What Does 2 Corinthians 8:21 Mean?

(21) **Providing for honest things . . .**—Many of the best MSS. give: “For we provide for honest things,” as though he gave the general principle on which he was now acting in this particular instance. The rule of life is repeated, a few months afterwards, in Romans 12:17. The English reader does not recognise the fact, which the Greek reader would see at once, that the words are a quotation from Proverbs 3:4. where the Greek version has: “Write them upon the table of thine heart, and thou shalt find favour. *Provide things honest in the sight of God and man.* The citation is interesting, as showing that even one who was taught by the Spirit, as St. Paul was, could yet find guidance for his daily conduct in a book which seems to many almost to be below the level of the spiritual life. In this case, had the Apostle had only the judgment of God to consider, he could with a pure conscience have taken up the money to Jerusalem by himself. But he had to consider that men were judging him, and might suspect him, and therefore he insisted, as has been said above, on having his accounts audited.