nd bring none to
that which receives. 'I call you not servants, but friends.' The region
in which Christian liberality moves is high above the realm of law and
its correlative, obligation.

Further, Christian liberality springs spontaneously from conscious
possession of Christ's riches. We cannot here enter on the mysteries of
Christ's emptying Himself of His riches of glory. We can but touch the
stupendous fact, remembering that the place whereon we stand is holy
ground. Who can measure the nature and depth of that self-denuding of
the glory which He had with the Father before the world was? But, thank
God, we do not need to measure it, in order to feel the solemn, blessed
force of the appeal which it makes to us. Adoring wonder and gratitude,
unfaltering trust and absolute self-surrender to a love so
self-sacrificing, must ever follow the belief of that mystery of Divine
mercy, the incarnation and sacrifice of the eternal Son.

But Paul would have us remember that the same mighty act of stooping
love, which is the foundation of all our hope, is to be the pattern for
all our conduct. Even in His divinest and most mysterious act, Christ is
our example. A dewdrop is rounded by the same laws which shape the
planetary spheres or the sun himself; and Christians but half trust
Christ if they do not imitate Him. What selfishness in enjoyment of our
'own things' could live in us if we duly brought ourselves under the
influence of that example? How miserably poor and vulgar the appeals by
which money is sometimes drawn from grudging owners and tight-buttoned
pockets, sound beside that heart-searching and heart-moving one, 'Ye
know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ!'

Further, Christian liberality will not go off in good intentions and
benevolent sentiments. The Corinthians were ready with their 'willing'
on Titus's previous visit. Now Paul desires them to put their good
feelings into concrete shape. There is plenty of benevolence that never
gets to be beneficence. The advice here has a very wide application: 'As
there was the readiness to will, so there may be the completion also.'
We all know where the road leads that is paved with good intentions.

Further, Christian liberality is accepted and rewarded according to
willingness, if that is carried into act according to ability. While the
mere wish to help is not enough, it is the vital element in the act
which flows from it; and there may be more of it in the widow's mite