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Honor Jehovah with Your Wealth

Proverbs 3:9-10 Updated American Standard Version (UASV)
⁹Honor Jehovah with your wealth
and with the firstfruits of all your produce;
¹⁰then your barns will be filled with plenty,
and your vats will be bursting with wine.

Honor Jehovah with your wealth: The principal Hebrew term denoting “honor” is kabed, which literally means “to be heavy, weighty.” Thus, a person who is honored is seen as being weighty, that is, they amount to something. To Honor someone means that we hold them in high esteem, to recognize them as being great and worthy of our respect. Because of his being our Creator and Sovereign, God is deserving of our honor, our reverential regard or respect, wherein we speak highly of him at all times. (1 Tim. 1:17; Heb. 3:3, 4; Rev. 4:9-11) God deserves our honor not just for what he has done, or what position he holds in creation but also for who he is, as God is love. – 1 John 4:8.

Jehovah deserves our honor because of his good name, strong moral character or strength, and adherence to ethical principles. Our honoring him means that we have great respect and appreciation for him. Moreover, we do so by proclaiming his name. Our wealth (valuable things) need not necessarily refer to monetary. We can honor him with our time, our God-given talents, our body strength, by being grateful for all that he has done (Deut. 6:9-11), by being more reflective of him as we were made in his image (3:27-28), and yes, as well as our financial possessions. – Proverbs 11:25.

The reference to firstfruits takes us back to the time of Moses (Deut. 26:2, 10; Lev 23:15–21), where the Israelites were expected to give Jehovah God the firstfruits of their farming labors, which was an act of worship. This was heartfelt evidence that they appreciated all that Jehovah had given them. In all that we can honor God with, it should always be our first and our best of what we do in life.

Here we are again, with another, if you do (A); you will get (B). Largely, if the Israelites honored Jehovah with their prosperity from hard labor (A), they would have full barns and wine to drink (B). The barns and vats in the days of the Israelite nation are not representative of wealth. They are illustrative of the basics of life at that time, bread and wine. In other words, generally speaking, if the Israelites honored Jehovah God with the firstfruits of their labor, he would make sure that they did not fall below the basics of life.