Gluten Free & God Seeking: Giving in 2 Corinthians 8 & 9

Sunday, May 12, 2013

Giving in 2 Corinthians 8 & 9

You can never out give God. His heart is so much bigger than our own. I feel that God encourages us to give because it’s good for us. The Bible is full of encouraging verses and accounts of giving. I really like this verse in Malachi--when God’s house was neglected, He implored the Israelites to give for the rebuilding, and He promised them:

Bring the whole tithe to the storehouse that there may be food in My house; and prove Me, if you will, by this, says Jehovah of hosts, whether I will open to you the windows of heaven and pour out blessing for you until there is no room for it. Malachi 3:10

But what if you’re struggling to make ends meet? Do you still give? Witness Lee points out in Chapter 49 of the Life Study of 2 Corinthians that this is the very backdrop upon which Paul wrote 2 Corinthians chapters 8 and 9. He mentions that it might have appeared risky for Paul to encourage the poor Macedonian believers to give to those in Judea. What if something worse happened to them? But Paul knew God, and He knew His word.

To help the Corinthians give out of their own poverty, Paul uses in chapter 8 the illustration of the Israelites gathering manna to remind them of the miraculous ways that God uses to take care of the needs of His children. 2 Corinthians says, As it is written [in Exodus 16:18], He who gathered much had no excess, and he who gathered little had no lack.

And then in 9:6 he uses the illustration of farmers sowing seeds to help the believers see that even our financial harvest always matches our sowing. “He who sows sparingly, sparingly also shall reap, and he who sows with blessings, with blessings also shall reap.” In this excerpt on page 422 he shares what sowing with blessings means:

“What about the sowing of seed? According to chapter 9, our giving equals not only our gathering as in chapter 8, but also equals sowing…But what farmer when he sows seed in his field, has the thought of sowing for others? Surely most farmers have the concept of sowing for themselves. This kind of sowing however, is not with blessings. To sow with blessings is to give to others…As children of God, we all must learn to give. To give is to gather. How much manna we can gather depends on how much we give (Lee, Witness. Life-Study of 2 Corinthians. Anaheim: Living Stream Ministry, 1982, Print).

Since all that we have comes from God’s loving hand, we can give with the assurance that God will continue to care for us. Here's one of the songs produced by the New York City Young People called The Goal of the Gospel.This song was inspired by the gospel account of Mary who poured out her alabaster jar of ointment on the Lord. his was costly ointment that took almost a year to buy. Surely the Lord is worthy of our giving all that we are and have to Him for His purpose.