Ecclesiastes 5 · a question people ask
"Every man also to whom God has given riches and wealth … this is the gift of God" (5:19). Is this a promise that God will make people rich?
The verse speaks of a man who has been given riches, wealth and "power to eat of it" (5:19), and calls that the gift of God. It doesn't promise them to anyone. The verses just before tell of "wealth kept by its owner to his harm" (5:13), of riches that "perish by misfortune" (5:14), and of a man who "shall take nothing for his labor, which he may carry away in his hand" (5:15). The next chapter tells of a man to whom God gives riches, "yet God gives him no power to eat of it" (6:2). And the verse before speaks of eating, drinking and enjoying good in one's labor, and calls that "his portion" (5:18). No saying here is a promise, and these notes don't apply the verse to anyone's money today.
The verses
“a man to whom God gives riches, wealth, and honor, so that he lacks nothing for his soul of all that he desires, yet God gives him no power to eat of it, but an alien eats it. This is vanity, and it is an evil disease.”