1 Corinthians 9:27

Keep under, etc.] RV' I buffet my body and bring it into bondage.' The body is the seat of temptation to self-indulgence. One great object of fasting and abstinence is to secure this control over our bodies, so that 'the flesh may be subdued to the spirit.' The illness to which St. Paul was subject, his 'thorn in the flesh' (2 Corinthians 12:7), must have tempted him often to seek his own ease and comfort and to live a more self-indulgent and less laborious life; and this temptation he fought against unceasingly. Preached to others] like the herald who proclaimed the conditions of the contest and its prizes, and summoned the competitors. A castaway] RV 'rejected'; disqualified. 'No amount of usefulness to others will save us if we ourselves live not the life of God' (Woodford).