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For though I be free from all men; the word men is not in the Greek, but is supplied by our interpreters. Some make things the substantive, and restrain it to the things of the ceremonial law. It may be understood both of men and things; he was born no man’s servant, nor by God’s law made a servant to any men’s humours, and as free as to many other things, as he was to have taken maintenance of the churches, for the pains he bestowed amongst them.
Yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more; yet (saith he) observe my practice, that I might gain men to Christ, (so the apostle several times calleth converting souls, bringing them in love with the gospel, and into a road that may bring them to heaven, which we ought to account the greatest gain in the world, as it appeareth from Dan_12:3), I have become, or made myself, the servant of all; not the servants of their lusts and corruptions, (that is the way to lose men’s souls, and destroy them, not to gain them), but a servant to their weaknesses and infirmities, so far as they were not sinful: I have denied myself in my liberty, and determined myself to that part in my actions, which I saw would most oblige, profit, and endear them to me, and to bring them more in love with the gospel.