6 Remember this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. He who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 Let each man give according as he has determined in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. 8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, that you, always having all sufficiency in everything, may abound to every good work.

In this chapter, Paul urges the Corinthians to fulfill the commitments that they had made in their giving. Paul was proud of their desire to give and their follow-through on what they had promised. Paul often collected offerings and gifts from the more wealthy Greeks and he would send those gifts back to Jerusalem to help the poor Jewish Christians who lived there. In these few verses, Paul tells us a great deal about grace giving. The old system of the coercive tithe didn’t belong in the new churches of the Gentiles. Gone with the keeping of the law went the model for giving in the synagogues. Paul sets forth a simple principle that exists and works in God’s economy. It is the principle of reaping and sowing. Acts of kindness that are sown reap kindness. Generous acts of giving bring generous dividends. Stingy giving brings stingy results. Some so-called preachers on TV make it sound like an investment scheme. If you give so much, then God is obligated to provide you with so much in return. That is not giving. That is treating God like He is the big money market in the sky. 

God’s model is simple: let us each give as it is “determined in our heart” not “grudgingly or under any kind of pressure”, because “God loves a generous, cheerful heart that desires to give." 2 Cor. 9:7. Giving includes our time, talents, and treasure. As opportunities to give of those three come our way, we should be careful to lay that opportunity before the Lord and ask Him to what degree He desires that we participate. Err on the side of generosity. I once heard an old friend who was speaking about giving in the church. He said, “Until I gave God His 10% nothing in my life went right. You need to give till it hurts”. I thought for a long time about what he said, and although he was a kind soul and very well-meaning, he was wrong. His view wasn’t biblical. We need to realize that God doesn’t own “His 10%”, He owns it ALL. We shouldn’t “give till it hurts”; we should give till our generosity surprises even us. God loves generous hearts. Be a cheerful giver.

Paul had sent a harsh word to the Corinthians, and afterwards, he wondered whether or not it was the right thing to do. His motive was to correct them lovingly. It wasn’t to make them grieve. They received his letter and they wept over their condition. Paul wrote it to bring them to repentance, and they received the news, making changes in their lives and in their church. When a believer is sorrowful about some sin in their life and they repent of it, it brings about life. It helps to draw them back into the will of God and into Christlike behavior. Because of his love for them and his prior visits, Paul had laid the foundation of a good relationship, and he had the standing to write such a letter.

When I was about forty years old, I moved to a new community. I had just suffered a terrible personal blow that resulted in the loss of a company which my wife and I had started and built. We were pushed out of the business by younger partners. It was a tremendous blow to both of us, but it had a particularly profound impact on me. Often, a man wrongfully looks to his work to find his value and worth, and his identity. It’s a long story and doesn’t need to be retold here, but it hurt my pride and affected my psyche. As I joined a small men’s group in my new community, I shared my wound, and frankly, it dominated my thoughts and much of my conversation. I was always talking about myself to try, I suppose, to convince myself and others that I had value and worth after letting some other guys get the best of me. One day, one of the brothers in the small group took me aside and said to me, “You just love talking about yourself.” OUCH! I grieved at those words. I didn’t consciously realize it, but my subconscious self knew it was true, and I was devastated. I had become one of those pitiful people who always have to have the better story or be at the center of the conversation. I needed correction, and this brother gently pointed out a wrong that needed to be corrected. He had listened to me for many hours, and he had earned the right to give me a harsh letter, wrapped up in some gentle words.

You may need a letter like this, or you may need to give one to someone. Make sure that if you do, you have spent the time with that person to lay a good foundation. Speak to them in gentle words that help them to see the error of their ways and give them a clear path to walk out of it. People often talk about themselves due to insecurity. They don’t think much of themselves, so they overcompensate by trying to build themselves up in the eyes of others. Old wounds affect us greatly. If you can’t get past them, they will affect what you think, do, and say. The enemy uses them to distort us and causes us to focus on ourselves. Be open to correction, and if you need to correct a brother or a sister, lay the foundation, and do so with the greatest of love. If you do, it can bring life back to them. Paul had done so with the Corinthians, and they received the news, changed their behavior, and rejoiced.

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