Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in. mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.
Malachi 3:8-10
Perhaps at least partly inspired by the famous Sherlock Holmes story “The Red-Headed League,” a group of men rented a store near the Baker Street branch office of Lloyds Bank in London in 1971. They had learned that because there was a great deal of construction work going on nearby the vault’s sensors had been disconnected to prevent continuous false alarms. They dug a tunnel from under their rented building to the floor of the bank vault.
The police were actually alerted during the heist by a ham radio operator who had overheard their transmissions discussing the plan, but since the door of the vault was locked, the police left with checking inside. The robbers walked away with more than $50,000,000 in today’s value, but because the man who rented the building used his own name on the lease, they were quickly captured, tried, and convicted.
It takes a lot to rob a bank knowing how the authorities will respond and the consequences that will follow, but the idea of robbing God should fill our hearts with far more dread than facing the police. Everything that we have is the result of His goodness and grace in the first place. All of our resources belong to Him and we are merely stewards of what He has entrusted to us. Giving back to Him should not be viewed as a burden or something unfair. Instead, we should give joyfully, being thankful for all that we have been given and being faithful to use it wisely.
