Good Works Are Multiplied

The Reading of 2 Corinthians 9 and the Promise of Abounding Grace

Please turn your Bible to 2 Corinthians chapter 9. Preaching today will particularly be in verse 10, 2 Corinthians chapter 9. When you have that, go ahead and stand for the reading of God's Word, beginning in verse 6.

The point is this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. As it is written, he has distributed freely, he has given to the poor, his righteousness endures forever.

He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.

For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God. By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ.

And the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others, while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you. Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift.

Amen.

You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you today for your Word. We thank you that you supply seed to the sower and bread for food. We ask that you would, by your Word today, multiply our seed for sowing and increase the harvest of our righteousness.

In Jesus' name, amen. You may recall that earlier in this series on good works, particularly when we were going through various passages that talk about how salvation empowers us for good works, we looked at verse 8, and God is able to make all grace abound to you so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.

One of the things I pointed out there is that the word all is being used repeatedly such that you could even translate that last part, you may abound in all good works. Just all, all, all. God has equipped us greatly.

Good Works as Multiplying Fruitfulness

Today we are going to be looking at verse 10. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. Our emphasis lately has not been so much on how salvation empowers us for good works, but the productivity associated with good works.

In the previous two weeks, we looked at the different halves of the one-to-one correspondence between fruitfulness and good works. First, that good works are the only fruitfulness one might have, and secondly, that all good works are fruitful.

So, having established that one-to-one relationship, now we need to look at how fruitful are good works, and the answer is they are very fruitful. Good works are multiplied. God ensures that there is a cascading of righteousness.

This should stir up the heart to be excited to serve God. Once again, by good works, I do not mean simply those grand deeds of philanthropy that someone might do. I don't mean just the most charitable things that you might imagine.

I mean all ways of serving God, all ways of obeying Him, all ways of remaining faithful to Him and not giving in to temptation, all ways of denying yourself indulgences and pleasures that He would not have you to have, any kind of snare that would keep you from serving God as fully as you ought.

Why is it that you should obey God wholeheartedly? Well, in part, the answer is because good works are multiplied. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.

Paul’s Jerusalem Collection and the Meaning of Seed and Bread

In the context of this passage, what is taking place is that Paul is putting together what is known as the Jerusalem collection. There were many poor in Jerusalem. There was a famine in Jerusalem, and so they were struggling to get by.

And Paul, in a desire not only to help the church in Jerusalem, but also to unite Jews and Gentiles together, stirs up the various Gentile churches to give to Jerusalem in order that the church can be united, in order that the church can be edified, and furthermore that there would be a cascading of righteousness as we will see in this passage.

Now that is the context for this. Just to define a few of these terms here, these concepts that he's using in verse 10, he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food. Seed to the sower is the very initial parts of harvest.

You make the very initial parts of the whole farming enterprise, right? You place the seed in the ground. What is the bread for food? That is the very final part of the whole enterprise. After the seed grows up, and then it is harvested, and then it is ground up, and then it is prepared, and cooked, etc., finally, at the very end of that process, you get the bread.

So Paul is talking about everything all the way from the seed to the bread. God supplies both of these things. He says He will multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.

God not only gives you the capacity to do whatever He may call you to do, to obey Him in whatever way He may have called you to obey, but likewise, He ensures that your obedience results in all the things that it should result in.

He gives you the seed and also the bread. There is one passage that is alluded to here and another that is directly quoted, and I think it would be helpful for us to look at both of them, in part because they may seem like obvious applications, but when you see how Paul often uses the Old Testament, he does so in a counterintuitive way to make profound points that really don't seem that profound unless you realize how he is using the passage in a very different way than it may have initially appeared to be intended.

Isaiah 55 and God’s Word That Does Not Return Void

The first of these is Isaiah 55. If you go ahead and turn to Isaiah 55, when it talks about Him supplying seed to the sower and bread for food, we will see that there, Isaiah 55, and you may be familiar with this passage but just not have realized that this is what Paul is alluding to in 2 Corinthians.

