunderland) at the Annual Meeting of the Durham and 
 Northumberland Association of Congregational Ministers 
 and Churches in 1891, contains some of the plainest speaking 
 on the subject which I have ever come across. But I do 
 not think the language is at all too strong, for the subject, 
 almost ignored by so many ministers, is too often dealt 
 with by the few who do take it up in far too apologetic 
 and half-hearted a fashion. 
 
 Mr. Common says the state of their funds is a disgrace 
 to the churches, and that disgrace, he says, " attaches 
 specially to our wealthy men, who almost always, almost 
 always, and for almost every purpose, give proportionately 
 less than anybody else. It is not the amount that a man 
 gives that is measured by Christ, but the amount that is 
 retained." 
 
 After indicating the smallness of the givings to certain 
 funds, he adds : " And Christians claim to be followers of 
 Christ, imitators of Christ, who, though He was rich beyond 
 all human calculation or human conception, ' for our sakes 
 became poor, that we through His poverty might be made 
 rich.' 
 
 " I suppose there must be some way, I cannot under- 
 stand it, it is beyond my poor comprehension, but I 
 suppose there must be some way in which professing 
 Christians manage to satisfy their consciences that they 
 are imitating Christ, when they are adding thousands to
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 71 
 
 thousands, tens of thousands to tens of thousands, hundreds 
 of thousands to hundreds of thousands. 
 
 " Giving is a Christian duty, and there must be some 
 proportion of income, short of nothing, below which giving 
 cannot be acceptable to God. If this is denied, the denial 
 amounts to a contention that if a man has ^1,000 a year or 
 10,000 a year and ' purposes in his heart ' to give away a 
 sovereign a year, and gives it cheerfully, because ' the Lord 
 loveth a cheerful giver,' that such giving should be accept- 
 able to God, and no man outside a lunatic asylum would so 
 contend." 
 
 Mr. Common strongly maintained that a tenth was the 
 smallest proportion of his income that a Christian could give 
 to God. 
 
 "Is it conceivable that the God and Father of us all, 
 Who required at the hands of His children, the infants of 
 His family, at least a tenth of all their increase, can be 
 satisfied with less than a tenth at the hands of His full- 
 grown family ? The idea is simply preposterous, and 
 nothing but ignorance, or thoughtlessness, or conscience- 
 searing worldliness could make such a belief possible." 
 
 " Christ himself has stamped upon the proportion of a 
 tenth the seal of His approval and confirmation. ' Ye tithe 
 mint and cummin and anise, but neglect justice, judgment, 
 and mercy, this ought ye to have done and not have left 
 the other undone.' Ye tithe mint and cummin and anise, 
 ye do well, that is right, this ought ye to have done. I claim 
 this text as Christ's imprimatur upon the principle of a 
 tenth. You will find repeated utterances that might be 
 used as arguments, and that are used as arguments in favour 
 of a far larger proportion than a tenth, but not a solitary 
 syllable that can be used as an argument in favour of a lesser 
 proportion. Surely these facts, and they are facts, ought 
 to have influence with Christians who are wishful to do the 
 will of God." 
 
 He does not see how any man can give as God hath 
 prospered him who is not in the habit of giving a definite
 
 72 OUR GIVING. 
 
 proportion of his income, and believes " that the man who 
 in early life adopts the principle of a tenth, and honestly 
 adheres to it through times of difficulty, when he gets into 
 easy circumstances will not restrict himself to the proportion 
 of a tenth, but will occasionally, perhaps frequently, 
 perhaps permanently, increase the proportion The love 
 of giving, and the pleasure of giving, grow with the practice 
 of giving, just as the love of hoarding, and the pleasure of 
 hoarding, grow with the practice of hoarding." If a man 
 fixes a lesser proportion than a tenth, " he has no guide to 
 any lesser proportion, either in the Old Testament or in the 
 New His only guide will be his own inclination in other 
 words, his own selfishness, the very worst guide that any 
 man can follow." 
 
 " But perhaps you say we cannot afford it. There is 
 not a man in this assembly who cannot afford it, if he is 
 only willing to afford it. Perhaps you say We are obliged 
 to maintain a certain appearance of respectability, we are 
 obliged to occupy a certain position in the social scale. 
 You are under no such obligation. There is not one of us 
 obliged to live as we are now living. There is not one of 
 us that might not come down a step or two if necessary ; 
 if necessary, not only without injury to any of our interests, 
 temporal or spiritual, but with positive advantage. 
 Probably most of us have at times had the feeling how much 
 more comfortable we might have been, how much more 
 easy in our circumstances, how much better able to give, 
 how much better able to save, if we had only been content 
 to live in a smaller house ; but the curse of social com- 
 petition is upon us all, ministers as well as people. 
 
 " Let me give you two instances of liberality one a 
 minister, the other a layman, one an Englishman, the other 
 a Scotchman. According to Dean Farrar, John Wesley 
 lived for years on 28 a year, and gave away all above that 
 sum ... A working man in Glasgow, who never had 
 more than 303. a week, gave regularly 20 a year more 
 than a fourth of his income to the funds of the church of
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 73 
 
 which he was a member, and on one occasion, when the 
 authorities of the denomination to which he belonged 
 appealed for ^20,000 for Mission purposes, he gave ^200 
 towards the amount, and when he died and his affairs were 
 looked into, it was found that he had kept a regular account 
 of his expenditure, and that he had lived upon los. a week, 
 his only extravagances being, buying books and giving to 
 God." 
 
 Mr. Common, explaining how he felt bound to speak 
 plainly, said : "In my judgment then, ministers are to a 
 large extent to blame for the present miserable scale of 
 giving on the part of Christians and Christian Churches. 
 The people have never been taught, educated, trained in 
 the duty of giving." 
 
 After quoting a number of texts on the subject of Giving, 
 and asking his hearers if they had ever preached from these, 
 he added, * 
 
 " Just one other text in this connection I might quote 
 a dozen Have any of you ever preached from this text ? 
 ' They that will be rich ' (not they that are rich it is just 
 within the limits of possibility that a rich man may be. 
 saved) but ' they that will be rich,' that are determined 
 to be rich by any process, ' fall into temptation and a snar : 
 and into many foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men 
 in destruction and perdition.' Now these texts are all 
 applicable to all ranks, classes, and conditions of men. 
 But there are special texts for special cases. Some of you 
 have rich men in your congregations men who to your own 
 knowledge, and to the knowledge of all who know them, 
 are little other than muck-rakers, money grubbers, wealth 
 accumulators. John Foster, in one of his lectures, says 
 with regard to such men ' One has come in the way of 
 knowing here and there divers such individuals, members 
 of Christian Churches, punctual in attendance on ordinances, 
 very regular in their conduct, free from the ordinary and 
 external vices, but while perfectly well-known to be vastly 
 rich, not less notorious for niggardly parsimony in their
 
 74 OUR GIVING. 
 
 contributions to the cause of God plainly, robbers of God.' 
 Again he says ' Here is a great flagrant idolater in Church 
 Communion, who might just as well go on his knees and 
 literally worship his gold and silver if put in the form of an 
 image (his objection to have it put in that form would be 
 that it would pay no interest,) yet he would affect to admire 
 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.' 
 
 " In a leading article in ' The British Weekly ' some 
 months ago, we have these words ' Under no honest 
 interpretation of Christ's words is it possible to exclude from 
 the indispensable elements of Christian holiness a superiority 
 to the common passion for wealth. Nor is it possible to 
 doubt that in any church governed by His will the scorn 
 reserved at present for the dissolute and the criminal would 
 flash with even greater intensity on the covetous.' 
 
 " We now come to what Christ has to say distinctly and 
 definitely as to the rich. Have any of you ever preached 
 from any of the following texts : ' Verily I say unto you 
 that a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of 
 Heaven,' or ' It is easier for a camel to go through the eye 
 of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom 
 of God,' or ' Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many 
 years, take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God 
 said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul will be required 
 of thee,' or ' If thou wouldst be perfect, go sell all that thou 
 hast and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure 
 in Heaven, and come and follow me ; and he went away 
 sorrowful, for he was very rich,' or ' Woe unto you that are 
 rich, for ye have received your consolation,' or ' And the 
 rich man lifted up his eyes in hell, being in torments.' All 
 these passages are in the words of Christ, and I purposely 
 confine myself to Christ's own words. Now an honest, 
 common-sense interpretation of these passages forces upon 
 one the conviction that it is all but impossible for a rich 
 man to be saved. There is not a word in any of these 
 passages about moral character. There is not a word 
 against the moral character of any of the men who are
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 75 
 
 mentioned ' a rich man ' they that have riches ; ' rich 
 and increased with goods ' ; ' He went away sorrowful, 
 because he was very rich ' ; ' Woe unto you rich, for ye have 
 received your consolation ' not ye have been living wicked 
 lives ; ' Ye have received your consolation/ ye have got 
 what you wanted. ' The rich man lifted up his eyes in hell,' 
 and Abraham said unto him, ' Son, remember that thou in 
 thy lifetime receivedst thy good things,' not a word about 
 his having done any evil things. The probability is that 
 every one of these men would have been received into 
 church fellowship with open arms by any Church in 
 Christendom. 
 
 " What, then, does it mean ? Manifestly this, that it is 
 all but impossible for a rich man to love his God more 
 than he loves his gold. If he loved his God more than he 
 loves his gold, it would be absolutely impossible for him 
 to go on hoarding whilst all around him, on every hand, 
 multitudes of his fellow-creatures, his own brothers and 
 sisters, God's human family, are perishing for lack of bread, 
 and for lack of knowledge. ' He that hath this world's 
 goods and shutteth up his bowels of compassion against 
 them, how dwelleth the love of God in him.' If he loves 
 his gold more than he loves his God, he is an idolater, the 
 one thing above all others that God abhors, and no matter 
 what his character may be in other respects, publicans 
 and sinners, drunkards and harlots will go into the Kingdom 
 of Heaven rather than he. This gives tremendous emphasis 
 to Christ's exhortation, ' Lay not up for yourselves treasures 
 on earth.' Now, surely Christ's own teachings teachings 
 of such momentous importance, and of such terrible 
 significance, ought not to be overlooked or ignored." 
 
 If the pulpits of the country had been faithful on this 
 subject, " the scale of giving would have been very different 
 from what it is, and the churches themselves would have 
 been purged and purified from a vast amount of the dross 
 of worldliness, which like a deadly virus is destroying the 
 spirituality of the churches, and hindering the salvation of
 
 76 OUR GIVING. 
 
 the world. On this point, however, I will simply ask one 
 question will the excuse of delicacy of feeling pass muster 
 on the great day of account ? There is another difficulty. 
 In connection with most churches there are professing 
 Christians, usually men of substance, who detest sermons 
 on the subject of giving they cannot listen to them with 
 patience." 
 
 " I know, then, that there are these difficulties, but as 
 I do not know that any of you purposely ignore this subject 
 in the pulpit, through fear of giving offence to some of your 
 hearers, I shall not say anything to you about it. I shall 
 address myself to myself in your hearing. If I were a 
 minister of religion, and felt conscious, or even suspicious, 
 that I was purposely ignoring this subject in the pulpit, 
 through fear of giving offence to some of my hearers, I should 
 have no hope at all that the blessing of God would rest 
 upon any part of my ministry. Nay more, I should be in 
 daily fear lest I should hear or feel in my inmost soul, 
 in dreams or visions of the night, the Angel of the Lord, 
 crying in the midst of the heavens and saying, ' Curse ye 
 the minister, yea, curse him bitterly, saith the Angel of the 
 Lord, because he came not up to the kelp of the Lord, 
 to the help of the Lord against Mammon the Mighty ' 
 Mammon the Mighty, great Mammon, God of the world 
 and worldlings, the greatest God below the skies. This is 
 the dangerous Devil with whom Christians have to do battle, 
 not the roaring lion going about seeking whom he may 
 devour, but the respectable Devil, the fashionable Devil, 
 the insinuating Devil, the fascinating Devil, binding his 
 victims in thousands and tens of thousands in golden chains 
 and dragging them down to Hell. This is the Devil against 
 whom Christ Himself has specially warned us. ' Ye cannot 
 serve God and Mammon.' " 
 
 " In the same leading article in ' The British Weekly ' 
 from which I have already quoted, there are these words : 
 ' Though Christ Himself had no money and desired none, 
 He thought and spoke as much of it as any miser. He saw
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. 77 
 
 it to be the real rival to God. He personified it as Mammon, 
 and set it over against God in his picture of human life. 
 Nearly all his parables are concerned with the relation of 
 men to their money. In avarice more than anything lay 
 the power that corroded the human soul.' This witness 
 is true, and a careful and honest interpretation of Christ's 
 teaching will prove it to be true. Well, then, I ask does 
 this subject occupy in the pulpits of England the same 
 position of relative importance that it occupied in the 
 teachings of Christ ? If not, why not ? If not, why not ? 
 It is far more important and far more necessary to preach 
 against the love of money than to preach against lying, 
 or dishonesty in business, or drunkenness, or impurity. 
 Men who commit such sins know that they sin, and if 
 detected are ashamed, but the money-loving man glories 
 in his sin. He calls it thrift, prudence, laying up against 
 a rainy day, providing for the future, whilst all the time 
 he is living a life of idolatry, and worshipping a golden 
 calf." 
 
 If we look at the annual subscription lists of many of 
 our religious and charitable institutions, what do we find ? 
 Long lists of the names and contributions of those who live 
 in comfort, far removed from want and poverty. Not 
 knowing by what principles or motives the giving of many 
 of these is regulated, we need not wonder at the smallness 
 of their contributions ; but oh, how sad it is to see from 
 such lists the number of professing Christians who, though 
 they can well afford to give largely, yet conform to the 
 miserable standard which the custom' of a selfish and cold- 
 hearted world has fixed ! Sadder still it is to know that 
 even such too often turn a deaf ear to the appeal for help, 
 dismissing the, it may be, already disheartened collector, 
 as they would a troublesome and importunate beggar, 
 without kind words, or even bare civility. 
 
 Some people's giving is " pitched in such a low key " 
 that it actually hinders more than it helps. 
 
 Why should the whole giving in each town, or district,
 
 78 OUR GIVING. 
 
 or church, be so often left to a few generous souls, who, 
 although they may be far from wealthy, yet give for the 
 whole community ? 
 
 Christians, we must raise the standard of giving. " A 
 high standard is essential to a high attainment." Let us 
 pray earnestly to be delivered from all lukewarmness, cold- 
 ness, and indifference ; and let us show the world that there 
 is a mighty constraining power in the love of Jesus Christ 
 our Saviour. 
 
 An atheist being asked by a professor of Christianity how 
 he could quiet his conscience in so desperate a state, replied, 
 " As much I am astonished at yourself, who, believing the 
 Christian religion to be true, can quiet your conscience in 
 living so much like the world. Did I believe what you 
 profess, I should think no care, no diligence, no zeal 
 enough." Alas ! that we, who profess to be the followers of 
 Christ, should give so much cause for astonishment. Can 
 too much be expected of sinners saved by grace, and called to 
 such a glorious inheritance ? 
 
 " Give as you would if an angel 
 
 Awaited your gift at the door ; 
 Give as you would if to-morrow 
 
 Found you where waiting was o'er ; 
 Give as you would to the Master, 
 
 If you met His searching look ; 
 Give as you would of your substance 
 
 If His hand your offering took." 
 
 " William Carey gave each year to the mission, out of 
 his Government salary of ^1,500, not less than ^1,400. 
 When every Christian gives like this, there will be no want 
 in the treasury of God." 
 
 It is said of John Wesley, who was most charitable, 
 that he " gave away, not merely a certain part of 
 his income, but all that he had. His own wants being 
 provided for, he devoted all the rest to the necessities of 
 others. . . . He li ved economically ; and in the 
 course of fifty years, it has been supposed, he gave away 
 more than thirty thousand pounds."
 
 MUCH TO GIVE. 79 
 
 In 1776, having been asked to make a return of the silver 
 plate in his possession, on which duty was payable, he 
 replied as follows : 
 
 " SIR, I have two silver teaspoons at London, and two 
 at Bristol. This is all the plate which I have at present, 
 and I shall not buy any more while so many around me 
 want bread. I am, Sir, your most humble Servant. 
 
 JOHN WESLEY." 
 
 He knew that " a man's life consisteth not in the abund- 
 ance of the things which he possesseth." He wanted to be 
 "rich toward God" (Luke xii. 15-21). " Sell whatsoever 
 thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have 
 treasure in Heaven " (Mark x. 21). 
 
 Another noble example of self-denying dedication of 
 property is that of the late Robert Haldane, who sold his 
 beautiful estate of Airthrey in Stirlingshire, and laid the 
 money at the feet of Christ. Of him it is said, that in the 
 training of godly young men for the ministry, the building 
 of " missionary churches " in remote localities, and on 
 similar objects, he, during the ten years following his 
 conversion, spent no less a sum than forty thousand pounds. 
 His story is unfortunately not so well known as it should be. 
 Yet, thank God, there are not wanting men to-day who are 
 possessed with a like devotion, though it may not be 
 manifested in exactly the same way. 
 
 It is, indeed, cause for thankfulness that here and there 
 a gracious soul, " taking his stand by the Cross, gives nobly 
 for the diffusion of truth in our benighted world ; " but, 
 alas ! may the Lord not still ask, " Were there not ten 
 cleansed ; but where are the nine ? " 
 
 " From the " New York Observer " we quote the following 
 account of the late Mr. Alexander Stuart, head of one of the 
 greatest firms in New York or in the world. 
 
 " As riches increased, he did not set his heart upon 
 them. He knew that he was a steward, to whom was com- 
 mitted a great responsibility, and he discharged that trust
 
 8o OUR GIVING. 
 
 with a fulness and sufficiency, such as is rarely known 
 among men in active business life. His own private 
 wants being few, his style of living simple and unostenta- 
 tious, he gave his money largely, but with careful dis- 
 crimination as to the objects to receive his charities. To 
 enumerate the several noble benefactions of this benevolent 
 man would be impossible, and not the least beautiful feature 
 of his benevolence was his unwillingness to have it known. 
 To buy and give a church to a feeble congregation, to 
 extinguish a church debt, to endow a chair of theology, to 
 present a mansion completely furnished to the head of a 
 college, to found a hall for a theological seminary, to 
 replenish the exhausted treasury of a board of the Church 
 or a benevolent society, to relieve the necessities of Christian 
 ministers, to give away in a year sometimes his whole 
 income and more, drawing as he would playfully say, 
 ' from his principal from principle,' he made his money yield 
 riches for others in the extension of the Kingdom of God, 
 the comfort of the poor, and the welfare of man." 
 
 Of the late Mr. John Thompson Paton, Alloa, it was 
 said : " For more than a century the name of Paton has 
 had an honoured place in the story of Scottish industrial 
 development and in the records of evangelistic and mission- 
 ary effort. For business sagacity and enterprise, crowned 
 with enduring success and stable prosperity, the name has 
 gained a world-wide reputation. But the foundations of 
 the firm's success were laid in the faithfulness of Christian 
 stewardship, and the devotion of time and talent, as well 
 as money, to Christian service. . . . He was always 
 ready to serve the best interests of the national life, and 
 showed a lifelong fidelity and unfaltering loyalty to great 
 principles and good causes which make for national righteous- 
 ness and social well-being. ... A liberal giver himself, 
 he stimulated liberal giving in others, and won not a little 
 support for schemes in which he specially interested himself 
 by the enthusiasm and generosity he displayed. . . . 
 His liberality was thoughtful and timely, full of sympathy,
 
 HOW MUCH TO GIVE. Si 
 
 while conscientiously systematic. He did not weary in 
 well-doing, but to the last was a cheerful giver to the Church 
 he loved and to the cause of Christ, to Whom he had at an 
 early age given himself." 
 
 " It has been narrated of the late Thomas Wilson, 
 Treasurer of Highbury College, that he received an impulse 
 to enlarged liberality from a discourse by the Rev. Andrew 
 Fuller on this text, Ecclesiastes xi. I ; especially from the 
 following observation. ' Observe,' said the preacher, 
 ' it is not said, Cast thy crumbs but thy bread, thy substance, 
 the whole loaf.' Few men of modern times have more 
 completely embodied the spirit of this passage." 
 
 In the will of the late Sir Thos. McClure he stated that 
 for many years he made it a habit to give the half of his 
 income to the cause of God. He left the half of his property 
 to the Presbyterian Church. 
 
 Amongst others who have provided suggestive models 
 of Christian generosity may be mentioned Sir W. P. 
 Hartley and Mr. John Cory. We must ever hold in honour 
 and affection those two, who, though not possessed of 
 great riches, were yet so rich in faith that they devised liberal 
 things for the glory of God and the good of their fellows 
 men like Miiller and Spurgeon, Barnardo and Quarrier, 
 Hudson Taylor, and many others. 
 
 " The self-indulgence of wealthy Christians, who might 
 largely support the Lord's work with what they lavish upon 
 their houses, their tables, or their personal expenditure, is 
 very sad to see." 
 
 " Why should only those who have limited means have 
 the privilege of offering to their Lord that which has 
 really cost them something to offer ? . . . The very 
 abundance of God's good gifts too often hinders the wealthy 
 from the privilege and delight of really doing without 
 something superfluous or comfortable or usual, that they 
 may give just that much more to their Lord." 
 
 In connection with the poor widow's offering, it has been 
 said : " Duty might have constrained her to cast one 
 O.G. F
 
 82 OUR GIVING. 
 
 mite into the temple treasury, love prompted her to offer 
 two even all she had. A proportionate giver this ? Yes, 
 truly. She had nothing left. The others who gave were 
 disproportionate givers. They cast in much, and yet had 
 enough and to spare. So hers was the greater offering. 
 There was little of it, but there was much in it. It was of 
 insignificant money value, but its heart value was priceless." 
 The rich gave, no doubt, " of their abundance " what 
 they could easily spare. Yet they did so far well ; for it is 
 probable that others, who were also rich, cast in very little. 
 Just as in our own days there are many rich who give much 
 though few give what they might feel the want of ; but, 
 alas 1 there are many, both rich and poor, who give very 
 little a mere nominal sum, which, as an offering to the 
 Giver of every good and perfect gift, is little better than a 
 mockery and an insult. 
 
 Would that we all, in the matter of giving to the Lord, 
 resolved to " measure our duty by this test, ' He loved me, 
 and gave Himself for me.' " 
 
 " We can all do more than we have done 
 
 And not be a whit the worse ; 
 It never was loving that emptied the heart, 
 Or giving that emptied the purse."
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE 
 
 F2
 
 CHAPTER IV . 
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE 
 
 WE should give upon Scriptural grounds, proportionally, 
 systematically, and on principle ; habitually, methodically, 
 and frequently ; timeously and judiciously, with purpose 
 and with plan. " Surely," said the late Rev. Dr. William 
 Wilson, "it is not beyond the sphere of the sacred 
 functions of the ministry that the members of a congregation 
 should be instructed, not only in this matter, but in the 
 method of Christian beneficence. Method is very necessary 
 in the whole conduct of life. Life, indeed, is wasted, if it 
 be without purpose and plan. And in the department of 
 beneficence, method is not less profitable than in any other. 
 Besides, God has graciously provided for His people, 
 method which it is our duty to adopt and follow." 
 
