2 Corinthians 8:5

2 Corinthians 8:5. And this they did, not as we hoped, but far exceeding our expectations, first they gave their own selves to the Lord (the Lord Jesus), and to us (as acting for Him) by the will of God. This evidently means something more than that, having consecrated themselves to Christ at the time of their conversion, they now gave this gift as an act of Christian principle. When the proposal was first submitted to them, as a thing not only eminently Christian in itself, but fitted to melt down Jewish prejudice against uncircumcised converts, the whole thing would seem to them a new idea; and meeting probably by themselves, and praying over it, they seem to have made a fresh gift of themselves to the Lord and to the apostle and his associates as His honoured servants in this business. The associates, it would appear, were “Sopater of Beroea,” one of the Macedonian churches, and Aristarchus and Secundus of Thessalonica, another of those churches; for these accompanied our apostle in his journey to Jerusalem, and were probably the bearers of this collection (Acts 20:3-4).