The Early Church · c. AD 56
Chapter 21
A Cheerful Giver
Let each man give according as he has determined in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
For parents
Paul lists what he has suffered (2 Corinthians 11:23–27): five times he was whipped with forty lashes minus one, three times he was beaten with rods, once he was stoned, and three times he was shipwrecked; in Damascus he escaped arrest in a basket (11:32–33). He also writes of false apostles and Satan (11:13–15), of “a messenger of Satan” sent to torment him (12:7), and of sexual sins he fears many have not turned from (12:21). It is all told plainly, without detail.
’s letter to the of God at turned next to the gift for the . “Now, brothers and sisters, we want to tell you about God’s , which has been given in the assemblies of .
“They have been through a hard test of suffering, and in it their great joy and their deep poverty have spilled over into rich generosity. They gave all they could—I can vouch for it—and more than they could, all on their own. They begged us, pleading hard, to receive this grace and their share in the service to the saints. It was not what we had expected. First they gave themselves to the Lord, and to us, by the will of God.
“So we urged to finish this grace among you too, just as he had begun it before. Just as you are rich in everything—in faith, in what you say, in knowledge, in all eagerness, and in your love for us—see that you are rich in this grace too.
“I’m not saying this as an order. I am using the eagerness of others to prove that your love is real as well. You know the grace of our Lord : he was rich, and yet for your sakes he became poor, so that through his poverty you might become rich.
“Here is my advice about this, and this is what is good for you. A year ago you were the first to begin, not only to do it but also to want to. So now finish the doing too. Then, just as you were ready and willing, you will also complete it, as far as you are able. If the readiness is there, it is accepted according to what you have, not according to what you don’t have.
“This is not so that others may have it easy while you have it hard. It is for equality. Right now, what you have to spare fills what they lack. Then what they have to spare may also fill what you lack, so that there will be equality. It is just as it is written: ‘Whoever gathered plenty had nothing left over, and whoever gathered a little did not run short.’
“But thanks be to God, who puts the same eager care for you into the heart of Titus. He did accept our urging, but he was very eager himself, and he went out to you on his own.
“With him we have sent the brother who is praised in the Good News throughout all the assemblies. And more than that, the assemblies appointed him to travel with us in this grace, the service we are doing to the glory of the Lord himself and to show how ready we are.
“We want to avoid anyone blaming us over this great gift that is in our care. We care about what is honorable, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of people.
“We have sent with them our brother, whom we have often found eager in many things. Now he is much more eager still, because of the great confidence he has in you.
“As for Titus, he is my partner and fellow worker for you. As for our brothers, they are the of the assemblies, the glory of Christ. So, in front of the assemblies, let them see the proof of your love, and of our boasting about you.
“I really don’t need to write to you about the service to the saints. I know how ready you are, and I boast about it to those in Macedonia, telling them that has been prepared for a year now. Your eagerness has stirred up a great many of them.
“But I have sent the brothers so that in this matter our boasting about you won’t turn out to be empty, and so that you will be ready, just as I said. I don’t want anyone from Macedonia to come there with me and find you not ready. Then we (to say nothing of you) would be disappointed in this confident boasting.
“So I thought I needed to ask the brothers to go to you before I do, and to put in order ahead of time the generous gift you promised earlier, so that it will be ready as a matter of generosity, and not of greed.
“Remember this: whoever sows only a little will reap only a little, and whoever sows plenty will reap plenty.
“Each person should give what he has decided in his own heart, not unwillingly or because he has to, for God loves a cheerful giver.
“And God is able to make all grace overflow to you, so that you will always have all you need in everything, and have plenty for every good work. As it is written, ‘He has scattered far and wide. He has given to the poor. His remains forever.’
“Now may the one who gives seed to the sower and bread to eat give you seed for sowing and multiply it. May he make the fruits of your righteousness grow. You are being made rich in everything, for every kind of generosity, and that generosity, through us, brings about thanks to God.
“This service of giving that you perform does more than fill up what the saints lack. It also pours out in much giving of thanks to God. This service gives proof, and because of it they praise God for your obedience to the Good News of Christ, which you confess, and for your generous gift to them and to all.
“And as they pray for you, they long for you, because God’s grace in you is so great.