 Proportional giving is a better name than systematic 
 giving, for many give systematically, but systematically a 
 great deal less than they ought to give, and by no means in 
 proportion as the Lord hath prospered them. 
 
 " Our giving ought to be the fruit of deep-rooted principle, 
 of deliberate forethought, and of calm and conscientious 
 consideration, not of variable emotions." It should be 
 the outcome of an intelligent Christian beneficence, rather 
 than the result of transient excitement, fitful impulse, or 
 spasmodic effort. It should be a real spiritual act, not 
 produced by " pathetic appeals talcing the passions by 
 storm, but by the simple faith of the ' truth as it is in 
 Jesus.' " We should " think about giving, and arrange for it." 
 
 " He who only, or chiefly, under the guidance of feeling, 
 
 85
 
 86 OUR GIVING. 
 
 gives of his substance to the Lord occasionally, perhaps, 
 giving too much will much oftener, probably, give nothing, 
 or a great deal too little." 
 
 Some, acting more as owners than as stewards for the 
 Lord, " give only from feeling or particular circumstances ; 
 and thus life is gone, before they are aware of it, without 
 good use having been made of that one brief life here on 
 earth, in using their means for the Lord as they might have 
 done." 
 
 " System is necessary," says Dr. Mackay, of Hull, in an 
 address on " Christian Giving " ; " but system is not all : 
 hence we believe the title ' Christian giving ' to be preferable 
 to ' Systematic giving.' We know some who are very 
 systematic in their giving, but very unchristian." 
 
 If we would give rightly, two things are required : "A 
 vivid conviction of divine teachings and Christian obligation, 
 and a steady and conscientious dedication in proportion to 
 means." Much blessing is lost for want of a regular habit 
 of giving. In the Word of God (i Cor. xvi. 12) we have a 
 clear indication of an apostolic rule, if not a divine plan, for 
 the guidance of all who desire to give liberally and cheerfully. 
 This has been called " the financial law of Christ," and 
 " the necessity of the age." We may not be required to act 
 up to the exact letter of the injunction to " lay by (us) in 
 store upon the first day of the week " though it is found 
 to be a most excellent practice, and " it connects our giving 
 to God with God's great gift to us, of which the weekly 
 Sabbath is the standing memorial " ; but we must, accord- 
 ing to circumstances, adopt whatever plan enables us to 
 give most freely, with ease and pleasure to ourselves. 
 What is needed is deliberate purpose to give, a plan and 
 principle of giving, and a constant provision in order to be 
 prepared to give." 
 
 Our contributions should be provided for by the previous 
 storing, or laying aside, of a definite part of our means 
 that is, having determined between God and our conscience 
 what proportion of our income we can set apart for Christian
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 87 
 
 work and purposes of benevolence, let us, at such time as is 
 most convenient, consign it to a separate and inviolable 
 fund, and " from this sacred fund, consecrated and dedicated 
 by prayer to God, let His claims be met." As they are of 
 the first importance, they should be provided for first. 
 " If what is given to God is the remains of one's income, it 
 will be acknowledging God last, instead of first, and will be 
 a very mean offering compared with what it ought to be." 
 " God's portion should be the first item in expenditure ; 
 for if we do not place God first, in what other place can we 
 put Him ? " We must honour the Lord with the first- 
 fruits of our substance. " The very word first-fruits 
 implies bounty received and bounty in prospect." How 
 many of us think we may meet the claims of God out of 
 what remains, after providing for everything else. " Chari- 
 ty forms no part of our actual expenditure. . . . Our 
 libation to God is not from the brim of an overflowing cup, 
 but from the bottom, from the dregs. The principle on 
 which we set out is wrong. God first, and then the remainder 
 to other purposes, should be the principle of domestic 
 economy." This point is well stated in Arthur's " Duty of 
 Giving Away a stated Proportion of our Income." 
 
 " If every one, before assigning any portion as a thank- 
 offering to the Giver of all, is to spend what meets his views 
 of providing for his own and his children's wants, present 
 and prospective, in ninety-nine out of every hundred cases 
 it will prove that the surplus for giving away is next to 
 nothing. In many cases, giving liberally will be postponed 
 till family provision is made, till resources are fairly in 
 advance of demands ; and by that time all heart for giving 
 will be gone. . . . Another advantage of deciding that 
 a consecrated proportion shall take the precedence of all 
 other outlay, instead of counting on giving what we have to 
 spare, is this : It materially affects our scale of personal 
 expenditure. Our ideas of what is necessary are ruled by 
 our knowledge of what we have to spend. A gentleman with 
 five hundred a year, who means to give away what he can
 
 88 OUR GIVING. 
 
 spare, unless he be a man of extraordinary generosity and 
 decision united (which cases are never the rule), forms his 
 whole scheme of expenditure on the basis of five hundred 
 a year, and finds it hard, now and then, to spare a pound 
 or two ; not that he is unwilling, but all his resources are 
 pre-engaged. Another with the same income has his regu- 
 lar benevolent fund, into which the first fifth of his income 
 goes. The effect is, that all his plans of expenditure proceed 
 on the basis of four hundred a year ; and thus, while the 
 Benevolent Fund is strong for all legitimate claims, it pays 
 itself perhaps more than pays itself by acting as a 
 check upon the Vanity Fund, the Hobby Fund, the Folly 
 Fund, and several other exigent funds on which millions of 
 our domestic revenues are wasted. We, then, hesitate not 
 for a moment to prefer the rule of giving regular first-fruits, 
 even in the low proportion of a tenth, over the rule of giving 
 all we have to spare. This last, while for a strong 
 and holy man the highest of laws, is for the great 
 majority a law which amounts to no more than is now 
 prevalent." 
 
 This is much the same as what is called " Storing for 
 God." Storing or laying aside money for the purpose of 
 giving shows forethought, deliberate purpose, and plan, 
 which has many advantages over the practice of leaving 
 giving to be done on the spur of the moment from whatever 
 there is to spare. It checks selfish feelings, encourages 
 economy, provides a ready fund, and makes giving a real 
 pleasure. 
 
 "It is only by storing that the first-fruits can be con- 
 secrated to benevolent purposes. And there are singular 
 advantages in following the method prescribed to the 
 Corinthian Church. The setting apart of a portion of our 
 substance from week to week has the advantage of periodical 
 contributions at short intervals, which, in the case of most 
 people, is more easily done than when a large sum is 
 deducted at once from their income. And this method is, 
 besides, more productive. A monthly contribution yields
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 89 
 
 a larger revenue than an annual or half-yearly subscription, 
 and a weekly storing would be more productive still. 
 
 ' ' Moreover, the weekly setting apart of a portion of income 
 for sacred and benevolent purposes is fitted to bring up 
 very frequently the question, whether we are giving as the 
 Lord has prospered us ? What we thus store is not a 
 stereotyped sum. From week to week we are called to 
 consider what we ought to add to the Lord's treasury, and 
 this consideration will lead to enlarged liberality. And 
 especially this will be the result if we fully adopt the method 
 commended to the Corinthians ; if we lay by in store on the 
 first day of the week ; if we make Sabbath work of it ; if 
 it is a sacred religious service an act of worship. What is 
 thus set apart for God will be set apart as in God's presence, 
 and with calling upon His name. It will be set apart, 
 moreover, at a time when all the hallowed memories 
 associated with the Lord's day are fresh upon us, and when 
 we are most prepared to feel our indebtedness to Him who 
 was delivered for our offences, and has been raised again for 
 our justification." 
 
 All who have ever adopted this system of a " separate 
 fund," provided for by self-assessment, can bear testimony 
 to the many advantages connected with it, and to its great 
 influence in promoting liberal and cheerful giving.* In 
 practice it is eminently helpful, and most efficient ; and its 
 possessors will generally find that what they have to give 
 away is considerably more than they expected. They will 
 be " ready to distribute, willing to communicate " (i Tim. 
 vi. 1 8). They will " find themselves ready and happy to 
 aid many an object which others of larger means plead 
 inability to assist." They will not be guided, as too many 
 are, merely by what others give ; and what they do give 
 will be given with ease and pleasure. Should any con- 
 gregation or body of people store in this manner, in order 
 to give, they would be amazed at the amount they were 
 
 * See writings of the late Rev. John Ross and Mr. Muller, 
 of Bristol.
 
 go OUR GIVING. 
 
 able to contribute ; and if all the churches did so, how 
 blessed would be the result 1 Nothing short of the adoption 
 of a system such as this, which appeals to the conscience 
 of each individual member and adherent of the Church, 
 will enable her to carry out her high vocation of going into 
 all the world, and preaching the Gospel to every creature. 
 
 " What is more certain, than that in the course of civil, 
 social, and personal expenditure, unless sj'stematic provision 
 be made for works of beneficence, they will be jostled aside, 
 and fail to obtain needful funds ? " When the money is 
 not set aside, every appeal has to contend with selfishness 
 and covetousness ; but when thus dedicated, it is already 
 given, and the only question is as to its allocation and 
 distribution. Temptation is reduced to a minimum. 
 We dispense a fund which is not our own. The effect " is to 
 keep the eye and ear open for cases of need, and the heart 
 tender towards want and suffering." We think there are 
 so man}' 1 things to give to, that we are over cautious lest we 
 give too much. But if we possess such a fund, and record 
 our contributions " not as a list of good works, but to aid 
 in performing a solemn obligation " we will probably 
 find that they are not so many, and the amount given not 
 so much, as we expected ; and we may frequently have to 
 seek for deserving objects on which to bestow our charity. 
 Unlike the great majority of people, who think they do well 
 if they give when they are asked, we will actually be found 
 taking trouble to give ! 
 
 " Dr. Parker said that in soliciting charitable and other 
 subscriptions he had never had any difficulty or trouble 
 with men who had given proportionately and systemati- 
 cally. ' A man who does not give definitely, and who does 
 not set down in his account book exactly what he does give, 
 is apt to think that he is always giving. There is no 
 falsehood larger and deeper than this in all practical life. 
 If you will put down just what you give to charitable 
 purposes you will be surprised at the end of the year how 
 little you have given, yet you may have the feeling that you
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 91 
 
 have been always parting with your money in response to 
 benevolent appeals.' Dr. Parker added that those who 
 had made a system of giving were the finest, strongest, 
 sweetest-sou led men he had ever met." 
 
 In carrying out in practice this system, the money may 
 either be kept in a separate purse (as recommended by the 
 late Rev. J. Ross, in his little book, " Uncle Ben's Bag "), or 
 the amount may be noted, along with its disposal, in a book 
 kept for the purpose. But the great matter is, the dedica- 
 tion and solemn resolve that what is dedicated must be 
 given. " Merchants, and those whose profits are liable 
 to fluctuation, so that they cannot tell what their income 
 is, might meet the case by contributing during the year a 
 proportion of the sum they think themselves entitled to 
 spend upon themselves." We need not be too anxious 
 about exceeding the amount, but we should be very careful 
 to see that it is all given. " The smallest amount which 
 is fixed to be given may be continually gone beyond ; but 
 it is well we should fix this lowest amount, lest we should 
 do nothing at all, or scarcely anything." Over and above 
 the proportion of our regular income which we set apart, 
 we should offer thank-offerings for special mercies. 
 
 We must sedulously avoid borrowing from this fund,, or 
 using any portion of it with the intention of replacing it 
 shortly. 
 
 Here are a few extracts from " The Duty of Giving Away 
 a Stated Proportion of our Income," by Wm. Arthur, A.M. : 
 " Giving is an essential part of the Christian religion. This 
 position needs no special argument. In support of it the 
 whole New Testament cries aloud. The system of redemp- 
 tion is, from first to last, one prodigious process of gift. 
 God loved the world, and GAVE His only-begotten Son. 
 The Son loved us, and GAVE Himself to death for us all. 
 This giving does not rest at the point of bounty, but passes 
 on to that of inconceivable sacrifice. Every man on whose 
 spirit the true light of redemption breaks, finds himself 
 heir to a heritage of givings, which began on the eve of
 
 92 OUR GIVING. 
 
 time, and will keep pace with the course of eternity. To 
 giving he owes his all ; in giving he sees the most substantial 
 evidence he can offer, that he is a grateful debtor ; and the 
 self-sacrifice of Hun in Whom he trusts says, far more 
 pathetically than words could say, ' It is more blessed to 
 give than to receive.' " 
 
 " It is ordained by Christianity that giving shall be both 
 bountiful and cheerful. . . . The twofold requirement 
 is a gift not sparing as to amount, nor grudging as to feeling. 
 . . . A bounty that reaches the point of sacrifice, and a 
 heart-charity that rejoices in such sacrifice, can alone meet 
 the call of the Gospel. . . . Whether we take the Old 
 Testament or the New, the lowest proportion of giving for 
 which we can find any pretext or foothold whatever in 
 command or in precedent, is one-tenth. He who fixes on 
 this deliberately fixes on far less than was required of a Jew. 
 He who fixes on less than this deliberately excludes all 
 Scripture instruction, and chooses a standard for which no 
 part of God's Word offers a justification." 
 
 " It is not probable that year after year one will carefully 
 set apart a fixed proportion for the service of his God, 
 without becoming habituated to feel that he is neither 
 author nor owner of any fraction of property, but merely 
 steward ; and that He at Whose feet he lays the first-fruits 
 is the Lord, the Giver of all. Such stated setting apart 
 is a practical keeping of the precept : ' Thou shalt remember 
 the Lord thy God : for it is He that giveth thee power to 
 get wealth.' And whoever thus begins life by keeping a 
 law of proportion is the most likely of all men to advance 
 his proportion as his Benefactor augments His blessing." 
 
 " One strong reason for some definite rule lies in this, that 
 we have far better memories for our virtues than for our 
 obligations, for the pounds we give away, than for those 
 we receive or spend upon ourselves. Even truly excellent 
 persons, who have not tested their givings, monstrously 
 exaggerate the amount of them to their own mind. The 
 relish of one act of liberality remains long upon the lips ;
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 93 
 
 and some who believe that ' their hand is never out of their 
 pocket ' would be confounded if the great account where 
 all items are entered were placed before them, and they 
 saw how miserably little their endless deeds of generosity 
 amount to. The first expenditure of all should be that 
 which sanctifies the rest, that which is not for self, or 
 flesh, or earth, or time, but for the Lord, for gratitude, 
 for the training of the soul, for store in Heaven. Our own 
 morsel will be sweeter, and more wholesome too, when the 
 due acknowledgment has been first laid, with a bountiful 
 hand and a thankful heart, on the altar of the Saviour. 
 ' Ye shall eat neither bread, nor parched corn, nor green 
 ears, until the selfsame day that ye have brought an offering 
 unto your God ' (Lev. xxiii. 14). This was the spirit of 
 the first-fruits, a spirit of noble preference for the honour 
 of God over selfish care." 
 
 " On the very same grounds that it is a serious injury 
 to a man to pauperise him, it is a great service to teach 
 him to save something and give it away. The one induces 
 feebleness, the other power ; the one inclines him to be 
 listless in earning and thriftless in spending, the other to be 
 alert in earning and careful in spending. The moment 
 a man begins to save something and give it away, he rises 
 in the social scale, and takes his place in the family circle of 
 benefactors. As to the godly poor, I will test this whole 
 question of proportionate giving by their verdict, sooner 
 than by that of any other class. Let some of those who 
 would bid us not ask them to give, learn what they do, and 
 perhaps they will look anew to their own proportions. 
 And when one sees how the poor tax themselves by waste, 
 by hurtful luxuries, by ill-spent time, how often their spare 
 money, not pre-engaged for good ends, is the cause of their 
 ruin, one feels indignant at those self-constituted friends 
 of theirs who would protect them from the calls of generosity 
 the very calls which would raise and make men of them ; 
 and we say, Stand out of the way of the poor. ' Let him 
 that stole steal no more : but rather let him labour, working
 
 94 OUR GIVING. 
 
 with his own hands the thing that is good, that he may have 
 to give to him that needeth ' (Eph. iv. 28). If, then, a reformed 
 thief, just beginning to earn his own bread, is at once to 
 set before him the joy of giving away a share of his earnings, 
 who dare degrade the working-men of Christendom by 
 telling them they are to look on themselves as meant only 
 to feed their own wants ? Oh what a blessing had it been 
 to many a poor working-man, what a saving to his means, 
 what a comfort to his home, had his father trained him 
 to honour the Lord with the first-fruits oi all his 
 increase ! " 
 
 " There are no sorrows I would hold more sacred than 
 theirs who unite in themselves the feelings of the rich and 
 the fortunes of the poor. Poverty is a cold wind, and the 
 higher your situation the colder it blows. But this is to be 
 said : However sacred may be the claims of respectability, 
 of the desire to honour your family and maintain your 
 appearances, more sacred still are the claims of gratitude, 
 piety, and goodness. Nor will it ever prove that what you 
 painfully spare from your own respectability for the purpose 
 of honouring your God will fail to bring back its reward. 
 ' Them that honour Me, I will honour.' " 
 
 " Where is the life that really adorns the Gospel ? Surely 
 it is not that of a man who calls himself a Christian, and yet 
 to whom no one will turn in his need as to a certain friend 
 for body or for soul. Alas for that man from whose door 
 a neighbour in distress instinctively turns away ; to whom 
 collectors for any holy work never think of going I Oh, 
 who would rest under a roof upon which no man's blessing 
 comes ? Not long ago one rich man was letting a splendid 
 seat to another rich man, and, mistaking the character 
 of his customer, he stated, among the many attractions of 
 the place, this great attraction : ' And there are no charities /' 
 Ah I lay not your dying head on that man's pillow 1 
 
 " The Gospel will be adorned only by men who, not in word 
 and in tongue, but in deed and in truth, love their neighbour, 
 body and soul ; by men in whom the character of Christ,
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 95 
 
 to some extent, reappears, that character of love and 
 self-sacrifice to which the glory of God and the salvation 
 of man were the sole objects ; wealth, or ease, or pride, 
 nothing. Aim, then, aim at such a standard of beneficence 
 as shall attract to the religion you profess the admiring eye 
 of many, who before had seen in it no loveliness 1 " 
 
 " I plead, for the Lord's sake, that His claims may be 
 vindicated. I have already said that many who are willing 
 to look upon Him as God of the world to come, feel as if this 
 world's property was not so directly His and under His 
 hand. For the Creator's glory and the creature's rest, it 
 is needful that all be taught that the gold and silver, the 
 harvest's yield, flocks, herds, and fisheries, are all His 
 property ; that whatsoever man has in his hand is there 
 only in trust and stewardship, not created nor yet retained 
 by his power ; that a Hand unseen can at any moment 
 empty his hand, and a Mind unseen blight the fruit of a 
 life's prudence, by the mistake of a day. Go, then, and 
 assert the Lord's claims ; go and teach man's stewardship, 
 not in word, but in deed. Steadily devote the first-fruits 
 of all wherewith you may be intrusted to holy uses. Let 
 your daily actions say in your neighbour's ears, ' Freely ye 
 have received, freely give 1 ' . . . Go, then, and sow, 
 not sparingly, but bountifully. Foregoing the proud store, 
 foregoing the present recompense, cast your treasure out 
 of your grasp, out of your sight, cast it with a broad hand 
 and a glad heart ; leave it there unseen, in the soil of 
 eternity and under the suns of heaven. Even here the 
 fruit will be, that by degrees your mmd will set itself more 
 strongly on the joys that never wane ; and when the 
 harvest-day sets in, how many will be fain that they had 
 sowed as you I ... As with our life, so with our money : 
 he that saveth his money shall lose it ; and he who, for the 
 Lord's sake and the Gospel's sake, loses his wealth shall 
 find it. The only money we save for ourselves is what 
 we give to the Lord. From the moment you depart hence 
 (and how long is that moment away ?) not one farthing of
 
 96 OUR GIVING. 
 
 all you ever handled will remain to you, except that which 
 you freely gave away." 
 
 We should give frequently. For most people it is easier 
 to give small sums frequently than to give large sums at 
 distant intervals. It is, perhaps, best for us that our 
 benevolence should not take form in a few splendid acts, 
 but that it should be the rule and habit of our lives. We 
 should live in an atmosphere of charity. 
 
 " Frequent money-getting for self, strengthens money- 
 love and self-love. Frequent getting money for God, and 
 devoting it to God, strengthens love of God, and weakens 
 love of money by exercising to use Dr. Chalmers's ex- 
 pressive words ' the expulsive power of a new affection.' " 
 " The repetition of any deed increases the tendency to do 
 it " ; and " the oftener we do an act, the easier we shall 
 do it." Without exercise there is a danger of the grace of 
 giving being dwarfed and enfeebled. " Habit is a powerful 
 teacher, and God uses it to train us to be givers. Human 
 nature is rather puffed up with the giving of large sums 
 at long intervals ; but such a method does not train so 
 effectually as constant and regular sacrifice." 
 
 As regards opportunities, there should be a collection at 
 every service. " This seems to accord best with the 
 simplicity of the Gospel, and there is no elaborate system 
 of book-keeping required and the contributor deals directly 
 with the Lord, not with men. There is no giving grudgingly 
 nor to be seen of men in this plan. No collectors are 
 required to compel delinquents to pay up their dues. 
 But this plan implies, what should always be true, that the 
 congregation is willing to deal honestly with the Lord and 
 their brethren." 
 
 We should give timeously. We have but one brief life 
 in which to give. Let us not leave our giving till we draw 
 near to death, or till we are gone. Bacon says, " Defer 
 not thy charities till death ; for certainly, if a man weigh 
 it rightly, he that doth so is rather liberal of another man's 
 than his own." Mr. Spurgeon compares some people to
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 97 
 
 children's money-boxes. You can put what you like in, 
 but you cannot get it out any more until you break the 
 box 1 This is, alas ! too true of many. But, Christians ! 
 " shall we wait till the vivid realisation of dying moments, 
 when God, and heaven, and eternity, standing out in their 
 true character, induce us to relax the hold on treasures 
 previously but half consecrated to Christ, and which 
 already too many have at such moments desired to employ 
 for God, when they could no longer be retained for self ? " 
 Shall we not rather seek to " realize the unutterable im- 
 portance of using every talent we possess for Him Who 
 left us, saying, ' Occupy till I come,' " and to enjoy " the 
 blessedness of working, spending, and being spent for Him, 
 while the golden moments of our one little life here 
 continue ? " 
 
 " He died wickedly rich," said a good man, in speaking 
 of one who had left the world with great reputation. 
 
 " Some years ago," says Mr. David Dickson, " I was 
 consulted by a rich man, who had been gathering up money 
 all his life. His anxious question was, how he could save 
 the large legacy-duty which would be payable at his death. 
 I told him I could at once suggest a plan for this viz., 
 giving away his money in his life-time. This was the only 
 honest way of avoiding expense. He thought for a little, 
 and then said, with mournful truthfulness, ' No, no ; I 
 never thought of that. But it won't do, for I would like to 
 die rich.' " 
 
 Too many, it is to be feared, cherish this desire in their 
 hearts ; and, it may be, this accounts for the way in which 
 so many hoard up their money, giving little or nothing 
 away in their life-time. How much nobler and better it 
 is to give while our money is our own ! 
 
