Prayer of Thanksgiving: Give thanks to God for His love that endures forever and for the blessings of our local church.

Prayer of Supplication: Pray for the ladies in the congregation who are pregnant and for missionaries.

Bible reading and commentary:

Read: 1 Corinthians 9:1-27 

Having established that Christian freedom with respect to indifferent matters must be accommodated to the consciences of weaker believers, Paul now illustrates in 1 Corinthians 9 how he applied this principle in the conduct of his own ministry among the Corinthians.

As an apostle, Paul has the right to financial support (vv 4. 6-12). But love for Christ leads him to give up this right; so that others will understand that God’s saving mercies are a free gift, not something to be obtained through human works. The ministry that Paul is talking about is the proclaiming of the gospel. True Christian pastors diligently seek lost people through the ministry of the Word; they adapt their sermons to the capacity of ordinary people; they hold indifferent views (alcohol, movies, secular books etc.) freely as to win men and women to the truth; they perform their pastoral duties with spiritual zeal and diligence to the very end.

Many words have been written about Paul’s statement that he has become “all things to all people” (v 22). One thing he does NOT mean is that Christians should sin so as to fit in with those they are trying to evangelize. Paul is simply saying that he has adopted many customs and cultural practices that are not his own preferences, so that he might honor Christ and bless others by sharing the gospel with as many different kinds of people as possible. Even those of us who are not apostles are called to show such zeal for “building up” our neighbors (8:1; 10:23).

Practical application in our day would include things such as when inviting Catholics to our homes for dinner on Friday we would not serve meat and wound their conscience or invite Jews over and serve bacon. I call this Spirit led common sense. Paul also has in mind here that when we are explaining the gospel we would start where people are in their knowledge of the things of God. In Paul’s day he would probably not start with Moses when speaking to Gentiles because they may not know who Moses his. This kind of considerate love is exactly what people need. We are to love our neighbors which includes are enemies. Paul never gave up on anyone or any group and neither should we. Prayer for others is the most important thing Christians can do when hoping for others’ salvation.

The source of such selflessness is the transforming power of love for Christ, who gave up so much to become a servant for our sake (Mark 10:45; Phil. 2:7; 2 Cor. 8:9). When we are gripped by such love, a focus on personal comfort gives way to a focus on advancing the gospel and the blessings it brings. As the athletic images in 1 Corinthians 9:24-26 remind us, passion for Christ fuels sustained, intense effort. The grace we have already received gives us strength and motive to complete our “race,” where the final victory of resurrection life in Christ awaits us (v 25).

In 1520 Martin Luther, the great Reformer in Germany, wrote a treatise called "The Freedom of the Christian." He began it with this paradox: A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none. A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all. Then he explained: These two theses seem to contradict each other . . . [But] both are Paul's own statements, who says in 1 Corinthians 9:19, "For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all," and in Romans 13:8, "Owe no one anything, except to love one another." Love, by its very nature, is ready to serve and be subject to him who is loved.