2 Corinthians 9

13. “For I mean not that other men be eased and ye burdened”; as if the benefit of the poor were the main end; as if God cared for the poor, and not for the rich; as if to get from those who have, and bestow on those who have not, were the object of inciting to liberality. Paul distinctly denies this. He takes the higher ground: it is a grace of God. He contemplates the benefit to the soul of the giver.

15. The principle laid down is, that the abundance of the rich is intended for the supply of the poor, and the illustration of the principle is drawn from a miracle in the wilderness. There, by a miraculous arrangement, if any one through greediness gathered more manna than enough, it bred worms, and became offensive; and if, through weakness, or deep sorrow, or pain, any were prevented from collecting enough, still what they had collected was found to be sufficient. In this miracle Paul perceives a great universal principle of human life. God has given to every man a certain capacity and a certain power of enjoyment. Whatsoever he heaps or hoards beyond that is not enjoyment but disquiet. If a man piles up wealth, all beyond a certain point becomes disquiet. Thus thought James: “Your gold and silver is cankered.” You can not escape the stringency of that law of the daily manna. F. W. R.

16. Titus does not, like Timothy, appear at intervals through all the passages of the apostle’s life. He is not mentioned in the Acts at all, and this is the only place where he comes conspicuously forward in the Epistles, and all that is said of him is connected with the business of the collection. If we put together the notices, scanty as they are, of the conduct of Titus, they set before us a character which seems to claim our admiration for a remarkable union of enthusiasm, integrity, and discretion. C.

20,21. It was in order to preserve his own reputation that Paul shielded himself from censure by consulting appearances, for if so large a sum had been intrusted to him alone, an opening would have been left for the suspicion of appropriating a portion to himself. In this is to be observed Paul’s wisdom, not only as a man of the world, but as a man of God. He knew that he lived in a censorious age, that he was as a city set on a hill, that the world would scan his every act and his every word, and attribute all conceivable and even inconceivable evil to what he did in all honor. F. W. R.

1. For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you: 2 for I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, 3 that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many. Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain in this behalf; that, as I said, 4 ye may be ready: lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, 5 we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting. Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready, as a matter of bounty, and not as of covetousness. 6 But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which sow- 7 eth bountifully shall reap also bountifully. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. 8 And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all suffi- 9 ciency in all things, may abound to every good work: (as it is written, He hath dispersed 10 abroad; he hath given to the poor: his righteousness remaineth for ever. Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed 11 sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;) being enriched in every thing to all

12 bountifulness, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God. For the administration of this service not only supplieth the want of the saints, but is abundant also by many thanks-givings unto God; whiles by the experiment of this ministration they glorify God for your professed subjection unto the gospel of Christ, and for your liberal distribution unto them, and unto all men; and by their prayer for you, which long after you for the exceeding grace of God in you. Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.

CHRISTIAN liberality puts itself in sympathy with that great tide of universal mercy, which, flowing forth from the throne of God and the Lamb, encompasses every island, washes every shore, and proffers its life-giving waters to every individual of the race. It is prompted by sympathy with Christ in his love for universal man. It recognizes Christ as the Saviour of universal man. It recognizes the kingdom of Christ as spiritual and universal. Prompted by the spirit of love to God, enveloping and sanctifying the loves and the liberalities of earth, Christian liberality forces the stream of its bounty upward, far, far above them all, and pours it forth into the treasury of that universal empire of which it is written: “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever.” Here only does Christian liberality become pure, because here only does Christian love become pure. Unmixed with the loves and the liberalities of earth, it exhibits itself, like the water of the river of life, clear as crystal, and flowing, like that blessed river, in unstinted bounty all over the world. H. Smith.

What we wait for, and are looking hopefully to see, is a consecration of the vast money power of the world to the work and cause and kingdom of Jesus Christ. For that day, when it comes, is the morning, so to speak, of the new creation. That tide-wave in the money power can as little be resisted when God brings it on as the tides of the sea; and like these also it will flow across the world in a day. And such a result we are to look for largely to the merchant class of disciples. Trade expanding into commerce, and commerce rising into communion, are to be the outline of the story. When the merchants seeking goodly pearls—all the merchant race—find the precious one they seek, and sell their all to buy it, they will make it theirs. H. B.

