Wisdom and Finances
Proverbs 3:9–10
9 Honor the Lord with your wealth
and with the firstfruits—the best part—of all your produce;
10 then your barns will be filled with plenty,
and your vats will be bursting with wine.
Wise living includes wise spending.
When we choose to follow Jesus, we choose to let Him be the Lord of our lives—our whole lives. While that is easy to pray, it is challenging to live when bills must be paid and things are desired. If you are anything like me, you may start negotiating in your head about how little you can give God while still keeping Him happy.
This is not the wise way.
Proverbs 3:9 calls us to honor God with our wealth by giving Him the first and best of what we produce. In an agricultural society, where life depended on the harvest, the people were commanded to give the first grains, grapes, and goods they gathered. After waiting weeks or months for fruit to be produced, the first items reaped were to be given away.
This required great faith.
Faith that more would come.
Faith that locusts would not devour the harvest.
Faith that there would be enough at the end of the season.
The wisdom we are given in the Word of God is to honor God with what we receive. Are you doing that? Are you honoring God with the fruit of your labor? Or, in the name of prudence, security, or even greed, are you building your own stockpile and offering God whatever is left over?
Firstfruits are not a simple or easy offering, yet this is the wise way presented to us.
Will you live wisely?
Finally, a blessing is promised here: barns filled and vats bursting. This passage assures us that God is the provider and that honoring Him is always wiser than trusting only in what we can accumulate. It is not a blank check promising that every faithful giver will become wealthy. It is an invitation to trust that God knows our needs and can provide what is necessary as we faithfully surrender to Him.
We can offer many “what if” scenarios and hypothetical conundrums, but my charge to you is this: Are you actually living in the “what if,” or are you simply trying to justify your unwillingness to release what you have?
Too often, we look for loopholes in order to rationalize our unwillingness to live rightly.
Wise living includes wise spending. God is not just concerned with your firstfruits or your tithe. God cares about how you spend 100 percent of your money, not just 10 percent.
Are you honoring the Lord with what you have?
Wisdom and Blessing
Proverbs 3:5–6
5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart,
and do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him,
and He will make straight your paths.
The Bible often makes great statements and promises of blessing, yet we are sometimes scared to speak about them. Why? Because too many preachers have bought mansions and planes while promising things from God that He does not intend to give. The prosperity gospel is alive and well, preying on spiritual infants who are trying to find the truth.
While the prosperity gospel is a corruption of the truth, I fear that we have too often overcorrected. As a result, we fail to discuss the God who desires to bless His children. I think the main reason for this is that we have the wrong definition of blessing.
When we think of blessings, we often limit them to the things our greater culture believes make life better: money, power, platform, and comfort. Maybe some of those things are less like blessings and more like temptations. Jesus says it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom because of divided loyalty. Those with platforms and power are often more vulnerable to temptation and attack. Even comfort can create in us a sense of laziness that is not promoted in the Scriptures.
God wants to bless you with things that are truly good for you—actual blessings.
Think about a family that has a child with Down syndrome. From the outside, people may focus only on the challenges the family will face. Yet, when speaking with the parents, we often hear about the profound blessing their child has been. Alongside real challenges, that child may teach the family more about love, laughter, joy, and living life to the fullest. The blessing is not found in pretending that the challenges do not exist, but in recognizing the beautiful ways God works through a life that the world may too quickly underestimate.
Proverbs 3 tells us that when we trust in the Lord, He will make our paths straight. It does not say that the road will be easy, full of fun, free of rocks, or shaded from the scorching heat. The promise is clear direction for those who trust in God. Uncertainty may remain, and challenges may come, but we can walk with confidence in the One who directs our steps.
Our God is a good Father who loves to bless His children with good things—even with the things we request when they align with His desires for us. No matter how much little Coop may want a motorcycle, I will not let him drive one because it would be detrimental, not helpful!
God promises to bless His people—not necessarily with riches and power, but with direction, love, grace, and mercy.
Can you be satisfied with that?
Fear of the Lord
Proverbs 1:7
Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
Practical wisdom for living is the central concern of the book of Proverbs. Throughout these 31 chapters, Solomon gives nuggets, analogies, comparisons, and commands regarding how to live wisely in a world opposed to God. That sounds good to me!
Throughout the book, Solomon will say that wisdom starts with the fear of the Lord. It sounds nice, and you probably could have recited that, but what does it actually mean?
The fear of the Lord does not mean viewing God as a terrible monster seeking to devour us like King Kong or Godzilla! Nor is God like the deceitful serpent who leads humanity astray. To fear the Lord does not simply mean to be afraid. Yet the Bible says that God is to be feared.
The fear of the Lord is the recognition of who I am and who God is.
I am weak. He is strong.
I am finite. He is infinite.
I know some. He knows all.
I make things. He created everything.
I work. He holds all things together.
