What Does the Bible Say About Generosity?

Cardio Renal Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charity organization. Your donation advances our mission to provide a solution beyond dialysis.

It is one of the oldest questions a believer can ask her Bible: what does it actually say about generosity? Not about money in general, and not what any church or charity says — what the verses themselves say. This page gathers them in one place, quoted exactly, and grouped by what they teach. Every verse below is quoted from the World English Bible, a translation in the public domain written in plain modern English, so you can check each one against the Bible on your own shelf.

Generosity as Joy, Not Obligation

The Bible's best-known words on giving are not a command to give until it hurts. They are about the heart the gift is given with. Paul was writing to Corinth about a collection being taken up for Christians in need, and his picture is a farmer sowing seed:

"Remember this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. He who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Let each man give according as he has determined in his heart; not grudgingly, or under compulsion; for God loves a cheerful giver."
— 2 Corinthians 9:6–7

Notice where the deciding happens: in your own heart, first. A gift dragged out of someone, or given with a grudge attached, is not the thing being praised here. The same teaching is far older than Paul. In Deuteronomy, Israel is instructed on how to treat a neighbor who has fallen on hard times:

"You shall surely give, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to him, because it is for this thing Yahweh your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you put your hand to."
— Deuteronomy 15:10

"Your heart shall not be grieved" — the gift is not supposed to leave a sting behind it. And Paul, near the end of his ministry, sums the whole matter up with words he says came from Jesus himself:

"In all things I gave you an example, that so laboring you ought to help the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that he himself said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"
— Acts 20:35

More blessed to give than to receive. Start to finish, the Bible's framing is that giving is a happiness, not a tax.

Generosity as Trust

The second thing the verses teach is a kind of trust: a gift given to someone who cannot repay it is not lost. Proverbs says it in one startling line:

"He who has pity on the poor lends to Yahweh; he will reward him."
— Proverbs 19:17

The poor man cannot pay you back — that is the whole point of him being poor. The verse's picture is that God himself takes up the account: kindness to the poor is treated as a loan made to the Lord, and the Lord is good for it. Jesus teaches the same shape in the Sermon on the Plain:

"Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be given to you. For with the same measure you measure it will be measured back to you."
— Luke 6:38

Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over — that is a market picture: a seller filling your basket of grain, pressing it down to make room, shaking it so it settles, and filling it again until it spills over the top. The measure you use for others, Jesus says, is the measure that comes back to you. And Proverbs gives the same trust a quieter picture, from the garden:

"The liberal soul shall be made fat. He who waters shall be watered also himself."
— Proverbs 11:25

"The liberal soul" is the generous person — liberal in its old sense, free-handed. Watering is work you do for somebody else's garden. The promise tucked inside the picture is that the one who waters does not go dry.

Generosity as a Habit

The third thing the Bible teaches is that generosity is not meant to be an occasional event. It is a way of living, practiced steadily, the way you practice anything you believe in. Paul's instruction to Timothy about people who have money is not "give something once." It is a standing charge:

"…that they do good, that they be rich in good works, that they be ready to distribute, willing to share…"
— 1 Timothy 6:18

Rich in good works — in this verse, the wealth worth having is measured in deeds, not in the balance. And the letter to the Hebrews folds generosity into the ordinary sacrifices of a faithful life, right alongside praise:

"But don't forget to be doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased."
— Hebrews 13:16

Doing good and sharing are called sacrifices God is well pleased with — not ceremonies, but the daily habit of an open hand. There is even a day on the modern calendar set aside for that habit: Giving Tuesday, the day of giving back that follows Thanksgiving. But the Bible's picture is bigger than any single day. It is a life in which giving is simply what your hands do.

What the Word "Generosity" Means in the Bible

The verses above are quotations. This section is a summary, in our own plain words. When the Bible talks about generosity, it is rarely talking about the size of a gift. It is talking about the direction of a heart. Generosity, in Scripture's sense, is an open hand toward the person in need who is in front of you — given freely, without a grudge, without keeping score, and given steadily, as a habit of life rather than one grand gesture. It can be money, but it is just as often food, time, mercy, or work. If your question is who all this giving is for — What Does the Bible Say About Giving to Others? — we worked through that question honestly on its own page.

An Example: The Widow's Two Coins

The Gospels tell this story in a few lines. Jesus was sitting in the temple, watching people put their offerings into the treasury. The rich put in large amounts, out of money they would never miss. Then a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins — the smallest coins there were, worth almost nothing. Jesus called his disciples over and told them that she had given more than all the rest put together: they gave out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, gave everything she had to live on. The story is told in Mark chapter 12 and Luke chapter 21. It is the Bible's own measure of generosity in one short scene: the gift is not weighed by its size. It is weighed by what it cost the giver, and by the heart that gave it.

A Quiet Word From Your Hosts

Generosity today looks the same as it did in these verses: neighbors helping neighbors, an open hand toward the person in front of you. That is the work this Foundation tries to do — plain-language education and free tools for people living with kidney and heart disease, on the conviction that dialysis should not be a life sentence, together with support for research toward a solution beyond dialysis. If these verses have you thinking about your own giving, the pledge below is an invitation to stand with that work. It is offered once, and softly, in the spirit of everything quoted above: decided in the heart first, and given freely — or not at all.

This page is published by the Cardio Renal Foundation. Our legal name is Cardio Renal Foundation Inc, our EIN is 33-4359765, and we are a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization — verifiable in the IRS records by anyone, in about three minutes, and we would rather you checked than simply believed us. Questions reach a person here, at donations@cardiorenalfoundation.org or (646) 770-3946.

This article is informational only and is not tax, legal, or financial advice. Charitable giving and tax rules change and depend on your individual circumstances; consult a qualified tax advisor or attorney about your own situation.