Firstfruits

Firstfruits

A farmer named Samuel had struggled financially for years. In a particularly lean season, he knelt in his field and dedicated the first of the harvest — whatever it was — to God before he looked at the numbers. 'I felt ridiculous,' he said later. 'The harvest was small and I was giving more of it away.' That year, the remaining harvest sold at prices he hadn't seen in a decade. He didn't call it a prosperity formula. He called it the day he discovered that honoring God with his first changed how he saw his last. 'It reordered everything,' he said. 'I stopped living for the leftovers and started living from the gift.'

The principle of firstfruits runs through both Testaments. In the Old Testament, the first of the harvest was brought to God before any was eaten — an act of trust that acknowledged God as the source. The firstfruits were not the leftovers after needs were met; they were the first, given before certainty of what remained. This principle of 'first' is a posture of dependence: God first with our time, our money, our attention, our plans. When we give God the first and best, we are making a statement about who we believe is actually in charge of provision. What does it mean for you to honor God with the firstfruits of your life today?