In Isaiah 55, verses 10 through 11, Paul says, excuse me, not Paul, Isaiah says, For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.

So it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. So, here it is at the end of verse 10, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater.

Now one thing that makes this passage very surprising is you may also know how this chapter.

Opens.

The chapter opens with, Come everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come buy and eat. Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen diligent to me and eat what is good, and delight yourself in rich food. So this passage is speaking about God freely giving to His people, and they can come and have His righteousness without money, without price.

What is Paul calling the people to do and to give of themselves? He's calling them to give money. He's calling them to give money to Jerusalem. And so he's using this passage, which is about not needing any money, in order to implore the people to give their money.

And so he's making a very profound point that in the context of 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, it is evident that the reason that this is appropriate is because God has given them what is sufficient. He will stir up generosity within them, that what they are giving of themselves ultimately is something that God has given to them, and that what they need is not a certain quantity of money in order to give.

Paul tells them that if they lack, that does not count against them. Rather, it is generosity. And where does generosity come from? Generosity doesn't come from yourself, perhaps like your money might be said to.

Generosity comes from the Lord. And so even though the Lord supplies finances in a sense, there is an even more direct sense in which He is supplying the generosity to you. So how is it that Paul can apply this passage that's about not needing money, not giving money, to telling the people to give money?

Because ultimately, what he is calling for them, what he is hoping to see in them is not something that is strictly financial. He wants to see in them the generosity that only God can give, and God will increase that generosity as needed.

He will supply them all the needed generosity, and likewise, He will increase it. Now one of the ways you might…. This analogy is frequent through Scripture. You see it in Galatians 6. You see it in 1 Corinthians 9, this sowing seed.

Now you might know that term from televangelists, right? This is something televangelists like to say, just sow a seed into my ministry and God will increase it tenfold. So what they're saying is, well, if you give $100, you're going to get $1 ,000 back.

What is being increased here? Now, there is a sense in which you can count on God to supply everything that is needed for further good, and that may involve actual finances. That may involve actual finances.

But it definitely involves spiritual growth. It definitely involves increased generosity and joyfulness in giving. And this is what God guarantees to increase. There are many things that may be needed that God may increase as they are needed, but the one thing that is certainly needed is maturity before Him, and He will increase that.

Psalm 112 and the Righteousness of the Generous Man

Now the other passage that Paul quotes here in verse 9, he says, "...as it is written, He has distributed freely, He has given to the poor, His righteousness endures forever.". Where is this from? This is from Psalm 112.

Please turn to Psalm 112 because I'd like you to look at this passage as well. Once again, he is using this in a counterintuitive way to make a profound point. Verse 9 is the quoted verse. He has distributed freely, He has given to the poor, His righteousness endures forever.

His horn is exalted in honor. Now verses 3, excuse me, verses 1, let's just start at verse 1. You will see this is not actually talking about the Lord. In 2 Corinthians 9, Paul is using it to speak of the Lord.

The Lord gives freely, His righteousness endures forever. In Psalm 112, it's talking about the man who fears the Lord. So you see that He has wealth and riches, He has righteousness, He is gracious, merciful, righteous.

All these things are kind of combined additively. There's not really a relationship that's described between them yet exactly. It is well with the man who deals generously and lends, who conducts his affairs with justice, for the righteous will never be moved.

He will be remembered forever. He's not afraid of bad news. His heart is firm, trusting in the Lord. His heart is steady. He will not be afraid until He looks in triumph on His adversaries. He distributes freely.

He is given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. Okay, so this is describing the man who fears the Lord. And not only that, what is the relationship between His wealth or His freely giving?

He's distributing freely, giving to the poor. What is the relationship between His giving and His righteousness? Well, one is constituting the other. His righteousness is the fact that He freely gives.

