For if there be first a willing mind. — This grows “out of that which ye have” in the previous verse. He is expecting a sum large relatively, and not absolutely. The history of the widow’s mite, found in the Gospel of his friend St. Luke (Luke 21:1-4), was probably not unknown to him as belonging to “the words of the Lord Jesus” which he freely cites (Acts 20:35). He has, at all events, imbibed the spirit of its teaching from other like words.
Related Commentaries of 2 Corinthians 8:12
2 Corinthians 8:12
12 For if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not.