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When Should You Tithe? Country-Star-Turned-Pastor Explains

Photo by Akira Hojo on Unsplash

When Should You Tithe? Country-Star-Turned-Pastor Explains

Movieguide® Contributor

Former country artist Granger Smith is sharing advice about churches and tithing with a podcast listener whose home was destroyed in a tornado last May.

“Last April, my wife was offered an opportunity to relocate with her current employer back to Kentucky where she’s from and we felt ready to be close to family again,” Smith read in an email from one of his podcast listeners, an Oklahoma resident. “We made a plan to list our place for sale over Memorial Day weekend, and on the evening of April the 28th, I got called in to haul fuel to a rig and my wife didn’t want me to go because it was bad weather and I went and tried to reassure her it would be fine.  A couple hours later there were multiple tornadoes on the ground. One was heading towards our property.”

“My wife and neighbor were able to get into a safe room. Our place took a direct hit, flooding our house and destroying most of our property,” he continued. “Through this tragedy, we’ve had so much support.”

A neighbor invited them to their church, which the listener and his wife have happily attended since May. The listener asked Smith to provide counsel on whether he should give a tithe to the church for the last five months, as he still intends to move to Kentucky after his home insurance settlement resolves.

“If you’re convicted to be tithing anywhere, I think that should say something,” Smith said. “You should listen to that conviction and not just a church. Of course, I believe you should be giving to your church, but because you’re in this transition period, you’re wondering what to be doing and you could be convicted for a ministry.”

“You could meet someone that runs a ministry, and you really believe in that ministry, and you could feel convicted to give to that ministry. Amber and I will go through this, you know,” Smith said of his wife. “Amber will come home, and she’ll go, ‘Hey, I met I met this woman, and she runs this thing, and I think we should give to them,’ and I’ll say, ‘Okay, I’ll trust your conviction on that,’ and then vice versa if it happens to and I tell Amber and we never disagree.”

Smith reassured the listener that there’s nothing wrong with spiritual conviction and wanting to tithe.

“You don’t feel comfortable joining the church while waiting for the insurance to fix the property, so you could just sell it and then move away, and I agree with that, and that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attend,” Smith told the listener. “I think there would be nothing wrong, in fact…you would be encouraged to attend this good church with your friends and tell the leadership of the church exactly what’s going on…The pastor, I think it would be appropriate to tell him that, and they can kind of wrap their arms around you, help walk you through this transition.”

“That’s what they’re there for,” Smith said. “That’s what a pastor would do. You know, a pastor’s a shepherd.”

Smith added encouragement for the listener to actively start looking for a church in Kentucky before he moves. Finding a church can be a long process, and Smith believes it’s something very important that shouldn’t only be taken into consideration after moving. He cited an example of a friend who moved to another state but went ahead of time to look for a church that he could move near to.

Smith has covered similar themes in previous podcast episodes. He answers questions like, “How do I find a good church?” and “Is going to church necessary?”

Movieguide ® recently shared Smith’s spiritual wisdom:

Former country star and pastor Granger Smith recently explained the difference between joy and happiness. 

“People misinterpret joy for happiness, and those are not the same things,” he said during an appearance on TBN’s PRAISE. “Happiness, many times, happens upon you, and you express happiness as an emotion. But joy is deeper than an emotion — happiness, sadness, anxiety — joy is different.”

Smith continued, “Joy is a result of a foundational contentment, grounded in and anchored in hope. And then we begin to trust who He is, as He’s revealed Himself in the Bible. And we go, ‘If He has the ending from the beginning, He has all of this plan for me, even through the suffering.’ And we begin to become content in the rocky road of life, in the rollercoaster of all our emotions. And then, through that contentment, we go, ‘I have joy in the contentment, anchored in hope, in the truth of the One who is victorious for me.’”

As a country star turned pastor, besides answering spiritual questions on his podcast, Smith also travels around the country on speaking engagements. His next event is in College Station at the Hope Conference on Oct. 11-12. His wife, Amber, will also join him in speaking.


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