I Did It My Way

By Rob Smith (and Elvis)

Malachi 3:8-10 New International Version (NIV)

⁸ “Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me. “But you ask, ‘How are we robbing you?’ “In tithes and offerings. ⁹ You are under a curse—your whole nation—because you are robbing me. ¹⁰ Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.

I am very embarrassed to share this article with you.  It exposes a sin that I am not very proud to talk about.  As a matter of fact, I “fought” the Holy Spirit all the way to the point of saying, “Well, I wouldn’t know what to title it!”   Immediately, as that thought entered my mind, the radio in my truck blared Elvis singing these words: “The record shows I took the blows and did it my way.”  Allow me to take you through a journey of the last few months of my life where “I did it my way” and took the “blows.”   

October 1^st is a date that looms in my mind every year.  This is the date my yearly land payment of 14k is due on a 200 acre plot I purchased from relatives over thirteen years ago.  This payment on the land is nothing new, and I have seen God work miracles through faithfulness in tithing.  I remember one year was very “tight.”  I wasn’t sure how God was going to make it happen.    At the perfect time my timber company called and said, “Hey – we had an audit that revealed a mistake when we cut your timber two years ago.  We need to settle with you and cut a check for $25,000.00!”  To them I quietly said, “That’ll be fine.”  Inside I was screaming, “Praise God – YOU ARE SO FAITHFUL AND AWESOME!!! You have ‘opened the floodgates’ just as you promised in Malachi 3:10!”    You see, I also had a truck go down that year, and God paid for the land and a new motor!  He even left me enough for new tires!  

When trials approach, we fellows like to roll up our sleeves, grit our teeth, and get ready for it.  This year looked as if it was going to be another of those “tight” years.  Against all that I know from the Bible and have experienced in life, I made the decision to withhold a few tithe checks from the church to “make ends meet.”  Every part of my soul knew this was wrong!! My church even does a month long focus on faithfulness and how to worship God through our finances.  However, my stubborn “Y chromosome” prevailed.    

So the land payment was made with a lot of scratching and clawing about a week late.  Allow me to chronologically take you through the “blows” of my decision and how God brought me to my knees.

1. A day or so after the payment, I had to plant about fourteen deer patches, and no help was available.  This was really no big deal, as long as my equipment didn’t let me down.  About half way in, the water pump shaft on my tractor mysteriously snapped and sent the fan through the radiator and destroyed it.  The ignition switch on the farm truck hauling seed and fertilizer snapped inside the column and rendered it useless.  I then had to revert to the diesel Kubota side by side to haul the goods.  A coolant hose broke, overheated the engine and locked it up.  Now I had three vehicles down and some serious repair bills. 
2. A day or so later, my son sat me down to tell me some news.  This concerns any parent when a teenager wants to do this!  He had scraped the fender of a friend’s car with his bumper. I talked to the father and asked him to get quotes and agreed I would take care of it out of pocket and not deal with insurance.  The damage was a little more extensive than just a scratch – to the tune of $1400.00.  This hurt, but the last thing I wanted was for a relationship with friends and even church members to be strained.     
3. A day or so later, a heat pump went out in our house.   I said, “That’s ok.  We have a second unit that is newer, and it can handle the load.”  At this point I was gritting my teeth and hanging on. (That is one of those Y chromosome traits!)
4. A day or so later, I headed to the farm in my 2002 F350 dually.  That 7.3 turbo diesel was a jewel in my mind.  I remember thinking that if every vehicle I have went down I would always have this faithful 7.3 to keep me going.  You guys who know 7.3’s know what I am talking about! It was a cold morning, and I heard a slight “tick” that didn’t concern me much.  I watched oil pressure and other gauges to make sure.  I got 100 yards from the house when the whole engine basically flew apart and was destroyed!   It locked up right in the middle of the road, oil spilling from the holes in the engine.   
5. A day or so later, the “newer” heat pump in our house went down.  Both units had flipped on emergency heat and were sucking down the electricity.  I felt my pocket book shrink every time they came on! 
6. A day or so later, Lori and I were talking about making a trip to her brother’s home in north Georgia after Christmas.  I took her Highlander in to have it checked out.  Oil was leaking profusely on the engine and all of the struts, and shocks and tires needed to be replaced.  Just parts would be $2000.00 alone!!  
7. At this point, I was down to a 1989 Ford Ranger to drive and a cold house to live in.  The transmission started slipping in the Ranger, which pushed me to my last back-up vehicle – a 1976 Ford F100.  I drove it even though the flywheel was warped and the clutch was extremely hard to manage.  It’s probably not the most fuel efficient vehicle either!  
8. A day or so later, some heavy rains hit, and three leaks sprang up in the roof of our house.  The inspection revealed the roof needed replacing and was probably three years past due to be replaced.

Ok, we are looking at a span of about two weeks post land payment.  You mechanical mathematicians are rolling figures in your head.  Let me save you some time.   Right now we are sitting at $15,400.00 to repair all the things above if I do all the work myself.  This does not include a roof which may be outside my realm of ability.   

Here is the “straw that broke the camel’s back.”  It is difficult to even write about this weeks later!   I was on the farm when my oldest son called me.  He said, “Dad – my truck is making a loud ticking sound.”  It was so pronounced I could hear it over the phone.  I told him to shut it down and leave it alone until I could get there.  The next day I went out and faced what I already inevitably knew to be the case.  I cranked the truck and the crankshaft knock was so loud that neighbors could hear it!  I am a very mechanically inclined man, and there was no question what was happening.  The motor was about to go down and probably sustain unrecoverable damage (just like mine did).  I got on my knees with the truck knocking and started praying to God.  “I am so sorry that I have been robbing you as stated in Malachi 3:8.  I also am aware that I am under a ‘curse’ as referenced in Malachi 3:9. I deserve every bit of what is coming to me, but I want you to know my spirit is broken.  I humbly ask that you please forgive me.”  No sooner did those words leave my lips than the engine knock started fading away until it was gone!!!!!!  That just simply does not happen!  With uncontrolled weeping, I entered the house and begged forgiveness from my wife that I had allowed a curse from Satan to dig into our finances.  My decision was having a ripple impact on the whole family! It was a sloppy cry, and you better believe I could not wait to get that December tithe check into the plate.

  I have a renewed focus that everything belongs to God.  He is so gracious to allow us to keep and manage 90% and ask for only 10%.  However, if He owns everything already, what does that tithe even mean to Him?  It is an act of worship and a way to see God in His fullness.  He even says to “test Him” as referenced in Malachi 3:10.  Well, I “tested” Him, and it did not turn out very well!   Please understand that God did not “make” these bad things happen to me, rather my sin of disobedience blocked God’s blessings.  

Why stiffen up like a stubborn man and try to fix everything yourself?  Why not do it as God laid it out, and stay under his “umbrella of protection and blessing”?  It sure helps lessen the “blows” that Elvis even referred to!  Next time you begin to say, “I’ll do it my way – ask yourself, ‘What is God’s way?’”