God Gave Me My Money

From an article titled "How the Richest Man in the World Observes Christmas," published in the Woman's Home Companion (December 1905 according to a BYU citation by Arthur C. Brooks; sometimes cited as 1915 in secondary sources). Rockefeller elaborated to a New York American reporter around the same period: "I believe the power to make money is a gift from God, to be developed and used to the best of our ability for the good of mankind." He was expressing a genuine Calvinist theology of stewardship — that wealth was a divine trust, not personal property — which shaped his systematic philanthropic giving from early adulthood.