Objection: We Should Expect, as Paul Did, to Always Bear Jesus’ Dying in Our Own Bodies (2 Corinthians 4:10)
2 Corinthians 4:10:
Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
I am amazed at how many Scriptures can be used when preaching divine healing and answering objections to it. I am also amazed at how many Scriptures are quoted out of context like this one to give the impression that healing is not always God’s will for all. It actually gets worse, as the objector proceeds to also misappropriate 1 Corinthians 4:16 (“Wherefore I beseech you, be ye followers of me”) and/or 1 Corinthians 11:1 (“Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ”) by saying that Paul urged people to imitate him so that they also should bear this “dying” in their own bodies!
If you get a flu bug from that person who coughed and sneezed and blew his nose the whole flight in the airline seat next to you, you can’t convince me that it has anything to do with the “dying of the Lord Jesus.” It certainly had nothing to do with what Paul was discussing, as we’ll see. But even within this verse, notice that it ends saying that the life also of Jesus might be manifest in our own bodies. So that alone proves that getting sick does not equate to Jesus’ dying, unless you are prepared to claim as well that your sickness causes the life of Jesus to manifest in your body! And if the life of Jesus, the Healer, manifests in your body, you’ll be healed, not sick! So this makes a decent healing verse but a horrible stay-sick verse.
But the argument gets even weaker when you consider the context of 2 Corinthians 4:10. Let’s take it along with the 2 verses before it and the 2 verses after it, and we will see how downright unscholarly it is to use the verse as a healing objection.
2 Corinthians 4:8-12:
We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;
Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;
Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
So then death worketh in us, but life in you.
Now we see that Paul is talking about his persecutions and physical abuse for the sake of the gospel. Just as Jesus was physically abused by his persecutors, so was Paul. That’s why he called it “the dying of the Lord Jesus.” But even then he said that the life of Jesus would be made manifest in his body, so that instead of actually dying from the physical torture, as Jesus did, he would still be kept alive and healed from whatever was inflicted that would have caused death.
The verse following verse 10 proves again that this “dying” was persecution-related. Paul was delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake. Being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or rheumatoid arthritis has absolutely nothing to do with Jesus’ interests. Not only does it not further the gospel, but it hinders it inasmuch as you end up unable to spread it. But again Paul says that the life of Jesus would be manifest in his mortal flesh. In other words, the more he was tortured, the more Jesus would manifest His life in Paul’s body to supernaturally strengthen him, heal him and keep him going.
The clincher is the final verse above where Paul says that death worked in him, but life worked in the Corinthians. So the Corinthians were not experiencing the horrible physical torture that tried to work death in Paul. So having “the dying of the Lord Jesus” only applies if you are being physically tortured for your faith in Jesus. Yet there is one more gem here related to healing. Paul said that life was working in the Corinthians. So even though they were NOT being tortured practically to death and needing that life to work in them to stay alive, that life was still working in them anyway without death working in them! This is similar to what Paul told the Romans – that the same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead would impart life to their mortal bodies (Romans 8:11). That cannot refer to the resurrection because they would not have mortal bodies after the resurrection! That applies to this life.
So far from being a “stay-sick passage,” this passage can and should be used as a healing passage! When you really study the passage in question, the entire objection gets turned on its head and backfires on the objector!