2Corinthians  ◦   Chapter 6

1As members of God's spiritual health-care team, we implore you not to waste God's gracious Remedy.2For God says, "When the time came that you needed my assistance, I heard you; and when the day arrived for me to provide you Remedy, I helped you." I state this plainly: God is assisting us right now, and now is the time to partake of his Remedy.

3We don't put obstacles to healing in anyone's way, so our ministry is not the reason some fail to get well.4Rather, as God's representatives, we do all we can to make ourselves useful in spreading the Remedy. We endure opposition, misrepresentation, shortage of helpers, lack of supplies,5attacks, imprisonment, riots. Some nights we work all night or skip meals in order to administer the Remedy.6We work with pure hearts, understanding the problem and God's solution for it, reaching out patiently, gently, kindly. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, we are filled with love7and speak the truth to bring the power of God to bear. With all our beings, we wield the weapons of right–doing what is right, healthy and reasonable because it is right, healthy and reasonable — 8regardless of whether we receive honor or dishonor, praise or criticism, whether we are seen as legitimate or regarded as frauds.9Even if people pretend they don't know us when they really do, we still will do what is right. Though regarded as being terminal, we have taken the Remedy, so we live on; though beaten, we are not killed.10We are saddened by such opposition, but our hearts always rejoice in sharing the Remedy; though poor, we make others rich; though we have nothing the world values, we possess everything, for we possess the Remedy of Jesus Christ.

11Dear friends in Corinth, we have spoken freely to you from the love that is in our hearts.12We have not closed our hearts to you, but you have closed your hearts to us.13I reach out to you as a parent to their child: Open your hearts and love!

14Do not become partners with those who reject the Remedy. For what do wellness and sickness have in common? Or how can light and darkness fellowship together?15Are Christ and Satan allies, working together? What does one who shares God's Remedy have in common with those who spread Satan's terminal illness?16Would you put a pagan idol in God's temple? Well, remember that you are the living temple of God where he dwells by his Spirit, so don't put pagan ideas about God into your hearts. As God has said, "I will live among them and share life with them. I will be their God, and they will be my people."

17The Lord says, "Come out from the sick and be separate from the dying. Don't touch that which will poison your body, contaminate your soul, or soil your character.18I will be your Father, and you will be transformed to be like me, to be my sons and daughters," says the Lord Almighty.