For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith. From now on, the crown of righteousness is stored up for me, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day; and not to me only, but also to all those who have loved his appearing.
Parallel Translations
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For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure has come.
I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith.
From now on, the crown of righteousness is stored up for me, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day; and not to me only, but also to all those who have loved his appearing.
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For I am now redy to be offered and the tyme of my departynge is at honde.
I have fought a good fight and have fulfilled my course and have kept the fayth.
From hence forth is layde vp for me a croune of rightewesnes which the lorde that is a righteous iudge shall geve me at that daye: not to me only but vnto all them that love his commynge.
Show all 3 translations
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For I am nowe readie to be offered, and the time of my departing is at hand.
I haue fought a good fight, and haue finished my course: I haue kept the faith.
For hence foorth is laide vp for me the crowne of righteousnesse, which the Lord the righteous iudge shall giue me at that day: and not to me onely, but vnto all them also that loue that his appearing.
Cross-references (58)
- 1 Timothy 6:12 (v7) Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, and you confessed the good confession in the sight…
- 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 (v7) Don’t you know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run like that, that you may win. Every man who strives in…
- James 1:12 (v8) Blessed is a person who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to…
- Hebrews 12:1-2 (v7) Therefore let’s also, seeing we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily…
- Acts 20:24 (v7) But these things don’t count; nor do I hold my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I…
Show all 58 cross-references
- Philippians 3:13-14 (v7) Brothers, I don’t regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do: forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching…
- Revelation 2:10 (v8) Don’t be afraid of the things which you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be…
- 1 Peter 5:4 (v8) When the chief Shepherd is revealed, you will receive the crown of glory that doesn’t fade away.
- John 4:34 (v7) Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.
- Revelation 3:8 (v7) “I know your works (behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one can shut), that you have a little power, and kept my word, and…
- Luke 8:15 (v7) Those in the good ground, these are those who with an honest and good heart, having heard the word, hold it tightly, and produce fruit with…
- Luke 11:28 (v7) But he said, “On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God, and keep it.”
- Revelation 3:10 (v7) Because you kept my command to endure, I also will keep you from the hour of testing which is to come on the whole world, to test those who…
- Matthew 6:19-20 (v8) “Don’t lay up treasures for yourselves on the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for…
- 1 Timothy 6:20 (v7) Timothy, guard that which is committed to you, turning away from the empty chatter and oppositions of what is falsely called knowledge,
- Philippians 1:23 (v6) But I am hard pressed between the two, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better.
- 1 Peter 1:4 (v8) to an incorruptible and undefiled inheritance that doesn’t fade away, reserved in Heaven for you,
- 1 Corinthians 9:25 (v8) Every man who strives in the games exercises self-control in all things. Now they do it to receive a corruptible crown, but we an…
- 2 Timothy 1:12 (v8) For this cause I also suffer these things. Yet I am not ashamed, for I know him whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to…
- John 17:6 (v7) I revealed your name to the people whom you have given me out of the world. They were yours, and you have given them to me. They have kept…
- 1 Timothy 1:18 (v7) I commit this instruction to you, my child Timothy, according to the prophecies which were given to you before, that by them you may wage…
- 2 Timothy 1:14 (v7) That good thing which was committed to you, guard through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us.
- Proverbs 23:23 (v7) Buy the truth, and don’t sell it. Get wisdom, discipline, and understanding.
- Colossians 1:5 (v8) because of the hope which is laid up for you in the heavens, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the Good News
- Psalms 31:19 (v8) Oh how great is your goodness, which you have laid up for those who fear you, which you have worked for those who take refuge in you,…
- Philippians 2:17 (v6) Yes, and if I am poured out on the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice, and rejoice with you all.
- 2 Timothy 2:5 (v8) Also, if anyone competes in athletics, he isn’t crowned unless he has competed by the rules.
- Titus 2:13 (v8) looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,
- Revelation 1:7 (v8) Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, including those who pierced him. All the tribes of the earth will mourn…
- 1 Corinthians 2:9 (v8) But as it is written, “Things which an eye didn’t see, and an ear didn’t hear, which didn’t enter into the heart of man, these God has…
- Revelation 19:11 (v8) I saw the heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it is called Faithful and True. In righteousness he judges and makes…
- Acts 13:25 (v7) As John was fulfilling his course, he said, ‘What do you suppose that I am? I am not he. But behold, one comes after me, the sandals of…
- 2 Timothy 4:1 (v8) I command you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom:
- Hebrews 9:28 (v8) so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting…
- Malachi 3:17 (v8) They shall be mine,” says Yahweh of Armies, “my own possession in the day that I make, and I will spare them, as a man spares his own son…
- 1 Timothy 6:19 (v8) laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold of eternal life.
- Joshua 23:14 (v6) “Behold, today I am going the way of all the earth. You know in all your hearts and in all your souls that not one thing has failed of all…
- 2 Thessalonians 1:5-6 (v8) This is an obvious sign of the righteous judgment of God, to the end that you may be counted worthy of God’s Kingdom, for which you also…
- 2 Peter 1:14-15 (v6) knowing that the putting off of my tent comes swiftly, even as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me. Yes, I will make every effort that…
- Genesis 48:21 (v6) Israel said to Joseph, “Behold, I am dying, but God will be with you, and bring you again to the land of your fathers.
- Numbers 27:12-17 (v6) Yahweh said to Moses, “Go up into this mountain of Abarim, and see the land which I have given to the children of Israel. When you have…
- Psalms 7:11 (v8) God is a righteous judge, yes, a God who has indignation every day.
- Proverbs 4:9 (v8) She will give to your head a garland of grace. She will deliver a crown of splendor to you.”
- Matthew 7:22 (v8) Many will tell me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, in your name cast out demons, and in your name do many mighty…
- Matthew 24:36 (v8) But no one knows of that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only.
- Romans 2:5 (v8) But according to your hardness and unrepentant heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath, revelation, and of the…
- Romans 8:23 (v8) Not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for adoption,…
- 1 Thessalonians 1:10 (v8) and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead: Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come.
- 2 Timothy 1:18 (v8) (the Lord grant to him to find the Lord’s mercy in that day); and in how many things he served at Ephesus, you know very well.
- Revelation 4:4 (v8) Around the throne were twenty-four thrones. On the thrones were twenty-four elders sitting, dressed in white garments, with crowns of gold…
- Revelation 4:10 (v8) the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives forever and ever, and throw their crowns…
- Revelation 22:20 (v8) He who testifies these things says, “Yes, I come quickly.” Amen! Yes, come, Lord Jesus.
- Genesis 50:24 (v6) Joseph said to his brothers, “I am dying, but God will surely visit you, and bring you up out of this land to the land which he swore to…
- Deuteronomy 31:14 (v6) Yahweh said to Moses, “Behold, your days approach that you must die. Call Joshua, and present yourselves in the Tent of Meeting, that I may…
- Luke 10:12 (v8) I tell you, it will be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than for that city.
- 2 Corinthians 5:2 (v8) For most certainly in this we groan, longing to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven,
- 1 Thessalonians 5:4 (v8) But you, brothers, aren’t in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief.
- Genesis 18:25 (v8) May it be far from you to do things like that, to kill the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be like the wicked. May…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (23 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6 For I am now offered as a sacrifice…
6 For I am now offered as a sacrifice He assigns the reason for the solemn protestation which he employed. As if he had said, “So long as I lived, I stretched out my hand to thee; my constant exhortations were not withheld from thee; thou hast been much aided by my advices, and much confirmed by my example; the time is now come, that thou shouldst be thine own teacher and exhorter, and shouldst begin to swim without support: beware lest any change in thee be observed at my death.”
And the time of my dissolution is at hand We must attend to the modes of expression by which he denotes his death. By the word dissolution he means that we do not altogether perish when we die; because it is only a separation of the soul from the body. Hence we infer, that death is nothing else than a departure of the soul from the body — a definition which contains a testimony of the immortality of the soul.
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“Sacrifice” was a term peculiarly applicable to the death of Paul, which was inflicted on him for maintaining the truth of Christ; for, although all believers, both by their obedient life and by their death, are victims or offerings acceptable to God, yet martyrs are sacrificed in a more excellent manner, by shedding their blood for the name of Christ. Besides, the word σπένδεσθαι which Paul here employs, does not denote every kind of sacrifice, but that which serves for ratifying covenants. Accordingly, in this passage, he means the same thing which he states more clearly when he says,
“But if I am offered on the sacrifice of your faith, I rejoice.” (Philippians 2:17.)
For there he means that the faith of the Philippians was ratified by his death, in precisely the same manner that covenants were ratified in ancient times by sacrifices of slain beasts; not that the certainty of our faith is founded, strictly speaking, on the steadfastness of the martyrs, but because it tends greatly to confirm us. Paul has here adorned his death by a magnificent commendation, when he called it the ratification of his doctrine, that believers, instead of sinking into despondency — as frequently happens — might be more encouraged by it to persevere.
The time of dissolution This mode of expression is also worthy of notice, because he beautifully lessens the excessive dread of death by pointing out its effect and its nature. How comes it that men are so greatly dismayed at any mention of death, but because they think that they perish utterly when they die? On the contrary, Paul, by calling it “Dissolution,” affirms that man does not perish, but teaches that the soul is merely separated from the body. It is with the same object that he fearlessly declares that “the time is at hand,” which he could not have done unless he had despised death; for although this is a natural feeling, which can never be entirely taken away, that man dreads and shrinks from death, yet that terror must be vanquished by faith, that it may not prevent us from departing form this world in an obedient manner, whenever God shall call us.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v6 He foretelleth his death to be at hand, and…
He foretelleth his death to be at hand, and setteth before them an excellent example, both of invincible constancy and sure hope.
To be offered for a drink offering: and he alludeth to the pouring out of blood or wine which was used in sacrifices.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6 For I am now ready to be offered,…
6 For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
Ver. 6. Ready to be offered] To be poured out as a drink offering upon God’s altar. {a} Thus the apostle expresseth himself emphatically, pathetically, elegantly, setting forth by what death he should glorify God, viz. by being beheaded. Whether my death be a burnt offering, a drinkoffering (by fire or sword), or a peace offering (that I die in my bed), I desire it may be a freewill offering, a sweet sacrifice to the Lord.
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The time of my departure] He makes nothing of death. It was no more between God and Moses but "Go up and die." So between Christ and Paul, but launch out, and land immediately at the fair haven of heaven.
{a} σπενδομαι. He speaks of it as done already.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For I am now ready to be offered; spendomai,…
For I am now ready to be offered; spendomai, the word properly signifieth to be offered as a drink-offering, which was offered by being poured out. Some say that σπενδομαι is only used to signify such offerings whereby some covenant was confirmed; so as it not only signifieth that Paul was sensible that he should die a violent death, but that his death should be an establishment and confirmation of the doctrine of the gospel which he had preached, that he should be offered upon the sacrifice and service of their faith, as he speaketh, Phi 2:17, where the same word is used. A learned author thinks it is there used in a little different sense, there as an accession to the sacrifice, here as a preparation to it, they being wont to prepare their sacrifice by pouring wine upon it; which possibly guided our translators to translate it here, I am ready to be offered. And the time of my departure is at hand; analusewv we translate it departure, it properly signifieth resolution, because in death we are resolved into dust, from whence we are. If any ask how Paul knew that the time of his death was so near;
Answer: He might know it by revelation from God, or from his observation of Nero’s temper, malice, or behaviour toward him.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On v6 Our apostle being now come almost to the end…
Our apostle being now come almost to the end of his Christian and ministerial race, he first looks downward into his grave with comfort, ver, 6. and sees his death a pleasing sacrifice to God, and a sweet departure to him; I am ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
Next he looks backward, and reflects upon his well-spent life with joy: I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, 2Ti 4:7.
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Last of all he looks upward, and there sees heaven prepared for him, 2Ti 4:8. Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.
Observe, 1. St. Paul’s intimation of his death: I am ready to be offered up: a sacrificial word, "I am ready to be poured out as a drink-offering; my death will be a sweet sacrifice to God, my blood being shed for Christ, as the wine was poured out in the meat-offering."
Learn hence, That the death of God’s ministers, especially of such as die martyrs, is a most pleasing sacrifice unto God: precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of all, but especially of the saints.
Observe, 2. St. Paul’s narration of his life: I have fought, I have finished,&c. The word run is a figure taken from the Olympic games, where was combating, wrestling, running, according to the laws of the games, and judges appointed to declare the victors, and to give them the prize, a crown of garlands.
The first metaphor is taken from a soldier, a combatant, a champion; I have fought a good fight.
Learn, Every sincere Christian, but especially every faithful minister is a spiritual soldier; their enemies are spiritual, their weapons spiritual, their warfare spiritual, their victory spiritual; they must be men of courage, men of conduct, men that can endure hardship, men of unity and activity among themselves.
The second metaphor is taken from a strenuous runner; I have finished my course, "I am come to the period of my days, and to the end of my race;" alluding perhaps to his course of life after his conversion, which was wholly spent in running from place to place to preach the gospel.
And now he was come to the last stage or gaol at Rome, where he was to receive his garland, his crown of martyrdom.
Learn hence, A Christian’s life is a race, which he must not only cheerfully begin, but perseveringly finish: so says the apostle here, "I, Paul the aged, have fought the good fight, &c., have not only begun, but finished, my course."
O what a comfort is it to be an old soldier of Jesus Christ! St. Paul is now reckoned to be sixty-one years of age when he suffered martyrdom; he runs his race patiently, cheerfully, reservedly, and perseveringly.
The third metaphor is taken from depositories, who faithfully keep things committed to their trust without embezzlement. This depositum, the Christian faith, St. Paul had kept; I have kept the faith. He kept first, the grace of faith; secondly, the doctrine of faith, inviolable; endeavouring to transmit it down to posterity, in despite of the legal Jew, or the profane Gentile.
Observe, 3. St. Paul’s expectation of his reward: Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousness &c.
Here note, The reward is a crown of righteousness, because only given to righteous men: the person rewarding, Christ, the righteous judge: the person rewarded, me, St. Paul himself, and all the faithful that love Christ’s appearing: the certainty of the reward,, it is laid up, reserved and kept safe, as an inheritance for a child: the time of the reward, in that day, the great day of the Lord, when he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
Learn hence, 1. That the reward which God has in hand for his faithful servants, is no less than a crown of glory.
