At this time of year, people are looking to fulfill resolutions regarding healthy eating, exercising, and finances. Regarding the latter, I want to offer what I consider to be a foundational element in our understanding of money and its use. Without understanding this one thing, next year at this time of year, the same financial problems will be present in our lives along with the repeated annual visit of regret.

I have come to understand that money and how we steward its use offer some of the clearest insight into our personal lives, our values, and our understanding of the nature of God.

Two people have helped form my understanding of money. One was my father and the other is my wife, Jan. My father grew up during the Great Depression. He lived for 9 years hopping freight trains across America to find enough work to eat and if he had anything left over, he sent it home to his parents to help feed their large family. Jan grew up as a missionary kid in Central America not having her thinking formed by the consumer-driven culture of the United States. She never watched TV except for a few times on infrequent visits back to the States. She did not sit for hours watching a television screen being indoctrinated to think that more was better.

My father and Jan taught me that a generous heart, even in times of personal need, was the key to financial freedom. This is a freedom that is a matter of the heart, not what one has in a bank account or an investment portfolio. 

In God’s Kingdom, there is a foundational understanding that must be in place before we can experience healthy wealth accumulation, “Give freely and become more wealthy; be stingy and lose everything. The generous will prosper; those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed” (Proverbs 11:24-25).  

When Jan and I got off a flight from Europe landing in Medford, Oregon 24 years ago, we only possessed our checked luggage. It was all we owned at the time apart from a few boxes of Christmas decorations stored in my mom’s attic awaiting our return. To this day, as I survey the financial blessings of God in our lives, the only interpreter of why this has happened has been the lessons we learned that involved giving freely without fear when we were not sure we had enough to meet our own needs. That coupled with God’s good and giving heart opened the door for the blessings we now enjoy and give thanks for each day.

As the verse above promised, “The generous will prosper; those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed.” An open hand and a giving heart is the key to understanding how to prosper in our personal finances and become a blessing to others. A tight-fisted approach motivated by fear will always choke to death the potential for the blessings the Lord has planned for each of us as a testimony of His love and care.