Okay, He's righteous because He's a generous man. That is His righteousness, is this overflow of goodness from Him. But now, in 2 Corinthians 9, it's pretty clear that this is being applied not to the man who fears the Lord, but to God Himself.

It says in verse 8, and God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. As it is written, He has distributed freely and has given to the poor.

His righteousness endures forever. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. Who is the one giving?

Who is the one freely giving here? It is the Lord who is. And so, verse 9 is being applied not to the man who fears the Lord, but it's being applied to God who gives to the man who fears the Lord. Now, on top of that, what is the relationship between giving and righteousness here in this passage?

Is one constituting the other? Is His righteousness the fact that He is generous in giving? He has distributed freely and has given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. Not really.

Not really.

When you see that it's distinguishing between the seed and the bread, and then it explains later on in verses 11 and following that as they are generous, it produces thanksgiving, it produces righteousness in others, what you see is not the giving being constituting righteousness.

Rather, giving is provoking righteousness, or it is the means by which righteousness is accomplished. And so, as God gives freely to people everything that they need in order to do the things that He calls them to, His righteousness comes out through them, and then not only through them, but even to the ones who are given to by them.

Those that God gives to have the capacity for righteousness, and they are righteous. And then as they give to others, have a new capacity for righteousness, for thanksgiving,.

Etc.

And so, righteousness exudes from them as well. And so here, this giving is not the righteousness itself, but the giving is the means by which those who are given to have a capacity for righteousness.

So Paul uses both of these passages, and this is not the only time he does this kind of.

Thing.

He's saying this is kind of a very frequent way that he uses the Old Testament is in unexpected ways that are counterintuitive to the way that you would have originally read it in that context. And he's saying that it… and this is not a… let me just explain.

This is not a rhetorical trick of a vain philosopher. Okay, Paul, of course, inspired by the Spirit, he is accurately using these things. The man who fears the Lord is one who emulates God. Okay, so if it describes the man who fears the Lord, of course these things can be said of the Lord.

And then there is enough in that passage to let you know that the nature of the relationship between giving and righteousness does not need to be limited to it constituting righteousness. So Paul is… he's applying all these things appropriately.

He is just doing so in a counterintuitive and profound way. So let's talk about the bread, and let's talk about the seed. For the seed, what is the guarantee that God has given? He will give you everything that you need to do the things that He has called you to.

Do.

Now, once again, that may involve certain things. That may involve material things. If He calls you, just very plainly, if He calls you to give $100, He will ensure that you have $100. God is not going to call you to do something that you do not have the capacity to do or that He won't give you the capacity to do.

That's just not going to happen. He will give you that capacity. But what is guaranteed is that He will give you the spiritual maturity to be obedient. He will increase your capacity to follow Him. In this context, that term is generosity.

But it could be anything. It could be patience. It could be courage, whatever the case may be. He will give you the virtues necessary in order that you would be able to serve Him completely. Now, what is the symptom that results when someone feels that the burden is on them to supply the seed?

You know, the farmer, you see this frequently in Scripture, the farmer is concerned not just about getting fruit every year, he's concerned about having enough seed to be able to even farm. In Isaiah 35, 36, 37, there's…somewhere in there, there's passages about the people not having enough seed, so they would have a very small harvest, and the next year they have enough seed to have a larger harvest, and the next year enough seed to have a larger harvest, etc.

If you think that the burden is on you to have enough generosity or to have enough patience such that you need to supply these things of yourself as though they wouldn't be given by God, what's going to happen?

You are going to be idle. You are going to wait to obey the Lord and determine that right now is not the right time to obey the Lord. They may be a later time to obey the Lord. But God tends to give the seed necessary for sowing in the context of one who is ready to sow, not having those things yet, knowing that God will grant them.

Now, you can think of all kinds of examples where this may be the case. Someone might say, well, I am very…I'm a very timid person. I can't handle a lot of new people. I'm going to stay away from the gathering of the saints because God just hasn't equipped me for that just yet, and I'm going to kind of stay isolated, and maybe at some point He'll grow me enough that I could go spend time with the saints.