The fear of the Lord is a reverential awe of the enormity of God and the frailty of me. It is a place of humbly admitting that I am nothing before the Almighty! Not many people get to this place. So many who dwell on this earth think much of themselves and little of God. I must admit—that is me far too often.
John MacArthur defines the fear of the Lord as “a state of mind in which one’s own attitudes, will, feelings, deeds, and goals are exchanged for God’s.” It is a recognition of who I am and who He is.
Today, I encourage you to admit the many ways in which you have shrunk God in order to enlarge yourself.
Admit the ways you have acted according to your own desires and failed to look or listen to His.
Today, take another step toward “fearing the Lord” as you stand in awe of our God!
Proverbs: A Book of Wisdom
In my personal time in the Word, I am reading through the book of Proverbs. Over the next several days, I will be writing about some of the nuggets of wisdom that have challenged me, as I believe they will be edifying to you as well.
Proverbs 1:1–7 (NLT)
1 These are the proverbs (wise teachings) of Solomon, David’s son, king of Israel.
2 Their purpose is to teach people wisdom and discipline,
to help them understand the insights of the wise.
3 Their purpose is to teach people to live disciplined and successful lives,
to help them do what is right, just, and fair.
4 These proverbs will give insight to the simple,
knowledge and discernment to the young.
5 Let the wise listen to these proverbs and become even wiser.
Let those with understanding receive guidance
6 by exploring the meaning in these proverbs and parables,
the words of the wise and their riddles.
At the beginning of this book of wisdom, Solomon starts by giving us his purpose: that we may learn from and live in response to these wise words. Wisdom is not static; it is active. Wisdom is not meant merely to build our intellect but to change our everyday lives.
In this collection of wisdom, we are hearing from a man who was gifted with wisdom directly from God. When Solomon became king at a young age, his prayer was not for power, prominence, or prestige. His prayer was simply that God would give him the wisdom to lead the people because the task was beyond his capacity.
I bet there are places in your life that feel beyond your capacity. Is it your work, which has become a tremendous burden and created uncertainty? Is it your finances, which have tightened and left you unsure of the way forward? Is it parenting, which continues to throw you curveballs you cannot hit? Is it a relationship that is deeply broken? Is it a calling or question you cannot answer?
God, the author of wisdom, is showing us in His Word that wisdom is to be found in Him. By listening to the Proverbs—and to the greater scope of Scripture—we can attain wisdom that will buoy us in the crashing waves of life.
Read through the passage again today. Consider how you are actively seeking wisdom from God and how you are applying it to your life.
No Days Off!
“Christianity is so hard because it forces me to live in two worlds!”
That is the complaint of many believers.
Do you feel that divide?
The divide between trying to be productive and prayerful.
The divide between trying to honor God and trying to get all your hours in.
The divide between handling the responsibilities of the spiritual world and the secular world.
I should be praying, reading Scripture, and attending church, but I also have to eat, sleep, work, mow the grass, and wash the dishes.
It can feel as though these two worlds are opposed to one another and that every choice we make with our time is a choice between the sacred and the secular.
“The sacred-secular [divide] has no foundation in the New Testament.”
—A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God, 113
Colossians 3:17 says:
“And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
First Corinthians 10:31 says:
“So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”
If even eating and drinking can be done for the glory of God, then nearly every part of our lives can be lived for His glory.
We must not separate our lives into secular moments and sacred moments. Your attitude at work, the compassion you show a coworker, the effort you give to a project, the responsibility you take for your tasks, and even your reliability can all become expressions of worship.
In your “secular” job, you can and should see a sacred opportunity to live for God and shine His light.
Certainly, some activities feel more purposeful or spiritual, but that does not mean they are the only things that can be done for God. Worship in church feels different from a Monday meeting, but our gaze can remain fixed on God in both places.
In fact, we may sometimes be more distracted during a worship service than during a workday, and God’s goodness may sometimes be especially visible in a boardroom.
The challenge today is not to divide your life, but to understand that God desires to be Lord of all of it, not merely part of it.
God has called you to Himself, but He has also called you to work the job you have, love the spouse He has given you, train the children entrusted to you, care for the yard around you, and serve the community where He has placed you.
We do not clock in and clock out of godly living.
Every moment can become an act of worship.
“Lord, I would trust Thee completely; I would be altogether Thine; I would exalt Thee above all. I desire that I may feel no sense of possessing anything outside of Thee. I want constantly to be aware of Thy overshadowing Presence and to hear Thy speaking Voice. I long to live in restful sincerity of heart. I want to live so fully in the Spirit that all my thought may be as sweet incense ascending to Thee and every act of my life may be an act of worship. Therefore I pray in the words of Thy great servant of old, "I beseech Thee so for to cleanse the intent of mine heart with the unspeakable gift of Thy grace, that I may perfectly love Thee and worthily praise Thee." And all this I confidently believe Thou wilt grant me through the merits of Jesus Christ Thy Son. Amen.”