2 Corinthians 11:7

Have I committed an offence Literally, committed sin (don sinne, Wiclif. Did I therein synne? Tyndale, Cranmer and the Geneva version). This passage is ironical. The Corinthians had allowed St Paul's anxious desire not to be burdensome to them to be used against him (see 1 Corinthians 9:1-14). He asks if such an anxiety for their welfare was to be imputed to him as a sin. Cf. the very similar passage in ch. 2 Corinthians 12:13.

abasing myself i.e. by working for his living, when he might have enjoyed what men are apt to regard as a dignified ease at their expense. For the word see note on ch. 2 Corinthians 10:1.

that you might be exalted He speaks, not of temporal exaltation, for his coming made no difference, unless perhaps for the worse, in their temporal condition, but of the "height of Christian salvation" (Meyer) to which they had been lifted.

freely Cf. 1 Corinthians 9:12-18; 1 Thessalonians 2:9; Matthew 10:8. There is a contrast intended between the greatness of the gift, the Gospel of God, and the cost for which it was imparted, for nothing(literally, as a gift). Cf. Isaiah 55:1.