This is how a lot of people address things like this. And so they wait on obedience because they think that they don't have enough to be obedient yet and that that excuses disobedience. That's not how it works.

God will give you everything that is needed as you follow Him, as you step out in obedience. Someone might say that they are very…they're a very anxious person, so they cannot do the thing that God has called them to do.

Someone might say, I'm not patient enough to handle whatever it is that God is calling them to, maybe some relationship that they would have, whether it be with a loved one, a family member that they should care for, whether it be children, whatever the case may be.

Someone might say, well, I don't have enough patience for that. I will wait until God gives me enough patience. Then I will serve the Lord the way that He is calling me to serve Him. The Bible gives us commands to hospitality.

Someone who might have all the material things necessary for hospitality might have this excuse as well. Well, God just hasn't given me that heart of hospitality. I will wait until He gives me that heart of hospitality, and then I will serve Him.

Do not go about these things in this way. Now certainly there are some things that are not matters of obedience that you should wait for God to give you everything necessary. Teaching is one obvious example.

Bible explains that no one should think more highly of himself than he ought in the context of teaching. And so, it is not stepping out obedience to go and teach in a capacity that you are not equipped for.

Right?

It is also, yeah, it's not obedience to give of yourself in ways where God has not equipped you materially in order to give. For example, if you were to give by going into debt, this is almost certainly not something that God would call you to, but a lot of people will do that kind of thing.

They will get in their mind that they need to be obedient in ways where they're not distinguishing between these things that God is certain to give and God is not always going to give.

Right?

God will always give you the maturity necessary to obey Him. But if something materially is lacking and He has not provided it, then this is not some kind of obedience that He is calling you to unless there is something just outstanding that would dictate that it will be supplied and that you can count on it.

You need to be able to distinguish these things to know what God is calling you to. So what's the experience of someone who has this mindset that they have to supply the seed themselves? It's cowardice.

It's cowardice. Revelation 21, 8 says that the portion of the cowardly is the lake of fire. Cowardice is not a small thing. It is a very significant thing in the eyes of the Lord. Now what about the other end, bread?

God supplies not only the seed, not only the beginning, but He also supplies the end. He supplies everything that is needed, but He also supplies the results. Just like Paul says in 1 Corinthians, I planted Paulus' water, but God gives the growth.

Okay, so in all these cases, God is giving the growth. God is producing it from beginning to end. God will bring results. Now, once again, there's need for a caveat. This does not mean it will be the results that you are expecting.

It does not mean it will always be the results that you want, and it does not mean that it will always be results that you can see, okay? Those are not things that are guaranteed, but it is guaranteed that it will always have good results and great results.

What is the symptom that follows after someone who thinks that they need to be responsible for the result? It is anxiety. Okay, so someone who is going to be idle and timid and not do things because they think they need to supply the seed, someone who is going to be anxious about some task that they are doing if they think that it's their responsibility to provide the result or to ensure the result comes out a certain way.

The Bible says that the thief should no longer steal, but should labor with his hands so that he might have… be able to provide for himself and have something for those who are.

In need.

So, if someone realizes, okay, well, I need to serve the Lord by looking for a job in order that I can do that, but then that search for a job is not materializing, but you are being faithful in the search for it, provided you are truly being faithful in the search for it.

That does not mean that that is failure in the Lord's eyes. That does not mean that you are not successfully doing what He commands in Ephesians 4 and putting on Christ. Similarly, with marriage, you might see that God is calling you to marriage given the things it says in 1 Corinthians 7 in the one who was called to marriage.

He has desires because of temptations of sexual immorality, etc., all the commands, all the statements about the goodness of marriage in Scripture. And as that is not coming to fruition the way that you would hope it to, but if you are being faithful in it, that does not mean it is not producing the right results because the results are largely results that are in you, but also ones that are outside of you, just not necessarily in the way that you may think.

