Robbing Peter to Pay Paul, Literally
O n a blog I read the writer was talking about giving books away. He said that when he gives books to his church he asks them to make put the value of the books into the building fund in his name, then he reduces the amount of money he puts into the building fund by that amount. By doing that, he feels like he is avoiding the money changers in the temple issue, which caused Jesus to overturn their tables. It took me a little bit to figure out what he is doing. I even had to draw it out on paper, just to get it clear in my head. It works something like this: Let’s say the church has a library or a bookstore. The author gives the library some number of books. Let’s say they are worth $50. Rather than paying the author for the books, the librarian has the church treasurer transfer $50 from the library fund to the building fund. At this point, the building fund has an extra $50 and the library has broken even. Had the author not donated the books, he would have given $100 to the building f...