Where Should the Pastor and the Pastor's Pastor and So On, Pay Their Tithe?
1) Direct Answer
- Every believer pays tithes to the storehouse where he is fed the Word—his own pastor.
- A pastor also pays tithes. He does not keep his own tithe. He sends his tithe to the minister who feeds him the Word, the one who pastors him, or faithfully into the Gospel work through a proven minister.
- The “pastor’s pastor, and so on” simply follows the same order. It stops where a man is actually being fed. Christ is our High Priest; the tithe supports His ministry on earth, not an endless ladder or a headquarters.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house” (Malachi 3:10). The tithe goes where the spiritual meat is served.
- “Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things” (Galatians 6:6). Tithe follows the one who teaches you.
- “Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel” (1 Corinthians 9:13–14). God ordains the ministry to live by the tithe.
- “Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the word and doctrine… The labourer is worthy of his reward” (1 Timothy 5:17–18). The preaching elder is to be supported.
- In the Old Testament pattern the Levites received tithes, and the Levites themselves gave “a tithe of the tithes” unto the Lord’s service (Numbers 18:21–28; Nehemiah 10:37–39). That shows ministers also tithe onward.
- Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek (Hebrews 7:1–8). That points to Christ, our High Priest, receiving tithes through His ministry.
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- Now notice: the tithe is not for buildings, boards, or programs first; it is for the ministry that brings you the Word. Where you eat is where you tithe.
- You see, a pastor is also taught and strengthened by ministry. So he pays his tithe to the one who truly feeds him or places it faithfully into the active Gospel ministry—not back to himself.
- There is no Scripture for a man tithing to himself, nor for sending tithes to an office that does not feed him. The Bible ties tithing to the storehouse and to the one who teaches.
- So the order is simple and consistent: the flock to their pastor; the pastor to the minister who pastors him or the Gospel work that nourishes him; and it all culminates in Christ’s service, not a human chain without end.
4) Reinforcing Statement
Keep it clean and biblical: tithe where you receive the Word. Let the laborer live by the Gospel, and let even the laborer honor God with his own tithe. That’s the order the Bible sets.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Life story (William Branham)
50-0820A §9
I never took up... I tried to take one offering in my life, and I failed on that. But I didn't... I never--wouldn't let me do it. I worked and pastored the Branham Tabernacle at Jeffersonville, which is a interdenominational institution. I worked every day, sometime with a pick and shovel, sometimes on patrol, sometimes in line work, and so forth: worked twelve years and pastored a church and never received one penny, not one cent. I was able to work. Now, not as I got anything against anyone... A minister, he's to...
Church Ages, part 5: The Pergamean Church Age
60-1207 §67
And what do we have in our Protestant churches? Soup suppers, entertainments, skating (oh, my!), rag sales, and everything else. Now, you know that's the truth. Well, now, if that is God's Word, friends, it's the truth. And all Protestant churches are guilty, see? Now, never was God's plan to have soup suppers, and dances in the basements, and all that there carrying on, to pay off the pastor and the things. If people was just taught to pay their tithes, that would be all there would be to it. That's God's plan. Bu...
A Greater than Solomon is here
58-0625 §45
Oh, you have to watch Elvis, Arthur Godfrey, "We Love Suzy," or something like that. Entertain. That's what's the matter with American people: They want entertainment; they don't want the gospel. When you get your preacher, and you go to vote for him in your church, what do you do? You'd get a man that's a little, sissified, Hollywood something, that'll lay out here all night, stretched out on the beach somewhere, and have a little social party, play bingo down in the church basement, soup suppers, and boil up some...
Hebrews, Chapter 7, part 2
57-0922 §17
By the way, while I'm speaking: somebody around this country somewhere, is guilty of writing some cards to move Brother Neville out of this pulpit. You're going to have to settle that with me. That's right. Yes, indeed. Now, I want you... It said something about the deacon board. The deacon board has not one thing to do with that pastor. No, sir! The congregation in full has all the authority. It isn't... A deacon board's just a policeman here in this church, just to keep order and so forth. But when it comes to ru...
The Deep calling to the deep
56-0415 §25
An old fisherman said one time to me, up on the Ohio River where I live, he was coming down the river. He said a little boy was with him. And the little lad was curious. He had went to church and he said to his mother, "Mother, if God is so great, could I see Him?" She said, "Ask the pastor." The pastor said, "No, son. No one could see God and live." And he went and asked his Sunday school teacher; she said, "You ask the pastor." Said, "I've ask him." He said, "Well, why is He, Mother, then if He's so great that so...