 " When a gentleman, who had been accustomed to give 
 away some thousands, was supposed to be at the point of 
 death, his presumptive heir inquired where his fortune was 
 to be found. To whom he answered, that it was in the 
 pockets of the indigent." 
 
 O.G. G
 
 98 OUR GIVING. 
 
 It might well be matter for serious consideration with 
 those who are drawing near the close of life, and who are 
 conscious that they have given little of their means to the 
 God before Whom they are so soon to appear, whether they 
 should not at once, while their money is their own, make 
 up for past remissness in this respect. 
 
 " A clergyman was staying with good Mr. Wilberforce. 
 He had come to ask his aid in some holy work, and on the 
 next day his appli cation was to be entertained. The next 
 morning at breakfast he saw plainly by his host's grave 
 face, and change of manner when he read his letters, and by 
 his beckoning his wife from the room, that some bad news 
 had arrived. He augured ill for the success of his appeal, 
 but presently Mr. Wilberforce called him from the room 
 into his study. Then he said, ' My friend, I have had what 
 is called bad news this morning. I find that I am several 
 thousands poorer than I yesterday thought myself to be. 
 This has taught me a useful lesson, as to the instability of 
 riches, and the necessity of making a good use of them while 
 they are with us. I meant, yesterday, to have given you 
 ^25 for your good work. But permit me now to hand you 
 this cheque for double that sum.' " 
 
 Some newspapers publish regularly the wills proved during 
 the past week or rather the amounts of the estate of 
 deceased parties and what they have left to charities, 
 and it is surprising how many turn to that part of the 
 paper 1 The charitable bequests are generally very small 
 compared to the total amount of the estate. But would it 
 not be much better if people were to give what they intend 
 to give while it is in their own hands. Possibly the heavy 
 duties now levied at death may encourage that practice. 
 
 A lady writing to Dr. Barnardo, on one occasion, said : 
 " Please find cheque for ^100. I had thought of leaving it 
 by will, but the legacy duty alarmed me. Either your 
 work or my residuary legatee would lose 10." She 
 continued, " Where it is possible, it is much better to give 
 than to leave for others to give."
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 99 
 
 " This letter," said Dr. Barnardo, " repeats a suggestion 
 which has frequently been made by others and occasionally 
 acted upon by a few, i.e., to give where it is possible in one's 
 lifetime to God's work those amounts we may have purposed 
 to leave at death, thereby accomplishing three things : 
 (i) Saving the legacy duty of 10 per cent. ; (2) often greatly 
 benefiting the charity ; and (3) not a little increasing the 
 happiness of the giver." 
 
 A rich old gentleman in Manchester, being waited on 
 for a subscription to the Bible Society there, said he thought 
 of giving a guinea a-year, and handed eighty guineas to the 
 collectors. They expressing surprise, he replied, " There, 
 gentlemen, I promised you a subscription of a guinea 
 a-year. I am eighty years old, and there are the eighty 
 guineas." 
 
 We are not told anywhere in the Bible to leave our pro- 
 perty to do good after our death, but we are told over and 
 over again to use it for that purpose during our lives. All 
 honour, however, to the memory of those who close lives of 
 kindness and Christian charity by bequeathing liberally 
 their property for religious and charitable purposes. 
 " These things " we ought to do, if we possess the means, 
 and " not to leave the other undone." 
 
 It is often of consequence to give at once what we intend 
 to give. There is some truth in the- proverb, " He gives 
 twice who gives quickly." " Withhold not good from 
 them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine 
 hand to do it. Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come 
 again, and to-morrow I will give ; when thou hast it by 
 thee " (Prov. iii. 27, 28). 
 
 " The benevolent Dr. Wilson once discovered a clergyman 
 at Bath, who, he was informed, was sick, poor, and had a 
 numerous family. In the evening he gave a friend fifty 
 pounds, requesting he would deliver it in the most delicate 
 manner, and as from an unknown person. The friend 
 replied, ' I will wait upon him early in the morning.' 
 ' You will oblige me,' answered the Doctor, ' by calling 
 
 02
 
 loo OUR GIVING. 
 
 directly ; think, sir, of what importance a good night's 
 rest may be to that poor man.' " 
 
 " Dorcas is said, in Acts ix., to have been ' full of good 
 works and alms-deeds which she did.' The crowning word 
 of this eulogy is the last little word. Many are full of good 
 works which they praise in others, and which they dream of 
 doing themselves at some future time ; but Dorcas was full 
 of good works and alms-deeds which she DID. 
 
 " Her hands wrought out her imvard thought and feeling. 
 One of her garments cut, made, and given to the needy, 
 was worth more than all the garments that the other 
 neighbours only planned and promised. After her death, 
 when Peter went into the upper chamber where she lay, 
 he found the room was full of weeping widows, as her heart 
 had been while she lived." 
 
 Let me note Dr. Thomas Guthrie's forcible words on 
 beneficence : " You are so to put forth the power that God 
 has given you ; you are so to give as to earn the eulogium 
 pronounced on the woman, ' She hath done what she could.' 
 Do it now ; it is not a safe thing to leave a generous feeling 
 to the cooling influence of a cold world. If you intend 
 to do a mean thing, wait till to-morrow ; if you are to do a 
 noble thing do it now, now ! and, like the blacksmith, 
 who, at one long stride, swings the glowing bar to the anvil 
 and rings his hammer on it, ' strike while the iron is hot ! ' 
 
 " That well-clad charity which, from apartments abound- 
 ing with all comforts, only looks out and says, ' Be ye 
 warmed and filled,' is not the quality which evinces kinship 
 with Christ, and which ' will live and sing when faith and 
 hope shall cease.' True charity has nimble hands and feet, 
 as well as love-beaming eyes and honey-dropping lips. 
 
 " "Tis good to speak in kindly guise, 
 
 And soothe where'er we can ; 
 Fair speech should bind the human mind, 
 And love link man to man. 
 
 " But stay not at the gentle words, 
 
 Let deeds with language dwell ; 
 The one who pities starving birds 
 Should scatter crumbs as well.
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 101 
 
 " True charity makes a loaf or a garment, and then 
 makes a visit. Those who see her without a bundle know 
 that she is on her way home." 
 
 " A helping hand in time of need, is worth whole volumes 
 of good wishes." 
 
 " It is very possible to be fairly faithful in much, and yet 
 unfaithful in that which is least. We may have thought 
 about our gold and silver, and yet have been altogether 
 thoughtless about our rubbish I " Many people seem 
 to have no idea of the immense variety of ways in which 
 their hoarded " rubbish " cast-off clothing, remnants, and 
 all kinds of odds and ends could be turned to good account 
 by the poor or by their active friends. Almost every scrap 
 can be used for something now-a-days. Nothing needs to 
 be wasted ; and there are many things in every house which, 
 if given to the deserving poor, would generally be made 
 the most of, as they know best how to dispose of them to 
 advantage. 
 
 " C. M. C.," a lady well known in the Church of Scotland, 
 writing in " Life and Work " on " Wasting Nothing, or the 
 Utilizing of Trifles," says : 
 
 "It is no exaggeration to say, that if the carefulness 
 and ingenuity of the olden time were systematically brought 
 to bear on the vastly increased possibilities of the present, 
 there is no end to the kindly help that might be given to 
 missions and missionaries at home and abroad, to sufferers 
 in forlorn homes, to emigrants on foreign shores, to soldiers 
 and sailors who are feeling it may be as if God and man had 
 alike forgotten them by the use of these unconsidered 
 trifles. What a little thing useless perhaps to us may 
 if carefully mended or adapted, comfort a lonely heart 
 or gladden a neglected child. 
 
 "It is thoughtlessness, more than anything else, which 
 leads to the waste of so much that might otherwise be 
 turned to good account : but if we remember that of every- 
 thing even of ' the odds and ends ' we are but God's 
 stewards ' put in to manage the business,' as I heard
 
 102 OUR GIVING. 
 
 it said at Keswick, we will feel that such thoughtlessness 
 is sin." 
 
 " The giving of littles ' must not absorb too much of 
 our time and thought,' or usurp the place of larger gifts. 
 ' It must be as the fringe on the strong fabric of our solid, 
 substantial, self-denying giving. 
 
 " But there is yet another kind of systematic giving. 
 The systematic giving up of superfluities." 
 
 It is, of course, very necessary to weigh the comparative 
 importance of the objects we assist, and to consider the 
 urgency of their claims. As the Lord's stewards, our 
 trust is a responsible one. " It is very material how we lay 
 out money that does not belong to us. An honest man is 
 more careful over property committed to his charge than 
 over his own." A consecrated fund " must neither be 
 idly scattered, dispensed at random, nor thoughtlessly 
 bestowed, just because ' it has to be given away' " By a 
 careful, wise, and conscientious outlay of our fund, we may 
 do as much real good as some would do carelessly with 
 double the amount. Especially is this the case in relieving 
 the poor, where indiscriminate charity may do harm. 
 How many there are who are willing enough to give the 
 money which perhaps they never miss but who will do 
 nothing which requires effort, or the exercise of self-denial, 
 and will give neither time nor trouble to direct their charities 
 aright. " In every large city there is an amount of misery 
 unrelieved which would be appalling were it only known ; 
 and which is not known, because those who have whereof 
 to give care little for the trouble to which they must be at 
 to give wisely." They pass by on the other side, and do 
 not care to bring themselves in contact with misery, poverty, 
 and wretchedness. 
 
 Of Archbishop Whately it is said : " The indiscriminate 
 charity wliich is so common he never practised, and strongly 
 disapproved of. He was in the habit of saying, ' Whatever 
 you pay a man to do, that he will do ; if you pay him to 
 work he will work, and if you pay him to beg he will beg.'
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. io3 
 
 ' I have given away,' he said, '^40,000 since I came to Dublin, 
 but I thank God I never gave a penny to a beggar in the 
 street.' Giving to street-beggars he regarded as simply 
 paying a number of wretched beings to live in idleness and 
 filth, and to neglect and ill-treat the miserable children 
 whose sufferings too often form part of their stock-in-trade. 
 On the other hand, when cases of real need came under 
 his notice, he would give lavishly for their relief. Often 
 out of his own pocket he provided poor or over-worked 
 clergymen with the means of paying curates, or with money 
 enabling them to get rest and change. He saved nothing 
 out of the large income of the archbishopric, and died none 
 the richer for having held it." 
 
 When the Rev. Dr. Charles J. Brown was Moderator of 
 the Free Church of Scotland in 1872, he prepared, at the 
 request of the General Assembly, a Pastoral Address upon 
 the subject of " Giving," which was written with his 
 characteristic force and earnestness. He said : 
 
 " We are bound to suggest the solemn question, whether 
 the character which as a Church we have gained for liberality 
 may not be due partly to the world's low standard of what 
 Christian liberality is, and partly, so far as the character 
 is merited, to the noble givings according to their means 
 of a comparatively small number, before whose scale of 
 contribution, if all were known, the gifts of the large 
 majority would seem meagre indeed, while the gross results 
 serve to keep that meagreness out of sight, and to furnish 
 extensively the materials of a groundless self-gratulation. 
 This at least is certain, that if the whole amount of our 
 Church's liberalities be compared, not with our own 
 wretched givings in the days prior to the Disruption, nor 
 with the givings of other Churches around us, but with the 
 urgent necessities of the cause of the Lord at home and 
 abroad, we shall no longer find ground for the slightest self- 
 complacency, but very much cause for sorrow, and shame 
 and earnest searching of heart. 
 
 " We are led to press on your attention, with all earnest-
 
 104 OUR GIVING. 
 
 ness and affection, two practical suggestions, palpably 
 founded on Scripture authority, and which would at once, 
 if carried out, revolutionize our whole financial condition. 
 
 "I. ' Let every one of you ' (to allude to that most pregnant 
 direction in i Cor. xvi. 2), give to the cause of the Lord, ' as 
 God hath prospered him.' It is the universality of dutiful 
 giving, which is the hinge of this our first suggestion. Who 
 does not see how the energies of the Church are miserably 
 cramped, and her resources stinted, from the comparative 
 amallness of the number who give adequately the rest 
 either not giving at all, or giving very greatly below what 
 they ought ? What a change would be immediately visible, 
 if ' every one gave as God had prospered him ' from peer 
 to peasant landed proprietors, merchants, professional 
 men, tradesmen, artisans, domestic servants all ! 
 
 " II. Let the giving of ' every one ' be matter of principle 
 and of system, as opposed to mere variable feeling and fitful 
 impulse.' " 
 
 Speaking of the tendency which had lately been visible 
 to a falling off in the collections taken at the Church-doors, 
 he said : 
 
 " Let it be remembered that the peculiar spontaneousness 
 of it cannot fail (other things at least being equal) to render 
 it both very acceptable to the Lord, and a tolerably safe 
 test of the measure of our regard for His cause. And be it 
 further borne in mind that, by reason of its statedly periodi- 
 cal character, there is no form of giving which ought to bear 
 less hard on our resources, while securing an even and stead- 
 fast regularity and fidelity. It is also in beautiful harmony 
 with both the letter and the spirit of the Apostle's injunction 
 before referred to. ' Upon the first day of the week, let every 
 one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, 
 that there be no gatherings ' (no need for any spasmodic 
 efforts) ' when I come.' And still further, it can scarcely 
 fail to occur to you how suitable a spirit of large-hearted 
 liberality is to this day of our most precious spiritual 
 privileges, the day which, besides its own blessed rest,
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 105 
 
 tells of the everlasting rest that remaineth for the people of 
 God, the day in which are gathered up, and made to stand 
 forth in strongest relief, all the endless arguments and 
 motives for giving to the Lord, the day of our completed, 
 Heaven-sealed redemption by the blood of the Lamb. 
 
 " And thus would we close this Address, very dear 
 friends, by putting you affectionately in mind of such 
 arguments, incentives, reasons, for giving in the manner we 
 have attempted to set forth, as the high authority of God 
 enjoining it ; His wondrous providential beneficence 
 exemplifying and commending it ; the many precious 
 promises made, of richest grace, to the right doing of it ; 
 the profound necessities of the world requiring it ; the fact 
 that we are but stewards of all we have, proprietors of 
 nothing as in relation to God ; the kindred fact that the 
 Christian, bought with the Saviour's blood, is in a thousand 
 ways His, with all that He possesses ; and finally, the 
 matchless ' grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, though He 
 was rich, for our sakes became poor, that we through His 
 poverty might be rich.' Oh that, remembering the words of 
 the Lord Jesus, how He said, It is more blessed to give than 
 to receive, we might rise more and more to the privilege 
 and grace, the dignity and happiness, of giving ! " 
 
 The draft of the Address was submitted to the Commission 
 of Assembly on I4th August, 1872, by the Rev. Dr. Duff, 
 who, in many ways, rendered valuable service to the cause of 
 Systematic Giving. In his speech Dr. Duff remarked 
 
 " In this lofty Scriptural view of the subject, it is not 
 chiefly, still less exclusively, for the good of the recipients, 
 but, in a high and pre-eminent sense, for the good the 
 spiritual good, welfare, benefit, or enrichment of the souls 
 of the givers with the imperishable treasures of Heavenly 
 grace, in other words, for the advancement of their sancti- 
 fication and growing meetness for the inheritance of the 
 saints in light, that benefactions or free-will offerings are 
 required at their hands by a good and gracious God and 
 Father in Christ Jesus. So that it is emphatically true
 
 106 OUR GIVING. 
 
 that they who obstinately refuse such benefactions, or 
 heedlessly make light of them, or dexterously evade them, 
 or, under any subtle and plausible pretexts, reduce them 
 to the lowest possible minimum or trifle, will be found, to 
 their eternal shame and discomfiture, guilty at once of 
 robbery of God and of robbery and cruel wrong to their own 
 souls ! This, again, is surely an overwhelmingly serious 
 view of the solemn obligations which the subject involves. 
 " This high and solemn view of the subject also throws a 
 flood of light on the question so often mooted, as to what 
 ought to be the standard or measure of our liberalities or 
 charitable givings. The ordinary standard or measure of 
 these usually is what men can bestow or afford without 
 self-denial ; that is, without costing them anything, or 
 without any sensible diminution in the outlay on their 
 own comforts, pleasures, amusements, and all the endlessly 
 varied ways and modes of luxury, self-indulgence, and 
 self-regalement. Now, this is not charity in the Scriptural 
 sense of the term at all ; and does not, and cannot, secure 
 the highest and noblest Scriptural ends of charity, such as 
 those connected with the soul's spiritual enrichment, or 
 growth and progress of the divine life. That which costs 
 a man little or nothing is worth nothing, and of no account 
 in the judgment of a holy and righteous God. The gift of 
 the widow's mite, which was her all, being the fruit of self- 
 denial, was a vastly greater and nobler donative in the 
 judgment of our adored Immanuel than would be thousands 
 out of the surplus which might remain to the wealthy after 
 they had amply satisfied all their own carnal desires, selfish 
 predilections, worldly tastes, and capricious fancies. It is 
 by the cost of the offering to ourselves, and the consequent 
 self-sacrifice which it involves, and not by its apparent 
 magnitude in the estimation of man, that our own sincerity 
 and devotedness are put to the test and made manifest, 
 and that our heavenly Father measures its true greatness 
 and value, and apportions the promised blessing, which may 
 thus redound vastly more to the benefit of the giver than
 
 HOW AND WHEN TO GIVE. 107 
 
 the receiver. Hence the uselessness, the folly, or even sin- 
 fulness of all ingenious devices or contrivances for making 
 our charitable contributions easy, or such as will cost us 
 little or nothing ; such, therefore, as will not be missed or 
 felt. For, plainly, such devices or contrivances, instead of 
 promoting men's spiritual welfare, by weaning the heart 
 from the world and worldly attachments and conformity, 
 can only tend increasingly to impoverish the soul by carnalis- 
 ing it more and more.
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING 
 
 IN connection with the question of how and when we 
 should give, the following extracts may be given from 
 some writings on doubtful or wrong methods of giving : 
 
 " The Counterfeit in Church Finance and Christian 
 Giving." A very good pamphlet has been written (with the 
 above title) by the Rev. Charles Jerdan, M.A., LL.B., 
 Greenock. He says of the Church, that, " From a con- 
 sideration, of her methods and practices both of getting 
 and spending money we may arrive at a fair and just 
 judgment both as to the soundness of her moral tone and 
 the strength of her spiritual life." 
 
 " The foundation principle upon which the believer is 
 to rest all his giving, and on which a congregation ought 
 to build all its monetary arrangements, is that of God's 
 proprietorship and man's stewardship." 
 
 If our giving is to be Scriptural it ought to be " spon- 
 taneous or voluntary," " systematic and proportionate," 
 also " sacrificial," " ' God spared not His own Son,' 
 and we make but a poor return when we give only what we 
 can easily spare. We must not offer to Hun ' of that which 
 doth cost us nothing.' We are cheerfully to contribute to 
 Christ's cause such amounts as will involve us in sacrifice. 
 ' Honour the Lord with thy substance ' not with thy loose 
 change." 
 
 " There is only Christian giving where there is the spirit 
 of self-sacrifice. Our beneficence is to symbolize the 
 complete surrender of the soul to the Lord. 
 
 in
 
 112 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " It is also fundamental and vital that we keep constantly 
 in view the fact that giving of our substance to the cause of 
 Christ is at once an important act of worship and a precious 
 means of grace. Instead of being a necessary evil, it is a 
 spiritual good. So far from being a secular function, it is 
 to be inspired by love to the Lord Jesus Christ as the 
 Saviour, and it ought to be both in matter and manner an 
 adequate expression of gratitude for the blessings of His 
 redemption. God requires us to devote a portion of our 
 money to sacred uses, as one main means of keeping us 
 near to Himself, and making us like Him. 
 
 " Such being the foundation-principles of Christian 
 liberality, it seems to follow as a matter of course that the 
 methods of finance which the Church practises should all 
 be of such a kind as to ' adorn the doctrine,' and not to 
 contradict or caricature it. She should not regard any of 
 the precepts of Holy Writ which bear upon forms of giving 
 as merely ' counsels of perfection,' but should earnestly 
 strive to recommend and practise them. Her financial 
 methods should be such as are either directly authorized 
 in the New Testament, or are at least in manifest harmony 
 with the great spiritual principles of Christian beneficence 
 that are enunciated there. To say that some presently 
 employed modes are more or less directly opposed to Bible 
 teaching and example is not to bring a railing accusation 
 against any denomination in particular, for all sections of 
 the Church unfortunately are to a greater or smaller extent 
 involved in the same condemnation." 
 
 One method is thoroughly Scriptural. This is the offering 
 brought to the house of prayer each Sabbath. " Giving to 
 God is thus associated with public worship, and forms a part 
 of it." 
 
 " Having but little faith in the Lord's method of systema- 
 tic and proportionate beneficence, we supplement our 
 appeal for free-will offerings put into the collection-plate, 
 by the invention of methods in connection with which the 
 coercion of the will is but thinly disguised, and which may
 
 WRONG WAYS Of GIVING. 113 
 
 be described as ecclesiastical force-pumps to raise money. 
 Indeed, the very expression ' to raise money ' is significant 
 of departure from Bible principles and observances. And 
 we need not wonder that the treasury of the Church tends 
 to run low, and that her finances are frequently in a critical 
 state, so long as we practise methods for obtaining funds 
 which, either in their own nature or in the circumstances 
 which we associate with tljem, are not in strict harmony 
 with the principles of the Word of God." 
 
 Mr. Jerdan then speaks of PEW RENTS, which he thinks 
 offends against the great Bible principles to which he has 
 appealed. " In itself the seat-rent is a secular contribution 
 to the Church's exchequer, and not a spiritual one. It is 
 a commercial payment rather than a Christian offering." 
 I do not go further into the question here, but I think Mr. 
 Jerdan makes out a good case, and shows that the system 
 results in a serious moral loss. He then deals with the 
 special or extraordinary collection, and does not think it 
 morally healthful, " the planning of all the arrangements 
 with the one main purpose of gathering pecuniary revenue 
 out of them." " Does it not seem to involve a degradation 
 of the other ordinances of worship viz., prayer, praise, 
 and the reading and preaching of the Word to use them 
 merely in subordination to a pecuniary contribution, if not 
 avowedly as the very means of obtaining ? The office- 
 bearers of the Church should sanction no financial arrange- 
 ment which is fitted to encourage their fellow-members to 
 forget the great spiritual ends contemplated in the worship 
 of God and the proclamation of the Gospel." 
 
 Then the sending round of collectors to gather up the 
 offerings pf the people, although universally practised, is not 
 strictly in accordance with the Scriptural injunction to 
 bring their contributions. 
 
 "It is not uncharitable to suspect that many of the 
 subscriptions which are taken up from house to house are 
 given as the result of their having been begged for ; they 
 are not always purely free-will offerings to the Lord. 
 
 O.G. H
 
 ii4 OUR GIVING. 
 
