Two consecutive blogs on giving, but I can’t help it…you don’t have to be a bible scholar to know that 2 Corinthians 9 follows 2 Corinthians 8, about which I wrote yesterday. My favorite giving promises are here in chapter 9:

The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work…Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. (2 Corinthians 9.6 – 8, ESV, 10 – 11, NIV)

I saw this in action in my early days around The Navigators in the late 1960s. A few hundred men (mostly) would come to The Navigators Military Ministry conferences, and they would always have a Navigator staff person who was moving, maybe going overseas, that they needed to support. After presenting the specific needs (for example, $8,000 in moving expenses and $5,000/month support), Skip Gray would start, speaking slowly and deliberately, “Whoever sows sparingly, will reap also sparingly…”

They would collect the pledge cards Saturday night and report the results Sunday morning. Every time, just a few hundred people, mostly young enlisted guys, actually emulating the Macedonians Paul wrote about in chapter 8, would meet and surpass that need.

I close with another church that excelled in giving:

Moreover, as you Philippians know, in the early days of your acquaintance with the gospel, when I set out from Macedonia, not one church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving, except you only; for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me aid more than once when I was in need. Not that I desire your gifts; what I desire is that more be credited to your account. I have received full payment and have more than enough. I am amply supplied, now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They are a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God. And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4.15 – 19, NIV)