“Now thanks be to God for his gift, which is more than words can tell!”
Then Paul wrote about himself. “I, Paul, plead with you myself, by the humility and gentleness of Christ. I am the one who is lowly among you when I am there, but bold toward you from far away.
“Yes, I beg you that when I am there I won’t have to show the bold confidence I mean to use against some who think we live by the flesh.
“We live in the flesh, but we don’t make war by the flesh. The weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God for pulling down strongholds. We pull down arguments and everything high that lifts itself up against the knowledge of God. We make every thought a prisoner, to obey Christ. And we stand ready to punish all disobedience, once your own obedience is complete.
“Do you look at things only by what is in front of your face? If anyone is sure in himself that he belongs to Christ, he should think about this again: just as he belongs to Christ, so do we.
“Even if I boast a good deal about our authority, I will not be ashamed. The Lord gave it for building you up and not for throwing you down. I don’t want to seem as though I wish to frighten you by my letters.
“‘His letters,’ they say, ‘are weighty and strong, but when he is here, he himself is weak, and the way he speaks is looked down on.’ Anyone like that should think about this: what we are in the words of our letters when we are away, we are also in action when we are there.
“We don’t dare to count ourselves among some of those who praise themselves, or to compare ourselves with them. But those people measure themselves against themselves and compare themselves with themselves. They are without understanding.
“But we will not boast beyond proper limits. We stay inside the boundaries God gave us, which reach even to you. We are not stretching ourselves too far, as though we had not reached you. We came even as far as you with the Good News of Christ.
“We don’t boast beyond proper limits about other people’s work. But we hope that as your faith grows, our reach will grow much wider through you, in the area given to us. Then we may preach the Good News even in the places beyond you, without boasting about what someone else has already done.
“But ‘whoever boasts, let him boast in the Lord.’ The one who is approved is not the one who praises himself, but the one the Lord praises.
“If only you would put up with me while I am a little foolish! And in fact you do put up with me. I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy, because I promised you in marriage to one husband, so that I could present you to Christ as a pure .
“But I am afraid that somehow your minds might be corrupted and drawn away from the simplicity that is in Christ, just as the tricked with his craftiness. If the one who comes preaches another Jesus, one we didn’t preach, or if you receive a different spirit, one you didn’t receive, or a different ‘good news,’ one you didn’t accept, you put up with that well enough.
“I don’t think I am in any way behind the very best apostles. I am not skilled at speaking, it’s true, but I am not without knowledge. In fact, in every way we have been made known to you in all things.
“Or did I sin by humbling myself so that you could be lifted up, because I preached to you God’s Good News free of charge? I robbed other assemblies, taking wages from them so that I could serve you. When I was with you and in need, I wasn’t a burden on anyone. When the brothers came from Macedonia, they gave me what I needed. In everything I have kept myself from being a weight on you, and I will keep on doing so.
“As the truth of Christ is in me, no one will stop me from boasting like this in the regions of Achaia. Why? Because I don’t love you? God knows.
“But I will keep on doing what I am doing. I want to cut off the chance from those who want a chance, so that in the things they boast about, they will be found to be just like us.
“Such men are false apostles, workers who deceive, dressing themselves up as Christ’s apostles. And no wonder, because even dresses himself up as an of light. It is no surprise, then, if his servants also dress themselves up as servants of righteousness. In the end, what happens to them will match what they have done.
“I say again, nobody should think me foolish. But if you do, then accept me as foolish, so that I too can boast a little. What I am saying now, I am not saying the Lord’s way, but foolishly, in this confident boasting.
“Since many boast by the flesh, I will boast too. After all, you are wise, and you gladly put up with the foolish. You put up with anyone who makes you his slaves, who devours you, who takes you captive, who sets himself above you, or who hits you in the face.
“To my shame, I talk as though we had been weak. Yet in whatever way anyone is bold—I am speaking foolishly—I am bold too.
“Are they ? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the of ? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? (I speak like a man out of his mind.) I am more so. I have done far more hard work and been in prison far more often. I have been beaten beyond measure, and I have often faced death.
“Five times the Jews whipped me with forty lashes minus one, and three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I have been shipwrecked. For a night and a day I have been in the deep sea.
