1 Corinthians 9
1 Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Aren’t you my work in the Lord?
2 If I am not an apostle to others, at least I am to you. For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.
3 This is my defense to those who examine me.
4 Don’t we have the right to eat and drink?
5 Don’t we have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles, the Lord’s brothers, and Cephas?
6 Or are Barnabas and I the only ones who have no right to stop working?
7 Who serves as a soldier at their own expense? Who plants a vineyard and doesn’t eat its fruit? Or who tends a flock and doesn’t drink its milk?
8 Am I saying these things from a human point of view? Or doesn’t the Law say the same thing?
9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is threshing.” Is God concerned about oxen?
10 Or is he speaking entirely for our sake? It was written for our sake, because the one who plows ought to plow in hope, and the one who threshes in hope of sharing in the harvest.
11 If we sowed spiritual things among you, is it too much for us to reap material things from you?
12 If others share this right over you, don’t we have it even more? Yet we haven’t made use of this right. Instead, we endure everything so that we won’t put any obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ.
13 Don’t you know that those who perform sacred service eat what comes from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in what is offered there?
14 In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should make their living from the gospel.
15 But I haven’t made use of any of these rights. And I haven’t written this so that it should be done for me. For I would rather die than have anyone take away my reason to boast.
16 For if I proclaim the good news, I have no reason to boast, because I am under obligation. And woe to me if I don’t proclaim the good news!
17 For if I do this willingly, I have a reward. But if unwillingly, I have been entrusted with a responsibility.
18 What, then, is my reward? That when I proclaim the good news, I may offer the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel.
19 Though I am free from everyone, I have made myself a slave to everyone, so that I might win as many as possible.
20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, in order to win the Jews. To those under the Law I became like one under the Law—though I myself am not under the Law—in order to win those under the Law.
21 To those without the Law I became like one without the Law, in order to win those without the Law—though I am not outside God’s law, but under Christ’s law.
22 To the weak I became weak, in order to win the weak. I have become all things to all people, so that by every means I might save some.
23 I do everything for the sake of the gospel, so that I too may share in it.
24 Don’t you know that all the runners in the stadium run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win it.
25 Every athlete in training exercises self-control in everything. They do it to receive a crown that will perish, but we do it for one that will never perish.
26 So I run like this: not without a clear goal. I fight like this: not as someone beating the air.
27 But I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after proclaiming to others, I myself won’t be disqualified.
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