2. That the time when this reward shall be fully and finally dispensed, as the great day.
3. It is the property of the godly to look, love, and long, for that day.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For I am now ready to be offered,.... Or…
For I am now ready to be offered,.... Or poured out, as a libation, or a drink offering; or as the blood was poured out at the bottom of the altar; which is expressive of martyrdom, and shows that the apostle knew what death he should die; for which he was habitually ready; and this sacrifice of himself was not to atone for sin, his own, or others; Christ's death was the only sacrifice for sin, and that is a complete one, and needs no other to be added to it; but this was in the cause of Christ, and for the confirmation of the Gospel, and the faith of the saints in it: so covenants have been confirmed by libations or drink offerings of wine; and this was an offering acceptable unto God, in whose sight the death of his saints is precious; as the wine in the drink offering is said to cheer God, that is, to be acceptable to him:
and the time of my departure is at hand; death is not an annihilation of man, neither of his body, nor of his soul; the one at death returns to dust, and the other to God that gave it; death is a dissolution of soul and body, or a dissolving of the union that is between them, and a resolution of the body into its first principles; hence the Syriac version renders it, "the time in which I shall be dissolved"; and the Vulgate Latin version, "the time of my resolution". Death analyzes men, and reduces them to their first original earth; it is a removing of persons from one place and state to another; from an house of clay, from this earthly house of our tabernacle, to an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens, to everlasting habitations, and mansions in Christ's Father's house. This phrase, "a departure", is an easy representation of death, and supposes an existence after it; See Gill on Phi 1:23. Now there is a "time" for this; saints are not to continue here always; this is a state of pilgrimage, and a time of sojourning, and which is fixed and settled; the time for going out of this world, as well as for coming into it, is determined by God, beyond which there is no passing; the number of men's days, months, and years, is with him; and the apostle knew partly from his age, and partly from his situation, being in bonds at Rome, and it may be by divine revelation, that his time of removing out of this world was very near; and which he mentions, to stir up Timothy to diligence, since he would not have him long with him, to give him counsel and advice, to admonish him, or set him an example.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv6, 8 The time of my departure is at hand -…
The time of my departure is at hand - So undoubtedly God had shown him. I am ready to be offered up - Literally, to be poured out, as the wine and oil were on the ancient sacrifices.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv6–8 Verse 6. For I am now ready to be…
Verse 6. For I am now ready to be offered] ηοηαπενδομαι. I am already poured out as a libation. See Clarke on Php 2:17. He considers himself as on the eve of being sacrificed, and looks upon his blood as the libation which was poured on the sacrificial offering. He could not have spoken thus positively had not the sentence of death been already passed upon him.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For I am now ready to be offered -…
For I am now ready to be offered - This conviction of the apostle that he was about to die, is urged as a reason why Timothy should be laborious and faithful in the performance of the duties of his office. His own work was nearly done. He was soon to be withdrawn from the earth, and whatever benefit the world might have derived from his experience or active exertions, it was now to be deprived of it. He was about to leave a work which he much loved, and to which he had devoted the vigor of his life, and he was anxious that they who were to succeed him should carry on the work with all the energy and zeal in their power. This expresses the common feeling of aged ministers as death draws near. The word “ready” in the phrase “ready to be offered,” conveys an idea which is not in the original. It implies a willingness to depart, which, whether true or not, is not the idea conveyed by the apostle.
His statement is merely of “the fact” that he was “about” to die, or that his work “was” drawing to a close. No doubt he was ready, in the sense of being willing and prepared, but this is not the idea in the Greek. The single Greek word rendered “I am ready to be offered” - σπένδομαι spendomai - occurs nowhere else in the New Testament, except in Phi 2:17, where it is translated “if I be offered;” see it explained in the notes on that place. The allusion here, says Burder (in Rosenmuller’s A. u. n. Morgenland), is to the custom which prevailed among the pagan generally, of pouring wine and oil on the head of a victim when it was about to be offered in sacrifice. The idea of the apostle then is, that he was in the condition of the victim on whose head the wine and oil had been already poured, and which was just about to be put to death; that is, he was about to die. Every preparation had been made, and he only awaited the blow which was to strike him down.
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The meaning is not that he was to be a sacrifice; it is that his death was about to occur. Nothing more remained to be done but to die. The victim was all ready, and he was sure that the blow would soon fall. What was the ground of his expectation, he has not told us. Probably there were events occurring in Rome which made it morally certain that though he had once been acquitted, he could not now escape. At all events, it is interesting to contemplate an aged and experienced Christian on the borders of the grave, and to learn what were his feelings in the prospect of his departure to the eternal world. Happily, Paul has in more places than one (compare Phi 1:23), stated his views in such circumstances, and we know that his religion then did not fail him. He found it to be in the prospect of death what he had found it to be through all his life - the source of unspeakable consolation - and he was enabled to look calmly onward to the hour which should summon him into the presence of his Judge.
And the time of my departure is at hand - Greek: “dissolving, or dissolution.” So we speak of the “dissolution” of the soul and body. The verb from which the noun (ἀνάλυσις analusis), is derived (ἀναλύω analuō), means to loosen again; to undo. It is applied to the act of unloosing or casting off the fastenings of a ship, preparatory to a departure. The proper idea in the use of the word would be, that he had been bound to the present world, like a ship to its moorings, and that death would be a release. He would now spread his sails on the broad ocean of eternity. The true idea of death is that of loosening the bands that confine us to the present world; of setting us free, and permitting the soul to go forth, as with expanded sails, on its eternal voyage. With such a view of death, why should a Christian fear to die?
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv6–8 I am even now ready to be sacrificed.[5] Literally,…
I am even now ready to be sacrificed.[5] Literally, to be immolated. See Philippians ii. 17. --- The time of my dissolution (literally, resolution) is at hand. This makes many judge that this letter was written during his last imprisonment; but the sense perhaps may be, that being old and worn out with labours, he could not live long. (Witham)
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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]
Jam delibor, Greek: ede spendomai. See St. John Chrysostom (Greek: om. th. p. 372) that Greek: sponde, libamen, is more than Greek: thusia, hostia.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv6–8 Greek, "For I am already being offered"; literally, as…
Greek, "For I am already being offered"; literally, as a libation; appropriate to the shedding of his blood. Every sacrifice began with an initiatory libation on the victim's head (compare Note, see on Phi 2:17). A motive to stimulate Timothy to faithfulness--the departure and final blessedness of Paul; it is the end that crowns the work [BENGEL]. As the time of his departure was indicated to Peter, so to Paul (Pe2 1:14).
my departure--literally, "loosing anchor" (see on Phi 1:23). Dissolution.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv6–8 2. Triumphal anticipation of martyrdom, 2Ti_4:6-8.
2. Triumphal anticipation of martyrdom, 2Ti_4:6-8.
6. For—St. Paul now furnishes the reason for this urgent charge just given, and for the solemnity of the charge of this entire epistle. He was about exchanging labour for reward. His place in the Church below will soon be vacant; and O that Timothy might fill the blank as a second Paul!
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Ready to be offered—The elder biblical scholars literally translated the words, I am already poured upon with the libation. The allusion was to the ancient sacrificial custom of pouring a libation of wine upon the living victim the moment before his slaughter. Hence Paul’s meaning would then be, as in the English version, I am ready to be offered. But later critics maintain that the accurate rendering of σπενδομαι is not to be poured upon, but to be poured. What St. Paul, then, literally says is: “I am already poured as a libation.” He was not then the victim moistened with the drink offering, but the drink offering itself. And then the allusion is to his own blood poured forth under the Roman axe. Yet as this event seems not to have taken place until after the ensuing winter, the word already appears hardly fulfilled.
The answer is, that he viewed his present sufferings as part of his martyrdom. Nor must the words be viewed as an exact prophecy, but as a personal anticipation.
Departure—An allusion, perhaps, to a ship’s loosening for sailing forth.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. For I am now ready to be offered]…
6. For I am now ready to be offered] The present tense is still more vivid, and so the personal pronoun for as to me—I am already being offered; and the Greek word means ‘am being poured out as a drink-offering.’ St Paul recalls the thought and very phrase of his letter to Philippi in the first captivity; what was then a possibility is now a certainty; Php_2:17, ‘If I am required to pour out my life-blood as a libation over the sacrificial offering of your faith, I rejoice myself and I congratulate you all therein.’ See Bp Lightfoot, who quotes the similar metaphor recorded of St Paul’s great heathen contemporary Seneca when on the point of death, ‘respergens proximos servorum addita voce, libare se liquorem illum Jovi liberatori.’ Tac. Ann. xv. 64.
my departure]. Another thought and phrase from the same time and letter, Php_1:23, ‘I am hemmed in on both sides, my own desire tending towards this, to depart and to be with Christ.’ The metaphor of verb there and noun here is of a journey either by land or sea—loosing tent-cords, or weighing anchor, for starting up to depart; this latter part of the meaning belongs to the preposition. So in Luk_12:36, ‘he will return from the wedding’ ought to be rendered ‘he will depart.’ The servants look out eagerly not merely at the moment of his return being due, but from the moment of his departure from the feast being due. Clement of Rome connects this word, used for ‘death,’ with ‘journey,’ used for life. ‘Blessed are the elders who have taken the journey before us, in that they had their departure in mature and fruitful age’ (ad Cor. c. 44). The corresponding words for arrival at the end of a stage in the journey are the same verb and noun compounded with the preposition ‘down’ instead of ‘up’: for verb see Gen_19:2, where Lot asks the angels to ‘tarry all night,’ and Luk_9:12, ‘lodge and get victuals,’ Luk_19:7, ‘He is gone in to lodge with a man that is a sinner’; for noun Luk_2:7, ‘no room for them in the inn,’ Luk_22:11, ‘where is the guest-chamber?’ The original meaning of the word would be ‘to loose the beasts of burden for settling down to rest.’ Our word here has become an English word, analysis, from the cognate sense of ‘breaking up’ or analysing the component parts, e.g. of a sentence.
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is at hand] Rather with R.V. is come, lit. ‘stands by’ me, cf. Act_23:11, ‘the Lord stood by him and said.’ It is altogether a word of St Luke’s, being used eighteen times by him; by St Paul above, 2Ti_4:2, and 1Th_5:3, and nowhere else in N.T.
6–8. ‘I have appealed to you by the warning of the evil times and teachers that will be: I appeal to you now by the example of the good times and the good teacher that have been. Let my mantle fall on you, my days are numbered.’
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv6–8 (6) For I am now ready to be offered.—What,…
(6) For I am now ready to be offered.—What, in the Philippian Epistle (Php_2:17), was alluded to as a contingency likely enough to happen here is spoken of as something which was then absolutely taking place. In his first imprisonment at Rome St. Paul looked on to a martyr’s death as probable. In his second captivity at Rome he writes of the martyrdom as already beginning. The more accurate, as well as the more forcible, translation would be, For I am already being offered. The Greek word rendered “I am being offered,” points to the drink offering of wine which, among the Jews, accompanied the sacrifice. Among the heathen this wine was commonly poured upon the burning victims—the allusion here is to St. Paul’s bloody death. So convinced was he that the dread moment for him was at hand, that as he thus speaks he feels as though it was even then taking place, and sees—in his present suffering, in his harsh treatment—the beginning of that martyrdom in which his life-blood would be poured out. But he would not allow Timothy or the many Christians who revered and loved him to be dismayed by his sufferings or shocked at his painful death. He would show them, by his calm, triumphant language, that to him death was no terror, but only the appointed passage to glory. So he speaks of his life-blood being shed, under the well-known peaceful image of the wine poured out over the sacrifice, the drink offering, the sweet savour unto the Lord. (See Num_15:1-10; compare Joh_12:24, where the Master of St. Paul, too, speaks of His approaching death of agony and shame also under a quiet, homely image.)
And the time of my departure is at hand.—“My departure:” that is. “from life,” from this world to another. The moment of my death, so long looked for, is now close at hand, is all but here. The Greek word rendered “departure,” among other meanings, signifies the raising of the ship’s anchor and the loosing of the cables by which the vessel was hindered from proceeding on her destined voyage.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv6–8 Already being offered for now ready to be offered,…
Already being offered for now ready to be offered, A.V; come for at hand. A.V I am already being offered. The ejgw is emphatic, in contrast with the su of ver. 5: "Thou, who hast still life before thee, suffer hardship, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. I can do so no longer, for my martyrdom has already commenced, and my end is close at hand. Thou must take my place in the great conflict." Am being offered (spendomai); am being poured out, as the drink offering, or libation, is poured out. St. Paul uses the same figure in Php_2:17, where he couples it with the sacrifice and service (or offering up) of the faith of the Philippians by himself as the priest, and looks upon the pouring out of his own life as the completion of that sacrifice (see Ellicott on Philippians). "The libation always formed the conclusion of the sacrifice, and so the apostle"s martyrdom closed his apostolic service" (Huther), which had been a continual sacrifice, in which he had been the ministering priest. (Rom_15:16) So that the use of spendomai here exactly agrees with that insewv). Php_2:17. "My sacrificial work," St. Paul says," being now finished and ended, I am performing the last solemn act, the pouring out of my own life in martyrdom, to which I shall pass out of the prison where I now am." The time of my departure (thv ejmhv ajnalu) The word is found nowhere else in the New Testament, but St. Paul uses the verb ajnalusai, "to depart," inlusiv Php_1:23, where, the verb being in the active voice, the metaphor clearly is from weighing anchor, as in common use in classical Greek; hence simply "to depart." The classical use of ajna) rather favours the sense, either of "release" or of "dissolution." But St. Paul"s use of ajnaluw inlusiv Php_1:23, and the frequent use of the same verb in the LXX and by Josephus, in the sense of "to depart," favours the rendering of ajna by "departure," as in the A.V and R.V Is come; rather, is at hand (ejfesthke); the same verb as ejpisthqi in ver. 2. (On the difference between ejnesthke ("is come") and ejfesthke ("is at hand"), (see Alford on 2Th_2:2, and comp. Act_22:20)
Vers. 6-8.
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The nearness of the apostle"s death, and his prospects in connection with it.
He urges Timothy to increased zeal on account of his own approaching departure.
