2 Corinthians 9:15

Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(15) Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.—So the section on the collection for the saints comes to its close. We are left to conjecture to what gift the Apostle refers: whether to the love of God as manifested in Christ, or to the spirit of love poured into men’s hearts. The use of the word in the Acts (Acts 2:38; Acts 8:20; Acts 10:45; Acts 11:17) is in favour of referring it to the gift of the Holy Ghost; that of Romans 5:15; Romans 5:17, to the gift of pardon or righteousness. Probably it did not enter into his thoughts to subject the jubilant utterance of praise to a minute analysis.

At this stage there was manifestly another pause, of greater or less length, in the act of dictating. Fresh thoughts of a different kind are working in his mind, and rousing feelings of a very different kind from those which had been just expressed. At last he again breaks silence and begins anew.

MacLaren's Expositions

2 Corinthians

GOD’S UNSPEAKABLE GIFT

2 Corinthians 9:15It seems strange that there should ever have been any doubt as to what gift it is which evokes this burst of thanksgiving. There is but one of God’s many mercies which is worthy of being thus singled out. There is one blazing central sun which shines out amidst all the galaxy of lights which fill the heavens. There is one gift of God which, beyond all others, merits the designation of ‘unspeakable.’ The gift of Christ draws all other divine gifts after it. ‘How should He not with Him also freely give us all things.’

The connection in which this abrupt jet of praise stands is very remarkable. The Apostle has been dwelling on the Christian obligation of giving bountifully and cheerfully, and on the great law that a glad giver is ‘enriched’ and not impoverished thereby, whilst the recipients, for their part, are blessed by having thankfulness evoked towards the givers. And that contemplation of the happy interchange of benefit and thanks between men leads the fervid Apostle to the thoughts which were always ready to spring to his lips--of God as the great pattern of giving and of the gratitude to Him which should fill all our souls. The expression here ‘unspeakable’ is what I wish chiefly to fix upon now. It means literally that which cannot be fully declared. Language fails because thought fails.

I. The gift comes from unspeakable love.

God _so_ loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. The love is the cause of the gift: the gift is the expression of the love. John’s Gospel says that the Son which is in the bosom of the Father has _declared_ Him. Paul here uses a related word for _unspeakable_ which might be rendered ‘that which cannot be fully declared.’ The declaration of the Father partly consists in this, that He is declared to be undeclarable, the proclamation of His name consists partly in this that it is proclaimed to be a name that cannot be proclaimed. Language fails when it is applied to the expression of human emotion; no tongue can ever fully serve the heart. Whether there be any thoughts too great for words or no, there are emotions too great. Language is ever ‘weaker than our grief’ and not seldom weaker than our love. It is but the surface water that can be run off through the narrow channel of speech: the central deep remains. If it be so with human affection, how much more must it be so with God’s love? With lowly condescension He uses all sweet images drawn from earthly relationships, to help us in understanding His. Every dear name is pressed into the service--father, mother, husband, wife, brother, friend, and after all are exhausted, the love which clothed itself in them all in turn, and used them all to give some faint hint of its own perfection, remains unspoken. We know human love, its limitations, its changes, its extravagances, its shortcomings, and cannot but feel how unworthy it is to mirror for us that perfection in God which we venture to name by a name so soiled. The analogies between what we call love in man and love in God must be supplemented by the differences between them, if we are ever to approach a worthy conception of the unspeakable love that underlies the unspeakable gift.

