The In-Dept Study of the Bible
Corinthians 09
1 Am I not free? Am I not an apostle?
Haven’t I seen Jesus Christ, our Lord?
Aren’t you my work in the Lord?
2 If to others I am not an apostle, yet at
least I am to you; for you are the seal of my
apostleship in the Lord.
3 My defense to those who examine me is
this:
4 Have we no right to eat and to drink?
5 Have we no right to take along a wife
who is a believer, even as the rest of the
apostles, and the brothers of the Lord, and
Cephas?
6 Or have only Barnabas and I no right to
not work?
7 What soldier ever serves at his own
expense? Who plants a vineyard, and doesn’t
eat of its fruit? Or who feeds a flock, and
doesn’t drink from the flock’s milk?
8 Do I speak these things according to the
ways of men? Or doesn’t the law also say
the same thing?
9 For it is written in the law of Moses,
“You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads
out the grain.”* Is it for the oxen that God
cares,
10 or does he say it assuredly for our
sake? Yes, it was written for our sake,
because he who plows ought to plow in
hope, and he who threshes in hope should
partake of his hope.
11 If we sowed to you spiritualthings, is it
a greatthing if we reap yourfleshly things?
12 If others partake ofthis right over you,
don’t we yet more? Nevertheless we didn’t
use this right, but we bear all
things, that we may cause no
hindrance to the Good News of Christ.
13 Don’t you know that those who serve
around sacred things eat from the things
of the temple, and those who wait on the
altar have their portion with the altar?
14 Even so the Lord ordained that those
who proclaim the Good News should live
from the Good News.
15 But I have used none of these things,
and I don’t write these things thatit may be
done so in my case; for I would rather die,
than that anyone should make my boasting void.
16 For if I preach the Good News, I have
nothing to boast about, for necessity is laid
on me; but woe is to me ifI don’t preach the
Good News.
17 For if I do this of my own will, I have a
reward. But if not of my own will, I have a
stewardship entrusted to me.
18 What then is my reward? That when I
preach the Good News, I may present the
Good News of Christ without charge, so
as not to abuse my authority in the Good News.
19 For though I was free from all, I
brought myself under bondage to all, that
I might gain the more.
20 To the Jews I became as a Jew, that I
might gain Jews; to those who are under
the law, as under the law,† thatI might gain
those who are under the law;
21 to those who are without law, as without
law (not being without law toward
God, but under law toward Christ), that I
might win those who are without law.
22 To the weak I became as weak, that I
might gain the weak. I have become all
things to all men, that I may by all means
save some.
23 Now I do this for the sake of the Good
News, that I may be a joint partaker of it.
24 Don’t you know that those who run in
a race all run, but one receives the prize?
Run like that, so that you may win.
25 Every man who strives in the games
exercises self-control in all things. Now
they do it to receive a corruptible crown,
but we an incorruptible.
26 I therefore run like that, not aimlessly.
I fight like that, not beating the air,
27 but I beat my body and bring it into
submission, lest by any means, after I have
preached to others, I myself should be disqualified.