November 5, 2017

Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the first fruits of all your produce. Then will your barns be filled with grain, with new wine your vats will overflow. (Proverbs 3: 9-10)
The word steward from which stewardship is derived can be traced back to the Old English words, “Sty Warden.” The word “sty” meant whole farm or estate. Today we still use this word but only to refer to the place where pigs are kept. It originally meant the whole farm, the place where you stayed, hence “the sty.” The word “warden” still maintains its meaning when we talk of game warden. The warden was the protector, the guardian and the proxy. A warden was left in charge of the owner’s property when the owner was away. It was under-stood that the warden was in charge and was to treat the prop-erty entrusted to him as his own. In many ways it was there to use but not to own. This is yet another way of thinking about stewardship.
God give us gifts throughout our life, and in many ways they are not our own. Our money, our homes, our skills and abili-ties are on loan to us from God. It is our responsibility to care for the gifts that God has given us; to use them well and pre-serve them for the next generation.
Furthermore, when we do make our offering to God it should always come from the first fruits as it is taught to us in Sacred Scripture. Even in the story of Cain and Abel we see both of them making offering to God out of the harvest. The difference between their gifts was that Abel offered the first and the best of his harvest, while Cain’s offering was not his best and not the first fruits of his flock. Some Christian Denominations have a more elaborated understanding of tithing which acts as a goal to giving. The most important part of the notion of tith-ing is not whether it is 1%, 2%, 5%, or 10% of our income. What matters the most is the idea of deciding ahead of time the first fruits of our labors will be dedicated to the Lord.
All tithes of the land, whether in grain from the fields or in fruit from the trees, belong to the Lord, as sacred to Him. (Leviticus 27:30).
Fr. Dan