I THE IMMINENCE OF HIS DEATH. "For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
1. Mark the calmness with which the apostle contemplates a violent death. There is no tremor, or hurry, or impatience in his last days. The language is singularly composed. He knew that Nero would soon put an end to his life, for that monster of cruelty and crime was even then striking out wildly against the Christians. Nothing but an assured hope and a living faith could maintain the spirit in such trying circumstances.
2. The apostle is not too preoccupied with his own approaching sufferings to forget the cause for which he is now about to surrender his life. He is now more urgent than ever in his instructions to Timothy.
II THE HAPPY RETROSPECT OF A USEFUL LIFE. "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.
1. The good fight ended.
1. Every Christian is a soldier.
2. He has to fight against the threefold enmity of the world, the flesh, and the devil.
3. He overcomes through faith as his sole weapon. (1Jn_5:4, 1Jn_5:5)
4. There is a limit to the duration of the fight. Death ends it.
1. The race ended.
1. It is a long race;
2. a wearying race;
3. yet a glorious race, because it has a happy ending.
1. The faith preserved.
1. It is a precious deposit placed in our hands. (2Ti_1:14)
2. Errorists of all sorts are continually striving to wrest it out of our hands by their specious sophistries.
3. Believers keep it safest who treasure it in their hearts as well as their minds.
III THE BLESSED PROSPECTS IN STORE FOR HIM. "Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give to me at that day: and not only to me, but also to all them that have loved his appearing.
1. The reward. "The crown of righteousness.
(1) It was the symbol of excellence and glory.
(2) It was a recognition of the righteousness of the wearer.
It was not a crown of ambition. It was not won by inflicting miseries on the human race.
2. The certainty and manner of its bestowal.
(1) It is laid up in reserve securely for its wearers.
(2) It is conferred
(a) as matter of grace, for the Judge "awards" it of grace; and
(b) as matter of righteousness, for, as righteous Judge, he will not allow the works of believers to go unrewarded. (Rev_14:13)
3. The character of those receiving the reward. "Them that have loved his appearing.
(1) Believers do not dread Christs appearance in judgment.
(2) They look forward with hope, satisfaction, and joy, to the day of final account.
(3) All who love him now will love him at his appearing, when they shall see him in his glory.
(4) The day of reward; the day of judgment. T.C. Vers. 9-12.
The apostle"s loneliness and need of assistance and comfort.
The longing for sympathy and help in his hour of trial was natural. "Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me." There were several reasons for his desire to see Timothy, apart from the natural anxiety to see the most attached of his faithful disciples.
I THE APOSTLE HAD BEEN DESERTED BY DEMAS. "Demas hath forsaken me.
1. This brought great distress to the apostle:
(1) Because Demas had been a fellow labourer and friend. (Col_4:14)
(2) Because he forsook him at a critical time in his personal history, when he was already disheartened by the Asiatic deserters and in the near prospect of death.
(3) Because there was a special need for such as Demas to stand by the gospel in the city which was the heart of paganism, and to show courage and constancy in persecution.
2. The cause of the desertion was more distressing. "Having loved this present world." It may have been love of life or love of ease, or the desire to get back to old associations at Thessalonica (probably his native place), or the desire for pleasure or wealth. But it was a fatal passion. The love of this world is inconsistent with the true life, for all that is in the world is evil lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life." It is all,in the present order of things, opposed to God and destructive to man. Nothing but Christ can deliver us from the power of this present evil world. (Gal_1:4)
II THE APOSTLE WAS NOW ALMOST ALONE. Other fellow labourers had gone on their errands of usefulness to various quarters no doubt with his heart"s consent: Crescens to Galatia; Titus to Dalmatia, on the Adriatic; Tychicus, an old friend, and once before sent to Ephesus, goes back there by the apostle"s directions. Luke alone of all the ministers of Christ keeps the aged apostle company; for though such brethren as Eubulus, Pudens, Linus, and Claudia now dutifully attend upon him, yet the apostle is anxious to see Timothy, and begs that Mark may accompany him, for "he is useful to me for ministering," both in evangelistic and in personal service. T.C.
Life"s evening hour.
I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand." St. Paul felt sure that the enemies of the gospel would be successful in their designs upon his life. Sooner or later he knew that the lions or the flames, the executioner"s axe or the cruel cross, would complete his earthly course. But as he had made an "offering" of his life to Christ, so he was ready in death to be offered up for the Master"s sake.
I THE APOSTOLIC READINESS. Although a prisoner, he had been permitted to be a preacher in the neighbouring camp of Caesar"s palace during his first imprisonment at Rome. But not so now. Amid the Praetorian Guard alone could he testify now; and as the soldier to whom he was chained by the wrist would often be changed, he had the opportunity of speaking to each one in turn the good word of the kingdom of God. His imprisonments had been preceded by missionary journeys, in which he had planted Churches of Christ everywhere Churches which had become centres of evangelization and edification. He was "ready;" for his character had been moulded by "great tribulation;" so that his soul was purified by the grace of God working there the self-conquests of his nature. The righteous indignation of a strong nature which we know full well once in his apostolate would have been aroused at his adversaries had been softened into a calm submission to the Divine will, and he was conscious that God would take care of his own Church in the perilous times which had come. Moreover, Timothy was there to take up the great work and to preach the Word. Paul was ready for the "rest;" and the "rest" was ready for him.
II THE APOSTLE"S TIME. "The time of my departure." All our times are in God"s hand: "the time to be born and the time to die." This was with Paul no fatalistic creed; he did not forget that there was a divinely wise will ordering all.
1. Death was a departure. It was not the habit of St. Paul to dwell on death in itself, but rather on its glorious issues to the Christian. The faith was strong in him. The mottoMors janua vitoe is the gate of life," was the spirit of his creed.
2. But death was not the departure of the Christ. He was here. By his Spirit he was still working in the hearts of all who believed. The Christ in him was the Christ in Timothy too; and St. Paul well knew that the triumphant chariot of the Redeemer stops at no man"s grave. W.M.S.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v6 I am now ready to be offered.
2Ti_4:6-8
I am now ready to be offered.
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The law of sacrifice
The interest o the Second Epistle to Timothy is altogether exceptional. It is the interest of a heart-moving tragedy; and yet the tragic gloom which rolls above its heavens is relieved, is almost illumined with golden glory by a strain and temper of pathetic tenderness. It is, as far as we are concerned, the last earthly utterance of an altogether remarkable man; the last will and testament, so to speak, of one in whose character commanding ability, simple and unswerving purpose, unflagging energy, unselfish enthusiasm, and warm and wide and sunny sympathy were combined in a degree unrivalled in the history of our race. And then, too, St. Paul, as he writes, may indeed be the aged, but age can scarcely slacken power in such a soul, and here, consequently, he wins the unforbidden homage we pay spontaneously to one who, in the fullest vigour and energy of life, looks straight and calmly into the eyes of death. The text is, I suppose, one of the best-known verses in the Bible, an utterance of profound humility and lofty courage and unvarying truth; it is to us altogether interesting--interesting, doubtless, because it reveals the character of such a one as Paul; but more, a word of worldwide import, for at such moments great men are themselves revelations. Paul was alone in a sense in which he had never been before. The dear Churches--that is, the dear souls, loved with such strength and joy as was in him to love with--were far away; their faces he would never gaze upon again; the old places were gone; no more would he see the Holy City so rich in memories, no more the long blue line of the Abarim bounding the land of the chosen race, no more the jagged hills of his native Tarsus, no more the dancing waters of the blue AEgean, no more the Aeroceraunian crests, only lately marking the path of his pilgrimage from Corinth to Rome. Nature had closed her doors to the wanderer; from his prison on the Esquiline, or from the cave near the Capitol, or wherever it was that, in their last days, his eyes closed and opened to the light of the Roman summer, those eyes were straining beyond even objects of human affection to the unimagined wonders of another world; he was looking forward. At such a time it is that great natures fall back upon the principles which have governed life; and to us their utterances then, are supremely interesting, for such principles are the exhibition, in fact, of universal law. St. Paul, in his words illustrated by his life, is indeed proclaiming a fundamental law of the Church of his Master. The Reign of Law! Need I remind you that of that realm we are all the subjects? It is fundamental, it explains, as it has guided, the Churchs influence; it teaches, as it has trained, souls to tread the only way of lasting usefulness. It applies to all. It is not the heritage of the peerless apostle, but also the rule of the quiet Christian; obedience to it decides indeed the value of our choice in crises of destiny, but it also ennobles the trivial round of daily life. Here, indeed, it is thrown out in vivid colour from a dark background of death; here, indeed, in full force, it is borne in upon the mind, because it comes as no abstract statement, but the life-rule written in the hearts blood of a living and a dying man. In him it found a wonderful completeness: it is the fundamental law of the Church of Jesus--the Law of Sacrifice. And now, I ask, How for Paul was the grave transfigured? and the answer is, By the same power by which life was governed, by the law of sacrifice. What, then, is sacrifice? By sacrifice, speaking morally and spiritually, as now, I mean this: The willing surrender of legitimate desire in submission to a sovereign, an authoritative claim; and the interest of the text lies in this, not only that it expresses the rich result of that law operating in its completeness in a human soul, but also, it limits the stages of trial by which such completeness was achieved. What, let us ask, were some at least of those stages?
1. First, then, he had wakened up to the reality and requirements of the spiritual life. Man is a creature of two worlds, but of one sphere of being; standing he is within the boundary of time, but one foot is planted across the frontier of eternity. Little we see of mans real working, just here and there a hint is given by the definite act which meets the senses, excites our blame or sets the chorus of praise re-echoing through the halls of history, but day by day and hour by hour mans spirit, shrouded, veiled from his fellow man, is at work in the spirit sphere. Now to waken up to this, and to the consequent requirements of duty in this interior life, is to be brought under the law of sacrifice, because it is at once to be under the necessity of war. The Prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, is no mere tendency to wrong, but a personal spirit, with a personal power. And surely it has been the experience not only of the saints--the giant explorers in the regions of spiritual life--but the experience of earnest, commonplace children of God, that besides their struggle with their own corruption, they have been conscious of sudden assaults, of well-timed suggestions of sin, alarming, astounding, distinctly to them distinguishable from any picture of imagination; painfully, evidently separated from themselves, and clearly coming with the force and horror of the agency of a personal tempter. The action of the hierarchy of evil was indeed perhaps more evident to the Christians when St. Paul taught and lived than to ourselves. The entire imperial system of Rome might well appear to him an organisation of evil; and indeed, so awfully had the creature forsaken his Creator--read the first chapter of the Roman Epistle and say was it not so?--that that splendid fabric sprung from the genius of Pagan civilisation had become little else than a series of well-worked agencies of sin. It is true that the life of the second Adam permeating the race of the Redeemed has made of modern civilisation a very different story. But tell me, is there not enough in modern life to witness to the presence of the same tremendous power? Can you open your newspaper any morning without being impressed by the fact that the world is trying to get rid of the incubus of the thought of God? without being conscious of tones of thought and views of life nowise condemned by society at large, which would, to say the least, have shocked apostles? Is there not an air of unruffled indifference, or a tone of quiet patronage assumed towards moral evil which give the lie to the brave, the necessary hostility taught us in the Catechism when we were children? Does not this subtle tolerance of sin flow through society, invade the Church, deprave the mind? Hence men lose all sense of the severe requirements of a righteous God, because they have first lost all sense of His character of severe essential holiness; hence, young men, you are the victims (are you not?) in business life of habits of language, alliance with, almost toleration of, which you feel to be inconsistent with any nobility of mind, not to say any sincerity of Christian character. Ah! how are you to escape? Certainly not without struggle. Roused to the facts, roused to the requirements of spiritual life, you find yourself in battle; self must be denied, duty must be done, strength must be sought (faithfulness is needed in sacraments and prayer--faithfulness, too, in using strength when given). You must submit, and heartily, to the law of sacrifice. Spiritual activity on the side of right and truth and purity and duty--this is a stage towards a complete achievement. Paul had learned it; whether his description is drawn from the racecourse or the battle it matters not; he had learned at any rate the necessity of struggle. I have fought a good fight.
2. It is well, is it not, to awaken to the mystery, to recognise the reality, of the spiritual world? But there is surely a farther stage for the wayfarer in this path of sacrifice. What shall be the standard to measure and direct the struggle of life? To an earnest Christian what God forbids is bad--unutterably, inexcusably bad. Right is right and wrong wrong, without palliation or possibility of compromise. To do good is not merely wiser than to do ill; it is the place, calling, need of the creature; wilful sin, self-chosen evil, is the damnable, ruinous, and sorrowful thing, which may call for a tribute of sadness and pity, but admits of no defence. Need I say it? this necessary revelation of Gods will is furnished by the moral law. Conscience speaks first. I do not now pause to define its office or assign its place, or dwell upon the limits of its dominion; only let me remark in parenthesis--Obey your conscience, respect its warnings, listen for its whispers, submit unhesitatingly to its commands; you will be all the wiser, better men. Here Paul had first read and obeyed the will of God, and because he had tong been trained in that sincere and accurate submission, he was ready, when the face of Jesus was flashed upon him from the flaming heaven, above the peaks of the Hauran, at once to recognise, and unconditionally to obey. The prophets, the psalmists, the teachers of Israel had for him enlarged upon and enforced the lessons of that primal instruction, as revelation of the Christ, and the New as well as Old Testament Scriptures have ever since done for us all; but for him and for each since his time, the larger laws of Divine guidance have been particularised and pointed by special providence and special trials. The requirements of that Will are often--at least to human frailty--severe. The hearts most fierce desires are not most easily assuaged, the worlds most prized successes are not most surely secured, by obedience to the will of God. No. Splendid indeed the results, moral, spiritual, of such adherence and such submission, but the process is pain. Honestly and earnestly to choose Chat standard is to be subject to the law of sacrifice. Paul chose it, and, like him, each one who does, fulfils, though it be in pain, an allotted mission. I have finished, says the apostle, the course marked out for me.
