# Building Your Financial Foundation: Giving to the Poor ### Part 2

— Living in the Spirit Series

Financial foundations are not built by prayer alone. They are built through godly character, wisdom, diligence and responsible stewardship. One important part of that foundation is generosity.

Many believers faithfully give their tithes and offerings in church, yet remain largely indifferent to the poor and needy around them. They have learned to give when giving is part of a church service, but have not necessarily developed the character of a person who notices needs and responds.

Sometimes the opportunity to give is much closer and simpler than we imagine.

You notice someone has no food while you have enough to share, but you shut your heart. You have enough for your meal, but someone beside you has nothing, and you choose not to notice. You know someone is struggling, but because they have not formally asked for help, you convince yourself that their situation is not your responsibility.

Yet Scripture says the righteous gives and spares not. Giving is therefore not merely a financial transaction. It is part of the character of the righteous.

## Giving and Receiving

Proverbs 19:17 tells us that he who has pity upon the poor lends to the Lord, and what he has given will be repaid. Jesus said give, and it shall be given unto you. And Proverbs 11:25 says the one who waters others will himself be watered.

Scripture reveals a principle of giving and receiving. This does not mean that generosity should become a selfish strategy for making money. We give because love moves us to give. Yet God has established principles through which generosity becomes a channel of blessing.

A person who continually gives becomes a channel; a person who only receives can eventually become a container. Healthy financial living requires both.

## What Are You Doing With What You Have?

Financial stewardship is not only about how much you possess but what you do with what God has placed in your hands.

Money can feed someone. A skill can create income. Knowledge can become an opportunity. Land can become productive. A business can create employment. An idea can become an enterprise. A seed can become a harvest.

The question is therefore not only, "What do I have?" but "What can what I have become?"

## The Principle of Multiplication

God does not intend everything that comes into our hands to be consumed immediately. Some resources are seeds — things that, when stewarded wisely, can produce more value than they initially possessed.

A farmer who eats every seed may satisfy today's hunger but have nothing to plant for tomorrow. The seed must sometimes be separated from the food.

The same principle applies to financial life. Money can be consumed, given, saved or deployed productively. A skill can be developed into income. Knowledge can produce wisdom and better decisions. Capital can be used to create value. An idea can become a business.

This is multiplication: using what you have in a way that produces something beyond its present form or value. But multiplication is not simply about making more money — it is about increasing the usefulness, productivity and capacity of what God has entrusted to you.

Some resources should be spent, some given, some saved and some invested. Financial maturity is learning to recognize the difference.

## Stop Looking Only for a Foundation to Blame

When people experience prolonged financial difficulty, they may immediately search for generational curses, ancestral covenants or family patterns.

But there is another question worth asking: Am I building properly now? Have I developed the character of a giver? Am I diligent in my work? Am I disciplined with money? Am I learning, saving, and managing what I already have wisely? Am I using my resources in ways that can produce more value?

Sometimes the question is not, "What foundation did my ancestors leave me?" but "What foundation am I building?"

## Giving Is Not a Substitute for Diligence

There is a foundation of generosity, but there is also a foundation of diligence, discipline, wisdom and productive work. A person cannot continually reject responsibility, waste what comes into his hands and neglect opportunities to learn or produce, and then blame every financial difficulty on generational foundations.

We build financially by giving, working, saving, learning, managing and multiplying what God entrusts to us. The goal is not merely to receive more. It is to become a trustworthy steward of what we receive.

If there is someone hungry whom you can help, help them. If you have a skill, develop it. If you have an opportunity to work, work diligently. If you receive income, manage it wisely. If you can create something productive, begin.

**Receive. Steward. Develop. Multiply. Give.**

Why keep looking for a foundation to blame when you can begin building?

*Hassan Thomas Nenger / Author, My Divine Identity as the Righteousness of God / Living in the Spirit Series /