 As a recent writer has pithily said, ' We collect and pay 
 taxes. We gather by collectors what law demands. But 
 love should collect for itself.' " 
 
 " We do not remember even one instance in Scripture 
 of any offering in connection with the Church being gathered 
 by a band of collectors who went round for it to the people's 
 homes. As writers on systematic beneficence have often 
 pointed out, the uniform Bible precept is not only ' give,' 
 but ' bring.' ' Bring an offering, and come into His 
 courts.' ' Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse.' 
 ' Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring Me an 
 offering.' And such also was the practice in Bible times. 
 Abel ' brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat 
 thereof.' For the erection of the Tabernacle ' the children 
 of Israel brought a willing offering unto the Lord, every 
 man and woman, whose heart made them willing to bring 
 for, all manner of work.' 
 
 " One feature of the revival under Hezekiah was that ' the 
 children of Israel brought in abundance the firstfruits of 
 corn, wine, and oil, and honey, and of all the increase of the 
 field ; and the tithe of all things brought they in abund- 
 antly.' And so also in New Testament times. The woman 
 ' brought an alabaster cruse of ointment.' The people 
 ' cast their gifts into the treasury.' Barnabas, ' having a 
 field, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the 
 Apostles' feet.' The Macedonian Christians ' besought 
 Paul with much entreaty' that they might be allowed to 
 share in the good work of relieving the poverty of their 
 brethren at Jerusalem. It is evident, therefore, that were 
 the Church of the nineteenth century strictly to follow 
 Scripture precedent, she would send to the homes of her 
 people only for the offerings of the infirm and the sick, 
 and others who arc so situated that they cannot themselves 
 bring their gifts as a part of their public worship. 
 
 " Thus far we have dealt with the financial methods which 
 are usually in operation for obtaining the funds which the 
 Church requires for evcry-day congregational purposes.
 
 WRONG WAYS of GIVING. 115 
 
 We shall consider briefly now in what remains some of the 
 expedients which are frequently adopted when the purposes 
 or circumstances are extraordinary. It may be that a new 
 church or manse requires to be built, or an oppressive debt 
 to be liquidated, or a load of accumulated annual deficits 
 to be removed. What is to be done in such cases ? A con- 
 gregation that is not permeated with the conviction of God's 
 ownership and man's stewardship, and the members of 
 which have not learned to give systematically and pro- 
 portionately as an act of worship and a means of grace, 
 will often be at its wit's end to know what to do. Eventually, 
 however, having no heart for the Bible method of liberality, 
 it may be expected to have recourse to one or more of the 
 counterfeit methods of man's devising. 
 
 " One of these is the Conditional Subscription. This is 
 not infrequently offered by some wealthy member who is 
 apprehensive that the congregation may fall into the habit 
 of leaning too heavily upon himself in the discharge of its 
 financial obligations, and who desires accordingly to show 
 a becoming example of liberality, while at the same tune 
 teaching his fellow-members a salutary lesson of self- 
 reliance. . . . But should a member of the Church, 
 whether rich or poor, judge that a certain congregational 
 object is a worthy one, and that it is his duty to give a 
 certain sum in support of it, let him devote that sum 
 whether others give or not ; let him give it in single- 
 mindedness, and with the desire and prayer that it may 
 have the moral effect of stimulating the liberality of his 
 fellow-members. Every man's rule of giving ought to be 
 how much he himself owes to his Lord, and not the generosity 
 or the niggardliness of other Christians with whom he 
 happens to be in Church-fellowship. 
 
 " Another plan occasionally resorted to is that of lectures, 
 concerts, or other kinds of Popular Entertainments. Properly 
 speaking, however, the taking of tickets for meetings of this 
 kind is not Christian giving at all. Such expedients 
 appeal to the natural desire of getting something : they do
 
 n6 dUR GIVltfG. 
 
 not profess to have in view the cultivation of the spiritual 
 grace of giving. In this country happily we have not yet 
 entered upon the down-grade on which many congregations 
 in America have been going for some years as regards this 
 matter of counterfeit liberality by means of ecclesiastical 
 amusements. Among the methods largely used in collecting 
 funds for Church purposes and even in the New England 
 States, among the descendants of the Puritans are fairs, 
 festivals, harvest-homes, excursions, concerts, tableaux, 
 and amateur theatricals. In announcing these gatherings 
 in the religious newspapers, this style of advertisement is 
 frequently adopted : ' Wanted, a thousand persons to eat 
 oysters for the benefit of the Church.' 
 
 " It is indeed marvellous that American piety can tolerate 
 this sort of thing for a single day. These sensational and 
 undignified artifices are entirely in opposition to all the 
 precepts and examples, as well as to the prevailing spirit, 
 of Holy Scripture on the subject of giving. Instead of 
 being acts of worship, they are revelries of Vanity Fair. 
 So far from stimulating Christian self-sacrifice, they must 
 inevitably foster worldly self-indulgence- They teach the 
 people to spend, and not to give. They fritter away the 
 Church's energies, rob her of her spirituality, promote 
 carnality and worldliness among her young people, and give 
 great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. 
 
 " We must now say a few words before closing regarding 
 the bazaar method of obtaining supplies for extraordinary 
 purposes in connection with congregational finance. It is, 
 of course, indisputable that the principle which underlies 
 the ' sale of work ' is a sound one viz., that gifts of time 
 and labour and skill, capable of being translated into money, 
 may honourably be offered for the cause of Christ. Bazaars 
 are most commonly resorted to as an expedient for extin- 
 guishing the burdensome debt which so frequently remains 
 upon congregations as the result of the erection of new 
 places of worship. And yet it is now becoming a question 
 whether the system must not be credited with actually
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING. 117 
 
 creating quite as much debt as it extinguishes. For 
 sometimes a congregation allows itself to build a church of 
 a style entirely out of keeping with its means, or to add 
 one or two thousand pounds of additional outlay to the 
 building estimates, with the avowed intention of by-and- 
 by liquidating the deficit by means of a great, popular 
 fancy-fair. 
 
 " Be this as it may, however, it is undeniable that the 
 first honest simplicity of the sale of work is now gone. 
 Abuses have rushed like a flood into the bazaar system. 
 This method of obtaining money is every year becoming 
 more circuitous and expensive as well as more worldly and 
 morally counterfeit than before. Surely the Lord Jesus 
 Christ never intended that His Church should solicit public 
 charity as being a pauper institution, which requires to be 
 sustained with the aid of banners and bands of music, gay 
 costumes and insinuating smiles, comic minstrels and 
 dramatic reciters, mock auctions and fortune-tellings, 
 not to speak of the huckstering of dolls and pin-cushions. 
 One naturally remembers the whip of small cords 
 and the indignant command to ' take these things 
 hence.' '' 
 
 Mr. Jerdan concludes with some wise and earnest words 
 of advice to his ministerial brethren, urging them (i) to 
 teach Scripture principles on the subject of Christian 
 liberality, and to point to the work of redemption as the 
 supreme inspiration ; (2) to discourage congregational 
 extravagance, which often leads to unworthy methods of 
 getting money ; (3) " to discourage all questionable modes 
 of obtaining money " ; and finally " to labour to lift up the 
 Church to a loftier spirituality." 
 
 Would that all ministers and all congregations would say 
 with Mr. Broomhall, the Editorial Secretary of the China 
 Inland Mission : " We can afford to have as little as the 
 Lord chooses to give ; but we cannot afford to have 
 unconsecrated money." 
 
 Fancy Fair Religion. The following extracts are from
 
 Ii8 OUR GIVING. 
 
 an admirable book on the subject, entitled, " Fancy Fair 
 Religion," by the Rev. J. Priestley Foster, M.A. ; 
 
 " Fancy Fair Religion is digging the grave of all true 
 Christian liberality ; it is eating out the heart of systematic 
 giving ; its principles and methods I believe to be totally 
 inconsistent with Christian principles, and consequently, 
 if this be so, it is highly detrimental to the best interests 
 of the Christian Faith. 
 
 " There is, indeed, no disguising the fact that in the 
 estimation of a vast number of Christians the most paying 
 paraphernalia whereby to promote the religion of Jesus 
 Christ are to be hired out at so much per diem, just in the 
 same way as you would obtain a Christmas conjuror for 
 the amusement of children. No awkward principles are 
 asserted to test the sincerity of your faith, nor are any 
 embarrassing scruples of commercial morality allowed to 
 stand in the way of making the Fancy Fair a complete 
 financial success. 
 
 Money ! Money ! Anything for Money ! " The love of 
 dress and pleasure, of excitement, and of gambling is 
 appealed to with a most cynical and contemptuous dis- 
 regard to the fact that those to whom the appeal is made 
 are under a covenant to renounce the pomps and vanities 
 of this wicked world. 
 
 " At the root of the undertaking there is a most implicit 
 faith shown in the World its ways, its amusements, and 
 its manners for the collection of money, together with an 
 entire absence of faith in the power of the sacrifice of Christ 
 as a motive of action, and as the one chief principle 
 which ought among Christians to promote the giving 
 of alms. 
 
 " The cry is raised, ' Funds are failing, and we must get 
 money ; ' and the principle so much in vogue is adopted 
 ' get money honestly if you can, but by all means get 
 money.' The Almighty Dollar is now considered the 
 supreme arbiter of the destinies of the Church, and, 
 therefore, money must be obtained at any cost ; the
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING. 119 
 
 weight of the money bags is to be the measure of the 
 Church's success. 
 
 " ' This is the victory that over cometh the world, even our 
 faith ' used to be at the root of all effort on behalf of the 
 work of the Church, as also the measure of all its success ; 
 but now everything is thought to depend upon money, 
 and the machinery and material buildings which money 
 will produce. 
 
 " If the work of the Church be at a standstill through a 
 lack of self-denial and self-renunciation, then it is a revival 
 of Faith at which we have to aim through a more earnest 
 preaching of the Gospel, and not a mere acquisition of 
 money by any and every artifice, which, by the vain and 
 foolish imaginations of the carnal mind can be devised." 
 
 Legitimate Sales. " It must be distinctly understood, I 
 in no way desire to condemn any quiet Sale of Work to 
 which buyers are attracted by their anxiety to help forward 
 an object designed to promote God's glory, and not in 
 consequence of the inducements and attractions held out 
 either by the persons of those who sell, or by the sensa- 
 tional excitements and trappings surrounding and added 
 to the Sale itself. Many can be found who can give their 
 labour in working at articles for sale who have no money 
 to bestow, and that labour being the only offering they 
 have to lay upon God's altar, is without doubt as accept- 
 able in His sight as the money of their richer neighbour. . 
 
 " But the Bazaar and Fancy Fair of the present day is 
 an undertaking totally different from the modest Sale of 
 Work above mentioned different in kind as well as in 
 degree." 
 
 " Christian liberality then is to be replaced by the Bazaar- 
 monger, who will, for a due consideration, and by means of 
 unlimited puffing, and the exhibition of certain sensational 
 dodges and devices, produce the exact amount of money that 
 may be required. 
 
 " The furnishing of a Fancy Fair is now becoming more 
 and more a commercial transaction rather than the collect-
 
 120 OUR GIVING. 
 
 ing of articles freely made and freely given. Tradesmen 
 and manufacturers are now invited to contribute either 
 by the offer of a sort of quasi-partnership, or by an indirect 
 pressure and the levying of black-mail." 
 
 " It is doubtless true that many Christian people are too 
 poor to give much to the Church and her charities, but 
 it is also true that Christian liberality does not keep pace 
 with the legitimate demands upon her, simply because so 
 many Christians are only such in name, and have never 
 even conceived the notion that their religion requires a 
 personal dedication of themselves and of their incomes as 
 well as an attendance upon the ordinances of Religion. 
 
 " It is not poverty from which Christians surfer, but it is 
 from the diseases called Meanness and utter Selfishness, 
 and hence, while they have enough and to spare for them- 
 selves, their children, and their pleasures, they lack the 
 heart to give in order to promote God's glory and the good 
 of their fellow-men. 
 
 " There is still plenty of money among so-called followers 
 of Christ, but there is a plentiful amount of the spirit of 
 selfishness as well ; there is a huge stock of unreal profession 
 of Christian principles, and but little outcome from those 
 principles. 
 
 " Parents through love of their children can still give 
 them all they can desire, but their love of God produces 
 very few gifts to promote His glory ; the love of self will 
 still be able to bestow on self all that it needs, but the love 
 of Christ does not produce any gifts, worthy of the name, on 
 behalf of His Church, His suffering poor, His little wandering 
 sheep, and the heathen world." 
 
 " Selfishness and a love of pleasure reign where the love 
 of Christ is absent, and should yet be present, if the life 
 were at all consistent with its profession ; and hence in order 
 that any appreciable amount for the needs of the Church and 
 her charities may be gained, it is now considered essential 
 to bribe the professed followers of Christ with the bait of 
 pleasure, and a promise of an equivalent for what they give.
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING. 121 
 
 Hoping for nothing in return is a principle asserted by the 
 Saviour, but flaunted and laughed to scorn by Fancy 
 Fair Religion, which would teach instead thereof, that 
 Christian liberality is now to be a matter of Shop and 
 barter and of vulgar puffing, and not one of Self-renunciation, 
 Humility, and Love. 
 
 " Thus, then, now-a-days is the Church to be supported, 
 and because also in these days there is such a race for 
 pleasure and such a craving for excitement, therefore 
 pleasure and excitement are to be utilized and impounded 
 for Church purposes. And what, it may be asked, is the 
 principle involved ? " 
 
 " Here then at once, according to S. Paul, we have one 
 of the indications of those perilous times which will fore- 
 shadow the last days, and S. Paul further intimates that 
 such lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God have indeed 
 a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof ; 
 and what, I would ask, could better describe the Fancy Fair 
 than those words ? It is started for the service of God 
 in some form or other, and shows on the face of it an 
 anxiety for the promotion of His glory ; here is the form of 
 godliness but the power of godliness is denied, because the 
 charity would lack the support given to it through the 
 medium of the Bazaar if the appeal were made only for the 
 love of Christ." 
 
 " Fancy Fair Religion is a vast aid to very many who 
 would otherwise be openly irreligious : it offers to everybody 
 an easy opportunity of talking about and of working for 
 the Christian Religion, while at the same time taking every 
 care not to interfere with any pleasure nor to rebuke a love 
 of the World ; it has a most comfortable (or dangerous) 
 way of bamboozling people into the belief that they may 
 thus sanctify and consecrate the delights which they are 
 not in the least prepared to give up, while at the same time 
 giving a zest and excitement to the profession of what would 
 otherwise be voted slow, prosaic, and intolerably dull." 
 
 " If excitements of a histrionic, not to say in some cases,
 
 122 OUR GIVING. 
 
 of a vulgar and almost immoral nature, are the chief con- 
 straining powers to promote a Religion which, if words 
 mean anything, condemn them, why not at any rate be real 
 and true and without hypocrisy in our pleasures, and throw 
 away the forms of religious observance when the religion 
 itself has long lost its power to influence the heart and 
 life ? " 
 
 " It appears to be the correct thing when ' running a 
 Bazaar ' to quote what are considered apposite or witty 
 sayings on each page of the programme, and, in the Preface 
 of one, the words from Dryden, ' These times want other 
 aids,' were quoted, by way, I suppose, of justifying a depar- 
 ture from more Scriptural methods. Above the list of 
 noble and wealthy patrons were placed the words from 
 Lucan, ' The shadows of a mighty name.' To many it 
 would appear that any enterprise intended indirectly to 
 promote the glory of Almighty God might have been content 
 with ' a Name which is above every name,' but in ' these 
 times ' THAT NAME appears powerless beside the names of 
 Lordly Patrons." 
 
 " That which has been already stated, will, I trust, 
 awaken many to a sense of the Church's danger. If such 
 puerile eccentricities to call them by no other name 
 are considered in keeping with Christian faith and practice, 
 and, what is equally sad, are looked upon as one of the 
 best means likely to provide the funds necessary for building 
 up the material fabric of the Church, there is surely most 
 dire evidence that the spiritual fabric is rapidly approaching 
 a state of rotten and complete decay, and that while, it 
 may be, the form of godliness remains, its power has de- 
 parted from our midst." 
 
 " Bazaar Religion, as a matter of fact, takes its cue from 
 Mr. Worldly Wiseman, who dwelt in the town of Carnal 
 Policy : it was he who told Christian that if he followed the 
 advice of Evangelist his way would be one of ' weariness, 
 painfulness, perils, &c.,' and of him Evangelist declared 
 that ' he savoureth only the doctrine of this world (i John
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING. 123 
 
 iv. 5), and he loveth that doctrine best, for it saveth him 
 best from the Cross (Gal. vi. 12).' " 
 
 " Christian charity, like humility, has an inborn tendency 
 to hide its head, but now-a-days a loud, and as many would 
 think, a somewhat vulgar trumpet has to be blown when, by 
 means of a bazaar, we are going to build a Church, or 
 support a charity, and a long list of titled ladies is supposed 
 to give a tone and fashionable flavour to the undertaking, 
 which would fall very flat were ' the faithful ' asked to 
 support it only for the love of Christ. 
 
 " To support Christian institutions by other than Christ- 
 ian methods is akin to the action of the trader, whose ruin 
 is (often) certain when he deserts the paths of legitimate 
 trading for more risky and practically gambling methods. 
 Just as the individual Christian will avoid any pleasure 
 of the rectitude of which he is in doubt, so too any system 
 such as bazaar religion, which has a tendency to corrupt a 
 Christian grace, is not one which the Church of Christ can 
 consistently recognize and employ." 
 
 " In all classes of society at the present time it seems to me 
 the spirit of the age suggests one mad race after pleasure, 
 excitement, and self-indulgence, and this sad state of things 
 is at best but pandered to by Fancy Fair Religion. The 
 sober joys of the Christian life consequent upon a manly 
 conquest over evil in the heart and in the world, are but 
 little thought of or sought after, and the miserable caricature 
 of Christian self-sacrifice for the sake of God and man, 
 which bazaars are spreading over the length and breadth 
 of English Christendom, has, I believe, much to do with this 
 sad catastrophe. 
 
 " A true representation of the religion of self-renunciation 
 would do much to call out the nobility inherent in regener- 
 ated human nature, but to represent it as a religion of raffles 
 and of shows, of dresses and of dolls, of flirting and frivolity, 
 will but evoke the baser and not the nobler instincts of the 
 Christian, and thus dwarf that species to its lowest stage 
 of life,"
 
 124 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " I am constrained to ask, can fancy-fair methods really 
 be the outcome of the same faith as that which inspired 
 the dwellers among the Catacombs, the combatants in the 
 arena of the Coliseum, and the martyrs of the Reformation 
 period ? Surely that which is to continue through the ages, 
 and prompt men to strive on behalf of their religion, should 
 be made of sterner stuff and appeal to nobler instincts than 
 will ever be evoked by a punch and Judy show, or a wheel 
 of fortune, or a number of giddy, dressed-up girls." 
 
 " How can we suppose that the rising generation, when 
 subjected practically to such misguided instruction, will 
 ever give liberally, systematically, and of their own will 
 free from any inducements but those of love to God and 
 love to man ? So long as the Church and her ministers 
 sanction pleasurable, exciting, and in many cases more than 
 questionable methods, so long also will self-denial lie dor- 
 mant and at length die out. ' The prophets prophesy falsely, 
 and the priests bear rule by their means, and my people 
 love to have it so ; and what will ye do in the end thereof ? ' 
 God only knows ; but if the Church consents to sow the 
 wind, it will assuredly have to reap the whirlwind." 
 
 " The constraining love of Christ is practically declared 
 to be barren of results, for these results can only be procured 
 through the constraining love of pleasure, of dress, and of 
 excitement. Of this we may certainly be sure, that when 
 religion puts on the world's dress and apes the manners of 
 the pantomime, Christ Jesus cannot really be the gainer, 
 although His Church may have acquired large accessions 
 of s. d. True religion teaches man to love God and to 
 give up the world. Fancy Fair Religion not only tempts 
 man to love the world, but takes it for granted that he may 
 do so, and, what is more, trades upon that love. It also 
 assumes that he does not love God, for were he so to do, he 
 would need no coaxing to promote God's glory." 
 
 " As Guizot says, ' God takes a step, and ages have 
 elapsed ; ' and while we may greatly desire to see the accom- 
 plishment of a certain purpose, yet if we cannot attain it by
 
 WRONG WAYS OF GIVING. 125 
 
 Christ's methods, are we to stoop to methods which would 
 not receive His sanction in order to gain our own ends, 
 and then sanctify them in our own eyes by calling them 
 ' the work of the Church ' ? If those anxious to promote a 
 particular work were sure that it met with the approbation 
 of God and was needful to promote His glory, they might be 
 equally certain it would gain His blessing in His own time, 
 and that there was no necessity to fall back into the hands 
 of man, nor to court the World's aid. 
 
 " Objects, it may be, would not be so quickly gained, but 
 the very gaining of them by appropriate methods would 
 call forth and cultivate in the workers themselves Christlike 
 characteristics, and thus would sanctify and bless those 
 workers and not deprave them, while at the same time God's 
 glory would be promoted." 
 
 "It is quite impossible for the Church to go behind 
 every gift before it can be received, as also it would be 
 impossible for her to judge the motives of every giver, 
 but here is altogether a different question : Is the Church 
 right in appealing for support to base rather than to noble 
 motives, and is she justified in trading upon them ? Does 
 her existence depend upon money, or does it depend upon 
 the hold that religious principles have upon her members ? 
 
 " The gaining of money is not her object, but the outcome 
 of religious principle is that at which she aims, and hence 
 the Church should only encourage her members to give 
 from principle." 
 
 " Absolute ownership, however, rather than honourable 
 and honorary trusteeship, is the light in which too many 
 regard the gifts placed by the Almighty in their power, 
 whilst the Church has to a great extent failed to insist 
 upon a recognition of the truth that wealth and position 
 are given not merely for the benefit of the person in posses- 
 sion, but as talents to be used to the glory of God and 
 the good of one's fellow-men. In the eye of God men are 
 not great in virtue of what He has given into their keeping, 
 but according to the use they make of their stewardship.
 
 126 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " Were this truth more recognized than it is, the Treasury 
 of God would be full to overflowing, and the Kingdom of 
 Christ upon earth would not be degraded by contact with 
 the puerilities of Fancy Fair Religion." 
 
 The following paragraphs on the same subject are from 
 an excellent pamphlet on " Church Bazaars," by the late 
 Rev. Thos. S. Dickson, M.A., Edinburgh, Joint Convener 
 of the Committee of the United Free Church of Scotland 
 Anent Systematic Giving, and Editor of " The Lord's 
 Portion " : 
 
 " It cannot be denied that, ' as a rule, bazaars gain their 
 " chief end," which, certainly, is not the " glory of God," 
 but the raising of money.' The ' financial success,' how- 
 ever, ' is dearly bought.' 
 
 " ' The system is a very circuitous one. 
 
 " Oh, how unlike the complex works of man, 
 Heaven's simple, easy, unencumbered plan " 
 
 of Church finance.' ' It is also an expensive system,' and 
 often leads to practices which are illegal. 
 