II. The gift involves unspeakable sacrifice.

Human love desires to give its most precious treasures to its object and is then most blessed: divine love cannot come short of human in this most characteristic of its manifestations. Surely the copy is not to surpass the original, nor the mirror to flash more brightly than the sun which, at the brightest, it but reflects. In such a matter we can but stammer when we try to find words. As our text warns us, we are trying to utter the unutterable when we seek to speak of God’s giving up for us; but however such a thought may seem to be forbidden by other aspects of the divine nature, it seems to be involved in the great truth that ‘God is love.’ Since He is, His blessedness too, must be in imparting, and in parting with what He gives. A humble worshipper in Jewish times loved enough to say that he would not offer unto God an offering that cost him nothing, and that loving height of self-surrender was at the highest, but a lowly imitation of the love to which it looked up. When Paul in the Epistle to the Romans says, ‘He that spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all,’ he is obviously alluding to, and all but quoting, the divine words to Abraham, ‘Seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from Me,’ and the allusion permits us to parallel what God did when He sent His Son with what Abraham did when, with wrung heart, but with submission, he bound and laid Isaac on the altar and stretched forth his hand with the knife in it to slay him. Such a representation contradicts the vulgar conceptions of a passionless, self-sufficing, icy deity, but reflection on the facts of our own experience and on the blessed secrets of our own love, leads us to believe that some shadow of loss passed across the infinite and eternal completeness of the divine nature when ‘God sent forth His Son made of a woman.’ And may we not go further and say that when Jesus on the Cross cried from out of the darkness of eclipse, ‘My God! My God! Why hast Thou forsaken me?’ there was something in the heavens corresponding to the darkness that covered the earth and something in the Father’s heart that answered the Son’s. But our text warns us that such matters are not for our handling in speech, and are best dealt with, not as matters of possibly erring speculation, but as materials for lowly thanks unto God for His unspeakable gift.

But whatever may be true about the love of the Father who sent, there can be no doubt about the love of the Son who came. No man helps his fellows in suffering but at the cost of his own suffering. Sympathy means _fellow-feeling_, and the one indispensable condition of all rescue work of any sort is that the rescuer must bear on his own shoulders the sins or sorrows that he is able to bear away. Heartless help is no help. It does not matter whether he who ‘stands and says, "Be ye clothed and fed,"‘ gives or does not give ‘the things necessary,’ he will be but a ‘miserable comforter’ if he has not in heart and feeling entered into the sorrows and pains which he seeks to alleviate. We need not dwell on the familiar truths concerning Him who was a ‘man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.’ All through His life He was in contact with evil, and for Him the contact was like that of a naked hand pressed upon hot iron. The sins and woes of the world made His path through it like that of bare feet on sharp flints. If He had never died it would still have been true that ‘He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities.’ On the Cross He completed the libation which had continued throughout His life and ‘poured out His soul unto death’ as He had been pouring it out all through His life. We have no measure by which we can estimate the inevitable sufferings in such a world as ours of such a spirit as Christ’s. We may know something of the solitude of uncongenial society; of the pain of seeing miseries that we cannot comfort, of the horrors of dwelling amidst impurities that we cannot cleanse, and of longings to escape from them all to some nest in the wilderness, but all these are but the feeblest shadows of the incarnate sorrows whose name among men was Jesus. Nothing is more pathetic than the way in which our Lord kept all these sorrows close locked within His own heart, so that scarcely ever did they come to light. Once He did permit a glimpse into that hidden chamber when He said, ‘O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you, how long shall I suffer you?’ But for the most part His sorrow was unspoken because it was ‘unspeakable.’ Once beneath the quivering olives in the moonlight of Gethsemane, He made a pitiful appeal for the little help which three drowsy men could give Him, when He cried, ‘My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. Tarry ye here and watch with Me,’ but for the most part the silence at which His judges ‘marvelled greatly,’ and raged as much as they marvelled, was unbroken, and as ‘a sheep before her shearers is dumb,’ so ‘He opened not His mouth.’ The sacrifice of His death was, for the most part, silent like the sacrifice of His life. Should it not call forth from us floods of praise and thanks to God for His unspeakable gift?

III. The gift brings with it unspeakable results.

In Christ are hid ‘all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.’ When God gave us Him, He gave us a storehouse in which are contained treasures of truth which can never be fully comprehended, and which, even if comprehended, can never be exhausted. The mystery of the Divine Name revealed in Jesus, the mystery of His person, are themes on which the Christian world has been nourished ever since, and which are as full of food, not for the understanding only, but far more for the heart and the will, to-day as ever they were. The world may think that it has left the teaching of Jesus behind, but in reality the teaching is far ahead, and the world’s practise is but slowly creeping towards its imperfect attainment. The Gospel is the guide of the race, and each generation gathers something more from it, and progresses in the measure in which it follows Christ; and as for the race, so for the individual. Each of Christ’s scholars finds his own gift, and in the measure of his faithfulness to what he has found makes ever new discoveries in the unsearchable riches of Christ. After all have fed full there still remain abundant baskets full to be taken up.

