“Take from among you, a contribution to the Lord. Whoever is of a generous heart, let him bring the Lord’s contribution: Gold, silver, and bronze.”
– Exodus 35:5
This is a great phrase to describe giving to God and to the accomplishment of his purposes. So they’re needing money, tools, resources, gold, silver, and bronze for the construction of the tabernacle. And so God says whoever is of a generous heart, let him bring gold, silver, and bronze.
Don’t you want to be described before God as one who has a generous heart?
This Verse Reminds Us to be Generous
And I read this, and I just think, God, I want people to describe my heart that way. Don’t you want your heart to be described that way by God, before God? He has a generous heart. She has a generous heart. She gives freely, generously, gladly. To use 2 Corinthians 8–9 kind of language, cheerfully.
That’s the picture of generosity we see in scripture. It’s the picture we see here in Exodus 35:5, and I would just ask, is it the picture of your heart?
We Should Desire to be Selfless
And none of us wants others to say of us before the Lord, “He has a stingy heart.: She has a hoarding heart. She or he keeps for themselves more than they need.” No, we want to be generous people who are sacrificially giving above and beyond what we can give so that God’s purposes might be accomplished in the world. Oh, this is a word we need to hear, especially, especially in a culture as wealthy as the one I live in. I live in one of the wealthiest countries ever to exist on planet Earth. I have so many things, so many physical resources that people in history and people around the world today right now don’t have.
Exodus 35:5: Asking God to Give Us Generous Hearts
So, God, help me to be generous with what I have as you asked the Israelites to be generous in Exodus 35:5. God, I pray for my own heart. I pray for others’ hearts who are listening to this, praying with me. God, help us to be generous and help us not to be stingy. God, help us not to hoard that which you’ve given us. And Lord, help us not to store it away in barns in a way that prevents us from you using us right now to accomplish your purposes. You want the world to know your glory. You want your love to be made known among the least of these.
God, among those who are starving, among those who are sick, persecuted, imprisoned. God, among the fatherless and the widowed, the sojourner as we’ve seen in Exodus. Lord, we pray that you would help us use our resources to display your glory in a world of urgent spiritual and physical need in the world, among people who’ve never even heard the gospel.
Using Our Resources for the Spread of the Gospel
God, help us to use our resources to get the gospel to them. Lord, we pray that you would make us a generous people. God, help me to be more generous. Help us all to be more generous, we pray. God, we’re so prone to not being generous. Give us generous hearts. Change our hearts, just like you taught us, Jesus, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
God, use our resources in the world around us to accomplish your purposes, we pray. Forgive us for our lack of generosity. Help us to grow in generosity, in the generosity of our hearts. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