 " I maintain, further, that this bazaar system is injurious 
 to all concerned ; injurious to individual Christians in 
 diverting them from the only true and effectual principles 
 and modes of giving ; injurious to Christian ministers, who 
 are secularized in spirit, and humiliated in many ways by 
 having to act as warehousemen and traders ; and injurious 
 to the Church in degrading her institutions and aims in the 
 presence of an unbelieving world. For even where lotteries 
 are not resorted to, and that is in a minority of cases, how 
 often is the raising of funds for Church purposes associated 
 with practices of a frivolous and unworthy kind, such as are 
 altogether fitted to bring religion into contempt. 
 
 " The whole system gives undue prominence to an inferior 
 mode of Church finance. There is no appeal to Christian 
 principle. There is no attempt to elevate giving into a 
 grace, or to surround the gifts, the contributors, and the 
 purchasers with religious or high-toned associations.
 
 WRONG .WAYS OF GIVING. 127 
 
 " Were the spirit of prayer and of liberality (for these are 
 ever associated in New Testament times with the history of 
 the Church of Christ) to prevail among our congregations, 
 such miserable expedients would cease to exist. 
 
 " The bazaar system is fitted to give ' those that are 
 without ' a very low idea of the power of the cross of Christ 
 over the hearts of His professed people, as judged by the 
 absence of liberality and self-denial. Men of the world 
 liberally support what they believe in ; why should not 
 the Christian Church, which professes to owe everything to 
 Christ, support His cause, not of constraint, not indirectly, 
 not grudgingly, but willingly, directly, liberally ? Should 
 not unbelieving men be made to see that, in the estimation 
 of Christian people, the claims of Jesus Christ and His cause 
 are paramount ? ' Worthy is the Lamb ' to receive the 
 freely offered gifts of consecrated hearts, rather than the 
 tarnished gold of a fancy-fair ! May not this be one reason 
 why the Church has so little power among all classes of 
 society ? Men see her posing as a mendicant, sometimes 
 as a mountebank, to raise funds from friends and foes ; 
 and yet those who belong to the Church are men and women 
 who, by profession, have said or are prepared to say 
 
 ' Were the whole realm of nature mine, 
 
 That were an offering far too small ; 
 Love so amazing, so divine, 
 
 Demands my soul, my life, my all ! ' 
 
 " No method will do lasting good to those adopting it 
 unless it elevates giving to its divinely-appointed place as 
 an act of divine service, and as a 'means of grace to the 
 contributor. This end is even more important than the 
 immediate object which is to be gained by the money 
 contributed. If it be urged that though not good or desir- 
 able things in themselves, bazaars are ' good for the present 
 distress ' of financial niggardliness and deficit, I reply that 
 the ' distress ' is likely to become chronic by the application 
 of such a remedy, and is mainly brought about, to begin 
 with, by the neglect of ' the more excellent way." . . .
 
 128 OC7.fi? GIVING. 
 
 I am confident that the present humiliating state of matters 
 has been brought about by the imperfect exercise by many 
 Christians, and the inexcusable neglect by many more, of 
 the ' grace ' of Christian giving in other words, by a 
 departure from the teaching of the precepts and examples 
 of Scripture on this subject of Christian stewardship. 
 
 " I know of nothing more fitted to wither and dwarf this 
 grace than the bazaar system. The joyful freedom that 
 ought to characterize every offering laid on the altar of 
 Christ is conspicuous by its absence. The force-pump has 
 to take the place of the freely springing fountain ; and 
 nothing is more likely to check and stifle the growth of true 
 Christian liberality in a congregation than a successful 
 bazaar. We need to have a constraining love of the Lord 
 Jesus Christ act as a permanent motive to liberality in the 
 hearts of His redeemed people. 
 
 " Let no one say human nature is frail ; supreme motives 
 cannot always be appealed to ; money must be got mean- 
 while and somehow, to carry on the Church's work. The 
 Church's work 1 Whose is that work ? Is it not Christ's ? 
 Are not the silver and the gold His as well ? Dare we then 
 speak of motives lower than the highest, or adopt methods 
 other than the best, when His cause and honour are con- 
 cerned ? Remembering His own estimate in reference to 
 the widow's mite, ' more than they all,' I firmly believe 
 that a shilling freely offered as the outcome of the divinely 
 implanted grace of liberality will be more fruitful of blessing 
 than 100 shillings which come into the treasury in any other 
 way. In that faith, I take my stand against the bazaar 
 system against this modern caricature of true Christian 
 giving."
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL 
 
 O.G.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL 
 
 "THE kind-hearted or thoughtless people who bestow 
 uninquiring charity in the streets are simply feeding distress 
 instead of curing it. The penny that is given to the beggar 
 is in the majority of cases worse than thrown away ; it is 
 confirming and establishing him in his beggary, to the extent 
 of a penny. This is no reason against charitable giving ; 
 on the contrary, it is a reason why such giving should be 
 accompanied by knowledge, method, and care." 
 
 John Ruskin said : 
 
 " How often is it difficult to be wisely charitable ; to do 
 good without multiplying the sources of evil I To give 
 alms is nothing unless you give thought also. It is written, 
 not ' blessed is he that feedeth the poor,' but ' blessed is he 
 that considereth the poor.' A little thought and a little 
 kindness are often worth more than a great deal of money." 
 
 What is called " indiscriminate charity " may do more 
 harm than good. " Every one who tries to do good ought 
 to take the further pains of seeing that he is doing good." 
 It is undoubtedly to be regretted that so many well-meaning, 
 but misguided, people are content to bestow their money 
 on any who are forward enough to ask it. 
 
 " The relief of the poor calls for the wisdom of those who, 
 ' by reason of use, have then* senses exercised to discern 
 good and evil' (Heb. v. 14). An impulsive, indiscriminate 
 almsgiving may increase the evils you seek to lessen, and 
 turn the poor into paupers. The command, ' Give to him 
 that asketh,' has to be balanced with that other counsel, 
 that ' if any man will not work, neither should he eat.' " 
 
 131 12
 
 132 OUR GIVING. 
 
 We should endeavour to give, as far as possible, to all good 
 causes brought under our notice, "if it be only a trifle to 
 each, in order to express our sentiments and good-will 
 towards God's work, and to become thereby ' a companion 
 of all them that fear His name.' " At the same time, let 
 it not be a trifle (as it too often is) when it should be far 
 more. 
 
 Christians, however, while giving to all useful, benevolent, 
 and philanthropic objects, should give precedence to the 
 claims of religion, and the extension of Christ's cause in the 
 earth, inasmuch as the consciences of men, generally, are 
 naturally more alive to their duty towards their neighbours 
 than their duty towards God ; not realizing that the misery 
 and destitution of immortal souls far exceeds the sufferings 
 and wants of human bodies. 
 
 Freely we have received the Gospel ; let us " freely give." 
 Let us " show our estimate of what we have received, by our 
 efforts to impart it to others, far and wide." Let us give 
 with all our heart, to send the " glad tidings " throughout 
 the whole world ; while we ourselves 
 
 " Tell to others all around, 
 What a Saviour we have found." 
 
 " The reasons why one should go abroad in Christ's 
 service have a binding force upon those who stay at home. 
 The life and strength of the missionary is devoted to 
 preaching the Gospel. If we spend our life and strength 
 in earning money, what we are able to earn over and above 
 our necessities and comforts (?) should be held as a sacred 
 trust to be used in increasing the knowledge of Jesus 
 Christ throughout the world. 
 
 " The Christ-spirit within the heart is the only spirit that 
 can preserve the property that we may hold in our name 
 from being to us a positive injury ; preventing poverty from 
 making us rebellious and preventing wealth from making 
 us proud, as if we were independent of the God that gave 
 us being. 
 
 " The very life of our Church is in the development of the
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL. 133 
 
 true missionary spirit. Where there is a lack of interest 
 in the cause of missions there will be the growing spirit of 
 infidelity. A non-missionary church to-day will be an 
 empty church to-morrow." 
 
 " How loud is the cry for more men and more money I 
 There was probably never a time when there was more 
 need for preaching the Gospel, and more opportunity for 
 doing so. 
 
 " But the lack is of the means to take advantage of the 
 open doors." The world is perishing for want of the 
 Gospel, and there is money enough in the hands of God's 
 people to send it into every corner ! Why is it kept back ? 
 Can it be that we, who profess to love and serve Jesus Christ, 
 are living unto ourselves, and not unto Him Who died for 
 us, and rose again ? (2 Cor. v. 15). Henceforth "let it be 
 our chosen aim and richest satisfaction to employ our being 
 and resources to exalt His fame and extend His empire. 
 The world's necessities imperatively demand this. The 
 obligations of Divine love clearly enjoin it. There is 
 nothing in this profession-making, mammon-seeking, 
 luxury -loving age that would so palpably demonstrate true 
 devotion to Christ as a self-denying beneficence. The 
 appeal of Divine love and of human want is made to every 
 Christian personally." 
 
 Will not those who " tarry by the stuff " at home send 
 supplies for those who go forth to the battle (i Sam. xxx. 
 24) ? How can we " stay-at-homes " go into all the world 
 and preach the Gospel to every creature ? How except by 
 giving freely of our means to support those who do go ? In a 
 letter received from a missionary in China, she says, 
 "surely there must be banknotes and corns in possession 
 of Christians at home which would fain say, ' Here am I, 
 send me 1 ' " 
 
 An American lady earns 200 by teaching. She keeps half 
 to support herself; with the other half she maintains a 
 female missionary in China. " Thus she imitates the angels, 
 who serve God day and night ; for while she is asleep in
 
 134 OUR GIVING. 
 
 America, she is active by proxy on the other side of the 
 world." 
 
 " 'How shall they preach except they be sent ? ' It is 
 true that money has often been spoken of as if it were 
 the one thing needful to convert the world ; on the other 
 hand, it is no less true that while some of our brightest 
 young Christian lives are offered for missionary work of 
 various kinds in any lands, the one thing that hinders 
 their being sent is the want of a missionary spirit in those 
 who cannot go, but who could help others with the means 
 of going." 
 
 It is possible to have Preaching from the Counting- 
 House 1 " Christians have diversities of gifts for the 
 edifying of the body of Christ. Some have gifts for preach- 
 ing the Gospel, and others have gifts for acquiring riches. 
 The latter, by supporting the former in prosecuting their 
 glorious work, perhaps preach the Gospel as truly as if they 
 went out to all the world. Let not this important fact be 
 overlooked." 
 
 " The continual devotion of the best of the temporal to 
 the furtherance of the spiritual and eternal carries resistless 
 conviction. Christians must manifest the superiority of the 
 spiritual by sacrificing worldly gains for the interests of 
 Heaven, before their profession will become a vital force 
 and blessing." 
 
 " Shall not the Church seek to rise to her true position 
 before the world ? . . . Men behold energy, enterprise, 
 toil, and sacrifice everywhere else. Science, commerce, and 
 pleasure command them ; so also must religion, to impress 
 and convince mankind. 
 
 " In the light of Calvary's awful curse endured for our 
 sins, and of the unspeakable glory about to break upon our 
 gaze, and of the fearful realities of the eternal doom of the 
 impenitent, and of the solemn injunction of our departed 
 Lord to ' go and preach the Gospel to every creature,' let us 
 arise and go forth to the rescue of men now perishing for 
 want of Chrijt.
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL. 135 
 
 " Instead of simply keeping open, at a little personal sacri- 
 fice, the doors now accessible, shall we not greatly multiply 
 the means which God has so blessed in the past, but which 
 He leaves with those whom He has redeemed from the wrath 
 to come by His precious blood, to employ for Him." 
 
 It is estimated that, in China alone, each year, twelve 
 millions of souls pass into eternity unblessed by the Gospel. 
 
 " Oh 1 " said a dying Indian woman lately, " cannot your 
 people send us the Gospel a little faster ? " 
 
 " Hark ! the wail of heathen nations ; 
 
 List ! the cry comes back again, 
 With its solemn, sad reproaching, 
 With its piteous refrain : 
 
 ' We are dying fast of hunger, 
 
 Starving for the Bread of Life ! 
 
 Haste, oh hasten ! ere we perish, 
 
 Send the Messengers of Life ! ' 
 
 " Christian ! can you sit in silence, 
 While this cry fills all the air ; 
 Or content yourself with giving 
 Merely what you ' well can spare ' ? 
 
 " While you dwell in peace and plenty, 
 
 ' Store and basket ' running o'er, 
 
 Will you cast to these poor pleaders 
 
 Only crumbs upon your floor ? 
 
 " Hear ye not the tramp of nations 
 Marching on to Day of Doom ? 
 See them falling, dropping swiftly, 
 Like the leaves, into the tomb." 
 
 How often are we, who are privileged to dwell under a 
 dispensation of such peculiar love and liberty, reminded in 
 vain of the duty which we owe to God, and the obligation 
 which rests upon us, to give to the cause of Christ, that His 
 kingdom may be extended, and that the story of His 
 wondrous love may be told in every corner of this dark 
 earth ? When we consider how urgent the need of spreading 
 the glad tidings of salvation, how vast the field, how many 
 the opportunities in these days, and how little we are doing
 
 136 OUR GIVING. 
 
 to help, have we not cause for shame and confusion of face 
 before a loving and bountiful God ? What are our givings 
 compared with the grateful and profuse offerings which may 
 well be expected of us, and compared with the urgent 
 necessities of the cause of Christ everywhere ? Oh, that 
 we may rise more and more to a deep sense of the privilege 
 and happiness of giving. 
 
 In a Report of the Missions of the Moravian Church it was 
 said that, " Not ' / can't' but ' / won't ' is the blot that 
 stains the fair name of too many of God's children, to whom 
 He has committed the ' sacred stewardship of money,' with 
 a stain that nothing but the blood of Jesus can wipe out. 
 Without the help of the world, the Christian Churches 
 to-day could easily send out enough men and women to 
 evangelize the world 1 a fact, of which this little devoted 
 Church of the Moravians is at once a standing example and 
 reproach. And while millions of dark, dying, benighted 
 souls are crying out for the Light of Life, which living, 
 loving lips alone can carry them ; those who profess to love 
 the Saviour must be ready to realize the responsibility which 
 that love imposes. ' Responsibility ' ? Nay, rather Love 
 transforms. To ' love Christ,' is to be ' like Christ ' and 
 to be ' like Christ,' is to make self-complacent, self-centred, 
 self-indulgent lives an impossibility ; and the self-sacrifice 
 and self-denial of His, our privilege and pattern" 
 
 The late Dr. Duff said, " We are playing at missions." 
 Might it not with equal truth be said, that, as yet, we are 
 merely playing at Giving ? 
 
 The very heathen shame us. They give their gods the 
 best, and spend enormous sums upon their idols. " A 
 magnificent crown of gold, all set with precious stones, 
 valued at /3,ooo, was presented to an idol in the Temple of 
 Conjeveram. A beggar made this costly present to the 
 image. He had gone about begging till he had obtained this 
 money. His rule was, never to eat food till he had got ten 
 rupees (equal to twenty shillings) ; and the final result was 
 this gorgeous crown for the god."
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL. 137 
 
 "When the war chest of Frederick the Great was 
 exhausted, he appealed to the women to lay their jewels 
 on the altar of patriotism, promising to return jewels of 
 iron for jewels of gold, bearing the inscription, ' I gave 
 gold for the sake of the Fatherland.' Out of this response 
 to an appeal to German patriotism there arose the Order 
 of the Iron Cross. What we need in these last days is 
 a new order of living, that will mean a life of economy, a 
 life of plainer living, plainer dressing, plainer eating, less 
 expensive recreation, a giving up of much that we want, 
 that we may give the gift of eternal life to those who are 
 dead in trespasses and sins." 
 
 The following from a secular newspaper might be put 
 more strongly from the Christian point of view: "The 
 Easter festival is a great occasion in New York. It is a 
 sort of harvest time for the florists. One of this class, doing 
 a large business in the American city, has admitted that 
 he received no less a sum than 100,000 dollars for flowers 
 purchased for use in connection with the festival. Some of 
 the flower pieces for decorating the churches brought the 
 high price of 100 dollars. Referring to this circumstance 
 Bishop Coxe made some very trenchant observations, which 
 should suggest serious thoughts to people who lavish their 
 guineas on floral decoration, and spare grudgingly their 
 smallest copper pieces to the Church for its real work. 
 . . It is poor ambition to sink fortunes in great 
 floral exhibitions in places of worship to the neglect of the 
 real duties and sacrifices incumbent upon Christian people. 
 : -. : Dr. William Anderson, of Glasgow, standing behind 
 the plate and seeing three ladies richly arrayed in satins 
 and velvets passing along the corridor and dropping into 
 the collection-box a copper coin as their joint donation, 
 exclaimed ' There they go ; three a penny ! three a 
 penny 1 ' " 
 
 The lavish expenditure of congregations upon what 
 conduces to their own comfort or sensuous enjoyment con- 
 trasts painfully with what they give for spiritual work and
 
 138 OUR GIVING. 
 
 ends. Well would it be for the spiritual health and the 
 real prosperity and usefulness of both congregations and 
 individuals if they would learn to deny themselves those 
 things which are unnecessary or harmful and give more 
 freely for the true work of God. 
 
 A writer says, " I came across a Church in America, 
 where the congregation itself was supported by the 
 evening collection, tho smaller of the two. The morning 
 collection went one day every month to foreign missions, 
 and one day every month to home missions, and the other 
 days were devoted to various objects. He seemed to think 
 that was ideal. He did not believe in what is called 
 " spending in faith," saying truly, "If we can only 
 succeed by expensive corner sites and imposing buildings, 
 then money never can be a secondary consideration. Going 
 into debt for these objects is not an act of faith." 
 
 Christian people should, I think, reserve their principal 
 giving for spiritual objects, for the advancement of Christ's 
 cause and kingdom on the earth. Merely philanthropic 
 objects have a far larger circle to appeal to. All the kind- 
 hearted and amiable, but worldly, people will help many of 
 these ; but only Mew-hearted people can be looked to for 
 the support of purely spiritual work. Only they truly 
 realize the infinite importance of the soul as compared 
 with the body. 
 
 The consecrated money of God's people is greatly 
 needed, but " there is some danger of thinking only 
 of money in connection with giving for Missions. There 
 are far higher views of the subject to be taken. There are 
 far costlier offerings required. Some are called to give their 
 sons and daughters, and some to give themselves, an 
 offering alongside of which our largest money contributions 
 look wonderfully small. Then there is the giving of prayer, 
 the importance of which cannot be over-estimated. . . 
 It is told of Dr. Carey, long before he became a missionary, 
 that he never prayed without remembering the heathen. 
 Pastor Fliedner says, ' When the heart prays, the hand
 
 GIVING FOR THE GOSPEL. 139 
 
 opens ; ' and where the hand does not open, the likelihood 
 is that there is not much heart-praying." 
 
 One of the last messages of the late Dr. A. J. Gordon, of 
 Boston, to his people was the following : 
 
 " Forget not that your first and principal business as a 
 disciple of Christ is to give the Gospel to those who have it 
 not. Therefore 
 
 " Ask yourself daily what the Lord would have you do in 
 connection with the work of carrying the news of salvation 
 to the perishing millions. Search carefully whether He 
 would have you go yourself to the heathen if you have 
 the youth and fitness required for the work. Or, if you 
 cannot go in person 
 
 " Inquire diligently what blood mortgage there is upon 
 your property in the interest of foreign missions how much 
 you owe to the heathen, because of what you owe to Christ, 
 for redeeming you with His precious blood. I warn you 
 that it will go hard with you when your Lord comes to 
 reckon with you if He finds your wealth invested in super- 
 fluous luxuries or hoarded up in needless accumulations, 
 instead of being sacredly devoted to giving the Gospel to 
 the lost." 
 
 Christians ! what efforts, what sacrifices are we making 
 for the honour of Him who has prepared for us " a crown 
 of glory," " an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and 
 that fadeth not away " ? " Idolaters give their own child- 
 ren to false gods ; and shall we think anything too dear 
 to be dedicated to, or to be parted with for, the true God ? " 
 
 Too much, alas ! is spent on idols even in this Christian 
 land. But oh, how little how very little is dedicated to 
 the service of the living and true God ! 
 
 Where is our faith, our love, our zeal ? If we but loved 
 our God and fellow-men one-half as well as we love our 
 money and ourselves, there would be little need to ask us for 
 the wherewithal to do the Master's work. Could we but 
 realize what God might well expect from us, our so-called 
 " liberality " would hide its face for very shame ; nor could
 
 140 OUR GIVING. 
 
 we in our giving ever dare adopt the low mean standard of 
 a selfish world. 
 
 " What a melancholy calculation that is which was 
 recently made in regard to the communicants of two of 
 the most numerous Presbyterian bodies in this land 
 viz., that the yearly average of missionary giving for every 
 communicant amounted to somewhat like one shilling, and 
 no more 1 As if each communicant said, ' I value my share 
 in the Gospel at this rate. I give at the rate at which I 
 received.' Shall the Lord judge any of us by this measure ? 
 Has He deserved no more than this at our hands ? " 
 
 From a long experience as a foreign mission treasurer of 
 a congregation, I am able to say that it is possible for the half 
 or more of a nominally Christian congregation to give 
 absolutely nothing for the cause of Foreign Missions, and 
 many of those who do contribute, give the merest trifle. 
 I have heard of one congregation where only 200 out of a 
 membership of over 800 gave anything to Foreign Missions 1 
 
 Let us hope that the time is coming when we will not be 
 able to enjoy any luxuries while the work of Christ stands 
 still, while the souls and bodies of thousands perish even at 
 our doors.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE 
 
 THIS is of infinitely greater importance than the manner, 
 the method, or the amount of our giving. We should give 
 in a spirit of cheerfulness, gratitude, love, prayer, self-denial, 
 and humility. God knows our motives, and looks into our 
 hearts. In His sight the widow's mites, given cheerfully 
 and from love and gratitude to Christ, are far more precious 
 than millions given by the rich, if given in a legal spirit, or 
 from wrong motives. There are those who " are charitable, 
 not to benefit the poor, but to court the rich." Our offer- 
 ings may be an offence to God. " The sacrifice of the 
 wicked is abomination " (Prov. xxi. 27). 
 
 Philanthropy and natural generosity are very different 
 from " Christian giving," which can only be practised by 
 those who love and serve Christ. 
 
 " There may be much, even lavish distribution of sub- 
 stance, and no Christian giving." The motive is of far 
 greater importance than the amount. We may bestow all 
 our goods to feed the poor, and give our bodies to be burned, 
 but if our doing so is not the outcome of true love to Christ 
 and our fellow-men, it will profit us nothing (i Cor. xiii. 
 3). When the Great Giver gave His greatest gift, it was 
 because He " so loved the world that He gave His only 
 begotten Son." " The quality of our giving is the first thing 
 which God considers. The quantity follows. Giving with 
 the idea of paying for salvation, or helping to pay for 
 salvation, is not only useless but an insult to God. Such 
 was the sacrifice of Cain. He thought that God would
 
 I 4 4 OUR GIVING. 
 
 accept the offering of thanksgiving before He had received 
 the sin-offering of atonement." 
 
 We love Him because He first loved us ; and we must give 
 to Him because He first gave Himself for us. We do not 
 give in order to make Him give, but because He has given. 
 There can be no true giving for Christ's sake without first 
 receiving Him into our hearts. Then, and then only, will 
 we be willing, heartily willing to give ourselves, our services, 
 our means, our all, to Him Whom our souls love. Works 
 and gifts for merit are indeed an abomination to the Lord, 
 and only a false or counterfeit Church would encourage 
 such. 
 
