My oldest son has a part-time job and I’ve realized that our church doesn’t have anything set up to receive his tithing. Sure, he can drop cash in the offering, but there’s isn’t any communication, offering envelopes, or focus on his tithing. I realize that this is certainly the responsibility of my wife and I to teach him, but how cool would it be to have a focus in our youth ministry around tithing?
Within denominations, we seem to do a pretty good job of communicating assessments and the proposed cost per member or per family. I’ve been in plenty of churches that carry on that tradition and make it very clear how much each family has to commit to financially in order for the church to meet its financial obligations. I know that most Sunday schools have offerings as well. What I don’t see is much on the topic of youth tithing.
I’ve done some checking and there are resources and articles about tithing and how to share the topic with a youth group. Honestly though, until my own son started earning money, I didn’t realize how infrequently this is brought up with the youth of the church. I’ve had pastors tell me that they get criticized for preaching on the topic to the congregation, so they aren’t going to be easily persuaded to bring it up with the younger members of a family.
There have got to be some youth leaders who have tackled this topic head on. I would love to hear how they did it. It has nothing to do with helping our churches meet their budgets. It has everything to do with following the commands and the practices of Christ. How do we help parents address this topic?
