The Lodestar

In terms of finance, this verse is an absurd proposition. It seems highly unlikely that any finance expert or someone with average skill with numbers would admit that the more one gives, the more one will have. It is common sense that the numbers will be negative if the outflow exceeds the inflow.

However, the Bible teaches that the more a person gives, the richer he becomes. The converse of this theory is that the one who withholds will be the loser. In other words, generosity never makes a person a pauper, but the opposite happens.

Jesus affirmed this principle: “Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you” (Luke 6:38). Paul quotes Jesus as saying, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).

Human generosity is rooted in God’s character. Apostle James describes God as someone who “gives generously to all those who ask him” (James 1:5).

Generosity is not giving away all that we have but meeting the needs of others in proportion to what we have. It is an attitude of not withholding but sharing our resources. The more we give, the more we are given to give. So, we become not enormous storehouses of resources but wider channels of God’s blessings to others.

The generous givers never run dry because they are like rivers of God, as the psalmist describes: “The river of God is full of water” (Psa 65:9).

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