3. But there is one further stage of conquest dependent upon the most stern self-discipline. If there be anything that a man would seem entitled to call his own, it is his thought. Surely in thought, at least, man is free; surely I can think what I like, as it is the expression of a natural craving, so it is the statement of a truth. Scarcely; for thought, if untrained, undisciplined, and unrepressed, becomes a tyrant, not a slave; and thought, which shares the heritage of our natures blight, can only fulfil its intended function when purified by submission to the law of sacrifice. My brothers, to plant the footstep of your thoughts on the track of Divine Revelation, to refuse to them the by-paths of ungoverned fancy, to restrain them in their wild impulsive leaps, is to start them, nay, far to advance them, on the journey which ends in God. Be sure that to learn obedience to the truths of the Christian Faith, to bathe the mental habits in the cleansing waters of the Spirit, who gives light, humility, courage, and truth, is the one way possible for emancipating the mind from the thraldom of corruption; but to do this, how hard, how full of sorrow, how severe at times the trial and the strain; ah me I as in other things, in this also, obedience is learned by the things we suffer. To leave mens criticism, and desire the Revelation of God; to quit our own miserable inquiries, and choose the path of the Pathless One; to watch against the wilfulness that slights, the sin that weakens our power of believing; this, as it is an evidence of strength, and even of stern decision, is not lacking in an element of trial, requires submission to the law of sacrifice. Kept the Faith, mark you; for as to reach the path needed some self-conquest, so to keep the track required unflagging earnestness and persevering power. To submit to the Faith, in such an one as Paul, meant moral earnestness; to keep it implied moral force; for him, as for all men, to govern thought by Gods revelation implies obedience to the law of sacrifice. Paul, I say, did it, did it utterly, did it also in the face of extremest external difficulty, did it when to be faithful to conviction implied fierce persecution and inevitable death; it is a triumphant climax that last stage of struggle--I have kept the Faith. So the saintly soul advanced to that completeness of surrender which is completeness of power, and finds expression in the text. In fact, spiritual activity, a creaturely temper, and a humble mind, were the stages of his self-sacrifice. One question remains--Whence came its impulse? whence its sustaining strength? The answer is easy. It came whence only it can come, from supernatural, but personal affection. My friends, we are not all St. Pauls: very much the reverse usually, almost infinitely short of him in spiritual vigour, most of us. But being all professed disciples of Jesus Christ, God demands of each of us in our degree, submission to the law of sacrifice.
1. We are under special trial when the soul is subject to the illumination of some new truth. A light comes--such a course long lived is wrong, or is not the best. We must obey, but to us--for man is very frail and only human--this is sharp.
2. Or we lose something very dear. It may be an old friendship, it may be an old friend; it may be old, long-cherished, long-loved dreams; it may be that the mystery of the freshness of early life, once making all things fresh, has fled. There is, remember, nothing lost without a something gained, if the soul walk by this law, mind this rule.
3. Or, as you may be this week, as you and I have often been, there may be a time of temptation. How sorely some of you are tried I know. How not seldom Englands commercial greatness means that young souls must often choose between the loss of place, which means loss of maintenance--some-times too for wife and children dearer than self--and the loss of peace with God. This I am not forgetting. Oh brother, tempted, you or I, to wrong, in the interests of self-advancement, are we not after all only victims submitted to the law of sacrifice? Do not shrink. It is severe and painful, but it is the law of life.
4. And there is death. True, here we have no choice; but still, when that comes, how we shall comport ourselves may depend in very large, in very serious measure, oil our habit of sacrifice now. Every life, believe it, to be trained for God, for goodness, must be trained by sacrifice. Every work, believe it, that you do will be of lasting value in proportion to the amount of sacrifice entailed in doing. In fact, it is by submission to this law that the Church teaches you how to use the world. This world may be viewed in many lights, so many-sided it is, so strange! For instance, it is a burying-earth, a world of death, a huge and sombre grave. The world is full of death! We tread on the dust of a thousand generations, and other pilgrims, children of our children, shall tread on ours when we lie low! Stop! A powerful principle can transfigure everything, even the horror of death. The world is an altar of sacrifice: lives have been lived, and therefore deaths have been died of abundant fruitfulness and unending power. Why? Because these souls, which live each an endless life, have expressed themselves in sacrifice, have lost, have strangled the only death-giving principle, the principle of self, in undying devotion to truth and holiness. Further, then: the world is the vestibule of a palace of complete achievement. However, all here seems stamped with imperfection, branded with the trade-mark of unfinished labour, yet death, on such terms, is in truth the entrance to essential life; sacrifice, the birth-throe of a spirit satisfied. (Canon Knox Little.)
Ready to be offered
I. Things which make it difficult to say this.
1. The enjoyment of life.
2. Attachment to friends.
3. The anticipated pain of dissolution.
4. Uncertainty about the future.
II. Things which make it easy, at least comparatively, to say this.
1. The sad experience of lifes ills.
2. The consciousness of having finished ones life-work.
3. The pre-decease of Christian friends.
4. An ever-nearing and enlarging prospect of heavens glory. (T. Whitelaw, D. D.)
Death anticipated
1. The godly, by a spiritual instinct and sagacity, foresee their ends; so did Jacob (Gen_48:21), and Joshua (Jos_23:14), and Christ (Joh_17:2), and Peter (1Pe_2:14). They always watch and wait for their Masters coming. Their acts, diseases, and disquietments which they meet withal from the world are as so many petty deaths unto them. A man that dwells in an old crazy house where the walls fall down, the foundation sinks, the pillars bend, and the whole building cracks, concludes such a house cannot long stand. As for the wicked they are insensible and secure, and though grey hairs, which are signs of old age and death approaching, be here and there upon them yet they know it not (Hos_7:9).
2. Death is not dreadful to good men. The apostle speaks of it here not by way of lamentation, but of exultation. Death to him was but a departing from one room to another, from a lower room to a higher, from earth to heaven, from troubles to rest, from mortality to immortality. They are long since dead to the world, and so can part with it more easily. The wicked look on death as a dreadful, dismal thing; but Gods people looking on it through the spectacles of the gospel, see it to be a conquered enemy, having its sting taken out (Hos_13:15), so that what Agag said vainly and vauntingly, a Christian may speak truly and seriously: The bitterness of death is past (1Sa_15:32).
3. The soul of man is immortal. Death is not an annihilation, but a migration of the soul from the body for a time.
4. The death of the martyrs is a most pleasing sacrifice to God.
5. The death of the martyrs doth confirm the truth. The Church is Gods garden, and it is watered and enriched by the blood of martyrs. (T. Hall, B. D.)
Paul the martyr, Christian, conqueror
I. The information here given of Pauls death as a martyr.
1. He looked on his death as an offering on behalf of the gospel.
2. He looked on his death as a departure from every temporal bondage.
II. The declaration here given of Pauls labour as a christian.
1. As a soldier in the army.
2. As a runner in a race.
3. As a faithful servant to his Master.
III. The declaration here given of Pauls reward as a conqueror,
1. The preciousness of this reward.
2. The excellent Giver of this reward.
3. The solemn time of obtaining this reward.
4. The liberality of the Giver. Not to me only, etc. (M. Jones.)
Looking out toward heaven
1. He looks downward into the grave (2Ti_4:6) whither he was going, and there he sees comfort.
2. He looks backward and views his well-spent life with joy and comfort, and in a holy gloriation breaks forth, I have fought the good fight, etc.
3. He looks upward, and there he sees heaven prepared for him.
But doth not this savour of vain-glory and spiritual pride?
1. Answer: Not at all, for the apostle speaks not this proudly, as if he had merited anything at the hand of God.
2. He speaks this partly to comfort Timothy, and to encourage him to walk in his steps, keeping faith and a good conscience.
3. To encourage himself against the reproach of his reproaching violent death, he eyes that heavenly reward and that crown of life prepared for such as have fought the good fight as he had done. (T. Hall, B. D.)
The Christians course, conflict, and crown
I. The view in which the apostle represents his decease.
1. He expresses neither terror nor reluctance, on account of the violent nature of the death which awaited him, but speaks of it calmly as a sacrifice and offering to God. His last and most solemn testimony would thus be given to the truths of God, which he had everywhere proclaimed; and his blood, when poured out, would simply resemble, as his words imply, the mixture of blood and wine which was poured upon the altar in the ancient sacrifices. His death would merely form the concluding part of that offering, which he had made of himself to the service of his Lord; and he seemed rather to welcome than to withhold the termination of the sacrifice. The decease of every Christian may be likewise called an offering. We are all required to yield ourselves to God; to present ourselves to him as living sacrifices; and in our dying hour, or in our devout preparations for it, we may bear our testimony to His perfections, by manifesting our firm faith in His promises and our full submission to his will.
2. But the apostle here speaks farther of his decease, in a sense still more applicable to that of all men; the time of my departure (or as his words directly signify, the time of my loosing anchor) is at hand. Thus he teaches us to take a much more enlarged view of our existence than to regard our death as, strictly speaking, the last of its acts; and rather to consider the dissolution of our mortal frames as the transferring of that existence from the service of God on earth to the presence of God in heaven.
II. The reflections with which the apostle here looks back upon his life on earth.
1. Justly does he speak of his life as a fight, in which he had been engaged, and which he had maintained with the most unshaken resolution to that very hour.
2. This service he farther likens to a race, to one of those contests of bodily strength, or speed, or skill, in which it was common in those days for men to seek the prize of victory, and in which it was accounted the highest earthly honour to gain the corruptible crown. I have finished my course. In this course of the Christian he had long and perseveringly run, and he is now approaching the goal with the prize full in his view. He was the more encouraged in his anticipation of the recompense placed before him by the consideration that he had kept the faith; that he had not only run the Christian race, but had duly observed the rules of the contest. If a man strive for mastery, yet is he not crowned except he strive lawfully; and the first law of the race here spoken of is to walk by faith, to run with patience, looking unto Jesus, to be animated in every step and turn of your course by a devout love to His name, a humble trust in His grace, a fervent desire of His glory. In this manner had the apostle kept his fidelity to his Lord, both in fulfilling with diligence the portion of service assigned to him and in his course of labour living by the faith of the Son of God. By His grace and to his glory he has done the work given him to do; and, through his promised mediation, he now looked for the end of his faith, the salvation of his soul.
III. The hopes by which the dying apostle is cheered in view of an eternal world. You are thus called to exercise a rational regard to your own true happiness, looking forward to an eternal blessedness, which can be compared to nothing less than crowns and kingdoms; a settled approbation of perfect righteousness, desiring to receive, as the sources of your felicity, the approbation and favour and future presence of the righteous Judge of all the earth; a benevolent sympathy in the best interests of others, delighting in the thought that so many of your fellow-creatures may participate in your company, in the same blessed inheritance; and finally, a devout sentiment of love to the Son of God, anticipating with joy His own appearing, as the consummation of all His felicity to your own souls and to multitudes of His redeemed of every age and people. (James Brewster.)
A prisoners dying thoughts
I. The quiet courage which looks death full in the face without a tremor. The language implies that Paul knows his death hour is all but here. As the revised version more accurately gives it, I am already being offered--the process is begun, his sufferings at the moment are, as it were, the initial steps of his sacrifice--and the time of my departure is come. The tone in which he tells Timothy this is very noticeable. There is no sign of excitement, no tremor of emotion, no affectation of stoicism in the simple sentences.
1. We may all make our deaths a sacrifice, an offering to God, for we may yield up our will to Gods, and so turn that last struggle into an act of worship and self-surrender.
2. To those who have learned the meaning of Christs resurrection, and feed their souls on the hopes that it warrants, death is merely a change of place or state, an accident affecting locality, and little more. We have had plenty of changes before. Life has been one long series of departures. This is different from the others mainly in that it is the last, and that to go away from this visible and fleeting show, where we wander aliens among things which have no true kindred with us, is to go home, where there will be no more pulling up the tent-pegs, and toiling across the deserts in monotonous change. How strong is the conviction, spoken in that name for death, that the essential life lasts on quite unaltered through it all! How slight the else formidable thing is made. We may change climates, and for the stormy bleakness of life may have the long still days of heaven, but we do not change ourselves.
II. The peaceful look backwards. We may feel like a captain who has brought his ship safe across the Atlantic, through foul weather and past many an iceberg, and gives a great sigh of relief as he hands over the charge to the pilot, who will take her across the harbour bar and bring her to her anchorage in the landlocked bay where no tempests rave any more for ever. Such an estimate has nothing in common with self-complacency. It coexists with a profound consciousness of many a sin, many a defeat, and much unfaithfulness. It belongs only to a man who, conscious of these, is looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life, and is the direct result, not the antagonist, of lowly self-abasement, and contrite faith in Him by whom alone our stained selves and poor broken services can ever be acceptable. Let us learn too that the only life that bears being looked back upon is a life of Christian devotion and effort. It shows fairer when seen in the strange cross lights that come when we stand on the boundary of two worlds, with the white radiance of eternity beginning to master the vulgar ell lamps of earth, than when seen by these alone. All others have their shabbiness and their selfishness disclosed then.
III. The triumphant look forward. That crown, according to other words of Scripture, consists of life or glory--that is to say, the issue and outcome of believing service and faithful stewardship here is the possession of the true life, which stands in union with God, in measure so great, and in quality so wondrous that it lies on the pure locks of the victors like a flashing diadem, all ablaze with light in a hundred jewels. The completion and exaltation of our nature and characters by the illapse of life so sovereign and transcendent that it is glory is the consequence of all Christian effort here in the lower levels, where the natural life is always weakness and sometimes shame, and the spiritual life is at the best but a hidden glory and a struggling spark. There is no profit in seeking to gaze into that light of glory so as to discern the shapes of those who walk in it, or the elements of its lambent flames. Enough that in its gracious beauty transfigured souls move as in their native atmosphere! Enough that even our dim vision can see that they have for their companion One like unto the Son of Man. It is Christs own life which they share; it is Christs own glory which irradiates them. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
A Christians death
I. We begin with making some observations on the sources of that consolation which supported this eminent servant of God at the time when his departure was at hand. It was the reflection upon a well-spent life; it was the consciousness of a strenuous and immovable fidelity in the religious warfare which formed his habitual preparation for death, and laid the foundation of his joyful hopes. The only sovereign and efficacious remedy against the fears of dissolution is to mortify the power of sin within the soul, and to make all our vicious appetites to die before us, for the sting of death is sin. He that hath risen above the influence of sin can live beyond all possibility of any great annoyance from the terrors of the last enemy. How animating a scene is the deathbed of the righteous man! What can disturb his last and peaceful moments The recollection of his trials and patience, the many acts of piety and benevolence which his memory can then suggest, all rise to view, to refresh his retiring soul, to smile upon his departing spirit, and render it superior to the frowns of death, which he is thus enabled to consider, not as a stern and inexorable tyrant sent to execute the vengeance of heaven, but as the messenger of love and peace commissioned to close a troublesome and mortal life, and to put him in possession of one glorious and eternal.