 Rev. F. B. Meyer says wisely, 
 
 " I very much question the expediency of collecting money 
 for religious work from those who have no special religious 
 interest who give because they are pressed to give, or 
 because they do not like to disoblige their friends." 
 
 " We read in 2 Cor. viii. 5, they ' first gave their own 
 selves unto the Lord.' This is the secret of all Christian 
 giving. Appeals may be made to excite the compassion of 
 men with regard to the poverty, degradation, and immoral- 
 ity of their fellow-men ; but until the consecrated children 
 of God rise up to the dignity of their calling, and realize that 
 the anointing oil of the Lord is on the ear, and hand, and 
 foot their whole being, their own selves being the 
 Lord's the secret of Christian giving is still un- 
 discovered." 
 
 As has been truly said by a well-known worker in the 
 Home Mission cause whatever a man gives himself to, 
 he does not grudge to give his purse to also. Be it to busi- 
 ness, science, politics, art, pleasure, anything " the princi- 
 ple is universal. Whatever be a man's luxury, he never 
 counts it a sacrifice to lay out money on it ; and whenever 
 a man gives himself to anything it can command his purse." 
 " See how the devil works this grand principle, and see how 
 his treasury overflows." What he receives comes from the 
 artesian well of a whole-hearted devotion, compared with
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE. 145 
 
 which the giving of God's people is as " the mere surface 
 drainage of divided hearts." 
 
 The Rev. Andrew Murray, in a little book entitled 
 " MONEY : Thoughts for God's Stewards," shows what 
 Christ's estimate of money is. How He looks to the motive 
 of our giving, and the amount of sacrifice that is in it. How 
 giving helps our life of faith, and has an eternal value. 
 How " the secret of true giving is the joy of the Holy 
 Ghost." How the grace of God teaches to give, and how 
 like our Master we must be willing to be poor, to forsake, 
 renounce, lose all, and " find our joy in the heavenly riches 
 and the blessedness of dependence upon God alone." 
 
 Rev. James S. Kendall, General Secretary of the Christian 
 Stewardship Commission, Dayton, Ohio, points out that 
 DIVINE OWNERSHIP is the basis of Christian Stewardship, 
 and that, by right of Creation and Redemption ; and this 
 should be recognized by the Christian's consecration. 
 
 " Freely all things with Him given, 
 Peace on earth and hope of Heaven ; 
 What return shall one like me 
 Give, my gracious God, to Thee ? " 
 
 In Ephesians iv. 28 we have a fine description of a Christ- 
 ian giver. The apostle has shown that the dead in sins 
 are quickened with Christ. A thief is selected by the apostle 
 as illustrating the power of grace. " Let him that stole 
 steal no more : but rather let him labour, working with his 
 hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give 
 to him that needeth." He is now to be honest, industrious 
 in an honourable calling, provident, unselfish, and withal 
 discriminating. " This is God's grand process for pro- 
 ducing Christian givers. He has made provision for the 
 lowest, that they may be allowed to give," and He accepts 
 the humble gifts of the labouring man with, it may be, more 
 pleasure than the larger, and more easily given, offerings of 
 the rich. 
 
 " The true motive is not an external demand laid upon an 
 unwilling slave, but the thanksgiving of praise from a 
 
 O.G. K
 
 146 OUR GIVING. 
 
 grateful worshipper. Law demands us to love in order to 
 live. Grace gives us life in order that we may love." 
 
 God does not depend upon us for money. The world and 
 all that is therein belongs to Him ; and it is from Him 
 that we receive the wherewithal to give Him back. " For 
 every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a 
 thousand hills. . . . If I were hungry, I would not tell 
 thee : for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof " 
 (Ps. 1. 10-12). Our being required to give according to what 
 we have, is calculated to teach this, which David realized 
 when he exclaimed, " Who am I, and what is my people, 
 that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort ? 
 for all things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we given 
 thee," &c. (i Chron. xxix. 14-16). 
 
 Prosperity is from God, though we are all too apt to forget 
 this (Deut. viii. 10-18) ; and whatever we give may be 
 said to be " the measure of our appreciation of His blessing." 
 " Both gratitude and duty ought to lead us to repay the 
 goodness of the Lord." We must praise God with the 
 purse. 
 
 We are God's stewards ; and it is for our training in 
 faithful stewardship, and for our souls' good, that we 
 are permitted and privileged to dispense of the means 
 entrusted to us for the glory of God, and the furtherance of 
 Christ's kingdom on the earth. It is not the money itself 
 God wants, but the money from us. " It is not your money 
 I want," says a man of God, " but your happiness." 
 Giving to God is designed for blessing and for sanctification. 
 It "is an act of worship and a means of grace." The wor- 
 ship of God in His house begins at the plate. " Give unto 
 the Lord the glory due unto His name : bring an offering, 
 and come before Him : worship the Lord in the beauty of 
 holiness " (i Chron. xvi. 29.) " None shall appear before 
 Me empty " (Exod. xxiii. 15). May we give in the spirit 
 of David, who said, " Because I have set my affection to the 
 house of my God " (i Chron. xxix. 3). "It will be found 
 that in all ages and dispensations, in the primitive, the
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE. 147 
 
 patriarchal, the Mosaic, the prophetic, the apostolic, the 
 presentation of gifts or offerings was observed in the light 
 of worship rendered to God, as much as other incumbent 
 spiritual exercises. And when thus viewed, proceeding on 
 right ground, from the right motive, and in the right 
 measure, our gifts will rank as sacrifices acceptable and well- 
 pleasing to God a sweet-smelling savour ascending to the 
 Heavenly throne and will bring down on our souls choicest 
 blessings of grace and glory." God would have His people, 
 not only to root out of their hearts the sins of covetousness, 
 selfishness, and avarice, but to cultivate in their room the 
 graces of charity, liberality, and self-denial. Paul, exhort- 
 ing the Philippians to cultivate liberality, wrote, " Not 
 because I desire a gift : but I desire fruit that may abound 
 to your account " (Phil. iv. 17). " God yearns after men's 
 hearts, not their money ; He needs more of their grace than 
 their giving." 
 
 We should give willingly and cheerfully, not grudgingly nor 
 of necessity ; for giving is intended to be a source of joy. 
 We should delight in giving, and rejoice to be enabled to 
 give tangible expression to our gratitude, to exhibit practi- 
 cally, " What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits 
 toward me ? ' ' (Ps. cxvi. 12). "So did the Pentecostal Church 
 at Jerusalem." It is poor gratitude which exhausts itself 
 in words. While others grumble, " So many calls 1 " we 
 must reply, " Yes, very many ; but they are all calls in 
 Providence to cultivate in us a giving disposition." 
 Instead of being annoyed, as some are, by repeated appli- 
 cations, we must be ever ready to give, feeling that we are 
 privileged to do a blessed thing. " It is more blessed to 
 give than to receive " (Acts xx. 35). These " are words 
 that tell us, not simply that ' God loveth a cheerful giver,' 
 but that God has implanted blessedness in right giving, 
 so that the giver's face cannot fail to shine, if he knows what 
 he is doing." For a beautiful description of willing and 
 cheerful giving, see i Chron. xxix. 9. 
 
 " Then the people rejoiced, for that they offered willingly, 
 
 K 2
 
 148 OUR GIVING. 
 
 because with perfect heart they offered willingly to the 
 Lord : and David the king also rejoiced with great joy." 
 ".If we want ' great joy,' we must be great givers." 
 
 Seek not to lay up treasures here, 
 
 Where moth and ruse destroy ; 
 But set your hearts on things above, 
 Then will you have true joy. 
 
 (MATT. vi. 19-21.) 
 
 Perhaps the reason some of Ua have so little joy, is because 
 we neither give cheerfully nor in proportion to our means. 
 Giving should be a true pleasure. It might almost be said 
 that " the money we give aright is the only money we really 
 enjoy." There is a kind of pleasure in making or receiving 
 money, and there is undoubtedly a certain amount of 
 pleasure in saving money ; " but these pleasures, as earth 
 is different from heaven, are not to be compared with the 
 sweet solid pleasure of giving " that is, giving in the 
 right way. Even a generous worldly man may be con- 
 strained to say with Burns, 
 
 " A brother to relieve how exquisite the bliss." 
 
 " The ' cheerful giver ' does not necessarily give more than 
 his brethren, but he gives it in a different way. He makes 
 collectors feel that he is under an obligation to them for 
 taking the trouble to call and ask him for a subscription. 
 The moment you look at him you see that he is one whom 
 the Master has taught that ' it is more blessed to give than 
 to receive.' He parts with his money, not with a sigh, but 
 with a song of praise in his heart to God who enables him 
 to give. Nor is the explanation of such a man's cheerfulness 
 in giving far to seek. His gift has come from his heart before 
 it came from his pocket that explains everything." 
 
 " Giving, it appears, is not to be reckoned self-denial at 
 all ; " for to the soul fully imbued with the mind of God, 
 it is a more blessed act than receiving. By our giving, 
 " we bless ourselves that is, we, in the very act, break 
 open the alabaster box, which pours on us its own fragrance 
 and refreshing."
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE. 149 
 
 " The grand illustration of this blessedness is to be found 
 in the Godhead. Man loves to get, God loves to give ; and 
 it is God that is ' blessed for ever.' " " Thanks be unto 
 God for His unspeakable gift " (2 Cor. ix. 15). 
 
 " Let us never complain of the want of that which we may 
 honour God by parting with." No one is a loser by giving 
 to the Lord ; and as, Matthew Henry says, " What is not 
 our property will never be our profit." Give freely, and 
 then we shall have the blessing of God upon our substance, 
 and the comfortable enjoyment of it." " Blessed is he that 
 considereth the poor : the Lord will deliver him in time of 
 trouble " (Ps. xli. i). " He that hath a bountiful eye shall 
 be blessed ; for he giveth of his bread to the poor " (Prov. 
 xxii. 9). " He that hath mercy on the poor, happy is he " 
 (Prov. xiv. 21). " He that giveth unto the poor shall not 
 lack : but he that hideth his eyes shall have many a 
 curse " (Prov. xxviii. 27). 
 
 Our giving should be prompted by love to God and man. 
 The constraining power should ever be the love of Jesus 
 Christ our Saviour. " The motive power of all good work 
 and good giving is love a Spirit-wrought love to God, to 
 God in Christ, and, as flowing therefrom, love to man." If 
 we are moved to give by any selfish principle, by any 
 idea of " constructing a ground of acceptance before God," 
 by importunity, "or as a solatium to our consciences, it 
 profiteth us nothing." " The real value of any act lies in 
 the motive with which it is wrought." If we give, not 
 merely from custom, or a desire to oblige, but from love 
 to Christ, and an earnest desire to promote His glory, 
 our offering though it were but a cup of cold water 
 given in His name will be " as an odour of a sweet smell, 
 a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God ; " and our Lord 
 will attach to our humble act this eternal memorial, " Ye 
 have done it unto me." " Giving is not grace," but it 
 should be one result of it, and of the sincerity of love. The 
 precepts of our faith " touch the purse as well as the under- 
 standing, the heart and the tongue. In fact, those precepts
 
 i 5 o OUR GIVING. 
 
 regard all that a man has, as well as all that he is ; and 
 it is by the use of what he has that we come to find out 
 what he is." " By their fruits ye shall know them." We 
 cannot see into our hearts as God can ; and we may be 
 deeply deceived as to what is there ; but our giving affords 
 at least one important indication of their state. " Withhold- 
 ing from God and frofh His cause is a sure index of spiritual 
 poverty." " You see a man lavishing gold upon the lust 
 of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life ; 
 whilst around him is a mass of ignorant, miserable, suffering 
 humanity, for whose education, relief, and salvation he 
 stretches out no helping hand. Clearly that man has not 
 learned of Christ." How we give is a real test of our faith 
 and love. " The highest and purest form of love is that 
 which gives." 
 
 " Dr. Guthrie was once preaching on a special occasion. 
 The collection in the forenoon was about 2,630. The 
 Doctor rose and announced the amount at the close of 
 the service, and added, ' It shows that your heart is in 
 it ; for if you wish to know if a man cares for you, just ask 
 him for money.' " If we cannot find it in our hearts to 
 give to the cause of our blessed Lord we may well question 
 whether we are really His or not. It is very striking that 
 in Matt. xxv. 31-46, the difference between those who have 
 loved the Lord, and trusted in His blood, and those who 
 have not, is made to hinge on the grace of giving. 
 
 " It is a pitiful sight to see a human heart, that should 
 be warmly throbbing with love to all mankind, made of the 
 same blood, draw in like a hedgehog when asked to feel. 
 One likes, after all, to see, on the telling of a tale of sorrow, 
 the over-brimming eye, which speaks of an over-brimming 
 heart. Such people may be often imposed on, and their 
 sympathy and tears may be often thrown away on unde- 
 serving objects ; but they remind us more of Jesus than the 
 man with the hard, calculating look, who, with his bank- 
 book in his pocket, showing a large and increasing balance 
 in his favour, tells a collector, who calls on him, that he
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE. 151 
 
 really must be economical, and cannot subscribe to every- 
 thing 1 " 
 
 " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself " (Mark 
 xii. 31). 
 
 " Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of 
 Christ" (Gal. vi. 2). 
 
 " Remember them which suffer adversity, as being your- 
 selves also in the body " (Heb. xiii. 3). 
 
 Our giving should ever be associated with prayer. We 
 should be like Cornelius, who " gave much alms to the 
 people, and prayed to God alway " (Acts x. 1-4). Without 
 prayer we cannot expect what is given to be instrumental 
 in doing good ; and without giving we have no right to 
 expect to receive from Him of Whom we ask in prayer. 
 Giving " imparts vitality to prayer." How can we pray, 
 " Thy kingdom come," while we withhold that which will 
 help to establish it ? " It is the sheerest mockery on the 
 part of any Church to pray for an increase of spiritual 
 prosperity, when it is systematically neglecting to support 
 God's ordinances." Good wishes and prayers are well, 
 but money is needed too. 
 
 We should pray for direction in the use of our means ; 
 and we should pray to be delivered from a spirit of self- 
 righteousness in our giving, and that we may have faith, 
 not only to devote the allotted portion, but to believe that 
 it is given to One Who can return it an hundred-fold, if 
 need be. 
 
 When we have a prayer in our hearts for a good cause, 
 we will soon have our purse in our hands for it. 
 
 We must have faith to believe that, though the Lord can 
 and does " repay even in temporal things, through raising 
 up friends for us, or giving His manifest blessing upon our 
 earthly vocation," and in many other ways, our real recom- 
 pense will be in the world to come. Until Christians 
 recognize that their offerings are given to God, " there is 
 no likelihood that giving will ever be cultivated as a Chris- 
 tian grace, or assume its true place in the Christian life."
 
 152 OUR GIVING. 
 
 We honour God by trusting Him ; and we may be well 
 assured, that if we give to Him, He will provide for us. 
 " Trust in the Lord, and do good ; so shalt thou dwell in 
 the land, and verily thou shalt be fed " (Ps. xxxvii. 3 cf. ; 
 Ps. xxxiv. 9, 10 ; xxxvii. 16, 17). 
 
 We profess to walk by faith, and not by sight, and yet 
 how spiritually blind we are ; how unbelieving 1 We dare 
 not trust the Lord to fulfil His promises of manifold blessing 
 to all who will give freely of their substance for His cause 
 on earth. Surely we forget that " the earth is the Lord's 
 and the fulness thereof." Let us prove Him with our 
 giving, and see if He will not open the windows of Heaven, 
 and pour us out a blessing, that there shall not be room 
 enough to receive it (Mai. iii. 10). 
 
 What an encouraging example of the reward of faith we 
 have in the widow of Zarepta, who, though she and her 
 child were at the point of starvation, gave of her last morsel 
 to the man of God first I 
 
 In all our giving let us ever remember that we give only, 
 as in duty bound, of what we have received, and to Him to 
 Whom we owe a debt of gratitude which we can never fully 
 pay. So shall we be kept humble, and free from a spirit of 
 self-righteousness or thought of merit in our deeds. " Never 
 may we step upon the Pharisee's ground, and think to find 
 acceptance on the score of good works. Let us offer God the 
 duty, but cast away the merit as a filthy rag." " Let the 
 sweet incense of hearty obedience and humility mingle 
 with our every sacrifice ; then, presenting the same in the 
 name of Jesus, it cannot fail to find acceptance with God." 
 But never let us think " to propitiate God's favour by an act 
 which, when performed, leaves us but unprofitable servants." 
 
 We must ever bear in mind that we do not give in order 
 to be saved, but when we are saved we give because we are 
 saved. " Did Mary pour the ointment on Christ's feet in 
 order to be saved ? Nay, Christ knew it was to show her 
 faith and love." 
 
 There is a great danger in the present day of giving only
 
 THE RIGHT MOTIVE. 153 
 
 that our charity may be seen of men, and that we may 
 obtain praise from them. If we do so, the words of Christ 
 are addressed to us, " Ye have no reward of your Father 
 which is in Heaven " (Matt. vi. i). We must not " let a 
 poor relative starve because we want to look fine at the 
 top of a subscription list." We have all need to pray 
 earnestly to be kept from this spirit of pride and vainglory. 
 "It is a wretched thing to turn what is meant to be a 
 passage of love betwixt the true heart and its God into a 
 piece of petty ostentation. Secrecy in giving is the cure 
 which Christ prescribed I " 
 
 " Generosity is a sensitive virtue. Like the photographic 
 plate, it must be developed in the dark ; for the glare of 
 publicity spoils it just as daylight does the plate ; thus the 
 most generous deeds have been, and always will be, done in 
 secret." 
 
 Take heed that when ye do your alms, 
 
 Or when to God you pray, 
 Ye do it in a secret and 
 
 Unostentatious way. 
 
 For both to those who give and ask, 
 
 God's own reward is sure ; 
 But only when, in doing so, 
 
 He sees their motives pure. 
 
 The True Secrecy in Giving. " This, the Saviour tells us, 
 constitutes the true secrecy in giving : ' Let not thy left 
 hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms 
 may be in secret.' To hide them, from the gaze of our 
 fellow-men is nothing ; for a man may give privately to 
 ease his conscience, or with the idea of atoning thus for 
 sins which he has committed in the process of acquiring his 
 wealth ; but such would not be the secret giving which 
 the great Father rewards openly IT depends not upon the 
 absence of spectators, which is a mere accident, that may 
 or may not accompany our work, but upon the absence, as 
 far as possible, of all self -consciousness ; if that condition 
 be fulfilled, then whether it be in seclusion, or openly in the
 
 154 OUR GIVING. 
 
 synagogues and the streets that we give, the exhortation is 
 obeyed, ' Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand 
 doeth.' " 
 
 " Let us do our best to discourage and abolish the vicious 
 system of trumpeted benefactions, of advertized lists, of 
 alms wheedled by flattery out of close fists, of weak though 
 benevolent souls tempted into corrupt motives, and the 
 giving which brings no reward." Let us " teach that better 
 way of giving in the simplicity and unconsciousness of a 
 child-like regard for the Heavenly Father, which will make 
 our charity fragrant, and not an offence to Heaven." At 
 the same time, as a well-known writer says, "It is not 
 alwaj^s advisable to conceal our charities. It may some- 
 times be best that they should be known." It may be " quite 
 right to provoke one another in a certain way. Paul uses 
 the argument of the liberality of the Macedonians to bring 
 out the liberality of the Corinthian Christians. David's 
 example infected his people." " David gave the gold and 
 silver he had saved for the Temple in a public manner. But 
 why ? Not to gain praise, but to encourage others to give 
 also. Should we even hide our charities, and at the same 
 time desire that they should be discovered, God would not 
 be pleased with us. He looks at the heart. He wants us 
 to act to Him alone." He seeth in secret, but will reward 
 us openly. It may be that impulsive giving, imitative 
 giving, " or even competitive giving is better than no giving ; 
 but habitual, conscientious, worshipful, and secret giving 
 is the highest of all methods of giving." 
 
 Let us see to it, that in all our giving we recognize Christ. 
 Let us give, not merely because we are naturally disposed to 
 be amiable and kind, and feel it pleasant to see others pleased 
 not in order to enjoy the luxury of complacent self- 
 applause ; but because we are constrained by the love of 
 Christ, Who gave Himself for us.
 
 THE POOR AS WELL AS 
 
 THE RICH, THE YOUNG AS WELL 
 
 AS THE OLD, SHOULD GIVE

 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE POOR AS WELL AS THE RICH, THE YOUNG 
 AS WELL AS THE OLD, SHOULD GIVE 
 
 THERE is a tendency for the poorer members of a church 
 to depend too much upon the givings of a few wealthier 
 members. But they should remember that giving is not a 
 means of grace devised only for the rich and well-to-do, 
 but for ALL ; and every one who has anything at all to give 
 should be eager to share in the privilege of helping on God's 
 cause. " The poor may be lovers of money, and yet have 
 very little of it." Many give nothing because they can't 
 give much. But a poor man is as much a steward of what 
 God entrusts to him as a rich man. 
 
 This is a matter that concerns " EVERY ONE OF YOU," 
 old and young, rich and poor, as well as those who have 
 " neither poverty nor riches." It is not a matter where 
 undue pressure should be used. But having endeavoured 
 to show what God's will is, we would leave each one to act 
 according to the dictates of his own conscience, in the 
 light of a judgment day, and as he is constrained by love 
 to the Saviour. 
 
 The poor man may find consolation from the reflection 
 that the mere expenditure of money can never save 
 the world, but the pouring forth of life and soul and 
 spirit. All those our Lord spent spent in God-like fashion 
 but not money. Of all means for the saving of the 
 world, or for doing good as it is called, money comes far 
 behind these more costly gifts. 
 
