Dear LFTP: donated charity items kept by the organizer's family
- Are we wrong to be upset that items we donated to a charity giveaway are being kept for the organizer's family?
A listener named Abby writes that she and her wife have been donating items to a friend's charitable giveaway operation, but have now noticed donated goods appearing in the friend's home and on her family members. She asks whether they are wrong to feel their generosity was abused. The hosts answer: it isn't sticky — if you say you're collecting for others, you give it to others; at minimum don't be seen wearing the donations, because it reads as skimming the good stuff and kills future giving. One host adds a food-pantry anecdote about never taking even a snack for himself.
More on Giving
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Complaint-line follow-up: tithing, blessing, and the prosperity gospel
- Does faithfulness in giving guarantee material blessing, and does suffering imply unfaithfulness?
Ben reads his own complaint-line text challenging the prior show's tithe conversation: if giving brings blessing (Malachi's 'test me in this'), how should blessing be understood when faithful givers still lack basic needs, and does suffering imply unfaithfulness?
From No. 530 · Know Self Control
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Dear LFTP: the $8 spaghetti sauce in the grocery line
- Should I feel guilty for not covering the stranger's grocery bill when I could barely afford my own?
Boova (speaker-2, who reads the letter on-air) reads a Dear LFTP letter: at a grocery store, a young woman with an $8 jar of spaghetti sauce used the last of her food-stamp card,…
From No. 522 · Biking with Billy Shatner
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Only thirteen percent of evangelicals tithe
- What percentage of evangelicals actually tithe?
- Does a day set apart as holy still matter beyond legalism?
A giving study ("The Generosity Factor" finds only 13% of evangelicals tithe, half give less than 1% of income, and the median church giver gives about $800 a year.
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Practical kingdom actions: check-ins, restraint, and giving
- Should churches keep meeting in person during the pandemic?
Asked what the kingdom of Christ should be doing, a host gives three recommendations: make phone calls to isolated and immunocompromised people (even just dropping things on the…
From No. 398 · Thus It Begins…COVID