Two Percent of Two Percent

{If charity cost nothing, the world would be full of philanthropists}

Jewish Proverb

I love the book The Hole in our Gospel by Richard Stearns. He has been the President of World Vision since 1998. If you aren't familiar with World Vision, it is a Christian Humanitarian organization helping all over the world. I sponsor two children; a boy from Malawi and a little girl from Armenia with World Vision. My monthly contribution helps these children have food, shelter, clothing, medicine and an education. It is a wonderful way to help those less fortunate and to give someone else hope. I not only help the children but also their families and communities.

One of my favorite chapters in this book is titled Two Percent of Two Percent. Here are some of the things I learned in this chapter:

• You're rich, we're rich, and the Church in America is rich.
• If your income is $25,000 per year, you are wealthier than approx. 90% of the world's population!
• If you make $50,000 per year, you are wealthier than 99% of the world!
• Of the 6.7 billion people on this earth, almost HALF of them live on less than $2/day. 
• 93% of the world's people DON"T own a CAR!
• Our American lifestyles are not normative.....they are grossly distorted compared to the rest of the world. 
• It is important to put the American church in perspective b/c it is the wealthiest community of Christians in the history of Christendom!
• The total income of American churchgoers is $5.2 TRILLION {That's more than five thousand billion dollars}
• It would take just a little over 1% of the income of American Christians to lift the poorest one billion people in the world out of extreme poverty. Stated another way, American Christians, who make up about 5% of the Church worldwide, control half of the global Christian wealth; a lack of money is not our problem. 

Tithing should be 10% of your income. So as the wealthiest nation of Christians in the world, how do we do on tithing our income?

• If we define tithing as giving 10% or more of our pretax income to the church or to nonprofit ministries, only about 5% of American households tithe. 
• If we look at "born again" Christians in America {those who claim to have made a personal commitment to Christ}, the number of tithers improve to 9%.
• For "evangelical Christians", those who claim their faith has the greatest influence on their life and conduct, still only 24% tithe. 

If we aren't tithing 10%, then what is the American Church giving?

• The average giving of American church members in 2005 was just 2.58% of their income, about 75% less than the biblical standard of 10%. 
• Sadly, as our incomes have increased, our giving has significantly declined. In 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, giving averaged 3.3%, 27% more than we gave in 2005. 

Okay so now where does that money go once we give it to the church?

• 2% of it goes to overseas missions of any kind, whether evangelistic or to assist the poor
• The other 98% stays right here, w/in our churches and communities
• Bottom line is that the commitment that American Christians, the wealthiest Christians in ALL HISTORY, are making to the world is just about 2% of 2%--actually about five ten-thousandths of our income. 
• In simpler terms, that amounts to about six pennies per person per day that we give through our churches to the rest of the world-------SIX CENTS! 

What would happen if we ALL paid our tithe--10% of our incomes instead of the 2.5% we actually give......it is amazing......we would have an extra $168 BILLION to spend in funding the work of the Church worldwide!

To put this in perspective:

• $705 billion--amount Americans spend on entertainment and recreation
• $179 billion--amount spent by teenagers ages 12-17 {2006}
• $65 billion---amount we spend on jewelry {2008}
• $58 billion---amount spent on state lottery tickets {2007}
• $39.5 billion-total U.S. government foreign assistance budget for the WORLD
• $31 billion---amount spent on pets {2003}
• $13 billion---amount spent by Americans on cosmetic surgery {2007}
• $5 billion---total overseas ministries income to 700 Protestant mission agencies, including denominational, interdenominational, and independent agencies{2005}

If every American churchgoer tithed, we could literally change the world!

• $65 billion {less than 40% of the extra $168 billion}--could eliminate the most extreme poverty on the planet for more than a billion people
• Universal primary education for children would cost just $6 billion
• The cost to bring clean H20 to most of the world's poor, an estimated $9 billion
• Basic health and nutrition for everyone in the world, $13 billion

This next part I'm going to write really excites me and encourages me. I love it. 

"Imagine how stunning it would be to the watching world for American Christians to give so generously that it:

• brought an end to world hunger;
• solved the clean water crisis;
• provided universal access to drugs and medical care for the millions suffering from AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis;
• virtually eliminated the more than 26,000 daily child deaths;
• guaranteed education for all the world's children;
• provided a safety net for the world's tens of millions of orphans.

Think about the statement it would make if American Christian citizens stepped up and gave more than all of the governments of the world combined b/c they took Jesus seriously when He said to love our neighbors as ourselves. Terrorists might have a harder time recruiting young men to attack a nation so compassionate. Other wealthy nations might be ashamed--or inspired to follow our example. Adherents of other religions would surely wonder what motivates the Christians to be so loving and generous. The global social revolution brought forth by the body of Christ would be on the lips of every citizen in the world and in the pages of every newspaper--in a good way.  The world would see the whole gospel--the good news of the kingdom of God--not just spoken but demonstrated, by people whose faith is not devoid of deeds but defined by love and backed up with action. His kingdom come, His will be done, on earth, as it is in Heaven. This was the whole gospel that Jesus proclaimed in Luke 4, and if we would embrace it, it would literally change everything."

{The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

because he has anointed me

to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind,

to release the oppressed,

to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.}

Luke 4:18-19

Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.

Matthew 5:16

Want to learn more about World Vision or Child Sponsorship? Go to www.worldvision.org