“Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and one who waters will himself be watered” – Proverbs 11:25
When you think about what is required to be financially stable in your future years, two principles are typically given as fundamental: saving money and paying off debt. I wholeheartedly agree with those principles; you have to diligently save and diligently pay off debt in order to become financially well off. That being said, while those two principles are important, I want to take time out today to encourage you to add another principle to the rulebook of financial success: giving.
I realize that this principle seems counterintuitive. How does giving some of your wealth away help to build wealth? It’s not necessarily that the act itself automatically brings you more wealth (like some sort of magic formula), as much as the heart that chooses to be generous, rather than stingy, oftentimes gets rewarded with more wealth to be generous with. We all have in our heads the image of a wealthy person being like Ebenezer Scrooge from Charles Dickens’ novel “A Christmas Carol”. We tend to assume that many of the wealthy end up that way because they were super tight with their money and never gave any of it to anyone in need. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of rich Scrooges out there. However, you’d be surprised at the amount of people who amass wealth while being very generous. I have heard numerous times from people that the more they decided to give to others, the more money they always seem to have at the end of the month. Even King Solomon made an excellent observation in Proverbs 11:24, “One gives freely, yet grows all the richer; another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want”.
As the year is fast coming to an end, I have a 2024 challenge for all of you. While you are diligently saving money and paying down debt, try incorporating a little bit of giving to your financial strategy. While it may seem counterintuitive, don’t be surprised if the commitment to giving yields a bountiful financial harvest for 2024 and beyond.