Proverbs 10:22

A
B
C

The blessing of the Lord makes one rich, and He adds no sorrow with it.

Proverbs 10:22 (NKJV)

The blessing of the Lord brings wealth, without painful toil for it.

Proverbs 10:22 (NIV)

The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and he addeth no sorrow with it.

Proverbs 10:22 (KJV)

The blessing of the Lord makes a person rich, and he adds no sorrow with it.

Proverbs 10:22 (NLT)

The blessing of the Lord makes rich, and he adds no sorrow with it.

Proverbs 10:22 (ESV)

It is the blessing of the Lord that makes rich, and He adds no sorrow to it.

Proverbs 10:22 (NASB)

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

The blessing of the Lord makes rich, and He adds no sorrow with it [neither does toiling increase it].

Proverbs 10:22 (AMP)

Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMP), Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

The blessing of the Lord, it makes [truly] rich, and He adds no sorrow with it [neither does toiling increase it].

Proverbs 10:22 (AMPC)

Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMPC), Copyright © 1954, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.org

God's blessing makes life rich; nothing we do can improve on God.

Proverbs 10:22 (MSG)

Scripture quotations from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.

New Covenant Meaning

The Source of Wealth Is the Blessing of God, Not Your Output

Proverbs 10:22 is possibly the clearest statement on the source of wealth in all of Proverbs. It does not say hard work makes rich. It does not say smart strategy makes rich. It says the blessing of the Lord makes rich. The Hebrew berakah (blessing) refers to the overflow of divine favor, the outpouring of God's goodness on a life. That blessing is the active agent. Your effort is not the root cause of wealth; the blessing of God is. This does not make you passive; Proverbs has plenty to say about diligence. But it does reframe the source. Wealth that lasts flows from a different fountain than your own capacity.

No Sorrow Added: Wealth Without the Attached Costs

The second half of the verse is what makes this the most important verse on wealth in Proverbs. He adds no sorrow with it. The Hebrew etseb means pain, toil, sorrow, grief. In the world, wealth frequently arrives with a companion: anxiety to protect it, compromise to acquire it, broken relationships to sustain it, loss of integrity to grow it. The blessing of the Lord produces wealth without those attached costs. Matthew 6:33 describes the same reality from the other side: seek first the Kingdom, and all these things are added to you. The Kingdom-first path to abundance is different in kind from the world's path. The destination may look similar, but the journey and the cost are completely different.

Ephesians 1:3 says believers have already been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ. The berakah described in Proverbs 10:22 is not something you are waiting for God to decide to release. In Christ, you are already in the blessing. The question is not how to earn it or persuade God to release it. The question is how to walk in the reality of what has already been given. The blessing is the environment of the one who is in Christ. Everything produced in that environment carries a different quality: provision without the sorrow, abundance without the grief.

Application for Your Life

Reframe the Source of Your Provision

One of the most practical shifts a believer can make is in how they understand the source of their wealth. If your financial security rests entirely on your own capacity, then it feels like everything depends on you. That is a heavy weight. Proverbs 10:22 offers a different foundation: the blessing of the Lord is what makes rich. Your work and wisdom matter, but they are the channel, not the source. When you operate from that understanding, anxiety about provision decreases because the source is not your fluctuating performance but the steady blessing of God over your life.

Wealth Without Sorrow Is Accessible Because of What the Cross Did

Galatians 3:13-14 says that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law so that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles. The blessing of Abraham included material abundance (Genesis 13:2). The cross made that blessing accessible not through religious performance but through faith. You do not have to work your way into the blessing of the Lord. You step into it because of what Jesus accomplished. And the quality of that blessing is distinct: it comes without sorrow attached. That is not just a financial promise. It is a description of the character of God's provision compared to the world's.

Prayer Based on This Verse

Father, I declare what Your Word says: it is Your blessing that makes rich, and You add no sorrow with it. I am not chasing wealth through my own striving alone. I am walking in the reality of being blessed in Christ. You have already blessed me with every spiritual blessing in Him, and that includes the overflow into the material dimension of my life. I reject anxiety about provision because the source of my supply is You, not just my own effort. I receive abundance that comes without the sorrow the world's wealth brings. Thank You that Your blessing has a different quality. In Jesus name. Amen.