4:15
"It is all for your sake", then it increases "thanksgiving, to the glory of God". Again, we have a tendency to put things in terms of one or the other. Some talk only about how the gospel benefits us, becoming very self-centred, others focus of n the glory of God, paying little attention to what it does for us. The Bible focuses on both, and so should we.
4:16
The “wasting away” here is probably referring to the sufferings that Paul and his colleagues were enduring, though it could have a more general application of the aging process. The former would seem to be more in context with what Paul has been talking about. “Inwardly we are being renewed”. Our physical body does suffer and will eventually wear out or be destroyed, but inwardly we are being renewed. It is important to note that Paul is not saying the body is unimportant. Our essential being, soul and spirit, is being renewed. We will receive a new body at the resurrection. In Romans 8 Paul says that we are to live by the Spirit not the flesh. It is not that the body is unimportant, but it is not to rule.
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