The First Fruits

“Some of the first of your dough you shall give to the Lord as a contribution throughout your generations.” (Numbers 15:21, ESV)

Giving to the Lord is a precept that we find throughout the Scriptures. Here, the Lord commands that the people should give of the first of their dough, the product of the grain harvest in the land. This giving of the first of the intake is a universal principle of the Scriptures (Leviticus 23:40; Numbers 18:13; Deuteronomy 26:2; etc).

Why does the Lord ask us to give of the first fruits, why not the middle or the last? The reason is that the giving of the first takes faith. When one gives of the first it is an expression of faith in the Lord as the provider and that He will continue to provide for our needs.

Often Christians give of the leftovers. At the end of the month or pay period they will give some of what remains in the checking account. To give like this is better than to give nothing, but it does not take much faith. To give of the first of the paycheck means that one must trust that the Lord provides sufficiently to meet all of our needs. It means we believe that, if we manage our finances biblically, He works providentially in the affairs of life to ensure that we will have everything we need.

I can give personal testimony to this principle. Soon after the Lord saved me, I believed the Lord would have me give 10% of our income for His work. My wife and I began doing this by giving after covering all our expenses at the end of the month. One Sunday she asked me what we should do since we only had only a few dollars in the account. Well, we gave everything that we had left, a pittance of what I believed the Lord wanted us to do. Later that week in my Bible reading, I came across the teaching on the first fruits. We made a decision to give of the first of my paycheck and trust God to make ends meet. While there were some lean times, we can testify that we always made it. We have always been able to give what the Lord put on our hearts to do and still meet all the needs of the family.