¹Am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord? ²If I am not an apostle to others, at least I am to you. For you in the Lord are the seal of my apostleship. ³My defence to those who examine me is as follows. ⁴Do we not have authority to eat and drink? ⁵Do we not have authority to take a sister-lady around as the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord do, and Cephas does? ⁶Or is it only Barnabas and I who do not have a warrant not to work? ⁷Who ever serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat from its fruit? Or who tends a flock and does not eat from the milk of the flock? ⁸Do I just say these things on a human level? Or does the law not say these things too? ⁹For in the law of Moses it stands written: “You shall not muzzle an ox which threshes.” Is God really concerned about oxen? ¹⁰Or does he say it entirely for our sakes? Well, it was written for our sakes, because he who ploughs should plough in hope, and he who threshes in hope should have a share of his hope. ¹¹If we have sown spiritual things for you, is it anything extraordinary if we reap your material things? ¹²If others share in this authority over you, should not we all the more? But we have not used this authority; rather, we endure all things, in order not to create any hindrance to the gospel of Christ. ¹³Do you not know that those who work on holy matters eat from the income of the temple, and that those who officiate at the altar take a share in the sacrifices of the altar? ¹⁴In this way the Lord also made provision for those who proclaim the gospel to live from the gospel. ¹⁵But I have not used any of these things, and I have not written these things, in order for them to be forgone like that in my case. For it is better for me to die than that anyone should make my exultation void. ¹⁶For if I preach the gospel, I do not have anything to glory about, for necessity constrains me. But woe is me if I do not preach the gospel. ¹⁷For if I do this willingly, I have a reward. But if unwillingly, then I have still been entrusted with a stewardship. ¹⁸So what is my reward? That in preaching the gospel I may present the gospel of Christ without expense being incurred, so as not to exploit my authority with the gospel. ¹⁹For although I am free from all, I have made myself a slave to all, so as to win over the greater number of people. ²⁰And I became as a Jew to the Jews, in order to win over the Jews; to those under the law I became as one under the law, in order that I might win over those under the law; ²¹to those who are without the law I became as one without the law (not being without the law to God, but subject in the law to Christ), in order that I might win over those without the law. ²²To the weak I became as one weak, in order to win over the weak. I have become all sorts of things to all kinds of people, in order to save some in all sorts of ways. ²³I do this on account of the gospel, in order that I may be a fellow sharer of it. ²⁴Do you not know that those who run in a stadium all run, but only one receives the prize? Run so as to win! ²⁵Every contestant exerts himself in every way. So they do it in order to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable one. ²⁶So then, I run like that, not falteringly. I box like that, not beating the air, ²⁷but I deal severely with my body and bring it into subjection, in case, having proclaimed this to others, I myself become disqualified.

Reference(s) in Chapter 9: v.9 ↔ Deuteronomy 25:4.