2 Corinthians 9: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Paul continues his instructions about the collection being gathered for God's people. He says he is sending fellow workers ahead to Corinth so the gift will be ready and freely given rather than squeezed out at the last minute, since he has boasted about the Corinthians' eagerness to the churches in Macedonia. He then describes giving in terms of sowing and reaping, says God loves a cheerful giver, and states that God is able to supply what the givers need so they can keep doing good. He closes by saying the gift will meet the needs of God's people, stir up thanks to God, and lead the recipients to praise God and pray for the Corinthians.

Claim by Claim

1. 9:1
   • There is a ministry of relief directed to the saints.
   • Paul says it is unnecessary for him to write to the recipients about that ministry.
2. 9:2
   • Paul says he knows the recipients' eagerness.
   • Paul boasts about the recipients to the Macedonians.
   • Paul's boast is that Achaia has been ready since the previous year.
   • The recipients' zeal has stirred up the majority of the Macedonians.
3. 9:3
   • Paul has sent the brothers.
   • Paul sent them so that the boasting about the recipients would not be proved empty in this matter.
   • Paul sent them so that the recipients would be ready, as he had said they were.
4. 9:4
   • Paul raises the possibility that Macedonians may come with him.
   • Paul raises the possibility that those Macedonians would find the recipients unprepared.
   • In that case Paul and those with him would be put to shame in this confidence.
   • Paul says he will not say that the recipients themselves would be put to shame.
5. 9:5
   • Paul considered it necessary to urge the brothers.
   • Paul urged the brothers to go ahead of him to the recipients.
   • Paul urged the brothers to arrange in advance the gift the recipients had previously promised.
   • The purpose is that the gift be ready as a generous blessing.
   • The purpose is that the gift not be given as something extracted grudgingly.
6. 9:6
   • Paul states the following point.
   • The one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly.
   • The one who sows generously will also reap generously.
7. 9:7
   • Each person is to give as he has decided in his heart.
   • Giving is not to be out of grief or reluctance.
   • Giving is not to be out of compulsion.
   • God loves a cheerful giver.
8. 9:8
   • God is able to make all grace abound toward the recipients.
   • The purpose is that the recipients, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound in every good work.
9. 9:9
   • Paul cites a written scripture.
   • The scripture says he scattered abroad and gave to the poor.
   • The scripture says his righteousness remains forever.
10. 9:10
    • God supplies seed to the sower and bread for food.
    • Paul asks that God supply and multiply the recipients' seed for sowing.
    • Paul asks that God increase the harvest of the recipients' righteousness.
11. 9:11
    • The recipients are being enriched in every way for all generosity.
    • That generosity produces thanksgiving to God through Paul and his companions.
12. 9:12
    • The administration of this service supplies what the saints lack.
    • The administration of this service also overflows in many thanksgivings to God.
13. 9:13
    • Through the proof furnished by this ministry, people glorify God.
    • They glorify God for the recipients' obedience to their confession of the gospel of Christ.
    • They glorify God for the generosity of the recipients' sharing with them and with all.
14. 9:14
    • The saints pray for the recipients.
    • The saints long for the recipients.
    • Their longing is because of the surpassing grace of God upon the recipients.
15. 9:15
    • Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

9:1

"Saints" in the King James is not a special class of unusually holy people. It translates a word meaning simply those set apart as God's own, that is, ordinary members of the churches. The "ministering" is a specific relief fund: for several years Paul had been collecting money from the largely Gentile churches of Greece and Asia Minor for the impoverished believers in Jerusalem. Chapters 8 and 9 are about getting that collection finished.

9:2

"Forwardness" in 1611 meant eagerness or readiness, with none of the pushiness the word now suggests. "Provoked" likewise could be positive in 1611: stirred up, spurred on. Achaia and Macedonia are two Roman provinces of Greece. Achaia was the south, with Corinth as its capital, so "Achaia was ready" means the Corinthians and their neighbors. Macedonia was the north, home of the churches at Philippi and Thessalonica.

9:3

"The brethren" are the men named in the previous chapter, Titus and two other delegates, sent ahead to Corinth to handle the money. "In this behalf" simply means in this matter.

9:4

"Lest haply" means in case, or on the chance that. The parenthesis "that we say not, ye" is a polite sidestep: Paul says he and his colleagues would be humiliated, while making clear he could have said the Corinthians would be.

9:5

"Bounty" means a generous gift. "Covetousness" is misleading to a modern ear: the Greek word is pleonexia, grasping for more than one's share, and here it describes the collector's manner rather than the donor's. The point is that the money should look like a freely offered gift and not like a payment extorted by a grasping fundraiser.

9:6

The image is farming, and for Paul's readers it was literal household economics: seed grain held back at planting was grain not eaten at harvest. "Bountifully" renders a Greek phrase that literally reads "with blessings," a Hebrew-flavored idiom for open-handed abundance.

9:7

"Grudgingly, or of necessity" means out of reluctance or regret, or under pressure from someone else. "Cheerful" translates the Greek hilaros, the ancestor of the English word hilarious, but meaning glad rather than funny. The whole clause echoes a line in the Greek version of Proverbs 22:8 about the man who gives gladly.

9:8

"Grace" here translates charis, a word Paul works hard in chapters 8 and 9. In these two chapters the same word covers God's undeserved generosity, the collected money itself, the privilege of giving, and the thanks that result. "Sufficiency" renders autarkeia, a term borrowed from Greek philosophy meaning having enough and needing nothing further, self-sufficiency.

9:9

The quotation is Psalm 112:9, in the Greek version Paul normally used. In the psalm the one who scatters gifts is the person who reveres God, not God himself, and Paul's sentence leaves it open which is meant here. "Righteousness" in this Jewish usage often carried the concrete sense of charitable giving, so "his righteousness remaineth for ever" means his generous conduct has lasting worth.

9:10

The wording draws on Isaiah 55:10, where God sends rain so that the ground gives seed to the sower and bread to the eater, and on Hosea 10:12, about reaping a harvest of righteousness. "Ministereth" and "minister" here simply mean supplies and will supply.

9:11

"Bountifulness" translates haplotes, literally singleness or simplicity, meaning an undivided heart with no hidden motive, and so open-handedness. "Through us" refers to Paul and his companions physically carrying the money to Jerusalem.

9:12

Two words stand behind "the administration of this service." One is diakonia, practical service or relief work. The other is leitourgia, a public service word: in Greek cities it named the costly civic projects wealthy citizens funded out of their own pockets, and in the Greek Old Testament it named the work of priests in the temple. "Supplieth the want" means fills up what is lacking.

9:13

"Experiment" in 1611 English meant proof or test, the evidence that comes from trying something out; it had nothing to do with laboratories. "Liberal distribution" means generous sharing, with no political sense to "liberal." "Professed subjection" combines two ideas: the gospel the Corinthians publicly confess, and their submitting to it in practice.

9:15

"Unspeakable" in 1611 meant beyond the power of words to describe, not shocking or shameful as the word now suggests. The Greek adjective is not found in any surviving text before Paul, and may be one he coined.