II. From the manner in which the apostle expresses the foundation of his tranquillity and hopes, we may observe, in the second place, what is the nature of that service in which the Christian is engaged, and of that strenuous and immovable fidelity which is indispensably requisite to complete his character: I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. It is the uniform declaration of the Almighty to all the sons of men, that it is no easy thing to be a Christian, but that through much tribulation we must enter into the kingdom of God. We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers, with the rulers of the darkness of this world, with spiritual wickedness in high places. Our combat does not endure only for a little, nor is our security the reward of a few hours of steady opposition, but almost every step we take through the wilderness of life exposes us to some new attack; we are often assaulted by all the deceivableness of unrighteousness, and through the whole of life we maintain an unceasing struggle. Nor are all our enemies open and declared. Equally dangerous are our secret foes, these insidious passions which lodge within us, ever ready to catch at the bribes of an alluring world, and to open for it a secret passage to the heart. Thus surrounded with dangers on every hand, how absolutely necessary is it to be strong, to quit ourselves like men, to brace the mind with firmness and vigour, to keep the attention constantly directed to every quarter from which we may be assaulted? Thanks be to God, however, we are not left to struggle alone: there is an omnipotent grace which gives strength to the feeble. The law of the Christian dispensation is this: We are commanded to labour with as vigorous efforts as if the whole success of that work depended on ourselves alone, and, at the same time, with the humility and diffidence of a mind conscious of its own imbecility, and sensible of the necessity of Divine grace to render all its endeavours effectual. The man who is thus disposed has no reason to dread the greatest dangers: He who is with thee is greater than he who is against thee: the Lord is thy life and thy salvation, whom shalt thou fear? The Lord is the strength of thy life, of whom shalt thou be afraid? The sacred influence of His grace shall continually descend to guide thy doubtful steps, to invigorate every languid effort, to teach thy hands to war and thy fingers to fight, and to crown thee with final success and triumph.
III. Which leads us naturally to turn our thoughts, in the third place, to that blessed and glorious reward, specified in the text, by the expression of a crown of righteousness. This expression has an evident allusion to those crowns bestowed by the ancients on brave and intrepid warriors; to those marks of honour and respect by which they were wont to distinguish particular feats of valour. It intimates to us that high and splendid triumph which shall be at last conferred on the faithful and undaunted servants of the Most High God; that ineffable dignity which shall be bestowed on them in the day of Christs appearance; and recalls to our thoughts that most interesting period when the Judge of all the earth shall descend with ineffable pomp and majesty, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God. How great, O God, is that goodness which Thou hast laid up for them that serve Thee, and wrought for them that fear Thy name before the sons of men. Thou shalt hide them for ever in the secret of Thy pavilion; Thou shalt defend them from the strife of tongues, and from the pride of men. Such honour shall all the saints of God possess; such shall be the reward of the steady friends of Jesus. Thus blessed shall they be who are found holy and undefiled in the world; they shall have a right to the tree of life; they shall enter through the gate into the city, and reign with Jesus for ever and ever.
IV. Our last observation is founded on the declaration in the text, that this honour shall be conferred on those and those alone, who love the appearance of Jesus. Shall the treasures of Divine grace ever be prostituted to enrich the unworthy? or, shall the impious man ever be raised to that happiness which he hath always despised? No, the decree hath passed, a decree which shall never be reversed, that unless we are renewed in the spirit of our minds we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven. This decree is no arbitrary law; it is founded in nature; it is implied in the very reason of things, that none but the pure in heart are qualified for relishing the pleasures of that immortal inheritance. For, what is heaven? Not a total alteration of state, but reason, and every pious and virtuous disposition dilated and expanded to its highest pitch. What are the immortal joys which it contains but the security, the increase, and the perfection of virtue? (J. Main, D. D.)
Sayings of Christians at the end of life
Rev. J. Newton, who lived to a good old age, used to tell his friends in his latter days, I am like a parcel packed up and directed, only waiting for the carrier to take me to my destination. When Dr. Wardlaw was visited by Norman McLeod in his dying hour, and was asked by him if he could not wish, like Enoch, to escape the pains of death, No, he said, most touchingly, I would enter heaven by the way that Jesus went. I die no more, were the exultant words of old Dr. Redford, as he fell down in death. The Rev. Dr. Punshon, working and suffering, fulfilled a sort of double life until his Divine Master called him home. Then, in deeply reverent tones, looking upward, he said, with a firm voice, Christ is to me a bright reality. Jesus! Jesus! What a moment for his beloved wife when she saw a smile of rapture on his face, then marked him bow his weary head, and enter into the rest eternal!
Readiness for death
Sir John Burgh, a brave soldier, who received a mortal wound in the Isle of Rees, and being advised not to fear death, but to prepare himself for another world, answered, I thank God I fear not death; these thirty years together I never rose out of my bed in the morning, that ever I made account to live till night.
Contrasted deaths
There is one more point of tremendous reminiscence, and that is the last hour of life, when we have to look over all our past existence. What a moment that will be! I place Napoleons dying reminiscence on St. Helena beside Mrs. Judsons dying reminiscence in the harbour of St. Helena, the same island, twenty years afterwards. Napoleons dying reminiscence was one of delirium--
Tete darmee
Head of the Army. Mrs. Judsons dying reminiscence, as she came home from her missionary toil and her life of self-sacrifice for God, dying in the cabin of the ship in the harbour of St. Helena, was, I always did love the Lord Jesus Christ. And then she fell into a sound sleep for an hour, and woke amid the songs of angels. I place the dying reminiscence of Augustus Caesar against the dying reminiscence of the Apostle Paul. The dying reminiscence of Augustus Caesar was, addressing his attendants, Have I played my part well on the stage of life? and they answered in the affirmative, and he said, Why, then, dont you applaud me? The dying reminiscence of Paul the apostle was, I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous Judge will give me in that day, and not to me only, but to all them that love His appearing. Augustus Caesar died amid pomp and great surroundings. Paul uttered his dying reminiscence looking up through the wall of a dungeon. God grant that our dying pillow may be the closing of a useful life, and the opening of a glorious eternity. (T. De Witt Talmage.)
Death a departure
It is the most melancholy circumstance in the funerals of our Christian friends, when we have laid their bodies in the dark and silent grave, to go home and leave them behind; but, alas I it is not we that go home and leave them behind; no, it is they that are gone to the better home, and have left us behind. (Matthew Henry,)
Bishop Ken in life and death
Nothing could be more beautiful than Kens life. His days at Longleat are amongst the treasured memories of one of Englands fairest spots; and his last journeys derive a tender pathos from the singular fact of his carrying his shroud in his portmanteau--he remarking that it might be as soon wanted as any other of his habiliments. He put it on himself some days before the last; and in holy quietness and peace, his death was as beautiful as his life. (J. Stoughton, D. D.)
Passing on the torch
Bengel says that Paul was about to deliver up to Timothy before his decease the lamp or torch-light of the evangelical office. Bengel alludes, remarks Dr. James Bryer, to the ancient torch-races of the λαμπαδήφοροι, in which the torch was handed by the runners from hand to hand.
Carrying on the battle
A brave soldier in the day of battle, if he hears that a regiment has been exterminated by the enemys shot and shell, says, Then those of us that survive must fight like tigers. There is no room for us to play at fighting. If they have slain so many, we must be more desperately valiant. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The time of my departure is at hand.
A last look-out
I. Our departure. We loose our cable, and bid farewell to earth, it shall not be with bitterness in the retrospect. There is sin in it, and we are called to leave it; there has been trial in it, and we are called to be delivered from it; there has been sorrow in it, and we are glad that we shall go where we shall sorrow no more. There have been weakness, and pain, and suffering in it, and we are glad that we shall be raised in power; there has been death in it, and we are glad to bid farewell to shrouds and to knells; but for all that there has been such mercy in it, such lovingkindness of God in it, that the wilderness and the solitary place have been made glad, and the desert has rejoiced and blossomed as a rose. We will not bid farewell to the world, execrating it, or leaving behind us a cold shudder and a sad remembrance, but we will depart, bidding adieu to the scenes that remain, and to the people of God that tarry therein yet a little longer, blessing Him whoso goodness and mercy have followed us all the days of our life, and who is now bringing us to dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. But if I have had to speak in a somewhat apologetic manner of the land from which we depart, I shall need to use many apologies for my own poor talk about the land to which we are bound. Ah, whither goest thou, spirit loosened from thy clay--dost know? Whither goest thou? The answer must be, partly, that we know not. None of us have seen the streets of gold of which we sang just now; those harpings of the harpers, harping with their harps, have never fallen on these ears; eye hath not seen it, ear hath not heard it; it is all unrevealed to the senses; flesh and blood cannot inherit it, and, therefore, flesh and blood cannot imagine it. Yet it is not unknown, for God hath revealed it unto us by His Spirit. Spiritual men know what it is to feel the spirit, their own new-born spirit, living, glowing, burning, triumphing within them. They know, therefore, that if the body should drop off they would not die. They feel there is a life within them superior to blood and bone, and nerve and sinew. They feel the life of God within them, and none can gainsay it. Their own experience has proven to them that there is an inner life. Well, then, when that inner life is strong and vigorous, the spirit often reveals to it what the world of spirits will be. We know what holiness is. Are we not seeking it? That is heaven--perfect holiness is heaven. We know what peace means; Christ is our peace. Rest--He gives us rest; we find that when we take His yoke. Rest is heaven. And rest in Jesus tells us what heaven is.
II. The time of our departure, though unknown to us, is fixed by God--unalterably fixed; so rightly, wisely, lovingly settled, and prepared for, that no chance or haphazard can break the spell of destiny.
III. The time is at hand. In a certain sense, every Christian may say this; for whatever interval may interpose between us and death, how very short it is! Have you not all a sense that time flows faster than it did? In our childish days we thought a year was quite a period of time, a very epoch in our career; now as for weeks--one can hardly reckon them! We seem to be travelling by an express train, flying along at such a rate that we can hardly count the months. Why, the past year only seemed to come in at one door and go out at the other; it was over so soon. We shall soon be at the terminus of life, even if we live for several years; but in the case of some of us, God knows of whom, this year, perhaps this month, will be our last.
1. Is not this a reason for surveying our condition again? If our vessel is just launching, let us see that she is seaworthy. It would be a sad thing for us to be near departing, and yet to be just as near discovering that we are lost. I charge every man and woman within this place, since the time of his departure may be far nearer than he thinks, to take stock, and reckon up, and see whether he be Christs or no.
2. But if the time of my departure be at hand, and I am satisfied that it is all right with me, is there not a call for me to do all I can for my household?
3. Let me try to finish all my work, not only as regards my duty to my family, but in respect to all the world so far as my influence or ability can reach.
4. If the time of our departure is at hand, let it cheer us amid our troubles. Sometimes, when our friends go to Liverpool to sail for Canada, or any other distant region, on the night before they sail they get into a very poor lodging. I think I hear one of them grumbling, What a hard bed! What a small room! What a bad look-out! Oh, says the other, never mind, brother; we are not going to live here; we are off to-morrow. Bethink you in like manner, ye children of poverty, this is not your rest. Put up with it, you are away to-morrow.
5. And if the time of my departure is at hand, I should like to be on good terms with all my friends on earth.
6. If the time of my departure is at hand, then let me guard against being elated by any temporal prosperity. Possessions, estates, creature comforts dwindle into insignificance before this outlook.
7. Lastly, if the time of our departure is at hand, let us be prepared to bear our testimony. We are witnesses for Christ. Let us bear our testimony before we are taken up and mingle with the cloud of witnesses who have finished their course and rested from their labours. Let us work for Jesus while we can work for Him. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The dying Christian
It is recorded of one of our most distinguished British essayists, that he addressed to an irreligious nobleman these solemn words, I have sent for you that you may see how a Christian can die. Many critics have thought that the apostles request to Timothy, Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me, was prompted by a desire not only to have his companionship in the time of tribulation, but to impart religious counsel, and above all, that he might be a witness of the last moments of his aged father in Christ, the apostle. Whatever difference of opinion may be entertained of Addisons saying to the nobleman, who can doubt the wisdom and piety of Pauls wish?
I. Life present, or the apostles reflections on dying. How calm his mind! Whilst our views and feelings may be altered by the nearness of the last enemy, to Paul it seemed the same whether death was dimly seen in the distance, or the interval be measured by a single step. The words, I am now ready to be offered probably contain an allusion to the heathen custom of pouring wine and oil on the head of the victim when about to be offered in sacrifice. The apostle felt himself to be as near to death as that very victim; every preparation having been made, he only had to await the fatal blow. How could such a man fear death when for years he had been a living sacrifice in the service of his Master, and was now awaiting death as the consummation of the sacrifice? The other figure is not less beautiful. The apostle had hitherto felt himself bound to the present world as a ship to its moorings, but now anchor was to be weighed, fastenings to be loosened, and sails to be unfurled. But though the vast, the boundless ocean stretched out before him, he felt himself to be no mere adventurer--a Columbus going in search of an undiscovered land. Though known only by report, he knew that the report of this new world was not the speculation or idle conjecture of man. Thus, elsewhere, he is found saying, having a desire to depart [to loose cable] and to be with Christ, which is far better. How does the repetition of these figures show that his feelings were not transient impulses, but the settled habits of his mind. How intelligent was this confidence! His was not the peace of ignorance, or of a perverted view of the mercy of God. Here was his assurance of a triumph over the last foe, I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day. And is there not something sublime in this state of mind? What a contrast does it present even to some of those cases of supposed religions triumph over death which men of the world have quoted from classic antiquity, For what was it that made the apostle so resigned, so willing, so longing to meet death? Was it a feeling of misanthropy from the base treatment he had received from his fellow creatures, including even his professed friends? Was it disappointed ambition, the world refusing him its laurels? Was it anxious suspense from being in prisons and deaths oft? Was it the infirmity of old age, drying up all the sources of the enjoyment of life? Whilst these may be the secret motives which have urged many men of the world to desire departure, no such selfishness was enthroned in the apostles breast, as you may learn from his reflections: For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ, which is far better. We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
II. Let us look at life past; or, the apostles retrospect.
1. Here is life reviewed in reference to its conflicts. Life is not only a race, but a conflict--not only a stretching forward for the prize, but one continuous struggle with besetting foes: it calls not only for activities, but resistance. Say you this is a repulsive view of religion? We reply, is not self-denial necessary for success in all the departments of life? Is it not, moreover, as salutary as indispensable? Instead of complaining of this battle of life, ask yourselves if the self-knowledge thereby obtained, the opportunity afforded for the development of graces, the vigour given by exercise to every virtue, be not more than a compensation?
