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Originally Posted by byHismercy
Ohio, I can remember the time after the Lords table meeting in the Church in Diamond Bar, the leading brother asking the assembly to specifically label the tithes for DCP because that was where funds were needed. Of course, we were only to do so if the Spirit led. What a joke. It made me so uncomfortable to be sitting in the gathered saints listening to them discuss the lawsuits and the 'defence' of the ministry. I could not contribute.
Do they need tithes to be earmarked for specific purposes, to be in accordance with some law?? This was a large church with four languages meeting, in a big hall, divided for the table meeting. Is it illegal for a church to funnel tithes into their own personal lawyers pockets without knowledge or permission from the contributors? Crazy this is even a topic to discuss, of a 'church' and its' business dealings. Is that why they asked us to write where we wanted the money to go on the checks??
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Officially the officers of a church organization must decide how to allocate offerings, choosing to forward designated offerings to another 503c4, or NOT. Designated offerings really mean nothing, in fact, the IRS can remove your tax-exempt status if tax-exempt offerings are passed thru to designated individuals. That did happen to at least one LC. It's against the law. Otherwise I could donate my salary to you, and you donate yours to me, and neither of us pay taxes on that offering.
LSM bullies member churches into funding DCP. They of course maintain plausible deniability, but there's no denying it. Quotas are spelled out based on attendance. In a sense LC's are complicit, instructing their people to give to DCP, stating of course that the offering should not be taken from their regular giving. In 2002 after the "Phoenix Accord" where all the Midwest and Blended leaders agreed to be nice to each other, we were instructed to send a check monthly to DCP. That ended when they quarantined us.
In the Midwest, we were "taxed" by both Anaheim and Cleveland. I always had a running battle with the elder over this. He would pad our meeting stats in order to look good during the elders meetings, but I was treasurer and knew that would increase our "taxes." Every month we battled who would get paid, the bank, the utilities, or headquarters. We obviously couldn't meet all our commitments.
One day I got a note saying, "if you don't give Cleveland more money, then full-timers don't eat." Since my team had no control over either the church offering or the church expenses, I rejected the insinuation that I was starving little kids. I resigned on the spot.