LET this dignify wealth in your eyes; value it henceforth on this account, that the Lord will accept it at your hands as an offering of love. Be thankful, though you may have but little with which to present him. Seek out the right objects for it, the objects which you deem to be the dearest in his sight. Give to them all you can. Give under a grateful sense of your obligations, and you will feel that giving itself is a benefit, that it is an act in which you receive more than you render. J. H.—A liberal heart will have a liberal hand, be it full or empty. The most beautiful examples of charitable living are found alike among the rich and the poor. None are so low or so destitute but that they may equal the princes of the earth in charity. Their mites may even outstrip, in their beauty and reward, the largest bestowing of the wealthy. If riches make us proud and forgetful of our ill-deservings, they will harden the heart; but if they be received as the largesses of heaven, and our unworthiness be deeply tasted in them, we shall delight to use them for the good of others. H. H.

4. Observe the delicacy of the mode in which the hint is given: “We (that we say not, ye) may not be ashamed.” Paul makes it a matter of personal anxiety, as if the shame and fault of non-payment would be his. Thereby he appealed not to their selfish, but to their most unselfish feelings; he appealed to their gratitude, their generosity, to everything which was noble or high within them. This is a great principle—one of the deepest you can have for life and action. Appeal to the highest motives; appeal whether they be there or no, for you make them where you do not find them. Arnold trusted his boys, avowing that he believed what they affirmed, and all attempt at deceiving him ceased forthwith. Let men say what they will of human nature’s evil, a generous, real, unaffected confidence never fails to elicit the Divine spark. F. W. R.

6. “No man is thoroughly converted till his piety reaches his pocket.” So said a Christian layman who had earned the right to say it. Let the words ring in men’s ears. For few, how very few, have learned the blessedness of noble, bountiful, cheerful giving. Paul, who everywhere urged and organized the charity of the churches, has told us how “the Lord loveth a cheerful giver” and blesseth “him that soweth bountifully.” He warns us against the “covetousness which is idolatry”—which makes money our God. And he urgently enjoins upon the rich the duty of a bountiful liberality. The New Testament doctrine of human ownership, and the foundation of giving, is summed up in one word—STEWARDSHIP. An.

7. The duty of the preacher to preach, of the scholar to teach, is no more imperative than the obligation which lies upon the wealthy to give—to consecrate a similar proportion of the particular forms of power which they wield to benevolent ends. If we would ascertain, then, the right use of wealth and the extent of the obligation which binds men who control it, we should recur to the New Testament, and there study the precepts and example of Christ and his immediate followers. Whatever of self-denial, whatever of self-sacrifice, whatever of consecration of power to the salvation of men and the glory of God marked the career of these exemplars of our faith, is binding to-day upon the Christian teacher, the Christian preacher, and the Christian merchant. M. B. A.—The Gospel of Christ, in harmony with its great design of establishing a reign of love, leaves its followers to assess themselves. It puts into their hands, indeed, a claim upon their property, but leaves the question, how much? to be determined by themselves. In assisting them to fill up the blank with the proper assessment, the only step which it takes is to point them to the cross of Christ; and, while their eye is fixed there in admiring love, to say, “How much owest thou unto thy Lord?” “Freely ye have received, freely give.” J. H.—Christian charity is a calm, wise thing; nay, sometimes it will appear to a superficial observer a very hard thing—for it has courage to refuse. A Christian man will not give to everything; he will not give because it is the fashion; he will not give because an appeal is very impassioned, or because it touches his sensibilities. He gives as he “purposeth in his heart.” F. W. R.

