1 Corinthians 4:11

11 Up to this very moment we are hungry, thirsty, wearing rags, abused, and homeless.

1 Corinthians 4:11 Meaning and Commentary

1 Corinthians 4:11

Even unto this present hour
What is about to be related was not what befell the apostles now and then, and a great while ago; but what for a considerable time, and unto the present time, was more or less the common constant series and course of life they were inured to:

we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked;
wanted the common necessaries of life, food to eat, and raiment to put on, and gold and silver to purchase any with; which might be, when, as it was sometimes their case, they were in desert places, or on the seas; or when they fell among thieves; or had given all away, as they sometimes did, for the relief of others; or when they were not, as sometimes, taken notice of, and provided for, where they ministered, as they ought to have been.

And are buffeted;
not only by Satan, as the apostle was, but by men; scourged, whipped, and beaten by them; scourged in the synagogues by the Jews with forty stripes save one; and beaten with rods by the Romans, and other Gentiles.

And have no certain dwelling place;
were in an unsettled state, always moving from one place to another, and had no place they could call their own; like their Lord and master, who had not where to lay his head; and like some of the Old Testament saints, who wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins, in deserts, and in mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.

1 Corinthians 4:11 In-Context

9 I suppose that God has shown that we apostles are at the end of the line. We are like prisoners sentenced to death, because we have become a spectacle in the world, both to angels and to humans.
10 We are fools for Christ, but you are wise through Christ! We are weak, but you are strong! You are honored, but we are dishonored!
11 Up to this very moment we are hungry, thirsty, wearing rags, abused, and homeless.
12 We work hard with our own hands. When we are insulted, we respond with a blessing; when we are harassed, we put up with it;
13 when our reputation is attacked, we are encouraging. We have become the scum of the earth, the waste that runs off everything, up to the present time.
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