 I read lately in a Church Magazine a well-earned tribute 
 157
 
 158 OUR GIVING. 
 
 paid to a Working woman, engaged from 6 o'clock in the 
 morning to 6 o'clock at night, who had for 51 years collected 
 for one of the Church funds ' ' with a cheerfulness and tact 
 which had won for her the affectionate regard of all with 
 whom she had come in contact." Money help seems poor 
 beside such willing labour for the Lord. While it is true 
 that to give time and to take trouble, to give service and 
 help, to labour and to work for God is far more valuable 
 in many cases than to give money (which is really just the 
 very least we can do and often costs us little), still there is 
 much that money can do. God needs it and asks for it, and 
 it is very important that all should feel it to be their duty 
 to give, even the poorest. Our giving is to be universal 
 " Every one of you " (i Cor. xvi. 2). " What a glorious 
 truth this unfolds ! God will not deprive one of His 
 children even the poorest of the luxury of imitating 
 Him," or of the sanctifying influence of giving to His cause. 
 " The poor have always been identified with the Gospel 
 both as to receiving it and spreading it ; and the weekly 
 giving runs alongside the weekly wage received by those 
 who are the backbone of Christianity." The poor man is 
 as responsible to God for the administration of his pittance 
 as the rich man of his abundance. Of course the possessors 
 of higher incomes can give more, but the pence of the poor 
 are as precious in God's sight as the pounds of the rich. 
 The poor man's dove is an offering as acceptable to God as 
 the rich man's bullock. " For if there be first a willing 
 mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not 
 according to that he hath not' (2 Cor. viii. 12). Giving is 
 a means of grace, and, as such, cannot be for one class more 
 than another ; because all things that are necessary for true 
 happiness and holiness are as free to the poor as to the rich. 
 " The greatness of the sum, or the result produced by the 
 amount, is not the great thought, but the training, culture, 
 and spiritual education of the children of the Father." 
 God would have both rich and poor, each in their proper 
 place, to give. The question whether they are able to give
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 159 
 
 in pence or pounds is small compared with the greater 
 principle involved of each giving according to the utmost 
 of his ability, and in proportion as the Lord has prospered 
 him. But how common it is to find the working classes 
 not to speak of the poor excusing themselves, burying 
 the one talent which has been given them and depriving 
 themselves of much happiness. They regard God's claims 
 as on the same footing with the income-tax, from which all 
 whose incomes are under a certain amount are exempt. 
 It cannot be wondered at if such " often also do not prosper 
 temporally ; because, as they are not faithful over the little 
 with which God is pleased to entrust to them, He cannot 
 entrust them with more, unless He does so, as He did to 
 Israel (Ps. cvi. 15), in the way of chastisement, and send 
 leanness into their soul. They withhold " more than is 
 meet," and " it tendeth to poverty." God can take or keep 
 from those who will not give. The very reason why many 
 have so little may often be because they keep all which 
 the Lord is pleased to give them to themselves. " Charity 
 begins at home," say they ; forgetting that " it should 
 not end there." 
 
 Don't let the poor man say, " It is easy for the rich to 
 give, but not for me." That is " a mere make-shift to set 
 the supposed burden on the shoulder of another. For if you 
 cannot give say one penny out of your tenpence, far less 
 would your heart allow you to give a pound if you had ten, 
 or give a hundred if you should fall heir to a thousand. 
 Observation will tell, facts will show, experience will prove, 
 that the facility or easiness of a man's giving does not 
 increase with the increase of his wealth, but rather the 
 reverse." Let the poor man be faithful in that which is 
 little, and he may soon have an opportunity of being faithful 
 in that which is much (see Luke xvi. 10). If he waits until 
 he gets so much more, thinking that " then he will be able 
 to be useful, and to give freely, and do much good," he 
 makes a great mistake, and loses a great blessing. It is 
 a most unreasonable and injurious idea which some have,
 
 160 OUR GIVING. 
 
 that the rich should be the support of God's cause on the 
 earth. 
 
 The Rev. F. Bourdillon says : 
 
 " We are all stewards, and God is our Master. He has 
 intrusted us with His goods, some with more, some with 
 less. Whatever we have is not ours, but His, and we are 
 accountable to Him for the use of it. It is to be used, not 
 for our pleasure merely, but in the service of God and in 
 doing good. It is more easy to understand this with regard 
 to a rich man than a poor man, especially for those who are 
 poor themselves. We sometimes hear it said about one 
 who is very rich indeed, but who has not learned to make 
 a right use of his riches : " He does not make good use of 
 his money," as if he were bound to do good with his money 
 because he has so much. But why the rich man only ? 
 Why not the poor also ? Both are God's stewards. To 
 the rich man God hath committed much, to the poor 
 man little ; but the poor man is just as much bound to 
 spend his little aright as the rich man is to spend his wealth. 
 Besides, money is not all. A steward has all sorts of goods 
 in his charge, and so has God's steward. Money is one sort, 
 but time and health and strength are goods also. Every 
 one has something. Every one is a steward of God." 
 
 " Where there is a will, there is a way." So thought the 
 poor old yarn-spinner, who, when she could not otherwise 
 spare anything for the missionaries, spun an extra hank 
 every week, and thus was enabled to contribute her penny 
 to the good cause. " One must be poor to know the luxury 
 of giving. Every gift that requires self-denial doubles its 
 value and the giver's joy." One might safely say more 
 than doubles these. 
 
 " In what terms does Paul lay down the law to the work- 
 ing-man ? ' Working with his hands the thing \vhich is 
 good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.' . . 
 Paul knew that there were other enjoyments, to one who 
 had been cleansed in the blood of Christ, than those of sense, 
 the luxury of doing good, the happiness of making others
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 161 
 
 happy, of wiping away the tears of sorrow, of relieving the 
 groans of misery, of seeing Jesus honoured, and Satan 
 bruised under His feet. He knew that labour, thus conse- 
 crated by the sacredness and the grandeur of its end, was 
 sweeter to a redeemed soul than rest, and was, in truth, only 
 one development of that great law under which every true 
 Christian lives, ' Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all 
 in the name of the Lord Jesus.' " 
 
 Many years ago the Rev. Principal Brown, of Aberdeen, 
 in his closing address as Moderator of the General Assembly 
 of what was then the Free Church of Scotland, said : " How 
 as the vast and varied work committed to them rose into 
 prominence, were they to obtain the funds, without which 
 it could not be done. ... It would not do to depend 
 on the wealthy members of the Church. They must go 
 down to the lowest strata of their membership and instead 
 of treating them as if they were too poor to give anything 
 for Him Who redeemed them, they ought to be asked if 
 they knew the grace of their Lord Jesus Christ, and that 
 though He was rich yet He became poor, that they through 
 His poverty might be rich ; and if that grace had reached 
 their hearts, they would not ask to be excused from giving 
 anything to promote His cause, but rather seek to be allowed 
 to do it remembering, however little they possessed and 
 could afford to give, the widow's mite was more valued by 
 Him Who knew that she gave it out of her penury, than 
 all that the rich gave of their superfluity. 
 
 "If there were time for it, he would like to produce to 
 them the most beautiful picture of Christian generosity 
 from the highest of all principles which the New Testament 
 contained. It was the case of the churches of Macedonia. 
 That country had been desolated by wars, which had 
 impoverished its people. Its mines, which were its wealth, 
 had been seized by the State, and for working them the 
 people received wages ; but their taxes were so heavy that 
 the Government was obliged to reduce them. They would 
 think that the churches of that region, impoverished to the 
 
 O.G. L
 
 162 OUR GIVING. 
 
 last degree, and kept down by continued oppression, would 
 be among the last to which the apostle would be likely to 
 go for money. But he was not of that opinion. The 
 churches exceeded their liberality in giving, and the 
 apostle would hardly take it from them, and had to be 
 pra3^ed with much entreaty to do so. If grace could so 
 open the sluices of Christian liberality in such poor and per- 
 secuted churches, could any Christian doubt that the same 
 grace was able to open the springs of Christian liberality 
 on all their people down to the lowest, and up to the 
 highest, and in all their congregations, that their coffers 
 would be filled to overflowing ? 
 
 " The apostle's plan of systematic beneficence, he could 
 not but think, if carried out by them, would work wonders. 
 He enjoined that each member of the Church should, on the 
 first day of the week, lay by him in store or in some 
 receptacle for the purpose such a weekly proportion of his 
 means, as, when completed, might be judged a fitting 
 contribution from them for all philanthropic and missionary 
 purposes ; in which case, though the weekly sum might 
 bt small, the sum total would, perhaps, surprise themselves. 
 And when they looked abroad over the vast field of the 
 world, as their sphere of work for Christ at home and 
 abroad, could any Christian for a moment expect that the 
 whole earth was to be subdued to Christ without an out- 
 pouring of silver and gold, such as they had never yet seen ? 
 No, certainly ; but it would come, and let it be theirs 
 to hasten it on by doing their own utmost to promote it." 
 
 No doubt the offerings of the poor, when contrasted with 
 those of the rich, appear insignificant in the eyes of men ; but 
 not so in the sight of God, Who looketh, not upon the outward 
 appearance, but into the heart. Those who are poor 
 in the things of this world, may yet be " rich in good works," 
 and, " in a proportionate sense, the most liberal contributors 
 to the cause of Christ." The poor man's gift may be " far 
 more acceptable than the careless bounty which entails no 
 self-denial, nor curtails one of the many luxuries with which
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 163 
 
 the donor is surrounded." It is to teach this lesson that 
 the giving of the widow's mites is recorded on the sacred 
 page of Scripture (see Mark xii. 41-44). This was "the 
 pattern which throws completely into the shade all other 
 patterns of the kind ever heard of." This poor widow was 
 grieved, no doubt, that her offering was so small ; yet, " she 
 did what she could," and did it with a single eye to the glory 
 of God. " She had two mites, which make a farthing, and 
 she gave the widow's farthing, and not merely the mite : 
 the divided state of her purse gave occasion to show the 
 undivided state of her heart." " Her unparalleled liber- 
 ality was one of the fruits of her pre-eminent faith." Christ, 
 " so far from ignoring her offering, took special notice of it," 
 and it is recorded that we may be constrained to " go and 
 do likewise," " in spirit, although not exactly in letter." 
 Jesus sat over against the treasury " in order to remind 
 His people, not only at that time, but in all ages, that no 
 voluntary offerings, even the least, rendered to Jehovah, 
 ever pass unnoticed." May it not more often and more 
 truly be said of the poor than of the rich they have done what 
 they could ? 
 
 " If you cannot give your thousands, 
 
 You can give the widow's mite ; 
 And the least you do for Jesus 
 
 Will be precious in His sight." 
 
 " Whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little 
 ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, 
 verily I say unto you, ha shall in no wise lose his reward " 
 (Matt. x. 42). " Tried by the standard of proportion, the 
 largest offerings of the rich are often, in the sight of the 
 Omniscient One, the least, and the least offerings of the poor 
 often the largest." " There is no much or little in God's 
 sight, except as relatively to our means and willingness." 
 " The pence of the poor may be great tokens of gratitude. 
 They are little, but they are given out of little ; and no one 
 knows that better than God. He sees what they have 
 been spared from." God " would have the poor man do as 
 
 L2
 
 164 OUR GIVING. 
 
 noble deeds with pence as a rich man can do with pounds." 
 But no one can be noble so long as he makes self the centre 
 towards which he would have everything to flow. Giving 
 is a great help to getting away from self. Giving " goes 
 entirely against all the principles of the natural heart so 
 utterly selfish, and brings in the very principles of heaven's 
 unselfishness to mortal men witnessing for God on earth. 
 If grace sent its taxations, the poor might complain ; but 
 when grace sends its instruments of sanctification, the 
 poorest member would feel neglected by being left out." 
 
 Many of the poor give nobly though their gifts do not 
 bulk largely in the eyes of men. 
 
 " Do you remember how Bishop Patteson rebuked one 
 of his settlers ? The man was proud of his large contribution 
 to the building of the missionary church ; and, when the 
 seats were being allocated, he suggested that the largest 
 contributors should first choose. ' That I willingly agree 
 to,' said the Bishop ; ' but how shall we know who they 
 are ? ' ' The sums are noted down," replied the rich man. 
 'Ah, yes,' said the Bishop, 'I know that the sums are 
 noted down ; but that teaches me nothing : for do you not 
 remember, the widow who gave the two mites gave more 
 than they all? " 
 
 " None, it is true," said the Rev. Dr. Guthrie, " are so 
 kind to the poor as the poor, making sacrifices for each other 
 which put to shame those who look down on them. How 
 often have 1 known instances of their watching, after a 
 hard day's work, through the live-long night, by the bed 
 of a suffering neighbour ? People whose charity never 
 seriously interferes with their daily comforts think they do 
 well when doling out a shilling, half-a-crown, or the double 
 of it, to help a distressed family. But God's balances 
 weigh differently from ours ; and the humble washer- 
 woman, for instance, who gives nothing save a night's 
 watching, but, giving that, unfits herself for the next day's 
 work and forfeits its wages, is, in relation to her means and 
 circumstances, a more magnificent donor."
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 165 
 
 " None but God and the poor know what the poor do 
 for each other." 
 
 " For the poor man alone, 
 When he hears the poor groan, 
 Of his morsel a morsel will spare." 
 
 " At the tune the Bible Society was engaged in collecting 
 money to send the New Testament to China, a poor and 
 aged widow at Hereford denied herself the use of her usual 
 candle for eight winter evenings, in order to save fourpence 
 to send the better light of Divine truth to some benighted 
 Chinaman ! 
 
 " When Andrew Fuller visited the City of Bath, to plead 
 the cause of missions to the heathen, a poor widow came into 
 the vestry at the close of the sermon to give him a half- 
 penny, which was literally all her substance. As no one 
 else had contributed anything, Mr. Fuller gravely drew forth 
 his book, and wrote down in the accounts, ' Bath, Jd.' This 
 shamed the bystanders into liberality, and he left the city 
 with a handsome sum." 
 
 What a touching story Mr. Broomhall tells in " Faith and 
 Facts," of the poor widow who, out of her deep poverty for 
 many years contributed so liberally for the support of the 
 Lord's work in China and elsewhere. She received 23. a 
 week from the Parochial Board, is. a week for cleaning an 
 office and, with the assistance of friends, was enabled to 
 maintain her little home. " Poor in this world's goods 
 she was yet rich in faith, and abounded in good works." 
 
 The letters received from her, \phich Mr. Broomhall 
 prints, reveal the gracious feelings of a heart deep taught 
 by God. On one occasion she speaks of having " a battle 
 about it," before she was enabled to part cheerfully with 
 money which she feared she might need for herself. But 
 she writes : " I thought of what Jesus had done for me, 
 and of the blessings I was always asking from Him, and I 
 just spread the money before Him on my chair and knelt 
 and gave it over to Him. As I gave it, how happy I felt. 
 Ah, dear friend, the Lord will not be in any one's debt long.
 
 166 OUR GIVING. 
 
 Oh, it is good to get spiritual blessings for temporal gifts. 
 He is so good, praise the Lord." She kept a little box into 
 which her dedicated money was put. The story of her life 
 of prayer and self-denial for God's kingdom might well be 
 an inspiration to God's children, especially to those who 
 think they are too poor to give at all. Well may Mr. 
 Broomhall's sister (Mrs. Hoste), who went to see the 
 old lady, say they could thank God upon every remembrance 
 of her. 
 
 The Story of Khek-Peh. What a wonderful story of the 
 transforming power of God's grace is that which is told in 
 the last chapter of Mr. Campbell Brown's most interesting 
 book, " China hi Legend and Story," entitled "Commuted 
 Values." He tells of Khek-Peh, the lonely miser who lived 
 in a single room in a straggling native house in Chinchew. 
 He gained his living by hawking sweet potatoes through the 
 streets, and, although of a somewhat hard exterior, his 
 customers recognized in him an honest man. He had 
 apparently much good sense, but was a silent man. " His 
 dress was of the simplest, consisting of a blue cotton jacket 
 and short loose trousers. 
 
 " When the day's work was over, the old man would go 
 home to cook his evening meal. The coarsest fare sufficed 
 for his wants. A few potatoes somewhat damaged, or too 
 small to meet the wishes of his customers, were all he allowed 
 himself for food. . . . When the door of the pedlar's 
 room was bolted for the night, the day's earnings were 
 counted over with a scrupulous care that left no coin 
 untested. There was a box beneath the bed, in which a 
 percentage of the daily profits, however small, was placed 
 by the side of a growing roll of silver dollars and the title- 
 deeds of a shop acquired by years of painful trading. This 
 box was the shrine of Khek-Peh's worship ; it held his idol. 
 
 " It was a supreme moment when, the toils of the day 
 well ended, the wooden chest was drawn from its hiding- 
 place and opened." Then the solitary and penurious toiler 
 gloated over his hoard.
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 167 
 
 " He had already passed the .limit of threescore years 
 when strange rumours began to spread among the neigh- 
 bours. Barbarians had come to the City, who spoke of 
 life beyond the grave, and called common folk to worship 
 the Supreme Ruler, in Whose presence Wen Wang serves 
 on High. It was most perplexing and bad too, no doubt ; 
 for had not all the world been warned by the sacred edict 
 to beware of strange doctrines ? 
 
 " Khek-Peh was soon to make experiment of the new 
 teaching for himself. Happening to suffer from an ailment 
 which often troubled him, he sought advice from the foreign 
 doctor. The barbarian was strangely kind, and the treat- 
 ment did him good ; whilst in the hospital chapel he heard 
 words which stirred his heart and made him wish they might 
 be true. Besides, there were folk there, Chinchew people 
 like himself, who understood these words and could explain 
 them, and how could one " who did not even know the 
 character for nail ' (one of the simplest of the Chinese 
 characters), dispute with folk on matters of religion ? 
 
 " The old man found healing for both soul and body at 
 the hospital. Light dawned on the dim spirit, the intract- 
 able stony nature woke to life ; a new love trembled into 
 being, and he was changed. 
 
 " The lust of gain, however, died hard, and though it 
 lessened as he grew in knowledge, it cost him many a strug- 
 gle. The wrinkled face was the same, but a lamp new 
 kindled shone behind it." His customers saw a difference 
 in his way of bargaining. 
 
 " In course of time Khek-peh was received into the Church 
 of Christ. He plied his business keenly as before, but 
 found perhaps less pleasure in the chest beneath the bed. 
 As the new interests invaded his life, they slowly changed 
 the old." 
 
 His fellow-members in the Church found in him a faithful 
 spirit. His knowledge was not great, but his life was con- 
 sistent, and his judgment was sound. After a tune he was 
 appointed an elder. He said little, but in his humble way
 
 168 OUR GIVING. 
 
 he served the Church. ' None knew the battles which he 
 fought within his soul.' His faults slowly disappeared ; 
 even his besetting sin, avarice, was subdued. 
 
 One day Ngo Sien-si, the native minister of the Church, 
 called upon a friend with a message from Khek-peh, to the 
 effect that he wanted to give his savings for God's work, 
 and desired the friend to suggest the object to which the 
 money should go. 
 
 " ' Why not give it to the poor ? ' said his friend, thinking 
 that the old man, who lived so hardly and went so scantily 
 clad, could have but little to bestow. Or, he suggested 
 that he should keep his savings in the meantime in case of 
 need, and leave them to the Church at his death. But the 
 pastor was afraid Khek-peh would not agree to do that ; 
 and, sure enough, he returned next day to say that the old 
 man had quite made up his mind to give the money 
 without delay, saying that God would care for him as in 
 the past. 
 
 " ' Well, I suppose the sum is but a small one, and the old 
 man ought to follow his own mind in disposing of it.' 
 
 ' It amounts to six hundred dollars,' said the 
 minister. 
 
 " ' Six hundred dollars 1 ' gasped the other, in amazement, 
 ' Why, no one would imagine that Khek-peh had six 
 hundred cash to give away.' 
 
 " ' Yes, he looks very poor ; but he has worked hard all 
 his life, living on beggar's fare and spending almost nothing 
 on himself. The money has been his idol, and now he wishes 
 to put it away.' 
 
 '"He has decided to part with all his money now ? ' 
 queried the friend, almost overcome by the idea. 
 
 " ' Yes, he told me he had quite decided, saying, " The 
 Saviour gave all for me, and the least that I can do is to give 
 something in return to Him Who loved me so." ' 
 
 " Love had conquered the hard nature : the lifelong 
 treasure had been laid at Jesus' feet." 
 
 To these examples of the Poor giving may be added the
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 169 
 
 story which the Rev. Theophile Rivier tells in his book, 
 " Christian Liberality," translated from the French : 
 
 " A young Irish girl, called Margaret, had been committed 
 by her dying mother to the care of a lady, who brought her 
 up as her servant, without giving her other wages than her 
 food and clothing. The Divine Word, which she heard 
 preached, sank into Margaret's heart, as the rain from 
 heaven into the thirsty ground. Under the influence 
 of the truth she was completely changed, her character, her 
 conduct, even her appearance. Her mistress was so pleased 
 with her service that she gave her moderate wages, that she 
 might ensure her remaining with her. ' A few months 
 afterwards/ writes the minister from whom we heard the 
 fact, ' she came to me after Divine service, and with a glad 
 look slipped a pound note into my hand. " Margaret," I 
 asked, "What does this mean ?" " Sir," she answered, " it 
 is the first money that I have ever earned ; could I spend it 
 on myself, and forget my country ? No 1 it is for poor 
 Ireland, for my dear country ; I wish this money to be 
 given to help to preach the precious Gospel to my fellow- 
 countrymen, who do not know it." " Margaret," I said to 
 her, " it is too much, you need it yourself ; I cannot take 
 all that." " Oh, sir," she exclaimed, with Irish vivacity 
 " if you will not take it all I shall not sleep for a fortnight I " 
 And leaving the bank-note with me, she went away, saying : 
 " May God bless my poor country and teach it to know the 
 Gospel ! " ' " 
 
 He also tells of a poor working-man who, having only 
 bare necessaries, found it difficult to retrench, sacrificed his 
 tobacco in order to give to the cause of missions, and when 
 his children saw what he was doing they also were moved to 
 make sacrifices for the same good cause. 
 
 It is not unusual, for those in comparatively comfortable 
 circumstances, to plead poverty whenever they are asked 
 to give, often, no doubt, deceiving themselves, in then- 
 anxiety to give at the least possible rate. But in this matter 
 we must " be honest and true with God," for it is with Him
 
 iyo OUR GIVING. 
 
 alone we have to do. " Riches consist, not only in the 
 extent of our possessions, but in the fewness of our wants." 
 There are those who spend much on family and domestic 
 comforts, and even luxuries, who yet plead inability to give 
 to God's cause. And how many there are who, neglecting 
 almost entirely their duty towards God in this respect, 
 sacrifice everything to the maintenance, present or future, 
 of that respectability which is the idol of their hearts and the 
 ambition of their lives. It is a Christian's duty, with a 
 view to liberality, to see that he is not wasteful or lavish in 
 his expenditure. Ha must be faithful in the use of that 
 which is entrusted to him. Those to whom it is a luxury 
 to give, will be ready to deny themselves, and to live 
 frugally, that they may have the more to give. They will 
 say, with David, " Neither will I offer burnt-offerings to the 
 Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing." " It is 
 poor Christian love which will not forego some enjoyment or 
 indulgence, and by self-denial spare, at least, a tenth for the 
 eternal welfare of men and the glory of Christ ; and sorry 
 faith which cannot give it in confidence in the loving bounty 
 of an Almighty Father." " There is nothing like bitters 
 to give you an appetite, and it is when you give away what 
 you want that you enjoy what is left." 
 
 When Christians realize that they are the Lord's stewards, 
 all their expenditure should become sacred and religious, 
 and, if so, "a very large expenditure by Christian people 
 would come to an end, and be diverted to better channels." 
 " It should be a thought with every Christian : Is this 
 (whatever it be) a warrantable way for me as His steward to 
 spend my Lord's money ? From that to the privilege of 
 spending it as He would wish is an easy step, and one that 
 would be oftener taken." 
 
 " We are to spend what is really needful on ourselves, 
 because it is our charge to do so ; but not for ourselves, 
 because we are not our own, but our Master's." Thus the 
 consecration of our means may be real and complete ; but it 
 cannot exist along with self-indulgence and extravagance,
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 171 
 
 or even when there is no cheerful self-denial, no giving up of 
 questionable and worse than useless habits, and expensive 
 tastes. If we observe carefully, we will find that " the 
 more closely we are walking with our Lord, the more 
 immediate and unmistakable will be His gracious rebukes 
 when we swerve in any detail of the full consecration to 
 which He has called us." 
 
