1 Corinthians 9
9
1-2And don’t tell me that I have no authority to write like this. I’m perfectly free to do this—isn’t that obvious? Haven’t I been given a job to do? Wasn’t I commissioned to this work in a face-to-face meeting with Jesus, our Master? Aren’t you yourselves proof of the good work that I’ve done for the Master? Even if no one else admits the authority of my commission, you can’t deny it. Why, my work with you is living proof of my authority!
3-7I’m not shy in standing up to my critics. We who are on missionary assignments for God have a right to decent accommodations, and we have a right to support for us and our families. You don’t seem to have raised questions with the other apostles and our Master’s brothers and Peter in these matters. So, why me? Is it just Barnabas and I who have to go it alone and pay our own way? Are soldiers self-employed? Are gardeners forbidden to eat vegetables from their own gardens? Don’t dairy farmers get to drink their fill from the pail?
8-12a I’m not just sounding off because I’m irritated. This is all written in the scriptural law. Moses wrote, “Don’t muzzle an ox to keep it from eating the grain when it’s threshing.” Do you think Moses’ primary concern was the care of farm animals? Don’t you think his concern extends to us? Of course. Farmers plow and thresh expecting something when the crop comes in. So if we have planted spiritual seed among you, is it out of line to expect a meal or two from you? Others demand plenty from you in these ways. Don’t we who have never demanded deserve even more?
12b-14 But we’re not going to start demanding now what we’ve always had a perfect right to. Our decision all along has been to put up with anything rather than to get in the way or detract from the Message of Christ. All I’m concerned with right now is that you not use our decision to take advantage of others, depriving them of what is rightly theirs. You know, don’t you, that it’s always been taken for granted that those who work in the Temple live off the proceeds of the Temple, and that those who offer sacrifices at the altar eat their meals from what has been sacrificed? Along the same lines, the Master directed that those who spread the Message be supported by those who believe the Message.
15-18Still, I want it made clear that I’ve never gotten anything out of this for myself, and that I’m not writing now to get something. I’d rather die than give anyone ammunition to discredit me or question my motives. If I proclaim the Message, it’s not to get something out of it for myself. I’m compelled to do it, and doomed if I don’t! If this was my own idea of just another way to make a living, I’d expect some pay. But since it’s not my idea but something solemnly entrusted to me, why would I expect to get paid? So am I getting anything out of it? Yes, as a matter of fact: the pleasure of proclaiming the Message at no cost to you. You don’t even have to pay my expenses!
19-23Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn’t just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!
24-25You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally.
26-27I don’t know about you, but I’m running hard for the finish line. I’m giving it everything I’ve got. No lazy living for me! I’m staying alert and in top condition. I’m not going to get caught napping, telling everyone else all about it and then missing out myself.
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1 Corinthians 9: MSG
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
1 Corinthians 9
9
1Do I not have cherut?#9:1 in Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach Am I not a Shliach? Have I not seen Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach Adoneinu? Are you not my po'al (work) in Adoneinu?
2If to others I am not a Shliach, surely I am to you, for you are the chotam (seal) of my shlichus,#9:2 Ga 2:10 in Hashem.
3My apologetic to the ones cross-examining me is this:
4Do I not have the privilege of eating and drinking?
5Is the privilege not mine to take an achot b'Moshiach as isha in my travels for Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiachʼs avodas kodesh, just as the rest of his Shlichim do and the Achim#9:5 See Mt 13:55 of Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach Adoneinu and Kefa?
6Or is it only Bar-Nabba and I who are denied the privilege of not working at a parnasah?
7Whoever heard of someone serving as a chaiyal (soldier) but having to pay his own wages for doing so? Who plants a kerem (vineyard) but does not eat the p'ri hakerem? And who serves as a ro'eh (shepherd) over a flock and of the cholov (milk) of the flock does not partake?#9:7 Dt 20:6; Prov 27:18
8Do I say this according to the dvar haBnei Adam? Or does not the Torah say these things?
9For, in the Torah of Moshe#9:9 Rabbenu it has been written, LO TACHSOM SHOR BEDISHO (You shall not muzzle an ox treading grain).#9:9 Dt 25:4 Surely it is not for oxen that Hashem is concerned.
10Or does he not speak altogether for our sake, and is it not for us that Hashem says this? Ken, for us, because it was written that the one plowing ought to plow on in tikvah, and the one threshing ought to partake with tikvah.
11If we sowed spiritual things to you, is it too much if we reap in material things from you?#9:11 Ro 15:27
12If others over you can claim this privilege, can we not even more? But we did not make use of this privilege; we endure all things, lest any hindrance we should give to Moshiachʼs Besuras HaGeulah.
13Do you not have da'as that the kohanim serving in the Beis Hamikdash sherut (service in the Temple) eat the things of the Beis Hamikdash; the kohanim attending the Mizbe'ach (altar) have their share with the Mizbe'ach (altar)?
14So also Moshiach Adoneinu appointed the ones proclaiming the Besuras HaGeulah to get their parnasah from the Besuras HaGeulah.
15But I have not used any of these privileges; I did not write these things that it might be so with me; for itʼs better for me rather to die than that someone deprive me of my kavod [in Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach Pp 1:21].
16For if I preach the Besuras HaGeulah there is nothing for me to boast about, als (since) necessity is laid on me, for Oy Li (Woe to me!) if I do not preach the Besuras HaGeulah.#9:16 Jer 20:9
17For, if I do this willingly, I have a sachar (reward), but if unwillingly, then a ne'emanut (trusteeship), a kehunah for the Besuras HaGeulah#9:17 Ro 15:16 has been entrusted to me.
18What then is my sachar (reward)? That in preaching as a maggid of the Besuras HaGeulah, I may make the Besuras HaGeulah free of charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the Besuras HaGeulah.
19For being no indentured servant to any one of the Bnei Adam, I made myself a servant [working for nothing] to kol Bnei Adam, that I might win the more.
20And I became to the Yehudim as a Yehudi, that I might win Yehudim; to the ones under Gezetz, I became as under Gezetz — not being myself under [the epoch of] Gezetz#9:20 Ro 8:2 — that the ones under Gezetz I might win;
21To the ones without Gezetz, as without Gezetz, though not being without the Torah of Hashem#9:21 Ac 21:23 but being under Moshiachʼs Torah,#9:21 Ro 15:8; Isa 42:4 that I might win the ones without Gezetz.
22I became weak to the weak ones that I might win the weak ones. I have become all things to kol Bnei Adam, that by all means I might save some.
23And all things I do because of the Besuras HaGeulah that a fellow partaker and deveykus sharer in it I may become.
24Do you not have da'as that the ones running on a race course all indeed run, but it is only one who receives the prize? So run that you may obtain the prize.
25And everyone competing in the [Olympic] games in all things exercises shlitah atzmi: those ones, therefore, that they may obtain a perishable wreath; but we, an imperishable.
26Therefore, I run not as one without a goal that is kovua (fixed, set). I box as not beating the air.
27But I do more than merely spar with my basar; I pommel it and keep it under strict subjection, so that after I am the maggid to others, I myself will not become declared ineligible.
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