And the same is true in evangelism. If you go about serving the Lord and sharing the gospel with others, and you think that the burden of evangelism is on you so that you would produce the conversions, you'll be very anxious.

You'll be very disappointed. You'll go into it very excited. You'll come out of it very depressed when you don't see the particular results that you think that you are supposed to, by your own effort, be producing.

Bible says that the battle belongs to the Lord. The battle belongs to the Lord. So the experience of someone who has this mindset is going to be very bipolar, for lack of a better word. It's going to be manic depressive, you know, just really excited about something and then as you don't see results, just really depressed about it.

It's going to be a rollercoaster of emotions if you think that you are responsible for producing the results.

Okay?

So if you think you're responsible for producing the seed, it's going to end up in cowardice. If you think that you're responsible for producing the results, it's going to end up in anxiety and just a rollercoaster of emotions.

Proverbs on Generosity, Reaping, and Being Watered

There are a number of Proverbs that speak to this in a very...that are very counterintuitive about how God gives to those who give of themselves. Proverbs 3, 9 through 10, "'Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce.

Then your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine.'". Proverbs 11, 24 to 25, "'One gives freely, yet grows all the richer. Another withholds what he should give and only suffers one.

Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and the one who waters will himself be watered.'". Proverbs 19, 17, "'Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and He will repay him for his deed.'".

Proverbs 22, 9, "'Whoever has a bountiful eye will be blessed, for he shares his bread with the poor.'". Proverbs 28, 27, "'Whoever gives to the poor will not want, but he who hides his eyes will get many a curse.'".

Now first of all, these are all spoken in financial terms, but they apply to any kind of giving of yourself that you would do for the sake of the Lord. And this is the opposite of the way that most people think of themselves.

They think, well, I have this limited capacity, and so as I give of myself, it means that I will have less. But they don't recognize God's role in this process because He is infinite. He has all things.

And so as you are united to Christ, as you are in the vine, He will supply everything that is needed, and the result will not be that you will have less as you give of yourself as you follow the Lord in obedience.

The result is that you will have far more capacity to do so. And this is a cascading righteousness that it describes here in this passage. In verse 12, it says, "'For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints.'".

This is the mindset that most people have. When I do some good thing, it is just for that immediate purpose and nothing else. Okay, if I give to the poor, it is just to put them in a better condition, and that's the end of it.

He says it is not only for that. What will you be thinking if you think that's the only purpose of giving? You will think that that's supposed to be the effect, and then perhaps if it doesn't turn out the way that it should, perhaps they're not able to do with it as much as you thought, then it will feel like, well, maybe that wasn't good of me to be generous, etc.

If you have this mindset, all kinds of things could happen where you will be disappointed in the results, and even when you get good results, you will not be able to see all the results such that you would be as blessed by obedience as you should be.

Just a few more examples of a very results-oriented mindset. For example, if you go to the abortion clinic in order to proclaim the gospel, and you think that the metric is saving babies, you know, number of babies saved, well, as you see the results you want to see, you're not going to see the other things, and as you don't see the results you want to see, then you're going to be very discouraged in that work.

But if you realize that the Word always accomplishes its purposes like it had said in Isaiah 55, the Word always accomplishes its purpose and never returns void, you won't have that problem. Now consider the trajectory that Paul gives here.

Let me give an illustration of this real quick. I don't know if you've ever heard about this in just economic theory. There's a lot of people who think that in every economic transaction, okay, if you've got two things that are being exchanged, maybe you're bartering, maybe you're giving money for something, there's one party that's losing, right, because, well, one of those things actually is worth more, and so there's a loss that's always happening and a gain that's always happening.

That's the way a lot of people think about financial transactions. But the reality is that value is personal, and so someone may value something more than the other person for very good reasons. Someone may very much need food while the other person does not need the food that they're.

Giving.