“I have often been on journeys. I have been in danger from rivers, from robbers, from my own people, from the ; in danger in the city, in the wilderness, at sea; in danger among false brothers.
“I have known hard work and hardship. I have often gone without sleep. I have been hungry and thirsty, and I have often been . I have been cold, with too little to wear.
“Besides the things that come from outside, there is what presses on me every day: my worry for all the assemblies. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is caused to stumble, and I don’t burn with anger?
“If I have to boast, I will boast about the things that have to do with my weakness. The God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever, knows that I don’t lie.
“In the governor under King set a guard on the city, wanting to arrest me. I was let down in a basket through a window by the wall, and escaped his hands.
“No doubt it does me no good to boast, but I will turn now to visions and revelations of the Lord.
“I know a man in Christ who was caught up into the third heaven fourteen years ago. Whether it was in the body, I don’t know, or whether it was out of the body, I don’t know; God knows.
“I know this man. Whether it was in the body or outside of the body, I don’t know; God knows. And I know how he was caught up into Paradise and heard words that cannot be spoken, which a person is not allowed to say.
“I will boast about someone like that. About myself I won’t boast, except in my weaknesses. If I do want to boast, I won’t be foolish, because I will be telling the truth. But I hold back, so that nobody thinks more of me than he can see in me or hear from me.
“Because the revelations were so very great, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, so I would not be lifted up too much: a messenger of Satan to torment me, so I would not be lifted up too much.
“Three times I begged the Lord to make it leave me. He has said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ So I will most gladly boast in my weaknesses instead, so that the power of Christ may rest on me.
“So I take pleasure, for Christ’s sake, in weaknesses, in mistreatment, in hard times, in persecutions and in troubles. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
“I have become foolish in boasting. You made me do it. You should have been the ones praising me, because I am in no way less than the very best apostles, even though I am nothing.
“Truly, the signs of an apostle were done among you with all perseverance, in signs and wonders and mighty works. In what way were you treated as less than the rest of the assemblies, except that I myself was not a burden to you? Forgive me this wrong!
“Look, this is the third time I am ready to come to you, and I won’t be a burden to you. I am not after what you have; I am after you. It is not the children who ought to save up for the parents, but the parents for the children.
“I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls. If I love you all the more, am I loved the less? Even so, I myself didn’t burden you. But you might say that I was crafty and caught you by a trick.
“Did I take advantage of you by means of anyone I sent to you? I urged Titus, and I sent the brother with him. Did Titus take any advantage of you? Didn’t we walk in the same spirit? Didn’t we walk in the same steps?
“Again, do you think we are making excuses for ourselves to you? We speak in Christ, in the sight of God. But all of it, dear friends, is to build you up.
“I am afraid that perhaps when I come, I might find you not the way I want you to be, and you might find me not the way you want me to be. I am afraid there might be fighting, jealousy, bursts of anger, taking sides, slander, gossip, puffed-up pride, or riots.
“I am afraid that again when I come my God might humble me before you, and I might mourn over many of those who sinned before now and have not of the uncleanness, sexual sin and lust they have committed.
“This is the third time I am coming to you. ‘By what two or three witnesses say, every word will be settled.’ I warned you before, when I was there with you the second time, and now, while I am away, I warn you again. I am writing to those who have sinned before now, and to all the rest: I won’t go easy if I come again, since you are looking for proof that Christ speaks in me. He is not weak, but is powerful in you.
“He was through weakness, yet he lives through the power of God. We also are weak in him, but we will live with him through the power of God toward you.
“Look closely at yourselves: are you in the faith? Put yourselves to the test. Or don’t you know about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless, that is, you are disqualified. But I hope you will come to know that we are not disqualified.
“Now I pray to God that you will do nothing wrong. It is not so that we will look approved. It is so that you will do what is honorable, even if we seem to have failed. We can do nothing against the truth, only for the truth.
“We are happy when we are weak and you are strong. And this is what we pray for too: that you will be made perfect. That is why I am putting this in writing while I am away, so that when I am with you I won’t have to be sharp with you, using the authority which the Lord gave me for building up and not for tearing down.
“Finally, brothers and sisters, rejoice! Be made perfect. Be comforted. Be of the same mind. Live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss.
“All the saints greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s love, and the fellowship of the be with you all. .”