Introduction

Van Mastricht argued against the Anabaptist belief of the time that preachers should not be paid. I think Mastricht makes a good point that a preacher should focus on preaching and not be spending their time raising support. Their congregation should free up the preacher's time both financially and other ways so he can preach. Van Mastricht struck a good balance between a no financial support position and a mercenary attitude like a showman getting paid per show.

The reformed affirm that it is permitted to reeive a stipend, certainly not as a wage for their labor for that belongs to mercenaries, nor as a price for the Word, for that is simony, but so that they may more freely devote their entire selves to holy things, and not so that by the preaching of the Word, they may live from the stipend, but rather, they live from the stipend, so that they may preach the Word. They state it in this way because:

the Savior declares that the minister of the gospel, like a workman, is worth of hire. (Matt. 10:10); because

Paul expressly teaches this (1 Cor. 9:4-14); and hence,

he commands this same thing to the church (Gal. 6:6; 1 Tim. 5:17-18); because

God looked after the ministers of the Old Testament in regard to their honorable sustenance (Lev. 27:30; Num. 15:20-21; Deut. 26:2ff; etc.), hence from common equity, the same belongs to the minister of the New Testament