NOTES for Co2 8:13-15

Paul proposes a simple rule: help should not become a burden to anyone, so that some are impoverished by giving it while others receive support at the cost of the ruin of those helping them. In everything, the apostle says, there should be a fair balance. This does not, of course, mean dividing everything equally, but that each community should give as much as it can without burdening itself. Such a rule fully corresponds to the spiritual condition called poverty in the Bible.

Indeed, a poor person, if poverty is understood precisely as a spiritual condition, considers nothing in this world his own. He does not believe that he has a right to this or that property, to social status, or even to the talents and abilities he possesses. A poor person considers that all this has been given to him for use, not as property or possession. If so, he needs exactly as much of all these things as will allow his life to flow freely and fully, neither constrained by a lack of necessities nor burdened by a surplus of what is superfluous.

Since Paul regards the Church as the Body of Christ, the life of church communities must follow the same principle and obey the same logic. If a surplus of certain material goods has formed in one of them, this most likely means that another community, or other communities, lack those same material goods. It remains only to understand where and how the surplus should be redistributed so that everyone has enough for a normal life.

This happens quite naturally, just as naturally as the spiritual life of Christians is formed in the Kingdom, of which the Church is the manifestation on earth. The apostle evidently sees no need to disrupt the course of this natural process by creating, for example, special structures devoted specifically to material mutual aid within the Church. He knows from his own experience that the breath of the Kingdom blows where and as it wills. The main thing is not to hinder it, but to follow it.