Ministry Commons

¹AM I not a free man? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus Messiah our Lord? Are you not my work in my Lord? ²If I am not an apostle to others, yet to you I am; for you are the seal of my apostleship. ³So my answer to those who criticize me is this: ⁴Do we not have the right to eat and to drink? ⁵And do we not have the right to travel with a Messiahian wife, just as the rest of the apostles do, and as the brothers of our Lord, and as Kepa? ⁶I and Barnabas, do we not have the right to live without working? ⁷What officer commands an army at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its fruits? Who feeds sheep, and does not eat of the produce of his flock? ⁸I say these things as a man. Look the law also says them. ⁹For it is written in the law of Moses, You will not muzzle the ox that treads out the wheat. Why? Is God concerned only for the ox? ¹⁰No. It is known that he said it for our sakes and it was written for our sakes because the plowman must plow in hope, and he who threshes, threshes in hope of the crop. ¹¹Now if we have sown among you spiritual things, is it too much that we should reap material things from you? ¹²If others have this authority over you, do we not have the greater right? Nevertheless, we have not used this authority; but we have endured all things so that we would not hinder the gospel of Messiah. ¹³Do you not know that those who work in the holy place are maintained out of the temple? And those who minister at the altar share the offerings with the altar? ¹⁴Even so has our Lord commanded that those who preach his gospel should live by his gospel.

¹⁵But I have used none of these privileges; nor have I written these things that it should be done to me; for it were better for me to die, than that any man should declare my empty pride. ¹⁶For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of; for I am under obligation; yes, woe to me if I do not preach the gospel. ¹⁷For if I do this thing willingly, I have my reward; but if against my will, it is like a stewardship entrusted to me. ¹⁸What then is my wage? This is it. When I preach the gospel of Jesus Messiah, I do it without thought of repayment, and I have not abused the power given to me in the gospel. ¹⁹Because I am free from all these things, I have served all men that I may gain many. ²⁰So with the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win the Jews; and with those who are under the law, I became as one who is under the law, that I might win those who are under the law. ²¹To those who are without law, I became like one who is without law, though I am not lawless before God because I am under the law of Messiah, that I might win those who are without law. ²²With the weak I became as weak, that I might win the weak. I became everything to every man, that I might by all means save everyone. ²³And this I do for the gospel's sake, that I might be a partaker of it.

²⁴Do you not know that the runners in a race all run, but only one is victorious? So you must run that you may obtain victory. ²⁵And every man who battles in the contest frees his mind from everything else. Yet they run to win a garland which is perishable; but we to win one which is everlasting. ²⁶I therefore so run, not for something that is uncertain; and I so fight, not as one who beats the air; ²⁷But I conquer and subdue my body so that, by no chance, when I have preached to others, I will despise myself.