1 Corinthians 9:25

Through 1 Corinthians 9 Paul has been explaining his rights as an apostle. He is free, and he has the right to marry and to be supported by the churches (1 Corinthians 9:1). He has chosen to give these rights up, and he says why: “lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ” (1 Corinthians 9:12). He has made himself the servant of all (1 Corinthians 9:19–23), and he sums up that whole way of life in one sentence: “I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some” (1 Corinthians 9:22). He does it “for the gospel’s sake” (1 Corinthians 9:23).

The race and the boxing match show the discipline behind that self-denial, and here Paul moves from his own example to a call for every believer to live with the same purpose. His example also speaks to the quarrel over food sacrificed to idols in the chapter before (1 Corinthians 8), where a believer’s freedom has to give way to care for weaker brothers and sisters.

The Corinthians knew athletics well. Their city hosted the Isthmian Games on the nearby Isthmus of Corinth every two years, a festival second only to the Olympic Games in prestige, with foot races, wrestling, boxing and chariot racing. Athletes prepared for months under strict rules and a strict diet, keeping away from certain foods, from wine and from sexual activity. The victor was crowned with a wreath of wild celery or pine, and it soon withered. Paul could take this picture straight from the life of the city, and his readers would grasp it at once.

Paul opens with “Know ye not”, a question that assumes the answer. Everyone in a race runs, and only one receives the prize. Then comes the command: “So run, that ye may obtain.”

The verb for run, tréchō, means to move quickly, and in the games it is the word for competing in a footrace with all one’s strength. Paul gives it as a present imperative, trechete, a command to keep on running. The prize, brabeîon, comes from the word for an umpire and means the award given to the winner of the public games, the thing every athlete strains toward. In this passage it is the eternal reward of those who persevere in faith.

“That ye may obtain” is hina katalabēte, from katalambánō, to lay hold of something and make it one’s own. In other places the same verb means to grasp something with the mind and come to understand it. Here the picture is of a runner who finishes with the prize in hand. Paul wants us to run in a way that reaches the goal and takes hold of what God has promised.

He speaks of his own life the same way elsewhere: “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). Hebrews urges us to “run with patience the race that is set before us” (Hebrews 12:1–2), and near the end of his life Paul could write, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7–8).

“Every man that striveth for the mastery” is one word in Greek, agōnízomai, which gives us the English “agonize” and “agony”. It means to struggle, whether to compete for a prize, to contend with an adversary, or to work hard to accomplish something. Paul says that everyone who enters the contest “is temperate in all things”. The verb enkrateúomai means to exercise self-restraint, especially in diet and chastity, and so to be master of oneself. For the athlete “all things” took in what he ate, how he trained and slept, and whatever might distract him.

The same self-mastery belongs to the Christian. We bring our desires, passions and actions under God’s will, and this temperance is part of the fruit of the Spirit: “Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law” (Galatians 5:23). Paul’s aim is purposeful living for the gospel and for an eternal prize, which is far more than self-denial for its own sake. Salvation is God’s free gift, and it brings us into an active, disciplined life of growing holiness and perseverance.

The Greek stéphanos is the victor’s wreath. Paul calls the athlete’s crown phthartós, perishable and subject to decay, and the believer’s áphthartos, the same word with a negative prefix, meaning undecaying and immortal. The athletes put themselves through all that discipline for a ring of leaves that would soon be dry, and the honour faded with it. “But we an incorruptible.” Paul’s “we” takes in himself and all who run the Christian race. Our discipline may be just as hard as theirs, and what we run for is infinitely better.

This crown stands for eternal life, God’s own commendation, glory, and the unfading inheritance that waits for those who run faithfully. It lasts because it comes from the eternal God. Paul uses the same pair of words when he writes of the resurrection: “For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality” (1 Corinthians 15:53–54). Scripture names the believer’s crown in other places too: the crown of righteousness (2 Timothy 4:7–8), the crown of life promised to the man who endures temptation (James 1:12), and, for faithful shepherds of God’s flock, “a crown of glory that fadeth not away” (1 Peter 5:4). Set beside a crown like that, earthly success and earthly failure are both temporary, and that frees us to give our lives to what lasts.