He who has sounded the depths of Jesus most completely is ever the first to acknowledge that he has been but as a child ‘gathering pebbles on the beach while the great ocean lies unsounded before him.’ No single soul, and no multitude of souls, can exhaust Jesus; neither our individual experiences, nor the experiences of a believing world can fully realise the endless wealth laid up in Him. He is the Alpha and the Omega of all our speech, the first letter and the last of our alphabet, between which lie all the rest.

The gift is completed in consequences yet unspeakable. Even the first blessings which the humblest faith receives from the pierced hands have more in them than words can tell. Who has ever spoken adequately and in full correspondence with reality what it is to have God’s pardoning love flowing in upon the soul? Many singers have sung sweet psalms and hymns and spiritual songs on which generations of devout souls have fed, but none of them has spoken the deepest blessedness of a Christian life, or the calm raptures of communion with God. It is easy to utter the words ‘forgiveness, reconciliation, acceptance, fellowship, eternal life’; the syllables can be spoken, but who knows or can utter the depths of the meanings? After all human words the half has not been told us, and as every soul carries within itself unrevealable emotions, and is a mystery after all revelation, so the things which God’s gift brings to a soul are after all speech unspeakable, and the words ‘cannot be uttered’ which they who are caught up into the third heavens hear.

Then we may extend our thoughts to the future form of Christian experience. ‘It doth not yet appear what we should be.’ All our conceptions of a future existence must necessarily be inadequate. Nothing but experience can reveal them to us, and our experience there will be capable of indefinite expansion, and through eternity there will be endless growth in the appropriation of the unspeakable gift.

For us the only recompense that we can make for the unspeakable gift is to receive it with ‘thanks unto God’ and the yielding up of our hearts to Him. God pours this love upon us freely, without stint. It is unspeakable in the depths of its source, in the manner of its manifestation, in the glory of its issues. It is like some great stream, rising in the trackless mountains, broad and deep, and leading on to a sunlit ocean. We stand on the bank; let us trust ourselves to its broad bosom. It will bear us safe. And let us take heed that we receive not the gift of God _in vain_.

Benson Commentary

2 Corinthians 9:15. Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift — By this gift, for which the apostle so fervently thanks God, Dr. Whitby understands the charitable disposition that was in the Corinthians, Macedonians, and other sincere Christians, “by which God was glorified, the gospel adorned, the poor saints refreshed, and themselves fitted for an exceeding great reward.” The text, understood in this sense, is a clear proof that every good affection in the human heart is to be ascribed to a divine influence. But, as Macknight justly observes, “it may be doubted whether the apostle would call that gift unspeakable. So grand an epithet may, with more propriety, be applied to Christ. Besides the happy effects of a cordial friendship established between the [believing] Jews and Gentiles, now united in one faith, worship, and church, being the object of the apostle’s present thoughts, it was natural for him to break forth in a thanksgiving to God for Christ, the author of that happy union, and of all the blessings which mankind enjoy. And as these blessings are so many and so great, that they cannot be fully declared in human language, Christ, the author of them all, may well be called God’s unspeakable gift.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

9:6-15 Money bestowed in charity, may to the carnal mind seem thrown away, but when given from proper principles, it is seed sown, from which a valuable increase may be expected. It should be given carefully. Works of charity, like other good works, should be done with thought and design. Due thought, as to our circumstances, and those we are about to relieve, will direct our gifts for charitable uses. Help should be given freely, be it more or less; not grudgingly, but cheerfully. While some scatter, and yet increase; others withhold more than is meet, and it tends to poverty. If we had more faith and love, we should waste less on ourselves, and sow more in hope of a plentiful increase. Can a man lose by doing that with which God is pleased? He is able to make all grace abound towards us, and to abound in us; to give a large increase of spiritual and of temporal good things. He can make us to have enough in all things; and to be content with what we have. God gives not only enough for ourselves, but that also wherewith we may supply the wants of others, and this should be as seed to be sown. We must show the reality of our subjection to the gospel, by works of charity. This will be for the credit of our profession, and to the praise and glory of God. Let us endeavour to copy the example of Christ, being unwearied in doing good, and deeming it more blessed to give than to receive. Blessed be God for the unspeakable gift of his grace, whereby he enables and inclines some of his people to bestow upon others, and others to be grateful for it; and blessed be his glorious name to all eternity, for Jesus Christ, that inestimable gift of his love, through whom this and every other good thing, pertaining to life and godliness, are freely given unto us, beyond all expression, measure, or bounds.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Thanks be unto God - Whitby supposes that this refers to the charitable disposition which they had manifested, and that the sense is, that God was to be adored for the liberal spirit which they were disposed to manifest, and the aid which they were disposed to render to others. But this, it is believed, falls far below the design of the apostle. The reference is rather to the inexpressible gift which God had granted to them in bestowing his Son to die for them; and this is one of the most striking instances which occur in the New Testament, showing that the mind of Paul was full of this subject; and that wherever he began, he was sure to end with a reference to the Redeemer. The invaluable gift of a Saviour was so familiar to his mind, and he was so accustomed to dwell on that in his private thoughts, that the mind naturally and easily glanced on that whenever anything occurred that by the remotest allusion would suggest it. The idea is, "Your benefactions are indeed valuable; and for them, for the disposition which you have manifested, and for all the good which you will be enabled thus to accomplish, we are bound to give thanks to God. All this will excite the gratitude of those who shall be benefitted. But how small is all this compared with the great gift which God has imparted in bestowing a Saviour! That is unspeakable. No words can express it, no language convey an adequate description of the value of the gift, and of the mercies which result from it."