8. No soul was ever yet, or ever will be, generous in its dealings with God, which has not first formed a large estimate of God’s generosity. Oh for a juster conception of the intensity of His love and tenderness for us, of His unspeakable willingness to give us day by day, and hour by hour, all things which are requisite for the spiritual life! E. M. G.—Spiritual prosperity is inseparable from Christian liberality. For “God loveth a cheerful giver: and God is able to make all grace abound toward you.” As often as you practice this duty in an evangelical spirit, you must be conscious that the best part of your sanctified nature is called into exercise; your heart is partially discharged of its remaining selfishness; your mind is braced more for Christian activity; your sympathy causes you to feel afresh your alliance with man; your beneficence enables you to rejoice in your union of spirit with Christ, and adds a new bond to that power of affection which binds you to his cause. And while other duties bring you nearer to Christ, this may be said at once to place you by his side, and to exalt you into a real though humble imitator of his divine benevolence. J. H.

9. A habit of benevolence must be contracted and kept alive, as all other habits are, by constant exercise. There is not a day passes over our heads but we might contribute something to lessen the uneasiness or promote the happiness of those with whom we have to do, and, by studying to promote their happiness, we mold ourselves into those habits which are productive of our own, both here and hereafter. Seed.

11. Paul urges all these motives for giving: emulation; self-esteem; gratitude, or sense of infinite benefaction; prudence, common sense, and a reasonable regard to what is fair and equitable; a sense of honor before men and God; ambition—a noble desire to obtain for ourselves, and to turn to account the largest and most liberal supplies of the divine bounty; and lastly, zeal for the glory of God—a feeling of what redounds to His honor in this whole matter, He being first, middle, and end in it all. Ross.

12. By the practice of Christian liberality, the glory of God and the credit of religion are promoted; and what object should be of more precious and abiding concern to the believer than this? The new-born liberality of the first Christians for the support of their needy brethren was bringing the benevolent power of Christianity to the test; and the result of “the experiment of this ministration” was such as to call forth songs of exultation to the glory of God. It displayed the gospel in a new aspect, brought to light its benevolent energies, showed them that much as they knew of its virtues, it contained hidden excellences which it would require time and circumstances to evolve and display; it filled the Church with a chorus of praise to the glory of God. J. H.

13. What are the rewards of liberality which Paul promises to the Corinthians? They are, first, the love of God (v. 7); secondly, a spirit abounding to every good work (v. 8); thirdly, thanksgiving on their behalf (vs. 11-13). A noble harvest! but all spiritual. Comprehend the meaning of it well. When you give to God sacrifice, and know that what you give is sacrificed, and is not to be got again, even in this world; for if you give, expecting it back again, there is no sacrifice; charity is no speculation in the spiritual funds, no wise investment, to be repaid with interest either in time or eternity! No! the rewards are these: Do right, and God’s recompense to you will be the power of doing more right. Give, and God’s reward to you will be the spirit of giving more; a blessed spirit, for it is the Spirit of God Himself, whose life is the blessedness of giving. Love, and God will pay you with the capacity of more love; for love is heaven—love is God within you. F. W. R.

15. “Herein is love!” “Thanks be unto God

for his unspeakable gift!" And while you are standing in the presence of this matchless display of love, “what doth the Lord require of thee?” For yourself, he invites you to accept that love and be happy. And in relation to your fellow-men, he only requires that the stream of gratitude which his great love has drawn from your heart should be poured into that channel in which a tide of mercy is rolling through the world, and bearing blessings to the nations. He who for your sake gave his Son asks you for his sake to give of your worldly substance to the cause of human happiness. He asks you to cast into that treasury into which he hath given his Son, and poured all the blessings of his grace. The office to which God designates every man from the moment of his conversion is meant to be a new donation to the world. The relation in which he places him to the world is meant to be a fresh expression of the same infinite love which prompted him to give Christ; it is to be viewed as nothing less than a symbolical representation to the world of that unspeakable gift. He is not that gift, but is sent to bear witness of that gift; not merely to announce it with his lips, but to describe and commemorate its fullness and freeness in his own character. Like his blessed Lord he is to look upon himself as dedicated to the cause of human happiness.