Charles Ellicott Commentary 2 Corinthians 12:15

"And I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls. If I love you more abundantly, am I loved the less?" — 2 Corinthians 12:15 (ASV)

And I will very gladly spend and be spent.—The pronoun is emphatic, I, for my part. The latter verb implies spending to the last farthing. As he sought not theirs, but them, so he is ready to spend for them not only all that he has, but even, as if to the verge of exhaustion, all that he is. And yet with all this there was the painful consciousness of toiling without adequate return. It seemed to him, in his intense craving for affection, as if their love varied inversely with his own.