Paying tithing on gifts

[Doug the Hutt]

Has any of you LDS folks (and I suppose non-LDS folks as well) ever

1. been taught

2. taught

3. actually fulfilled the teaching

4. witnessed someone else fulfilling the teaching

...to pay tithing to the Church on gifts received for things like birthdays, Christmas, Easter, report-card-day, etc.? Like, have you been given $10 from your Uncle LaVerl in a birthday card and paid $1 of it to the Church, leaving you $9 (or did you zealously include the value of the card too --- $10 + $3.25 = $13.25. $13.25 *.10 = $1.33 tithe, leaving you a card +$8.67 left?)? I think I might have done it a million years ago when I was a young skull full of Cream o' Wheat (brown sugar & cinnamon -- not that flavorless 'original' frap). I want to know if anyone has a position, for or against paying tithing on gifts received, particularly the doctrinal basis for either. Thanks for your insights.

[ELF1024]

Has any of you LDS folks (and I suppose non-LDS folks as well) ever

1. been taught

2. taught

3. actually fulfilled the teaching

4. witnessed someone else fulfilling the teaching

...to pay tithing to the Church on gifts received for things like birthdays, Christmas, Easter, report-card-day, etc.? Like, have you been given $10 from your Uncle LaVerl in a birthday card and paid $1 of it to the Church, leaving you $9 (or did you zealously include the value of the card too --- $10 + $3.25 = $13.25. $13.25 *.10 = $1.33 tithe, leaving you a card +$8.67 left?)? I think I might have done it a million years ago when I was a young skull full of Cream o' Wheat (brown sugar & cinnamon -- not that flavorless 'original' frap). I want to know if anyone has a position, for or against paying tithing on gifts received, particularly the doctrinal basis for either. Thanks for your insights.

I was taught to pay tithing on "increase". However you determine what increase is. My parents have always paid tithing on their Gross Income. I assume that some people out there pay tithing on the Net Income instead.

As long as you can go to the Bishop at the end of the year and claim you've paid a full tithing, it's a matter between you and God.

[bluebell]

At our house, we pay tithing on all our monetary increase, which includes monetary gifts. We especially teach this with our children, because it's pretty much the only things that they have to pay tithing on and we feel it's important for them to have the opportunity to pay it when they can.

I personally believe that as long as a person feels that they are being honest with the Lord in their tithing-that they are paying it sincerely as they believe it is meant to be paid-then the Lord is pleased.

I think most of us know when we are attempting to justify a wrong behavior or when we are doing our best to obey both the letter and the spirit of a law.

[katherine the great]

I don't think you have tp pay tithing on Uncle Verle's card unless you sell it.

[LeSellers]

Has any of you LDS folks ... ever

1. been taught

2. taught

3. actually fulfilled the teaching

4. witnessed someone else fulfilling the teaching

...to pay tithing to the Church on gifts received for things like birthdays, Christmas, Easter, report-card-day, etc.?

The first three. I don't know what other people do, and wouldn't recognize it if I saw it.

23 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithes of mint and dill and cummin, and you have left aside the weightier matters of the Law: judgment, and mercy, and faith. It was right to do these, and not to have left those aside.

If we should pay tithing on the increase of our herb gardens (and "it was right that ye do these"), then the other, too, ought to be accounted for.

However, there are, in accounting, several rules, one of which is it shouldn't cost more to report that income (or expense) than the value of the item in question (I have forgotten more accounting than I ever used, someone out there will surely supply the formal name). E.G., you don't count each piece of bubble gum when taking inventory, you estimate. So the card and the postage, and the ink used to sign and address it are not material to the calculation of an honest tithe.

Lehi

[Duncan]

My Bishop just bought a new truck so I ain't giving him anymore money! heehee!

[thesometimesaint]

I pay tithing on net monthly and at tithing settlement write out a check for the difference between net and gross. It is easier on my book keeper. Plus am generous with other offerings.

[Doug the Hutt]

Okay, so Lehi has found a scriptural basis which shows that Jesus Himself said (while bludgeoning the scribes & pharisees for lack of judgment, mercy and faith) that we should pay up even on non-monetary things. Was Jesus only saying that *they* should pay tithes on their mints & herbs or did he mean it to all of us? Is there a modern day interpretation that makes it clear?

Let's go back then. Maybe we do pay the $$$ on LaVerl's card -- figure with 13,000,000 members there's a whole lotta birthday cards floating around. Figure in 5 birthday cards received per member per year at $4.00 a pop to be conservative: (I've zero idea how many cards are received by LDS people but it hardly matters)

13,000,000

* 5

* $4.00

* .1

= $26,000,000

Moooooo! Holy Cow!! That's what the members owe the Church in birthday-card-tithing-oversight alone (assuming nobody pays the Church on cards)! Factor in the value of gifts being exchanged, other holidays being shared via cardboard....and the Church is bleeding like hundreds of millions of dollars every year!

[ERMD]

The handbook uses the word "interest" meaning increase and states that there is no authorization to specify anything else.

[Whiskeypete]

I guess you could get real technical and figure that your increase is the difference between the gifts you receive and the gifts you give.

My wife's grandmother had a tradition with a friend where they would mail back and forth the same $50 bill. One would send it to the other at the beginning of the holidays, the other would send it back before Christmas. Then they would trade it for birthdays, mothers day, etc.

If they paid tithing on it every time, they would have had to stop after about the 11th time.

Just food for thought.

[ERMD]

The Lord will hold no one accountable for being too generous.

YMMV.

