not because we don't have the right, but to make ourselves an example to you, that you should imitate us.
The apostle’s working for his maintenance ought to have put the idle among the Thessalonians to shame, who perhaps excused, themselves from working, on pretense they were attending to their neighbours affairs. For, if the apostle did not make the necessary and laborious work of preaching the gospel an excuse for not working, the Thessalonians had no reason to excuse themselves from working, on pretense of their minding other people’s affairs; which in truth was not but officious meddling (MacKnight 434).