Daily Manna · Day 262 · September 19
Barns Filled with Plenty
“So shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine.”
Who is this verse really for: the man whose barn is full, or the man whose barn is empty?
Start one verse earlier, because the sentence starts there: "Honour the LORD with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of all thine increase." Firstfruits are the first part of the harvest, handed over to God before anyone knows whether the rest will come in. Remember, too, what kind of book Proverbs is. It describes how life usually goes; it does not write contracts. Elsewhere it says, "Better is a little with righteousness than great revenues without right." And one verse after the barns, Solomon turns straight to "the chastening of the LORD," which means God's correction. That would be a strange turn to take if he had just promised everybody a full barn.
So you cannot read the full barn backwards, as if it were a receipt. A man who does that has quietly made the size of his harvest the proof of where he stands with God, and that is exactly the mistake the next verses are written to prevent.
The empty barn is no accusation either. The verses about correction guard against that reading too, because a lean year does not prove that somebody held back from God.
What the proverb is really asking about is order. Does God get the first part of what comes in, or does He get whatever is left at the end of the month? That question has the same answer in a good year and a bad one, which is how you know it is the right question. And the God who asks for the first part is the Father who, two verses later, corrects "the son in whom he delighteth." Whatever is in your barn this year, you are loved.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 262 is Whosoever Will (Revelation 22:17).