Someone may need whatever resource that they're exchanging, et cetera. And so the reality is if everything's on the table properly, then both parties are winning in that transaction. And this is just different than most people think because if you're not thinking about value being different per person, you wouldn't realize that.

The same is true with what is being described here in this passage, that you might think, okay, well, I'm going to give to this other person, and so this is only good if it's at least as valuable to them as it is to me.

But it's missing all the other good that comes from it, that every transaction of obedience, every time you give of yourself, it is growing into much, much more. So he says, like I said, he said in verse 12, for the ministry of the service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, it's doing something much more than that.

In the previous verse, he said, you will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. Okay, so this is the summary statement that gives the whole trajectory.

You will be enriched. That will go through us. Who's us? Well, Paul is with Timothy. Titus is with the Corinthians and will be joining Paul and taking the money to him. So you will be enriched. That will flow through us, and then it will go to Jerusalem and produce thanksgiving to.

God.

Okay, so that is the whole of the trajectory. Now consider the different ways that it produces righteousness. So it says, for the ministry of the service is not only supplying the needs of the saints, but it is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God.

All right, thanksgivings is primarily talking about those in Jerusalem. Those in Jerusalem, when they are on the receiving end of the Corinthians' good works, particularly this one act of generosity, they will thank God.

Okay, so it produces in them a joy, a joy which is a righteous joy because they should be thanking God, and they have another reason to thank God, and so that is one that is focused on them and their selves.

Okay, them and their selves, there is a righteousness there. Then it goes on in verse 13. It says, by their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others.

Okay, so then after the thankfulness, they glorify God. Now what's this talking about? This is talking about not them just recognizing that God is good, but them bringing others to recognize that God is good.

So now this righteous recognition of God's goodness is spreading not just from themselves and thankfulness, but to others through their glorifying of God. And then it goes further, verse 14, while they long for you and pray for you because of the surpassing grace of God upon you, thanks be to God for His inexpressible gift.

So while they long for you and pray for you. So now the blessing is not just in them as they're thankful to God, the blessing of righteousness is not just in others as others are glorifying God because they are glorifying God, right?

They're telling others that God is good, and the others are recognizing that God is good, whether they be believer or unbeliever. But now then they also pray for the Corinthians. The saints in Jerusalem will pray for the Corinthians.

So it blesses the Corinthians as well. And so this is Paul's point here, is if you think of this very narrowly, you're not going to be stirred up to the kind of generosity that you should be stirred up.

If you think about the fruit of your obedience very narrowly and the direct thing that it's supposed to accomplish, you're not going to desire to obey God. Your heart's going to be very stingy in its desire to walk along the path that God has called you to walk if you are seeing so myopically.

But if you see that this is not only just to relieve their needs but to produce thankfulness in them, glorifying God in them for others to glorify God, and then also prayers for you, then you will realize, oh, this is expansive.

This is a cascading righteousness. This is a multiplying righteousness. He distributed freely and He's given to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. He gives, and then through that giving, as others give, His righteousness is growing.

People are growing in righteousness, declaring God's goodness. And this is the mindset, this is the understanding that is needed in order to obey Him fully. A lot of people think that they should just obey because God says to, and you should.

But you will not have the needed motivation. This is what the Bible is acknowledging. You are a weak creature. You are not a strong creature. It is not enough for you just to know what is right. He has blessed you by showing you many ways.

Now, there are many that are hidden from you, but He, in understanding your weakness, has told you about all the ways that is good so that you would have what is sufficient in order to know that He will give everything that is sufficient.

This is a relationship between faith and obedience. No one obeys apart from faith. But if you have faith in what God says, and moreover, all the things He says, including these things about the way that His righteousness cascades through obedience, you will have sufficient motivation, which is why we're doing this whole series.

The more that you understand these things, the more that your heart will overflow in a desire to obey God because you will see all the blessing that comes from it. And it will not feel like something that you have to do begrudgingly or stingily because it is just...it is something where you lose in the matter and you don't see the gain that takes place.