The morning Manna will be provided at 6am. Thanks.

Studying Managing for the Master until He comes in the SSnet.org series Lesson 3, may the Holy Spirit be the speaker to your heart.

The Topic today is: "Tithe principle in Ancient Times and Biblically evidenced  for Morning Manna in the Sabbath School Series Managing for the Master until He comes

The Opening Hymn will be 229 "Spirit of the Living God"

The Sabbath School Quarterly, downloadable from SSnet.org in the Teacher's Edition is on page 22.

The SSnet.org site allows anyone, anywhere to read the lesson in their own language. Choose your own language to see God speaking also to your heart.

Why do you not click right now on this link and enjoy the lesson of this week right now?

https://absg.adventist.org/pdf.php?file=2023:1Q:SE:PDFs:EAQ123_03.pdf

---The tithing system.

---Tithe means 10% of one’s income.

---Before we talk about Abraham’s tithe payments, we look at Ellen White’s statement in Testimonies to the Church volume 3 page 393.

---“Men were required to offer to God gifts for religious purposes before the definite system was given to Moses, even as far back as the days of Adam.”

---At a market in Drehem, a city that is about 12 km outside of the religious temple city of Nippur, was the tithe collecting center of the Nippur temples.

---Tablets were discovered in the hundreds at this place and circulated all over the world. An Armenian business man who became an Adventist purchased some of these and donated them to Andrews University and two of them are in the James White Library.

---What are they? Payments of tithe to the Drehem treasury for the use at the Nippur temple.

---That was in the years of the reign of Urnammu, Shushin and his other brothers. It was around 2048 BC. The tablets have a definite month and definite year on them. It was the receipts for the tithe payments.

---Abraham one hundred years before also paid faithfully tithe. Not to markets like this, but to God.

---Because Abraham lied in Egypt, the garden area of Sodom and Gemorrah and other cities (five of them) at the current Dead Sea area was colonized by Hammurabi I (earlier Hammurabi than the lawgiver Hammurabi II of 1750 BC).

---The Bible says Amraphel. El means god and the word dingir is used in Sumerian to show that. It reads dingir Hammurabi. Because Hebrews read from right to left they would put the el at the back. Am is ham, rabi is raph. Thus, Amraphel reads Hammurabi. But not the later lawmaker of which people discover his laws written on a stela found at Shushan in Elam.

---It was in Sumer but stolen from there and taken to Shushan when the Elamites took and destroyed Ur in 2004.

---For 14 years Hammurabi and other rulers colonized Sodom and Gemorrah with Lot in it.

---But because Abraham took God’s promises in his own hands, and tried to fulfill God’s promise instead of waiting for Him to fulfill it, therefore Lot was taken captive. It was after Ishmael was born in 2154 BC.

---Then Abraham and his forces went to rescue Lot and God helped him.

---The principle of the Hebrews and God was consistently in the Bible expressed even in his days: When at war and conquering a nation, do not touch their property.

---The happy ruler freed and liberated as well, wanted to pay Abraham gifts but he refused. Instead, he took of his own money and gave it to God. That was around 2153 BC.

---So how did Ellen White knew of the regularity of tithe payment in Sumer when the evidence was still lying below the dumps of Drehem and not yet found? The Holy Spirit was not buried under the dumps. Was He?

---The Drehem tablets published in books dated to 1912, 1914 and later. Here and there one tablet was published a little earlier. Look for Nesbit online, or D. Owen. I also published the Andrews University Drehem tablet. Look for Koot van Wyk Drehem tablet online at Academia.edu.

---So are you paying tithe as Moses required later after 1448 BC? Or as Maleachi promised that God will open the windows of heaven with blessings for you if you do?

---And He does. Try it. Amazing. When? Right now.