Proverbs to Live By – Honor the Lord with Your Wealth

“Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce; then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will be bursting with wine.” –Proverbs 3:9-10 (ESV).

Why does God ask us to honor Him with our wealth?  Paul had advice to his son in the ministry, Timothy (and for us as well) about this subject:  “But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.  But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.  For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils.  It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs” (I Timothy 6:8-10, ESV). This advice followed Paul’s saying, “Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world” (I Timothy 6:7).  The writer of Proverbs was advising his son to give proper perspective to wealth.  Offer the “firstfruits” of everything to the Lord.  This was in keeping with Jewish law.  To bring firstfruits indicated that the people recognized God’s provision, that the offering to him (firstfruits) was a sacred pledge and all that remained would be sufficient for the family’s needs: “your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine.”  This promise reiterates what is taught in Malachi 3:10:  “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.  And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.”  Paul substantiates this teaching about money and giving:  “The point is this:  whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.  Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.  And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.  As it is written: ‘He has distributed freely, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures forever’” (II Corinthians 9:6-9, citing from Psalm 112:9).

Money and earnings seem a necessary part of our lives.  The Bible has many teachings about our perspective on wealth. In biblical times, barter was often the means of financial survival.  That was practiced somewhat even in the days when I was a child.  We took our eggs and chickens to the country store to exchange them for items we needed on the farm that we could not produce ourselves.  Oftentimes, we even gave our preacher of the “firstfruits” of our crops and the fryers we’d reared in our chicken lot.  And too, sometimes we would ask for money for the chickens and eggs we took to barter so that we could have a tithe to place in the offering plate at church.  I can remember well in my husband’s early ministry, when he had what we called “student pastorates.”  We would leave our church fields on Sunday nights with a live chicken strapped in a box, eggs carefully packed, fresh vegetables shared from a garden, and a gallon or two of milk.  We knew we would eat well the next week as we gratefully took these items, prepared them for eating and stored them in our small refrigerator.  The Bible has much to teach about our regard for money and how we handle it.  It warns us against greed.  Remember Jesus’ parable of the rich man who kept building bigger barns to store the surplus of what he harvested?  The dire warning was, “Thou fool!  This night your soul shall be required of you” (Luke 12:20).  The beauty of this parable to live by is that when we early-on in our Christian experience decide to tithe and to honor God in how we use the remaining nine-tenths of what we earn, we are assured that this promise will be fulfilled in our lives: “I have been young and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.  He is ever lending generously, and his children become a blessing” (Psalm 37:25-26).  How, then, can we afford not to honor God with the firstfruits of our earnings?  To be a blessing to others as we give according to God’s plan assures that we, in turn, receive the blessings of God.  However, we give because we love the Lord, not to have Him “pay us back” or recompense us.  But in His grace, He provides for those who honor Him.