2. Life is here reviewed in reference to the individual sphere of active duties. We might here propose several questions. Is a man sent into the world by his Creator only to follow out his own inclinations, or is he in any sense born to the fulfilment of some great end in the kingdom of Gods providence? We might ask again if the individual believer sooner or later may not find out his particular vocation, and arrive at some satisfactory conclusion as to what end he was born, or for what cause he came into the world. Do not wants, gifts, counsels of friends, oft unmistakably point to the work assigned by the Disposer of all things? Will not the prayer, Lord, what wilt Thou have me to dot be answered, so that the suppliant shall be able to say, This is my course. If, then, there is a course prescribed by Divine providence for each of us, is it not our interest as well as our obligation to pursue it?
3. Life is here reviewed in reference to religious beliefs, or our fidelity to truth. By the word faith here is meant the Christian religion, so called because it is a revelation made to mans faith; the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith. But all cannot say, I have kept the faith. Could Phygellus, or Hermogenes, or Hymenaeus, utter such words? The patience and the faith of the saints are often severely tried, and blessed are they of whom it was said, Here are they that keep the faith of Jesus. If any think lightly of adherence to the faith, let them ponder over the deathbed confession of one who had swerved from the truth. It seemed, says a writer in the Quarterly Review, that Hume received a religious education from his mother, and early in life was the subject of strong and hopeful religious impressions; but as he approached to manhood they were effaced, and confirmed infidelity succeeded. Maternal partiality, however alarmed at first, came to look with less pain upon this declaration, and filial love and reverence seem to have been absorbed in the pride of philosophical scepticism: for Hume now applied himself with unwearied, and, unhappily, with successful efforts, to sap the foundation of the mothers faith. Having succeeded in this dreadful work, he went abroad into foreign countries, and, as he was returning, an express met him in London with a letter from his mother, informing him that she was in a deep decline, and would not long survive. She said she found herself without any support in her distress; that he had taken away that source of comfort upon which in all cases of affliction she used to rely, and that now she found her mind sinking into despair: she did not doubt that her son would afford her some substitute for her religion; and conjured him to hasten home, or at least send her a letter containing such consolations as philosophy can afford a dying mortal. Hume was overwhelmed with anguish, hastened to Scotland, travelling night and day, but before he arrived his mother had expired. Is it nothing, then, to hold fast the form of sound words, and, on a dying bed, to exclaim, I have kept the faith?
III. Let us notice life to come, or the apostles sublime anticipations. The race was nearly run, the conflict was well-nigh ended; it now only remained that the crown should be bestowed. The crown was to be one of righteousness. Not that the apostle felt he could claim it, for he who styled himself less than the least of all saints would be the first to cast his crown at the feet of the Royal Redeemer, exclaiming, Thou alone art worthy; but it was called a crown of righteousness because won in the cause of righteousness, and conferred upon him by One who is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have showed towards His name. In every age the attainment of a crown has been the summit of human ambition. For it, usurpers have dethroned monarchs--warriors have stood in the breach--navigators have defied the fury of the deep--philosophers have strained intellect night as well as day; for it the foot-racer, and the boxer, and the charioteer have endured severest bodily discipline--all--all reaching after the goal of worldly honour, all trying to distance their competitors--all dissatisfied with the present, and reaching to that which is before. Now Christianity addresses such aspirants, and points them to something better, to crowns purer, brighter, and more enduring. But what may be the crowns which the Lord the righteous Judge shall bestow, we shall not venture to describe. Sure we are, they are not merely symbols of sovereignty, or ensigns of victory, or tokens of national gratitude to earthly benefactors. The conqueror there will not be crowned with olives, or parsley, or any other such fading leaves. It will not consist in the praises of men, or worldly elevation above the millions of our fellow-creatures. It will not be awarded for human merit, nor will the wearer be conscious of any feeling of claim: the weight of his glory will rather weigh him down. It will not be of such a character as shall endanger his holiness, or that shall afterwards require a thorn in the flesh lest the victor should be exalted above measure. It will not be the joy and rapture of an hour, awakened by the excitement of the novelty, to be followed by ennui and disappointment. It will not awaken envy among the millions of the glorified, but rather raise higher joy as they see one wearing a more brilliant diadem than the rest. The crown will consist in nothing that will divert the mind from the Eternal All, and cause it to seek satisfaction in self. The real joy will be that it has been awarded by Gods own Son, placed on the brow by His own hand--that it will reflect higher glory on the Giver--that it will be prostrated at His feet. In a word, the honour will consist in the presence and favour and likeness of God. But we pause and tremble, lest we should darken counsel by words without knowledge. We must wait until we wear it, before we shall fully understand the words--a crown of life--a crown of glory--a crown that fadeth not away--a crown of righteousness. (J. S. Pearsall.)
Ready for home
I. As a departure to another country. As when the ship puts to sea, it is for the purpose of sailing to another port, so Paul looked forward to death as a departure for another country. The sailor does not leave the port with the prospect of an eternal cruise in unknown seas, or for the purpose of ultimately losing himself somewhere in some mysterious, undefined nothing.
II. As a departure to a better country. He was willing to sail. Now Paul was no misanthrope, who had become so sick of human society that he longed to be rid of it. He was not weary of life. Then why did he wish to go? Was he amongst those eternal grumblers who themselves do all the howling, and then complain that the world is a howling wilderness? By no means! His desire to depart was not because this was bad, but because that was better; not because he had had enough of Christian society and Christian service--that was good--but because he wished to be with Christ, which was infinitely preferable.
III. As a departure to a better country, which was his home. Paul compared himself to a sailor who, lying in a foreign port, was awaiting orders to sail for home. Such a man, though in a land of pleasure and plenty, would sit and long to be away. As he thought of friends beloved across the sea, he would count the weeks and days when he hoped to see them once again. Not unlike this are the Christians dreams of heaven.
IV. As a departure for home, the time of which was fixed. The time of my departure is at hand. The Psalmist says, My times are in Thy hand. My times!--that is, all my future is with God. He knows--
1. When I shall depart.
2. Whence I shall depart.
3. How I shall depart.
Two Cistercian monks in the reign of Henry VIII. were threatened, before their martyrdom, by the Lord Mayor of that time, that they should be tied in a sack, and thrown into the Thames. My lord, answered one, we are going to the kingdom of heaven; and whether we go by land or water is of very little consequence to us. So our thoughts should be fixed on the goal rather than on the path by which it is reached; on the rest that remains rather than on the toil through which it is obtained.
V. As a departure for home, the time of which was near. The time of my departure is at hand. The sailor, lying in a foreign port, with his cargo complete, his sails bent, and the wind fair for home, contemplates with joy the fact that the day is near when the order will come to bid him sail. Thus Paul waited for death. To him the disease, or the accident, or the martyrdom, would be but as the postman who brought the letter--the letter for which he longed with unutterable desire.
VI. As a departure for home, for which he was perfectly ready. I am now ready, said he. And so he was. As one by one he saw the cords being unloosened which bound him to this world--as loved ones were taken away--as sickness, disease, or age told him that the time was at hand when he was to depart, he viewed the whole with the complacent satisfaction of the sailor who sees his vessel being unmoored to sail for home. (W. H. Burton.)
Joy of a faithful minister in view of eternity
I. The character of a faithful minister.
1. He loves the gospel which he preaches.
2. He does not shun to declare all the counsel of God, but endeavours to preach the gospel as fully and as plainly as possible.
3. He will uniformly and perseveringly perform the self-denying duties of his office, which are of a less public nature, but of no less importance, than his ministrations on the Sabbath. In visiting the sick and the dying, he will deal plainly as well as tenderly with them. Whenever he is called to converse with persons about the state of their minds, whether they are in stupidity, distress, or doubt, he will not daub with untempered mortar, nor endeavour to comfort those who ought not to be com forted, tie will contend earnestly for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.
II. What reasons he may have to rejoice in the near prospect of eternity.
1. He has good reason to rejoice that he chose the work of the ministry in preference to any other employment in life. The most useful employment must be allowed to be the most important and desirable.
2. He has good reason to rejoice in the close of life and in the view of eternity, that God has enabled him to be faithful.
3. He has good reason to rejoice in the close of his ministry, because God has given him assurance that all his faithful labours shall produce some valuable and important effects, either sooner or later.
4. He has good ground to rejoice when the time of his departure is at hand, because God has promised him an ample reward for all his sincere services. (N. Emmons, D. D.)
A Christians death
I. The importance of preparation for our departure.
1. This is the last and closing scene of human life.
2. How serious a thing it is to die.
3. Because disease and the period introductory to our dissolution are special seasons given to us in which to glorify God and bring credit to religion.
4. This is the last opportunity we have of doing anything for God, for the Church, for our families, and for the world.
II. The manner in which a Christian should die.
1. Amidst the darkness, languor, and pain of a sick bed, a Christian man ought to engage in com mending the ways of God and religion to those about him. The words of dying saints have been called living oracles; and so they should be.
2. We should then attend to the duty of exhorting others who are walking in the ways of the Lord.
3. We ought to commend ourselves and others to God in the devout exercise of prayer.
4. In the exercise of strong faith. (A. Waugh, D. D.)
Calmness in death--its philosophy
I. A soul-absorbing interest in the great cause of universal truth and benevolence.
II. An accurate conception of what death really is to the good.
III. Delightful memories of the manner in which he had spent his life.
IV. A soul-enrapturing vision of the future into which he was about entering. (Homilist.)
Good-bye to the world
The way out of this world is so blocked up with coffin, and hearse, and undertakers space, and screwdriver, that the Christian can hardly think as he ought of the most cheerful passage in all his history. We hang black instead of white over the place where the good man gets his last victory. We stand weeping over a heap of chains which the freed soul has shaken off, and we say, Poor man! What a pity it was he had to come to this. Come to what? By the time people have assembled at the obsequies, that man has been three days so happy that all the joy of earth accumulated would be wretchedness beside it; and he might better weep over you because you have to stay, than you weep over him because he has to go. Paul, in my text, takes that great clod of a word, death, and throws it away, and speaks of his departure, a beautiful, bright, suggestive word, descriptive of every Christians re]ease. Now, departure implies a starting-place, and a place of destination. When Paul left this world, what was the starting-point? It was a scene of great physical distress. It was the Tullianum, the lower dungeon of the Mamertine prison. The top dungeon was bad enough--it having no means of ingress or egress hut through an opening in the top. Through that the prisoner was lowered, and through that came all the food, and air, and light received. It was a terrible place, that upper dungeon; but the Tullianum was the lower dungeon, and that was still more wretched, the only light and the only air coming through the roof, and that roof the floor of the upper dungeon. It was there that Paul spent his last days on earth, and it is there that I see him to-day, in the fearful dungeon, shivering, blue with cold, waiting for that old overcoat which he had seat for up to Troas, and which they had not yet sent down, notwithstanding he had written for it. Oh, worn-out, emaciated old man, surely you must be melancholy. No constitution could endure this and be cheerful; but I press my way through the prison until I come up close to where he is, and by the faint light that streams through the opening I see on his face a supernatural joy, and I bow before him and I say, Aged man, how can you keep cheerful amid all this gloom? His voice startles the darkness of the place as he cries out, I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. Hark! what is that shuffling of feet in the upper dungeon? Why, Paul has an invitation to a banquet, and he is going to dine to-day with the King. Those shuffling feet are the feet of the executioners. They come, and they cry down through the hole of the dungeon, Hurry up, old man. Come, now, get yourself ready. Why, Paul was ready. He bad nothing to pack up. He had no baggage to take. He had been ready a good while. I see him rising up, and straightening out his stiffened limbs, and pushing back his white hair from his creviced forehead, and see him looking up through the hole in the roof of the dungeon into the face of his executioner, and hear him say, I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. Then they lift him out of the dungeon, and they start with him to the place of execution. They say, Hurry along, old man, or you will feel the weight of our spear. Hurry along. How far is it, says Paul, we have to travel? Three miles. Oh, three miles is a good way for an old man to travel after he has been whipped and crippled with maltreatment. But they soon get to the place of execution--Acquae Salvia--and he is fastened to the pillar of martyrdom. I see him looking up in the face of his executioner, and as the grim official draws the sword, Paul calmly says, I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. One sharp, keen stroke, and Paul does go to the banquet, and Paul does dine with the King. What a transition it was I From the malaria of Rome to the finest climate in all the universe--the zone of eternal beauty and health. From shipwreck, from dungeon, from the biting pain of the elm-wood rods, from the sharp sword of the headsman, he goes into the most brilliant assemblage of heaven, a king among kings, multitudes of the sainthood rushing out and stretching forth hands of welcome; for I do really think that, as on the right hand of God is Christ, so on the right hand of Christ is Paul, the second great in heaven. He changed kings likewise. Before the hour of death, and up to the last moment, he was under Nero, the thick-necked, the cruel-eyed, the filthy lipped. But the next moment he goes into the realm of Him whose reign is love, and whose courts are paved with love, and whose throne is set on pillars of love, and whose sceptre is adorned with jewels of love, and whose palace is lighted with love, and whose lifetime is an eternity of love. When Paul was leaving so much on this side the pillar of martyrdom to gain so much on the other side, do you wonder at the cheerful valedictory of the text, The time of my departure is at hand? Now, why cannot all the old people of my congregation have the same holy glee as that aged man had? You say you most fear the struggle at the moment the soul and body part. But millions have endured that moment, and why may not we as well? They got through with it, and so can we. Besides this, all medical men agree in saying that there is probably no struggle at all at the last moment--not so much pain as the prick of a pin, the seeming signs of distress being altogether involuntary. But you say, It is the uncertainty of the future. Now, child of God, do not play the infidel. After God has filled the Bible till it can hold no more with stories of the good things ahead, better not talk about uncertainties. But you say, I cannot bear to think of parting from friends here. If you are old, you have more friends in heaven than here. Besides that, it is more healthy there for you than here, aged man; better climate there than these hot summers, and cold winters, and late springs; better hearing; better eyesight; more tonic in the air; more perfume in the bloom; more sweetness in the song. I remark again: all those ought to feel this joy of the text who have a holy curiosity to know what is beyond this earthly terminus. And who has not any curiosity about it? A man, doomed to die, stepped on the scaffold, and said, in joy, Now in ten minutes I will know the great secret. One minute after the vital functions ceased, the little child that died last night knew more than Jonathan Edwards, or St. Paul himself before they died. Friends, the exit from this world, or death, if you please to call it, to the Christian is glorious explanation. It is demonstration. It is illumination. It is sunburst. It is the opening of all the windows. It is shutting up the catechism of doubt and the unrolling of all the scrolls of positive and accurate information. I remark again: we ought to have the joy of the text, because leaving this world we move into the best society of the universe. You see a great crowd of people in some street, and you say, Who is passing there? What general, what prince, is going up there? Well, I see a great throng in heaven. I say, Who is the focus of all that admiration? Who is the centre of that glittering company? It is Jesus, the champion of all worlds, the favourite of all ages. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)
Presentiment of death
In one of his last letters Livingstone wrote, During a large part of this journey I had a strong presentiment that I should never live to finish it. It is weakened now as I seem to see the end towards which I have been striving looming in the distance. This presentiment did not interfere with the performance of any duty: it only made me think a great deal more of the future state of being.
