But by an {h} equality, that now at this time your abundance may be a supply for their want, that their abundance also may be a supply for your want: that there may be equality:

(h) That as now in your abundance you help others with a share of your goods, so should others in the same way bestow some of their goods upon you.

People's New Testament

8:14 But by an equality. There is a lack at Jerusalem; let your abundance supply it. So, too, if you be in want, they must supply it if they have abundance.

That there may be equality. The church is a band of loving brethren. Where one lacks, others should supply, that all may be equally provided.

Wesley's Notes

8:14 That their abundance - If need should so require. May be - At another time. A supply to your want: that there may be an equality - No want on one side, no superfluity on the other. It may likewise have a further meaning: - that as the temporal bounty of the Corinthians did now supply the temporal wants of their poor brethren in Judea, so the prayers of these might be a means of bringing down many spiritual blessings on their benefactors: so that all the spiritual wants of the one might be amply supplied; all the temporal of the other.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14. by an equality-"by the rule of equality" [Alford]: literally, "Out of equality."

now at this time-Greek, "at the present juncture" or season.

that their abundance also-The Greek being distinct from the previous "that," translate, "in order that," namely, at another season, when your relative circumstances may be reversed. The reference is solely to temporal wants and supplies. Those, as Bengel, who quote Ro 15:27 for interpreting it of spiritual supplies from the Jews to the Gentiles, forget that Ro 15:27 refers to the past benefit spiritually, which the Jews have conferred on the Gentiles, as a motive to gratitude on the part of the latter, not to a prospective benefit to be looked for from the former, which the text refers to.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

8:10-15 Good purposes are like buds and blossoms, pleasant to behold, and give hopes of good fruit; but they are lost, and signify nothing without good deeds. Good beginnings are well; but we lose the benefit, unless there is perseverance. When men purpose that which is good, and endeavour, according to their ability, to perform also, God will not reject them for what it is not in their power to do. But this scripture will not justify those who think good meanings are enough, or that good purposes, and the mere profession of a willing mind, are enough to save. Providence gives to some more of the good things of this world, and to some less, that those who have abundance might supply others who are in want. It is the will of God, that by our mutual supplying one another, there should be some sort of equality; not such a levelling as would destroy property, for in such a case there could be no exercise of charity. All should think themselves concerned to relieve those in want. This is shown from the gathering and giving out the manna in the wilderness, Ex 16:18. Those who have most of this world, have no more than food and raiment; and those who have but little of this world, seldom are quite without them.