In verse 26 Paul holds himself up as the example. The “I” is egō, written out in the Greek, where it is emphatic. “Therefore”, toínyn, draws a conclusion from what he has just said about the race and, behind it, about the rights he gives up for the gospel. “So”, hoútō, means “in this way”, and here it points forward to the way of running he goes on to describe.

He runs, tréchō again, “not as uncertainly”. The adverb adḗlōs means obscurely, without a clear mark, and pictures a runner with the finish line out of sight. Paul knows where his course runs and where it ends, so his life has a clear goal, a grasp of God’s will, and a steady pursuit of the heavenly prize.

Then he changes from running to boxing. The verb for fight, pyktéō, comes from a word related to the fist and means to box in the games. “One that beateth the air” joins dérō, to beat, with aḗr, the air. It is a picture of shadowboxing, swinging at empty air and wasting strength. Paul’s blows land, because we have real enemies in sin, temptation and the powers of evil: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12). The next verse shows that one opponent Paul strikes is his own body.

“I keep under my body” translates hypōpiázō, which literally means to strike under the eye, to bruise, the way a boxer lands a heavy blow. Used figuratively it means to subdue or treat harshly. The boxer of verse 26 aims his punches at his own appetites. “And bring it into subjection” is doulagōgéō, built from the words for a slave and for leading, so it means to lead away as a slave. Paul makes his body a servant of the gospel, with its desires, appetites and natural inclinations under rule, so that it becomes a willing instrument of righteousness. He teaches the same in Romans: “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God” (Romans 6:12–13).

This is an apostle speaking, a man with great authority and deep experience of God, and still he speaks of an ongoing battle against the flesh. His strong language serves holiness, a life whose actions match its words, which is a different thing from punishing oneself.

Then Paul gives his reason: “lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” He has preached to many and led many to faith, and he knows that the one who proclaims the gospel must live it. His public preaching and his private conduct have to agree, so that his life backs up his message. That weighs on everyone who ministers, and it reaches every believer, in public and in private. The athlete has to keep the rules as well: “And if a man also strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully” (2 Timothy 2:5).

Jesus ran his race with complete certainty about his mission, and every step from his baptism to his crucifixion led toward it. Hebrews tells us to look to him as we run: “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).

He was temperate in all things. When he was tempted in the wilderness, he put spiritual food ahead of his physical hunger (Matthew 4:1–11). In Gethsemane he gave his will up to the Father’s: “nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). He set aside earthly honour and power, embraced suffering and humility, and wore a crown of thorns before God exalted him to the highest place (Philippians 2:8–9). He did all this to win our salvation in perfect obedience to the Father.

His fight was real as well. He confronted sin, sickness and the powers of darkness, and he won the decisive victory over them: “And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it” (Colossians 2:15). Isaiah foretold the servant’s reward for his suffering: “He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied” (Isaiah 53:10–11). And he understands our struggle, for he “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15).

So our hope of obtaining the prize rests on his victory more than on our own strength. The imperishable crown is his gift, secured by his obedience and his death, and through union with him we share in what he has won. In the end the prize is Christ himself, as Paul says when he counts all things loss “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection” (Philippians 3:8–11).

The athlete’s training has its counterpart in our habits of prayer, Bible study, fellowship, service and self-control, kept up day after day. The Christian race is long, and it asks for endurance through trials, temptations and ordinary days. Distractions, complacency and the pull of worldly things slow a runner, which is why Hebrews tells us to “lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us” (Hebrews 12:1). Keeping the incorruptible crown in view helps us bear hardship and stay humble when things go well.

Paul’s concern in verse 27 reaches us too. What we profess and how we live belong together, whether we preach in public or simply live as Christians among our neighbours. Mature believers and long-serving ministers need that watchfulness as much as anyone. And all of it is done in the strength of the One who has already won. We run hard because Christ ran first, and he holds the prize for us.