Unconscious sense of the end of life
Churchill, in the unfinished Journey, the last fragment found among his papers, showed a strange unconscious kind of sense of being near his end. He calls it the plain unlaboured Journey of a Day, and closes with the line--I on my journey all alone proceed! The poem was not meant to close here, but a greater Hand interposed. That line of mournful significance is the last that was written by Churchill! (Timbs.)
Welcoming death
Of Bradford it is said, that when the keepers wife said to him, Oh, sir, I am come with heavy tidings--you are to be burnt tomorrow; taking off his hat and laying it upon the ground, and kneeling and raising his hands, he said, Lord, I thank Thee for this honour. This is what I have been waiting for, and longing for. (W. Jay.)
Byron and St. Paul--a contrast
For a contrast of worldly despair with Christian confidence at the end of life, compare with the words of Paul in 2Ti_4:6-8 the following, which are reckoned the last verses of Byrons pen:--
My days are in the yellow leaf,
The flowers, the fruits of love are gone;
The worm, the canker, and the grief,
Are mine alone.
The fire that on my bosom preys
Is lone as some volcanic isle,
No torch is lifted at its blaze
A funeral pile!
(J. E. B. Tinling, B. A.)
I have fought a good fight.--
The holy war
I. The two armies.
1. The army of the saints.
(1) Their Captain-General is the Lord Jesus Christ.
(2) The officers are the ministers of Christ, and all who are active and useful in His service.
(3) The soldiers are the saints.
(4) The enlisting--conversion.
(5) The uniform--the graces of the Spirit, and the robe of righteousness.
(6) The armour--helmet of salvation, etc.
(7) The instruction of the young soldiers--Bible.
(8) The allies--angels.
2. The army of the enemy.
(1) Generals--sin, Satan, and world.
(2) Soldiers--the wicked.
(3) Allies--evil spirits.
II. The battle.
1. What kind of a battle?
(1) A good battle.
(2) A hot battle.
(3) A very profitable battle.
(4) A battle that must be constant.
2. Where fought? Whole world.
3. When shall it be finished? At death for each individual soldier; at the day of judgment for the whole army.
III. The victory.
1. Is certain.
2. Shall be held in ever-lasting remembrance. (A. Fletcher, D. D.)
Moral warfare
1. It is lawful sometimes to speak of those gifts and graces which God hath given us, that we may comfort and quicken others by our example.
2. The sweetest songs of the saints have been towards their last ends. The sun shines sweetliest when it is setting, the wine of the spirit is strongest in the saints when they are drawing to an end. His motions are quickest when natural motions are slowest; as we see in Moses his swan-like song (Deu_31:1-30; Deu_32:1-52; Deu_33:1-29.), and David how sweetly doth he sing a little before he dies of Gods mercies to himself, of the covenant of free grace which God had made with him, and His judgments on the sons of Belial (2Sa_22:1-8). Joshua dying, how sweetly doth he exhort the people to obedience by setting before them the mercies of God (Jos_24:1-33.). All Christs sayings are excellent, but none so sweet and comfortable as those which He delivered a little before His death. Wicked men when they die they set in a cloud, and like the going out of a candle they leave a stench behind them: as their bodies, so their names rot and stink when they are dead and gone. As wicked men grow worse and worse and their last days are their worst, so good men grow better and better, and their last days are their best; having but a little time to live in the world, they are willing to leave it with a good savour.
3. The sweet resent which a good conscience hath of a well-spent life is matter of singular comfort and rejoicing in death.
4. Every faithful Christian is a spiritual soldier.
(1) In war there is watching, soldiers must stand on their guard continually for fear of a surprisal to the loss of all.
(2) In warring there must be arming, another man may go unarmed, but he that is a soldier must be armed.
(3) He must have skill and knowledge how to manage his weapons, his hands must be taught to war and his fingers to fight.
(4) Courage and valour. Even Rabshakeh could say counsel and strength are for war (2Ki_18:20). Policy and power are very requisite for a soldier.
(5) In respect of hardship a soldier must be a hardy man.
(6) In respect of obedience. A soldier is under the most absolute command of any man. He must obey and not dispute the commands of his commander to whom by oath he is bound to be faithful.
(7) In respect of order. In war there is much order. Soldiers must keep rank and file, they must abide in that place and keep on that ground on which their commander sets them.
(8) In respect of their unsettled abode. A soldier whilst he is in actual service hath no settled abode, but he is always either marching, charging, watching, fighting, lying in his tent for a night or two and is gone.
(9) A soldier must attend the wars, he must forsake house, land, wife, children and other lawful delights (for a time at least), and give up himself to his martial affairs; he cannot work and war, follow a trade and fight too; but he must wholly devote himself to his military employment that he may please his commander.
(10) In respect of unity, soldiers must be unanimous. United forces prevail much, but if soldiers be divided and mutiny they ruin themselves.
(11) Lastly, In respect of activity a soldiers life is a laborious life, they are cut out for action, they must never be idle. Now, the Lord will have us all to fight for these reasons:
1. For the greater manifestations of His own glory. He could deliver His people without fighting, but then the glory of His wisdom, power and goodness in their preservation and deliverance would not be so perspicuous to the world; nor His justice in downfall of His enemies be so apparent to all.
2. For the good of His people, hereby He exerciseth their graces and keeps them from rusting. Virtue decays if it have not some opposite to quicken it, and draw it out; hereby also He proves their valour and makes it more apparent to others. The skill of a pilot is not known till a storm, nor the valour of a soldier till the day of battle.
3. To make us long for our rest in heaven.
4. This spiritual fight is a good fight. His not warring after the flesh, but a spiritual, holy, honourable war (2Co_10:3-4).
It is a good fight in nine respects.
1. Of the author.
2. The man.
3. The matter.
4. The manner.
5. The end.
6. The armour.
7. The issue.
8. The fellow-soldiers.
9. The reward.
It is a great comfort to be an old soldier of Christ. Men cashier old decrepit men out of their camps; but the older soldiers we are in Christs Church the better and the more acceptable to Him. (T. Hall, B. D.)
The good fight
A general retrospect of Christian life may fill the soul with rejoicing at the end of life. It is the life that men live that is the evidence that they are fit to die. As against a selfish, sordid life the gleams of a lately-inspired hope are but doubtful evidences. A consciousness of imperfection and of sins need not dim the hope that men have, nor the triumph that they express in their last hours--nay, it may increase as the sufferings of a campaign lend added lustre to the victory. So, as one glances back and sees how the grace of God sustained him in all the imperfections of a long life, so one may at last be bold to affirm his fidelity and safety and become prophetic of that which is before him. For every man that is born and lives is building; and the builder invariably must hew. For the material of which character is built, as of houses, is either wood or clay, unfitted; and the clay must be moulded, and the brick must be burned, and the carpenter must hew the log, and there will be heaps of chips wherever there has been skilful work. But when at last the mansion stands out in all its fair proportions, and its scaffolding is removed, and the chips and uncleanliness are all taken away, that is what men look at; and he would be a woeful workman that should go, after he has completed his building, to count his chips and all the fragments of stone, lime, and litter. That is indispensable to this process of unbuilding in this life of character, as it is in external dwellings. It is said of Michael Angelo by one of his biographers that when the sacred enthusiasm seized him he went at a statue with such vengeance and vigour, that in one hour he cast off more stones that a workman could carry away in several hours; and Paul was sometimes like that in the vigour with which he was emancipating the true spirit within himself, he had made a good life. He had lived it. He stood therefore in the consciousness: I am a completed man. No matter how long I was in building; no matter what the dealing was by which I was brought where I am now, I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith, and I know that there is laid up for me the crown. This was a glorious confidence; the rational certainty that our purposes and fulfilments are not inconsistent with the true humility nor with the realisation that we are saved by grace. Paul looked forward. I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the faith; henceforth--manacled, abandoned, as he elsewhere shows himself to have been; the poorest man in creation, the most unfortunate, stripped and barren--henceforth, he cries, from out of his weary prison, there is for me--not captivity--there is for me a throne, a crown, and a sceptre. I am a monarch. Some men have said this when bereft of reason; but here is a man in the use of his highest reason that is able to say, A crown is laid up for me; and as he looked up he could well say, in his thought: O, crown, wait! I am coming for thee; it is mine; no one shall take it from me; wait for me. I have a crown laid up for me--a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give to me that day. What is a crown but a sign of eminence, of glory, and of power? What is a crown of righteousness but a crown that is made up of all the elements that constitute righteousness? It was the sum total of all the highest conditions and fruits of his very nature, and the nature was of Divine origin and likelihood. He had the vision of pre-eminent manhood; a glorified love; a glorified conscience; a glorified sympathy, with all that ordains one to the nobler condition of being laid before Him, and all was expressed in that crown of righteousness. A monarch, and my monarchy lies in the glorification of my whole nature, for I shall be as the Lord. Here was no anticipation of hoping that he should get to heaven somehow. There was certainly no intimation that he expected to escape into heaven so as by fire. He had no idea of sleeping a thousand years, or ten thousand years, and then appearing in glory. The vision was before him, near at hand, and the step off the platform of this earth was to be a step on to the pavement of heaven. How the elements of grandeur exist in this life! You are the crown-builders, you that are living for Christ and for heaven. No one that was ever disengaging gold from the quartz would ever see in it those miracles of art that at last shall be made out of it. We are creating, in this life, the material for our crown, for all the things in the soul that are of their nature and tendency Divine--every thorough impulse to the right, every impulse that is willing to sacrifice a present pleasure for the sake of higher joy of purity and nobility--all would seem to us to be the scattering of grace in our lives; they are, all of them, flakes of gold; they are, all of them, the material of which crowns are made, and men, in this life, are caged eagles, that, looking out on the sun and heavens, know that they would fly, but they have not room to spread their wings. Ten thousand intimations, ten thousand aspirations, struggling desires, and longings are breaking in the hearts of men, and, because they cannot execute them and bring them forth to real action in this life, they are not dead. In the early spring the root and the bud are checked and held back. They are not an nihilated; they wait. The rose is sealed up and cannot deliver itself, but it is the rose; and the root that dimly throws the evidence of itself above the ground is itself, though it cannot yet develop itself. But by and by, when soft southern rains and sweet suns begin to beam, week after week, the little garden breaks out into blossom. And in this life, where we are checked and hindered and tempted over much, where we find that we cannot carry out our best purposes, and are failing on the right and on the left, the attempts to do it are so many attempts to bud and blossom, but the sun is not warm enough yet. But when, by and by, the Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing on its beams upon our liberated selves, we shall break forth into the full glory of the kingdom of God. (H. W. Beecher.)
A noble career
I. Splendid achievements in regard to the duties of life.
1. Victorious soldiership.
(1) His behaviour was good.
(2) His cause was good.
(3) His Leader was good.
(4) His armour was good.
(5) His victory was good.
2. The successful athlete.
(1) Ambition.
(2) Self-denial.
(3) Concentration.
(4) Perseverance.
3. The faithful steward, lie had--
(1) embraced,
(2) lived,
(3) spread,
(4) defended the truth.
II. Great tranquillity in regard to the trials of life.
1. His knowledge of them.
(1) Of their honours--To be offered. Martyrdom.
(2) Of their nearness--Is at hand.
2. His preparedness for them--Ready.
3. His benefit by them--Departure.
III. Glorious expectation in regard to the reward of life.
1. In value it will be the highest possible. Crowns.
2. In principle it will be the most indisputable. Crown of righteousness.
3. In bestowal it will be the most honourable.
(1) Given by the Highest Being.
(2) On the most august occasion.
(3) In association with the most distinguished company. (B. D. Johns.)
Pauls review of his life
I. The past filled him with satisfaction.
1. He had been a warrior. And his contest was with no phantom or abstraction; not with a mere principle of evil, employed without will or intelligence, but with a real enemy. Paul evidently acted continually under the impression that he was in an enemys country,--that he was watched by an invisible foe, resisted by a being mightier than priest or prince. He recognised a terrible unity in sin--an energy and ubiquity which are angelic. He considered himself an officer in an army which has regiments contending in battlefields far away from this earth. Pauls enemy was Gods enemy. He had no quarrels of ambition, or revenge, or covetousness, or pride, to settle. His eye was fixed on the prince who led the revolt in heaven, and had brought it down to earth. Against him Paul proclaimed an open and uncompromising war--a war of extermination; and he extended it to everything that enlisted under Satan. Hence it began in his own heart, against the traitors long entertained there; and with them he proclaimed an unrelenting war.
2. He had been a racer, also. What was the goal? It was, to attain and accomplish the highest ends man can seek; the highest personal perfection consistent with being on earth; attaining, as he styles it, to the resurrection of the dead; the exalting Christ among men; the leading men to him; the confirmation of the Churches in their faith; the leaving behind him writings which should be the means of glorifying God, edifying His people, and converting men, to the end of time. He had aimed at these achievements; and, by the grace of God, he had accomplished them.