His unspeakable gift - The word used here ἀνεκδιηγήτῳ anekdiēgētō means, what cannot be related, unutterable. It occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. The idea is, that no words can properly express the greatness of the gift thus bestowed on man. It is higher than the mind can conceive; higher than language can express. On this verse we may observe:

(1) That the Saviour is a gift to mankind. So he is uniformly represented; see John 3:16; Galatians 1:4; Galatians 2:20; Ephesians 1:22; 1 Timothy 2:6; Titus 2:14. Man had no claim on God. He could not compel him to provide a plan of salvation; and the whole arrangement - the selection of the Saviour, the sending him into the world, and all the benefits resulting from his work, are all an undeserved gift to man.

(2) this is a gift unspeakably great, whose value no language can express, no heart fully conceive. It is so because:

(a) Of his own greatness and glory;

(b) Because of the inexpressible love which he evinced;

(c) Because of the unutterable sufferings which he endured;

(d) Because of the inexpressibly great benefits which result from his work. No language can do justice to this work in either of these respects; no heart in this world fully conceives the obligation which rests upon man in virtue of his work.

(3) thanks should be rendered to God for this. We owe him our highest praises for this. This appears:

(a) Because it was mere benevolence in God. We had no claim; we could not compel him to grant us a Saviour. The gift might have been withheld, and his throne would have been spotless, We owe no thanks where we have a claim; where we deserve nothing, then he who benefits us has a claim on our thanks.

(b) Because of the benefits which we have received from him. Who can express this? All our peace and hope; all our comfort and joy in this life; all our prospect of pardon and salvation; all the offers of eternal glory are to be traced to him. Man has no prospect of being happy when he dies but in virtue of the "unspeakable gift" of God. And when he thinks of his sins, which may now be freely pardoned; when he thinks of an agitated and troubled conscience, which may now be at peace; when he thinks of his soul, which may now be unspeakably and eternally happy; when he thinks of the hell from which he is delivered, and of the heaven to whose eternal glories he may now be raised up by the gift of a Saviour, his heart should overflow with gratitude, and the language should be continually on his lips and in his heart, "thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift." Every other mercy should seem small compared with this; and every manifestation of right feeling in the heart should lead us to contemplate the source of it, and to feel, as Paul did, that all is to be traced to the unspeakable gift of God.

Remarks

1. This chapter, with the preceding, derives special importance from the fact that it contains the most extended discussion of the principles of Christian charity which occurs in the Bible. No one can doubt that it was intended by the Redeemer that his people should be distinguished for benevolence. It was important, therefore, that there should be some portion of the New Testament where the principles on which charity should be exercised, and the motives by which Christians should be induced to give, should be fully stated. Such a discussion we have in these chapters; and they therefore demand the profound and prayerful attention of all who love the Lord Jesus.

2. We have here a striking specimen of the manner in which the Bible is written. Instead of abstract statements and systematic arrangement, the principles of religion are brought out in connection with a case that actually occurred. But it follows that it is important to study the Bible attentively, and to be familiar with every part of it. In some part of the Scriptures, statements of the principles which should guide us in given circumstances will be found; and Christians should, therefore, be familiar with every part of the Bible.

continued...

