2 Corinthians 11:7

¹³For what is there in which you were made inferior to the rest of the assemblies, unless it is that I myself was not a burden to you? Forgive me this wrong!

⁶Or have only Barnabas and I no right to not work?

¹Now I Paul, myself, entreat you by the humility and gentleness of Christ, I who in your presence am lowly among you, but being absent am bold toward you.

⁹For you remember, brothers, our labor and travail; for working night and day, that we might not burden any of you, we preached to you the Good News of God.

¹⁰We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You have honor, but we have dishonor. ¹¹Even to this present hour we hunger, thirst, are naked, are beaten, and have no certain dwelling place. ¹²We toil, working with our own hands. When people curse us, we bless. Being persecuted, we endure.

¹After these things Paul departed from Athens and came to Corinth. ²He found a certain Jew named Aquila, a man of Pontus by race, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from Rome. He came to them, ³and because he practiced the same trade, he lived with them and worked, for by trade they were tent makers.

³⁴You yourselves know that these hands served my necessities, and those who were with me.

⁸neither did we eat bread from anyone’s hand without paying for it, but in labor and travail worked night and day, that we might not burden any of you.

¹⁴Even so the Lord ordained that those who proclaim the Good News should live from the Good News.

¹⁵But I have used none of these things, and I don’t write these things that it may be done so in my case; for I would rather die, than that anyone should make my boasting void. ¹⁶For if I preach the Good News, I have nothing to boast about, for necessity is laid on me; but woe is to me if I don’t preach the Good News. ¹⁷For 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. ¹⁸What 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.

¹²If others partake of this 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.