 " How many poor ones might be helped, how many 
 ignorant children instructed, how many home-heathen 
 have the Gospel sent to them by the tract, the Scriptural 
 book, and the living voice of the faithful missionary, by 
 the money that is worse than wasted upon the very super- 
 fluities of hurtful luxury ! Oh that men would consecrate 
 their gain to the Lord ! " 
 
 Our Lord will one day return, and will reckon with us, 
 His servants, for all that He entrusted to us our time, 
 strength, influence, opportunities, gifts, money. And, oh ! 
 how can we face Him if we have to confess that these have 
 been rolled in the napkin of selfishness, and buried in the 
 earth of our own worldly advancement and comfort ? 
 
 " All should have the opportunity afforded them of giving 
 according to their means. Those who contribute more 
 liberally than others should not become impatient with 
 those who give inadequately ; they should bear in mind that 
 God's people must ' be made willing in the day of His 
 power,' and that one way of promoting this end is to continue 
 to show a good example, and not allow a bad example to 
 impair one's liberality." Let each do his own duty. By 
 setting a good example others may be led to follow. 
 " Let those give now who never gave before; 
 And those who always gave, now give the more." 
 
 It is apt to have a discouraging effect on poorer members 
 when those, who are able, do not give liberally ; but it is 
 also apt to discourage those who are able and willing to give 
 much, when the less highly favoured neglect to give to the 
 extent of their ability.
 
 1 72 OUR GIVING. 
 
 " God loveth the cheerful giver, 
 
 Though the gift be poor and small ; 
 What doth He think of His children 
 When they never give at all ? " 
 
 It is also of very great importance that the young be 
 trained to give liberally. What might not be done in the 
 next few generations, if our children were educated as they 
 ought to be in this matter ? If in youth they were led to 
 acquire the habit of giving largely, and were taught to look 
 upon giving as a blessed and happy privilege, and not as a 
 disagreeable tax, they would, in all probability, as they grew 
 up, find increasing pleasure and satisfaction in giving freely 
 to every good cause. " Learn young, learn fair ; Learn 
 auld, learn sair," is true, regarding this as well as other 
 things. We may be poor, but our children may live to 
 be rich, and have much to give. Let us see to it that our 
 example in this respect be such as to influence them for 
 good. 
 
 A story is told regarding Thomas a Becket's mother. 
 " She was a good woman, who did all she could to raise her 
 son up to be a thoughtful, charitable, and religious man. 
 Every birthday she took her son, and seating him in the 
 kitchen scales, she placed against him in the balance his 
 weight of food and clothing to be given to the poor. The 
 longer the boy was spared and the heavier he got, the more 
 were her gifts to the poor people round about. This 
 weighing against him of good gifts sunk into the Arch- 
 bishop's heart and influenced his life." 
 
 It is told of a little boy, about seven years old, who lived 
 many years ago, that he one day put into the plate a bag 
 containing 285 farthings ( =53. 1 1 Jd.), which he had received 
 from his mother for going errands. He must surely have 
 had good teaching, or a good example. 
 
 We must reduce our precepts to practice if we wish them 
 to have weight with the young. If our children see us 
 always giving the smallest contributions we can, and doing 
 it with a grumble, or, at least, without apparent pleasure ;
 
 EVERYONE SHOULD GIVE. 173 
 
 or if they are not trained to give of their own, and to take 
 an interest in what they give to, can we wonder if they 
 grow up without any charitable feeling ? 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Tweedie said : 
 
 " One remedy for the evil of covetousness is found in the 
 right training of the young in regard to the claims of God. 
 Who has not seen a youthful miser selfishly treasuring all 
 that he could collect, or a youthful spendthrift as selfishly 
 squandering, or a youthful epicure forgetful of everything 
 except his own gratification ? Now as ' the child is father 
 to the man,' such youthful tendencies demand a systematic 
 correction. Self-denial is to be fostered like every other 
 grace. The habit of giving to God's cause is to be taught by 
 careful and habitual training, ere the heart be ossified, or 
 rather steeled, by the world ; and only when that is done 
 and blessed by the Spirit of God need we expect His cause 
 to prosper. The injunction ' Feed My lambs ' demands the 
 inculcation of truth upon the subject of giving as upon 
 every other." 
 
 The Rev. Thos. S. Dickson said : 
 
 " It is to be remembered, besides, that there are passing 
 from school-life into the ranks of earners, year by year, 
 thousands of young people, to whom the question should at 
 once present itself for practical solution, ' How much of 
 my weekly wage, or year's salary, should I set apart as 
 the Lord's portion, sacred first-fruits, in glad recognition that 
 the power to earn money comes to me from God ? What 
 an impulse all our schemes and funds would receive, if all 
 the members and adherents of our Church would henceforth 
 resolve to give, not according to use and wont, caprice, or 
 sentiment, but on system and in due proportion, ' as the 
 Lord hath prospered '1 The Lord's treasury would over- 
 flow. 
 
 " When Spurgeon was a mere lad, he adopted the principle 
 of giving a tenth to the Lord. Having won a money-prize 
 for an essay on a religious subject, he felt he could not give 
 less than one-fifth of it. Afterwards he was never able to
 
 174 UR GIVING. 
 
 deny himself the pleasure of giving a fifth ; and, as every- 
 body knows, God wonderfully blessed and increased his 
 means and his enjoyment of the luxury of giving. His 
 was a case of lifelong proportionate ungrudging giving." 
 
 A large number of the members of the Church consists 
 of young people who have recently joined, and these, to a 
 considerable extent, do not appear to feel that any obliga- 
 tion lies upon them to give to the funds of the Church. This 
 sometimes arises from the fact that they are still entirely 
 dependent upon their parents for support, and have little 
 or no money that they can call their own. But, on the 
 other hand, there are very many young people, especially 
 young men, with small incomes of their own, who do nothing 
 in the way of giving, and who seem to imagine that such a 
 testimony to their love for the Saviour is reserved as the 
 especial privilege of householders. 
 
 There can be do doubt that the Churches and the cause of 
 Christ lose greatly by such a feeling, and probably ministers 
 are more to blame for it than any others. If ministers 
 made it plain to young people (or old people) when they 
 propose to join the Church what the making of a profession 
 of faith in Christ, if real, involves, there would not be so 
 many in our Churches who come to the Communion Table, 
 but who neither do nor give anything for the sake of Him 
 Whom they profess to love and serve, and to Whom they 
 owe everything for time and eternity.
 
 WHAT SCRIPTURE SAYS ABOUT 
 GIVING
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 WHAT SCRIPTURE SAYS ABOUT GIVING 
 
 " IF there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren 
 within any of thy gates in thy land which the Lord thy God 
 giveth thee, thou shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut 
 thine hand from thy poor brother : but thou shalt open 
 thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend hjm 
 sufficient for his need, in that which he wanteth. Beware 
 that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying, 
 The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand ; and thine 
 eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him 
 nought ; and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be 
 sin unto thee. Thou shalt surely give him, and thine heart 
 shall not be grieved when thou givest unto him : because 
 that for this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all 
 thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. 
 For the poor shall never cease out of the land : therefore 
 I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide 
 unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy 
 land" (Deut. xv. 7-11). 
 
 " Neither will I offer burnt-offerings unto the Lord my 
 God of that which doth cost me nothing " (2 Sam. xxiv. 24). 
 
 " All things, come of Thee, and of Thine own have we 
 given Thee," &c. (i Chron. xxix. 14-16). 
 
 " Blessed is he that considereth the poor : the Lord will 
 deliver him in time of trouble " (Ps. xli. i). 
 
 " What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits 
 toward me ? " (Ps. cxvi. 12). 
 
 " Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the 
 O.G. 177 M
 
 178 OUR GIVING. 
 
 firstfruits of all thine increase : so shall thy barns be filled 
 with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new 
 wine " (Prov. iii. g, 10). 
 
 " Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when 
 it is in the power of thine hand to do it. Say not unto thy 
 neighbour, Go, and come again, and to-morrow I will give ; 
 when thou hast it by thee " (Prov. iii. 27, 28). 
 
 " There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth ; and there 
 is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to 
 poverty. The liberal soul shall be made fat : and he 
 that watereth shall be watered also himself " (Prov. xi. 
 
 24. 25). 
 
 " There is that maketh himself rich, yet hath nothing : 
 there is that maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches " 
 (Prov. xiii. 7). 
 
 " He that hath mercy on the poor, happy is he " (Prov. 
 xiv. 21). 
 
 " He that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his Maker : 
 but he that honoureth him hath mercy on the poor " 
 (Prov. xiv. 31). 
 
 " He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the 
 Lord ; and that which he hath given will He pay him 
 again " (Prov. xix. 17). 
 
 " Whoso stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also 
 shall cry himself, but shall not be heard " (Prov. xxi. 13). 
 
 " The righteous giveth and spareth not " (Prov. xxi. 26). 
 
 " He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed ; for he 
 giveth of his bread to the poor (Prov. xxii. 9). 
 
 " If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto 
 death, and those that are ready to be slain ; if thou sayest, 
 Behold, we knew it not ; doth not He that pondereth the 
 heart consider it ? and He that keepeth thy soul, doth not 
 He know it ? and shall not He render to every man accord- 
 ing to his works ? " (Prov. xxiv. n, 12). 
 
 " He that giveth unto the poor shall not lack : but he 
 that hideth his eyes shall have many a curse " (Prov. 
 xxviii. 27).
 
 WHAT SCRIPTURE SAYS ABOUT GIVING. 179 
 
 " The righteous considereth the cause of the poor : but 
 the wicked regardeth not to know it " (Prov. xxix. 7). 
 
 " There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, 
 namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt " 
 (Eccles. v. 13). 
 
 " The silver is Mine, and the gold is Mine, saith the Lord 
 of hosts " (Haggai. ii. 8). 
 
 " By their fruits ye shall know them " (Matt. vii. 20). 
 
 " Freely ye have received, freely give " (Matt. x. 8). 
 
 " Sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and 
 thou shalt have treasure in Heaven " (Mark x. 21). 
 
 " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself " (Mark 
 xii. 31). 
 
 " Give, and it shall be given unto you ; good measure, 
 pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, 
 shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure 
 that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again " 
 (Luke vi. 38). 
 
 " Sell that ye have, and give alms : provide yourselves 
 bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that 
 faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth 
 corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will your 
 heart be also " (Luke xii. 33, 34). 
 
 " Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much 
 required " (Luke xii. 48). 
 
 " How much owest thou ? " (Luke xvi. 5). 
 
 " Occupy till I come " (Luke xix. 13). 
 
 " It is more blessed to give than to receive " (Acts 
 
 xx- 35)- 
 
 " What hast thou that thou didst not receive ? " (i Cor. 
 
 iv. 7). 
 
 " Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay 
 by him in store, as God hath prospered him " (i Cor. xvi. 2). 
 
 " For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, 
 though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that 
 ye through His poverty might be rich " (2 Cor. viii. 9). 
 
 " He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly ; 
 
 M2
 
 i8o OUR GIVING. 
 
 and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully " 
 (2 Cor. ix. 6). 
 
 " Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so 
 let him give ; not grudgingly, or of necessity : for God 
 loveth a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace 
 abound toward you ; that ye, always having all-sufficiency 
 in all things, may abound to every good work " (2 Cor. 
 . 7, 8). 
 
 " Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of 
 Christ " (Gal. vi. 2). 
 
 " Working with his hands the thing which is good, that 
 he may have to give to him that needeth " (Eph. iv. 28). 
 
 " Remember them which suffer adversity, as being 
 yourselves also in the body " (Heb. xiii. 3). 
 
 "To do good and to communicate forget not ; for with 
 such sacrifices God is well pleased " (Heb. xiii. 16). 
 
 " Whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother 
 have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from 
 him, how dwelleth the love of God in him ? My little 
 children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue ; but in 
 deed and in truth " (i John iii. 17, 18). 
 
 SEE ALSO THE FOLLOWING PASSAGES ; 
 
 Gen. xiv. 20. Abraham's tithes. 
 Gen. xxviii. 22. Jacob's tenth. 
 Exod. xxiii. 15. None to appear before God empty. 
 Exod. xxxv. 4, 5, 20, 21 ; and xxxvi. 4-7. Giving too 
 much ! 
 
 Lev. xxvii. 30-33. Tithes holy unto the Lord. 
 
 Num. vii. Princely giving. 
 
 Num. xviii. 21, 24. A tenth for the Levites. 
 
 Deut. viii. 10-18. Prosperity from God 
 
 Deut. xiv. 22, 29. Concerning tithes. 
 
 Deut. xvi., 10, 16, 17. Israelite's free-will offerings. 
 
 1 Kings xvii. 8-16. The Widow of Zarephath. 
 
 2 Kings iv. 8-10. The Good Shunammite. 
 i Chron. xvi. 29. Offerings and worship.
 
 WHAT SCRIPTURE SAYS ABOUT GIVING. 181 
 
 1 Chron. xxix. 9. Joyful giving. 
 
 2 Chron. xxxi. 5-12. Abundance for the priests and 
 Levites. 
 
 Neh. x. 32-39 ; xii. 44 ; xiii. 12. 
 
 Prov. xxviii. 8. God disposes. 
 
 Isa. Iviii. 6-n. How to get a blessing. 
 
 Haggai. i. 5-11. Why blessing was withheld. 
 
 Mai. iii. 8-12. Robbing God. 
 
 Matt. vi. i, 2. The wrong way to give. 
 
 Matt. vi. 3, 4. The right way to give. 
 
 Matt. vi. 19-21. Lay up treasures hi Heaven. 
 
 Matt. vii. 12. The golden rule. 
 
 Matt. x. 42. A cup of cold water. 
 
 Matt. xiii. 22. " The deceitfulness of riches." 
 
 Matt. xxi. 18, 19. " Nothing but leaves I " 
 
 Matt, xxiii. 23. Giving is not grace. 
 
 Matt. xxv. 14-30. The talents. 
 
 Matt. xxv. 31-40. " Ye have done it unto Me." 
 
 Matt. xxv. 41-46." Ye did it not to Me." 
 
 Matt, xx vi. 6-13. The box of precious ointment. 
 
 Mark x. 23. Riches are dangerous. 
 
 Mark xii. 41-44. The widow's mites. 
 
 Mark xvi. 15. Give for the Gospel. 
 
 Luke x. 29-37. The Good Samaritan. 
 
 Luke xi. 42. Giving is not everything. 
 
 Luke xii. 15-21. " Not rich toward God." 
 
 Luke xiii. 6-9. The barren fig-tree. 
 
 Luke xvi. 1-12. The unjust steward. 
 
 Luke xvi. 19-31. The rich man and Lazarus. 
 
 Luke xviii. 28-30. A manifold reward. 
 
 Luke xix. 8. The giving of Zaccheus. 
 
 Acts ii. 44, 45 ; iv. 31-37. Having " all things common." 
 
 Acts v. i-n. Pretending to have " all things common." 
 
 Acts ix. 36-42. Dorcas. 
 
 Acts x. 1-4, 31. Pray and give. Give and pray. 
 
 Rom. arii. 13. Distribute, and be hospitable. 
 
 Rom. xv. 27. Recognizing spiritual benefits.
 
 182 OUR GIVING. 
 
 i Cor. ix. 11-14. Giving for the ministry. 
 
 1 Cor. xiii. 3. Unprofitable giving. 
 
 2 Cor. viii. and ix. On the grace of giving. 
 Gal. vi. 6-10. Sow to the Spirit. 
 
 Phil. iv. 16-19. Profitable to the givers, and " well- 
 pleasing to God." 
 
 i Tim. vi. 9, 10. The love of money a root of evil, 
 i Tim. vi. 17-19. A word to the rich. 
 Heb. vii. i-io. Abraham's tithes referred to. 
 James ii. 12-17. Faith without works. 
 James v. 1-6. Riches rising up in judgment.
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY OF WORKS AND ARTICLES QUOTED 
 
 The Privilege and Blessedness of Giving as Taught in Scripture," by George Mailer. 
 ' The New Testament Plan of Christian Finance " \ 
 
 " Church Economics," B f J* Rev - J oh n R. 
 
 " Uncle Ben's Bag," and others, ) 
 
 " What, When, and How to Give," from a Sermon by Rev. Andrew Thomson, D.D. 
 " The Great Giver Teaching to Give," by Rev. Andrew A. Bonar, D.D. 
 Address at Mildmay Conference, z6th June, 1879, by Rev. Andrew A. Bonar, D.D. 
 ' The Treasury of the Church," by a Minister of the Gospel. 
 " Rich toward God," by the Author of " God's Tenth." 
 " The Grace of Giving," by the Editor of the Y.M . C. Magazine, Glasgow. 
 " Where are the Pence of the Poor ? " by Rev. P. B. Power. 
 " Sermon on Christian Giving," by Rev. William Forwell, Dundee. 
 " Christian Giving," by Dr. W. P. Mackay, Hull. 
 " How to Raise Money without Subscription Books," by " J. G., Jun. 
 Address by Rev. Dr. Wilson, Edinburgh. May, 1880. 
 " Christian Liberality," published by William Clee, Cheltenham. 
 " A Consecrated Purse," Liverpool Evangelical Tract Agency. 
 " Consecrated Gold," S. W. Partridge & Co., London. 
 " Kept for the Master's Use, by Frances Ridley Havergal. 
 " Mister Horn and his Friends ; or, Givers and Giving," by the Rev. Mark Guy 
 
 Pearse. Tubbs & Brook, Manchester. 
 Reports, Speeches, and Writings of William Ferguson, Esq., of Kinraundy ; David 
 
 Dickson, Esq. ; Dr. Moir, Edinburgh ; and Others. 
 " The New Commandment," by the Rev. J. R. Vernon. 
 " The Counterfeit in Church Finance and Christian Giving, by Rev. Charles Jerdaa 
 
 M.A., LL.B. 
 
 " Money," by Rev. Andrew Murray. 
 
 " Personal Consecration and Offerings," by Rev. Canon M'Cormick, D.D. 
 " The Duty of Giving Away a Stated Proportion of our Income," by Wm. Arthur 
 
 A.M. 
 
 ' The Stewardship of Money," by Rev. F. B. Meyer. 
 " Faith and Facts," by Marshall Broomhall, B.A. 
 ' ' China in Legend and Story," by Rev. Campbell Brown. 
 ' Fancy Fair Religion," by Rev. J. Priestley Foster, M.A. 
 " Pastoral Address on Giving," by Rev. Chas. J. Brown, D.D. 
 " The Money Question, in Relation to Christian Giving and Ministerial Faithfulnen ," 
 
 by Andrew Common, J.P. 
 
 ' ' Christ's Terms of Discipleship," by Rev. James Hutchison, M.A., Glasgow. 
 ' ' Every One of You," by J. Forbes MoncrieS. 
 " Christian Liberality," by Rev. Theophile Rivier. 
 " The Conversion of the Pocket, etc.," by Rev. E. A. Watkins. 
 ' The Sacred Tenth," by Rev. Dr. Lansdell. 
 ' ' The Tithe in Scripture," by Rev. Dr. Lansdell. 
 "The Lord's Portion," Quarterly Magazine of the Proportionate Giving Uoloa. 
 
 Edited by Rev. E. A. Watkins, then by Rev. Thos. S. Dickson, and now by 
 
 Rev. James Silvester, M.A. 
 
 183
 
 REVIEWS OF THE 
 SECOND EDITION OF "OUR GIVING" 
 
 " You lay us all under obligation by your faithful 
 advocacy of Christian Giving." REV. PROF. LAIDLAW. 
 
 " This little volume is in every way worthy of extensive 
 circulation, for it sets forth clearly and ably the teaching 
 of Scripture on the important subject of ' giving.' " 
 U. P. Church Magazine. 
 
 " This is a re-publication of an instructive and stimu- 
 lating little work on the very important subject of 
 Christian Giving, and on the motives and manner of 
 giving. It has already been largely circulated ; and we 
 trust it will obtain a much wider circulation still." 
 The British Messenger. 
 
 " The attention of ministers throughout the country 
 has already been called to Mr. Forbes MoncriefFs 
 admirable little book on Giving. We hope that it will 
 become as universally known to all classes of people in 
 the Church." Free Church Monthly Record. 
 
 " The writer contends both earnestly and forcibly 
 for a deeper realisation of the Scriptural idea of 
 liberality. ' ' The Christian. 
 
 " We trust the book will speedily find its way among 
 all the congregations of the Evangelical Churches." 
 Daily Review. 
 
 " I believe it would be a wise step for the Church to 
 take were she to yet more largely circulate your work 
 on Giving at her own expense. I have no doubt but that 
 the proceeds even in money would be a thousand-fold, 
 and the spiritual blessing unmeasurable." A. C. 
 
 " A good many works have been recently published 
 on the subject of Christian liberality, but we know of 
 none so likely to be useful as this is. What might have 
 been spread out into a considerable volume is put into 
 
 185
 
 REVIEWS continued. 
 
 the compass of a few short chapters ; yet nothing is 
 omitted which bears on the duty, its extent, its sanctions, 
 its motives. We are glad to hear that it has been 
 already circulated in hundreds by committees of the 
 Free and U. P. Churches, and portions of it to the extent 
 of 20,000. The other churches will find nothing better 
 adapted for the purpose of stimulating the still dormant 
 grace of Christian liberality among their people, and we 
 hope what has been done in the way of circulation is but 
 a beginning. The moderate dimensions and moderate 
 price of the work adapt it for extensive circulation 
 gratuitously, and the outlay would surely be remunera- 
 tive. If Christian people were only brought to ponder 
 the weighty considerations here set forth, there would 
 be little need for the urgent appeals that have so often 
 to be made for the support of the various enterprises 
 in which the Churches and missionary societies are 
 engaged. ' ' Christian Week. 
 
 " Capital ! Oh, that every rich Christian would read 
 this book ! It would show him why to give, and how 
 much to give, and when to give, and what to give to. 
 After reading it himself, he should pass it on to some 
 brother millionaire, to whom it might be equally a bless- 
 ing. But, stop, it is not rich men alone who are to have 
 the honour and joy of giving. Those who work hard 
 for their bread are permitted to sweeten it by the gentle 
 offices of charity. This little treatise would put new 
 ideas of liberality into some heads. Spread it then." 
 The Sword and the Trowel. 
 
 " An admirable plea, earnest, but not extravagant, 
 for increased liberality. The conviction is growing, 
 that God's work makes a larger demand upon us than 
 we have as yet responded to. Recognising the fact that 
 not even the new birth will make men liberal, in spite 
 of themselves, the object of this little book is to educate 
 men to give, and to make their giving a willing offering. 
 It can hardly fail to raise the standard of giving with 
 those who will read it earnestly and prayerfully." 
 Sabbath School Chronicle. 
 
 MORGAN AND SCOTT LD., LONDON, ENGLAND.
 
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 Complete Catalogue sent post free 
 on application to 
 
 12, Paternoster Buildings, London, E.G.
 
 From Morgan & Scott's List. 
 
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