Don't be the Stingy Man

‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭23‬:‭6‬-‭7a,‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Do not eat the bread of a man who is stingy; do not desire his delicacies, for he is like one who is inwardly calculating. “Eat and drink!” he says to you, but his heart is not with you.

Acts 20:35b, ESV

…and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

I have been the stingy man (or woman, I suppose:). 

I was always inwardly calculating the cost. I was bound by a mindset of lack, without realizing that’s what it was—until the Lord Himself brought me freedom. He broke me free from a bondage I didn’t realize held me captive—and He did it by teaching me generosity, in stages, during the same season through which He was teaching me to trust Him during extreme, ongoing financial hardship.

You see, a mindset of lack—stinginess—sneakily disguises itself as “stewardship.” The two are vastly different, but not easily distinguishable. To explore that contrast would be a much longer lesson; but, to summarize the difference, we could say simply that stewardship is motivated by faith, while a mindset of lack (stinginess) is motivated by fear. 

And I’m still a work in progress.

But here’s the irony: a mindset of lack is a tactic straight from the enemy to steal from the sanctified saint.

When we, as Christians, hold tightly to what we have, constantly calculating the cost rather than freely giving what has been given, the enemy steals from us. While we’re holding tightly, we’re actually being stolen from.

How?

1. Because giving begets blessedness.

2. Because as we think in our minds, so are we. 

Let’s start with the second point first. We took the title of this post from Proverbs 23:6 in the ESV translation (as seen above), but did you know this is also the verse from which we get the phrase “as a man thinks in his heart, so is he?” This verse in the original language reads more closely to the NASB translation:

Proverbs 23:6, NASB

Do not eat the bread of a selfish person; Or desire his delicacies; For as he thinks within himself, so he is.

If we’re constantly thinking through a mindset of lack, then lack (no matter how much or how little we have) will inform our decisions and our thoughts and our heart. It will hold a place in our inner man that shapes everything we decide to do/not do—until it informs the actuality of who we are. 

And this process will steal a blessedness from us that we were created to walk in. 

In Acts 20:35, Paul said that Jesus said it is more blessed to give than to receive. When APM first started, we did a lengthy study on the word blessed, which you can find here if you want to learn more. During that time, I learned that there are two Greek words which have been translated blessed in the New Testament.

The word used in Acts 20:35 is the word which people will say means “happy”—but that’s just scratching the surface of the word. The result of this type of blessedness is supernatural happiness, but it’s a happiness due to divine favor and a wide open life. The root word means “become long, large.”

And therein lies the irony. 

As we restrain what we give (which happens from the inside out), we are restrained (from the inside out). When we are the stingy man, we don’t live the wide open life we have access to through Jesus. 

So, today, let’s not just read another devotional and move on with our day, let’s sit with the Lord and ask Him to reveal places in our heart that are prone to stinginess. I know I’m still being worked on in this area, but I want to welcome that work because I want everything God promises I can walk in on this side of heaven.