Tithing

President Hinckley was pretty difficult not to like. He often spoke of finding ways to be a little better, try a little harder. He emphasized personal revelation on all levels in the Church and individually. He was pleasant to listen to and made you feel like he was just talking to you like a normal person would, not like someone sent here to correct us or dictate to us.


I always liked his message on seeking personal revelation; it's always been important to me to pray to Heavenly Father for my own welfare and aid, temporally and spiritually. When Jack has had questions, I've encouraged him to do the same thing and appreciated him doing this.


November was a month of realization financially. We'd had a crazy year with a lot of changes and things going on (obviously, nothing unusual for a lot of people this year) and felt like we were doing okay, but a closer look revealed that no, in fact, we were not. In fact, in adding up our necessary expenditures every month and comparing them to our income, we saw that we were a wee bit short. By a wee bit, I mean enough that we couldn't just pull that out of grocery store money. However, that was comparing our expenses with our post-tithing income, ten percent less than we originally brought home.


Let me say just a few words on tithing. We've always been full tithe payers, from the moment we married. I think both of us were full tithe payers before that, in all of our adult lives. I had one year that was a little short several years before I married, but that's all. If we pay our tithing, we won't be burned at the Second Coming. That's a nice blessing. And Heber J. Grant, that great promoter of this principle, told the story of how he would pay his tithing in advance based on how much he needed to make to meet his needs, and he was always blessed with that much. (Of course, he was a very hard worker, too.) It's been a big part of our lives and a pretty big part of our faith, at least in showing we had some.


Jack told me that he'd been trying to figure out what to do for our finances. He works hard but gets a salary, so can't just change the amount of money he makes. We've both been happy with me staying at home with our kids, taking care of them. (At least, he didn't mention any possibility of me finding a paycheck, which I appreciate.) He said he'd spent a lot of time kneeling in prayer lately, and the only thing that he can figure is to stop paying tithing. After extensive prayer, he felt good about this decision, completely at peace with it.


Years ago, I'd been stressed about family finances. I'd prayed a lot about them then, as well, and I felt very strongly that I needed to let Jack just take care of them and not worry anymore. Just trust him. That doesn't mean I don't know what's going on most of the time, but I leave it to him to make it work. I remembered that as he told me his decision, as he made sure I was comfortable with it. I was surprised, admittedly, but I believed he had made a good decision, and a rational one at that, since there was nothing else to be done. I had no big impressions that we were going to hell, and I know God gave us brains to figure a lot of things out on our own. Just in case, Jack had taken a lot of time to pray about this decision, and I trusted that aspect, too.


Anyhow, we decided that for now we'd stop paying tithing. It was still a good principle, but we couldn't do it right now. We'd hope for a raise in the spring and then return to being full tithe payers. In the meantime, we'd paid everything through November, and tithing settlement was scheduled for the last Sunday in November. We could at least say we were full tithe payers for now, though I knew I wouldn't be comfortable going to the temple when we weren't, even if my recommend hadn't expired. Jack and I went one more time, just before Thanksgiving. It was nice.