“Don’t accept a meal from a tightwad; don’t expect anything special. He’ll be as stingy with you as he is with himself; he’ll say, “Eat! Drink!” but won’t mean a word of it. His miserly serving will turn your stomach when you realize the meal’s a sham.”
You know that gut feeling you get when you’re hanging out with someone you feel has ulterior motives?
They could be saying the nicest things.
They could be presenting the sweetest opportunities.
They could be offering you the world on a silver platter.
But there, just underneath the surface, something is making your spidey senses tingle.
Proverbs 23:6-8 is advising us to not hang out with these kinds of people – the kinds of people that expect ten things in return for the one thing they do for you.
These people don’t give through a lens of generosity; they give with a spirit of reciprocity. Nothing you do will be good enough and they’ll make sure you know that for the rest of your life.
But to take it a level deeper, let’s also not be these kinds of people.
Let us give freely.
Let us love unconditionally.
Let us hand out grace, favor and blessing lavishly.
May we be known as people who give out of the goodness of our hearts and not out of convenience in timing or status in appearance.