[firepatch36]

I don't pay tithing on gifts. Here is an article published in an economic journal on a survey of Mormons and how they pay their "flat tax."

If you pay tithing on a monetary gift; would you pay tithing if someone bought you a meal on the value of a meal?

[bluebell]

If you pay tithing on a monetary gift; would you pay tithing if someone bought you a meal on the value of a meal?

No, i wouldn't. I know people who would, but i personally wouldn't.

What if someone gave you, as a gift, 100,000 to live on for the rest of your life and you never worked for pay again, would you pay tithing on the monetary gift then?

Some people who don't feel like they need to pay tithing on $100 would probably change their mind if the money was more significant or it represented a 'pay check' in some way. Others maybe just would never pay tithing again in their life, sticking with the idea that you don't need to pay tithing on monetary gifts and that it would be wrong to justify a practice based soley on the amount of money invovled.

What seems, and maybe is , reasonable under one circumstance might not be at all under another. Logically applying our beliefs in every circumstance might not always be in keeping with what the Lord wants us to get out of the law.

I say, as long as we make the decision, through prayer hopefully, on what we believe the Lord expects out of us in terms of tithing, consulting with what His servants have taught concerning the practice of course, we'll probably be fine. Later, if we gain more wisdom through the Spirit and need to change, hopefully we will be willing to do so.

[BCSpace]

The handbook uses the word "interest" meaning increase and states that there is no authorization to specify anything else.

Yep and one will get no other answer from a bishop or stake president. They will not tell you tithing must be on gross or net or on what gifts or not (though they might state their personal opinion). So we can extend this to the Law of Consecration. It's entirely up to you and if one pays on a gift and the other does not, neither is necessarily right or wrong.

[blackstrap]

John lives on a small pension plus whatever he can bring in doing odd jobs. His wife is in ill health and the medical costs are significant and ongoing. After rent and food and utilities etc. he runs a $100.00 deficit every month. If he were to pay tithing the deficit would increase to $200.00 . Should he pay tithing on his monetary income

and then go to the bishop to get welfare to feed his family? If he were to receive a $50 gift from a relative's estate

and pay $5 tithing on it then he would only run a $55 deficit that month. Because John's extra work is seasonal there are months when he must borrow extra to keep ahead(on his behindness). Pray tell what is his "interest" ?

[LeSellers]

Should he pay tithing on his monetary income and then go to the bishop to get welfare to feed his family?

Yes. Absolutely.

He owes tithing, and he should pay it. We, the others in the church, who have covenanted to bear one another's burdens and comfort those who need it, and comfort each other in our weaknesses, need the opportunity to keep our covenants (via, in this case, the Fast Offering).

If he were to receive a $50 gift from a relative's estate and pay $5 tithing on it then he would only run a $55 deficit that month.

Yeah, so? How long should he neglect to pay his bills?

Because John's extra work is seasonal there are months when he must borrow extra to keep ahead(on his behindness). Pray tell what is his "interest" ?

His interest is his income, from whatever source(s).

What's the problem people have with paying tithing? It's another obligation, and, as an honorable man, John would want to pay his bills, including tithing. If that means he should humble himself by receiving what those who have humbled themselves by offering, then that is why both can be grateful.

What is the problem so many people have with paying tithing?

Lehi

[blackstrap]

That is why it is up to the individual to decide. A farmer will look at what he has at the end of the fiscal year that was an increase over what he had at the end of the previous year.Does he have the same house and vehicles etc as he had before? Does he have anything new in his estate that was not there previously? Was there a bad crop for the third year in a row and he has had to borrow $100,000 to cover costs? The fact that he and his family is still alive,to some may be an increase.Some may think that the Lord wants him to borrow $112,000 to cover the tithing on his increase. It can be complicated and often difficult to define the letter and the spirit of the law.

[oats]

I don't like to tithe on gifts I receive from other family members who I know have already paid a tithing on the earnings used to purchase the gift. For smaller kids who only have income from family I understand the need for them to pay tithing, to learn the principle. If I had kids to whom I gave spending money or an allowance then I would not pay tithing on the amount I gave them. If they got 500$/year from me then the tithing on it would be paid by them, not me.

I also never paid tithing on any bursaries or scholarships I received because all were directly applied to tuition. There was no income on my part. The bill I got was simply less staggering.

[MIkew]

The handbook uses the word "interest" meaning increase and states that there is no authorization to specify anything else.

The handbook says a bit more than "interest"

14.4.1 Tithing

Definition of Tithing

The First Presidency has written:

[bluebell]

Pray tell what is his "interest" ?

It's between him and the Lord.

I personally would pay tithing on what i could because of the experiences i've had with tithing, but my experiences aren't everyones.

[ERayR]

Pay tithing as you are inspired to do so and in the amount you are comfortable with as an honest tithe.

[rpn]

I pay on cash gifts and occasionally on non-cash gifts when I sell them or transition them to cash, and have my whole life although I don't recall ever being taught in church to do so. (Lately of course, no one is supposed to be taught any more specifically than the words of the scriptures, since that is what is defined in the correlated manuals and taught from the pulpit.) I also thought it appropriate to pay on grants and scholarships I got for college and other forms of income. The way I figure it is I would rather have Heavenly Father at judgment say to me, "you over payed", than "why didn't you pay on all your increase". So when in doubt pay.

[Kenngo1969]

I don't think you have tp pay tithing on Uncle Verle's card unless you sell it.

E-bay?

P.S.: I'm sure the card is worth more with Uncle LaVerl's autograph!

[Doctrine 612]

Lets think on this one a little while