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

15. his unspeakable gift—the gift of His own Son, which includes all other inferior gifts (2Co 8:9; Ro 8:32). If we have received from God "His unspeakable gift," what great thing is it, if we give a few perishing gifts for His sake?

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Interpreters are not agreed what the apostle here meaneth by God’s

unspeakable gift. Some by it understand Christ, who is the gift of God, and the Fountain of all grace; and to this the epithet unspeakable doth best agree. Others understand the gospel, by which the hearts of men are subdued, effectually disposed, and inclined to obey the will of God. Others think it is to be understood of thai habit of brotherly love, which from the Spirit of Christ, by the gospel, was wrought in the hearts of these Corinthians. If the last be meant, (to which the most incline), the apostle declareth his firm persuasion of them, that they would obey him in this thing, and giveth God thanks for giving them such a heart. Seeing the contribution was not yet made, though a year before they had declared their readiness to it, I should rather incline to interpret it concerning Christ; and that the apostle concludeth this whole discourse about contributing to the relief of these poor members of Christ, with a general doxology, or blessing of God for Jesus Christ, who is the Author and Finisher of all grace, without such a particular reference to the preceding discourse; yet hereby hinting to them, that without the influence of his grace they would, they could do nothing.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift. Meaning either the goodness of God, both to the giver and receiver; for that the one gave so liberally, and the other received so largely, was from the grace of God, who so powerfully inclines the hearts of his children to do good, and offer so willingly of what he has given them, and who so wonderfully provides for the supply of the poor and needy; or else that exceeding grace of God which was so eminently, largely, and freely bestowed on the Corinthians in their effectual calling; or, as some think, Christ himself, who is to be sure "the unspeakable gift" of God; who, though his Son, his own Son, his only begotten Son, the Son of his love, his Son and heir, yet he gave him to be a covenant to the people, the head of his church, the Saviour of sinners, and to be a sacrifice in their room and stead: none can tell how great this gift is, which is so suitable and seasonable, so large and comprehensive, nor declare the love both of the Father and the Son, expressed in it. Thankful we should be for it; and our thankfulness should be shown by highly prizing and valuing this gift; by laying the whole stress of our salvation on Christ; by ascribing all the glory of it to him; by giving up ourselves to him, and to his interest; by walking worthy of him in all well pleasing, and by communicating to the support of his cause, and the supply of his poor ministers and members. And thus the apostle tacitly suggests one of the strongest arguments that can be used, to stir up the saints to generosity and liberality, taken from the wonderful grace of God in the gift of his Son; for if he of his free grace, and unmerited love, has given his Son to, and for his people, and with him all things freely, both the riches of grace and glory, then they ought freely and bountifully to communicate temporal good things to the poor members of Christ, for whom God and Christ have an equal love, as for themselves.

Geneva Study Bible

{m} Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.

(m) Lest by this great commendation and praise the Corinthians should be puffed up, he concludes this exhortation with this exclamation.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

2 Corinthians 9:15. At the close we have an exclamation of gratitude springing out of deep piety (comp. Romans 9:5; Romans 11:33 ff.; 1 Corinthians 15:57; Galatians 1:5; 1 Timothy 1:17), without any special purpose (such as to awaken humility, Beza; comp. Chrysostom), but issuing out of the fuller craving of the heart, without being intended (as Hofmann holds) to impress the duty of willingly contributing gifts which are so small in comparison.

The δωρεά is consequence and evidence of the χάρις, 2 Corinthians 9:14. Comp. Romans 5:15; Romans 5:17.

ἐπὶ τῇ ἀνεκδιηγ. αὐτοῦ δωρεᾷ] on account of his undescribable gift. What is meant by this is indicated to the Christian consciousness by ἀνεκδιηγ. (comp. Romans 11:33; Ephesians 3:18 f.), namely, the whole wonderful and inexpressibly blissful work of redemption. It is for this, and not simply for the grace imparted to the Gentiles (Hofmann), that Paul gives thanks, because it is the gracious foundation of such fellowship in love, and of its blissful working. Others[297] understand it of the previously discussed happy result of the work of collection (Calvin, Estius, Bengel, Billroth, Rückert, Osiander; comp. Ewald, who takes χάρις κ.τ.λ. as the quoted closing words of the prayer of gratitude on the part of the church at Jerusalem itself); but in that case ἈΝΕΚΔΙΉΓΗΤΟς appears to be much too strong an epithet, whereas it is quite suitable to the highest of all God’s gifts, the δωρεὰ κατʼ ἐξοχήν. Comp. Romans 5:15; Hebrews 6:4.

On ἈΝΕΚΔΙΗΓΉΤῼ, comp. Arrian, Anab. p 310: τὴν ἀνεκδιήγητον τόλμαν.

[297] To these belongs Grotius also, who in his acute way remarks: “Paulus in gratiarum actionem se illis in Judaea fratribus adjungit, et quasi Amen illis accinit.” Chrysostom and Theophylact quote both explanations, but incline more to that which we have adopted.

Expositor's Greek Testament

2 Corinthians 9:15. χαρὶς τῷ Θεῷ κ.τ.λ.: thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift. δωρεά is always in the N.T. (see reff., etc.) used of the gifts of God, not of men; and the “unspeakable” gift (cf. Romans 11:33, Ephesians 3:20) for which the Apostle bursts out here into a characteristic doxology is the gift of Christ Himself (John 3:16) and of salvation in Him, thankful appreciation of which had borne such fruit in Christian lives.

III. The Vindication of his Apostolic Authority. It would appear that while Titus had brought favourable news as to the loyalty with which the Corinthians had received St. Paul’s message of reproof in the matter of the incestuous person (2 Corinthians 7:9-11), he had also brought distressing intelligence as to the depreciation of the Apostle’s authority by certain active Judaisers at Corinth. The case is so serious that it requires immediate attention, and the third (and last) section of the latter is occupied with St. Paul’s reply in vindication of his claims. See Introd., p. 22.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

15. Thanks] The word is the same which is elsewhere translated grace.

for his unspeakable gift] This, as Dean Alford suggests (after Chrysostom), can be none other than Jesus Christ Himself. No other gift could correspond to the word ‘unspeakable,’ which suggests (like Romans 11:33; Ephesians 3:18-19) the idea of God. And in Jesus Christ ‘dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily’ (Colossians 2:9). From Him all gifts of nature or grace proceed. And what the gift is which is above all others, we learn from such passages as Romans 5:15; Romans 6:23; Hebrews 6:4. So Bengel. “Deus nobis dedit abundantiam bonorum internorum et externorum, quae et ipsa est inenarrabilis, et fructus habet consimiles.” See also Romans 8:32.

Bengel's Gnomen

2 Corinthians 9:15. Χάρις, thanks) This is the meaning: God has given us τὴν δωρεὰν, the gift, abundance of good things both internal and external, which both is in itself inexpressible, and bears fruits of a corresponding description; comp. 2 Corinthians 9:8, etc. (where there is an expression [an attempt to express the abundance of the gift], but its words are not adequate so as to satisfy Paul’s mind), and ch. 2 Corinthians 8:9; 2 Corinthians 8:1, and the full expression of these fruits, by reason of the copiousness of the topics, has rendered the language itself at the end of the preceding chapter somewhat perplexed. The modus[59] is added, thanks be to God.

[59] See Append. “Modalis Sermo.” Here, the modus accompanying the simple naked proposition is thanksgiving.—ED.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 15. - Thanks be unto God. Nothing ever seems so much to disburden the full heart of St. Paul after deep emotion as an utterance of thanksgiving (Romans 7:25; Romans 9:5; Romans 11:33; 1 Corinthians 15:57; Galatians 1:5; 1 Timothy 1:17). The thanksgiving here is like a great sigh of relief. The subject of it is perfectly general. It is not a mere "Amen" uttered, as it were, by St. Paul at the end of the thanksgivings of the saints at Jerusalem which he has been presupposing; but an offering of thanks to God for the issues of grace in general, all summed up in one act of "inestimable love" (John 3:16; Romans 6:23; Romans 11:33; Ephesians 3:19).



2 Corinthians 9:15

Vincent's Word Studies

Thanks, etc.

These abrupt thanksgivings are common in Paul's writings. See Romans 9:5; Romans 11:33; 1 Corinthians 15:57; Galatians 1:5; Ephesians 3:20.

Unspeakable (ἀνεκδιηγήτῳ)

Lit., not to be told throughout. Only here in the New Testament.