3. He had been a steward. His life presented in this aspect a trust discharged. I have kept the faith.
II. A future filled with blessedness. He had honoured his Redeemer, and he knew that Christ would honour him. He looked for a crown. It has been a common thing in the worlds history to contend for a crown. The Christian hero here stands on the level of the earthly hero. But, when we come to compare the nature of these respective crowns, the character of their conflicts, and the umpires to whom the warriors look, the Christian rises to an elevation infinitely above the earthly hero. There is nothing selfish in the war, the victory, or the coronation. (E. N. Kirk, D. D.)
Paul the hero
I. Here is a man whose entire being is under the supremacy of conscience. With other men con science often has theoretical supremacy; with St. Paul its reign was actual. Other men may waver and fluctuate in their obedience to its behests; St. Paul is held to this central power as steadily as the planets to the sun. There was no sham about this man. What he seemed to be, that he was. What he declared to another, that his inmost soul commended as truth and attested to its own secret tribunal.
II. His life was also under the dominion of another regnant power--the supremacy of an overmastering purpose. Every man needs the inspiration of a great purpose and a great mission to lift him above the pettiness and cheapness which are the bane of ordinary lives. Some great undertaking, with an element of heroism and moral sublimity in it, the very contemplation of which quickens the blood and fires the soul and awakens an ever-present sense of the dignity and significance of life- this is an essential condition of all great achievement. Such an inspiring purpose and ennobling work stirred the heart and stimulated the powers of St. Paul. Though nothing low had previously ruled or influenced him, it happened to him- as it has to many another man at his conversion--that the supreme purpose of life was formed in that supreme hour when the transforming touch of the Divine hand was felt upon the soul, and lifes sublime work opened before the clarified vision.
III. But the supremacy of conscience and of a great purpose are not sufficient in themselves alone to produce such a character and such a life as St. Paul presents for our study. To these two ruling forces must be added another--greater than either, and co-ordinate with both--the supremacy of an all-conquering faith. Christ to him was not a myth, not merely the incomparable Teacher of Galilee, not the theoretic and historic Saviour of men; He was infinitely more than that, the ever-present Partner of his life, the unfailing Source of his strength. His faith perpetually saw this personal Jesus, felt the warm beating of His loving heart, heard His sacred voice in solemn command or inspiring promise, and walked with Him as with an earthly friend. As well separate the spirit from the body, the beating heart from the respiring lungs, as separate this inspired apostle from this inspiring Christ. Anything is possible to such a man. Indeed, it is no longer a question of human ability at all, but of human co-operation with the Divine Christ- the natural man giving the supernatural agency full play and power. (C. H. Payne, D. D.)
I have finished my course.--
The Christians course
I. We are to consider the way or path in which the Christian is to run.
1. The way in which the Christian is to run is a way of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
2. The way the Christian is to run is a way of holiness (Psa_119:32; 1Th_4:7). Christians, in proceeding on this course, do it not with the same life and vigour; some appear cold and indifferent, whilst others are quick and lively; some make great advances, whilst others go on by slow degrees. Some begin the heavenly race soon, in the bloom of life, whilst others loiter till towards the evening of their days.
II. We now come to consider how we are to run, that we may finish our course with advantage.
1. That we may run the Christian race well, it is necessary that we cast off every weight.
2. We must begin and continue in a dependence upon Christ.
3. We must run with patience, courage, and resolution.
4. We must be watchful and diligent. Be upon your guard, Christian, the way you run is difficult, and it is attended with many snares and temptations.
5. We must keep pressing forward and persevere to the end of our course. You may meet with many discouragements, but still keep on, the further you go, the less ground remains to be trod, therefore let not your hearts be troubled.
III. The encouragement Christians have to run this race.
1. There is a glorious crown before us.
2. He that begins aright shall at length certainly finish his course.
3. Every one that finishes his course shall as surely receive the prize. To conclude, with some improvement of the point.
(1) The further-we proceed in our text, the more we see the difficulty of the Christian life, and the vanity of their hopes who content themselves with a mere form.
(2) How foolish are all those that run after perishing enjoyments, and neglect the prize of immortality.
(3) What arguments are there for running this race.
(4) How should every one that has begun this race rejoice in the encouragements that have been offered. (S. Hayward.)
The finished race
To this end we must run--
1. Rightly.
2. Speedily.
3. Patiently.
4. Cheerfully.
5. Circumspectly.
6. Resolutely.
7. Perseveringly. (T. Hall, B. D.)
Best at last
In our Christian course it is but too generally and too truly observed, that as we grow older we grow colder; we become more slack, remiss, and weary in well doing. The reverse ought to be the case, for the reason assigned by the apostle when stirring up his converts to vigour and zeal and alacrity: he says, For now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. In a race the push is made at last. (Bishop Horne.)
I have kept the faith.--
Keeping the faith
What does St. Paul mean by the faith which he has kept? Is he rejoicing that he has been true to a certain scheme of doctrine, or that he has preserved a certain temper of soul and spiritual relationship to God? For the term faith is a very large one. There can be no doubt, I think, that he means both, and that the latter meaning is a very deep and important one, as we shall see. But this term, the faith, did signify for him, beyond all doubt, a certain group of truths, all bound together by their common unity of source and unity of purpose. Paul was too wise and profound not to keep this always in sight. That there must be intellectual conceptions as the base of strong, consistent, and effective feeling is a necessity which he continually recognises; and the faith which he is thankful to have kept is, first of all, that truth which had been made known to him and to the Church by God. The first thing, then, that strikes us is that, when Paul said that he had kept the faith, he evidently believed that there was a faith to keep. The faith was a body of truth given to him, which he had to hold and to use and to apply, but which he had not made and was not to improve. We want, then, to consider the condition of one who, having thus learned and held a positive faith, continues to hold it--holds it to the end. He keeps the faith. We need not confirm our thought to St. Paul. An old man is dying, and as he lets go the things which are trivial and accidental to lay hold of what is essential and important to him, this is what comes to his mind with special satisfaction: I have kept the faith. The true faith which a man has kept up to the end of his life must be one that has opened with his growth and constantly won new reality and colour from his changing experience. The old man does believe what the child believed; but how different it is, though still the same. It is the field that once held the seed, now waving and rustling under the autumn wind with the harvest that it holds, yet all the time it has kept the corn. The joy of his life has richened his belief. His sorrow has deepened it. His doubts have sobered it. His enthusiasms have fired it. His labour has purified it. This is the work that life does upon faith. This is the beauty of an old mans religion. His doctrines are like the house that he has lived in, rich with associations which make it certain that he will never move out of it. His doctrines have been illustrated and strengthened and endeared by the good help they have given to his life. And no doctrine that has not done this can be really held up to the end with any such vital grasp as will enable us to carry it with us through the river, and enter with it into the new life beyond. And again, is it not true that any belief which we really keep up to the end of life must at some time have become for us a personal conviction, resting upon evidence of its own? I know, indeed, how much a merely traditional religion will inspire men to do. I know that for a faith which is not really theirs, but only what they call it, their fathers faith, men will dispute and argue, make friendships and break them, contribute money, undertake great labours, change the whole outward tenor of their life. I know that men will suffer for it. I am not sure but they will die to uphold a creed to which they were born, and with which their own character for firmness and consistency has become involved. All this a traditional faith can do. It can do everything except one, and that it can never do. It can never feed a spiritual life, and build a man up in holiness and grace. Before it can do that our fathers faith must first by strong personal conviction become ours. And here I think that, rightly seen, the culture of our Church asserts its wisdom. The Church has in herself the very doctrine of tradition. She teaches the child a faith that has the warrant of the ages, full of devotion and of love. She calls on him to believe doctrines of which he cannot be convinced as yet. The tradition, the hereditation of belief, the unity of the human history, are ideas very familiar to her, of which she constantly and beautifully makes use. And yet she does not disown her work of teaching and arguing and convincing. She cannot, and yet be true to her mission. She teaches the young with the voice of authority; she addresses the mature with the voice of reason. And now have we not reached some idea of the kind of faith which it is possible for a man to keep? What sort of a creed may one hold and expect to hold it always, live in it, die in it, and carry it even to the life beyond?
1. In the first place, it must be a creed broad enough to allow the man to grow within it, to contain and to supply his ever-developing mind and character. It will not be a creed burdened with many details. It will consist of large truths and principles, capable of ever-varying applications to ever-varying life. So only can it be clear, strong, positive, and yet leave the soul free to grow within it, nay, feed the soul richly and minister to its growth.
2. And the second characteristic of the faith that can be kept will be its evidence, its proved truth. It will not be a mere aggregation of chance opinions. The reason why a great many people seem to be always changing their faith is that they never really have any faith. They have indeed what they call a faith, and are often very positive about it. They have gathered together a number of opinions and fancies, often very ill-considered, which they say that they believe, using the deep and sacred word for a very superficial and frivolous action of their wills. They no more have a faith than the city vagrant has a home who sleeps upon a different door-step every night. And yet he does sleep somewhere every night; and so these wanderers among the creeds at each given moment are believing something, although that something is for ever altering. We do not properly believe what we only think. A thousand speculations come into our heads, and our minds dwell upon them, which are not to be therefore put into our creed, however plausible they seem. Our creed, our credo, anything which we call by such a sacred name, is not what we have thought, but what our Lord has told us. The true creed must come down from above, and not out from within. (Bp. Phillips Brooks.)
On keeping the faith
I. What is meant by keeping the faith.
1. It may signify that we firmly believe the doctrines God has revealed, and steadfastly maintain them. We read of a faith once delivered to the saints (Jud_1:3). These, therefore, coming from God are certainly worthy of our credit, deserve our notice, and ought to be steadfastly maintained by us.
2. The expression signifies that we faithfully observe the vows and engagements we have brought ourselves under, to our glorious Master, and hold on with integrity and constancy in His service.
II. The necessity and importance of keeping the faith.
1. It is the distinguishing characteristic of a real Christian. That profession that is not set upon good principles will never hold.
2. In keeping the faith, the Christians comfort is greatly promoted. The glorious doctrines of faith are of the most excellent nature; they abundantly recompense the Christian in his steady belief of and attachment to them, by the unspeakable supports they yield in every circumstance and station of life.
3. Keeping the faith is necessary to promote the honour of Christ, and to secure the Christian from those errors and snares to which he stands exposed.
4. Without a steadfast perseverance in the faith our hopes of heaven are vain and deceitful. Perseverence in the faith does not entitle us to eternal life, but there is no eternal life without it. A word or two of improvement.
(1) Is keeping the faith the distinguishing character of a Christian? Then how few are there in the present age. The honours of the world lead away some, the sensualities of life ensnare others.
(2) Is perseverance in the faith the character of a real Christian? How melancholy must their state be who never yet set forward in the ways of God.
(3) Is it so important to keep the faith? Then let us seriously examine our own hearts concerning it. (S. Hayward.)
Guarding the faith
I. The preciousness of that which he had kept. He was the emissary of the great Physician, who had but one remedy, one panacea for the one radical disease of man. In Rome he said, I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation unto every one that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. In Corinth he would say, The Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks foolishness; but to them that are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. In Galatia he would say, God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, whereby the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.
II. The strenuousness with which he had guarded it. Think you that he had no difficulties with which to cope? Was there to him no maze in Providence, no labyrinth which he found it impossible to track and thread? Providence in many of its movements was to him, as to us, an impenetrable mystery; but still he kept the faith. Think you that he found no difficulties in comprehending the dispensations through which God had manifested Himself to man; and that the wonder never rose up in his mind how it was that thousands of years had to pass away before the incarnation of the Son of God and the redemption of the Cross? He must have been less than man, or greatly more than man, if he could have sounded this depth; but still he kept the faith.
III. His success in guarding the faith. How he kept it he does not tell us here; but we catch glimpses, here and there, of the secret of his power. He kept it on his knees, kept it when he prayed night and day with tears. And be sure there is no faith, no true faith, no faith that will hold a man firm, which can be kept apart from fellowship with God. We can keep a creed without Divine help--we can keep a creed through the force of prejudice- through the force of obstinacy--through the force of ignorance--through the force of custom and social sanction--through the force of policy. To keep a creed is the easiest thing in the world, for it can lie, made up and dead, in some undisturbed chamber of the brain. But oh! to keep a faith is far from easy; for a faith to be a faith at all must be living, and if it be living, it must meet the onset of a thousand circumstances by which it will be tested. It will be tested by the influence of our obstinate corruption--it will be tested by the temptations of the world, by its maxims and customs--it will be tested by promises of advantage if only we will be faithless to our profession--it will be tested by changes in our circumstances, whether they be from poverty to wealth, or from wealth to poverty--it will be tested by those strange aspects of providence which bewilder at times the strongest minds, and make their feet almost to slip--it will be tested by the indifference or lukewarm ness of those around us. Happy the man who brings his faith through all these things. He is like a fire-safe, which guards its treasure unhurt, amid the flames which have raged around it in vain. (E. Mellor, D. D.)
Martyrdom
To die for truth is not to die for ones country, but for the world. (J. P. Richter.)
Keeping the faith
When Bernard Palissy, the inventor of a kind of pottery called Palissy ware, was an old man, he was sent to the French prison known as the Bastille because he was a Protestant. The king went to see him, and told him he should be set free if he would deny his faith. The king said. I am sorry to see you here, but the people will compel me to keep you here unless you recant. Palissy was ninety years old, but he was ashamed to hear a king speak of being compelled, so he said, Sire, they who can compel you cannot compel me! I can die! And he remained in prison until he died.
St. Paul keeping the faith
Paul kept the faith at Autioch, even when the infatuated crowd attempted to drown his voice with their clamour, and interrupted him, contradicting and blaspheming. He kept the faith at Iconium, when the envious Jews stirred up the people to stone him. He kept the faith at Lystra, when the fate of Stephen became almost his, and he was dragged, wounded and bleeding, outside the ramparts of the town, and left there to languish, and, for aught they cared, to die. He kept the faith against his erring brother Peter, and withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. He kept the faith when shamefully treated at Philippi, and made the dungeon echo back the praises of his God. He kept the faith at Thessalonica, when lewd fellows of the baser sort accused him falsely of sedition. He kept the faith at Athens, when, to the worlds sages, he preached of Him whom they ignorantly worshipped as the unknown God. He kept the faith at Corinth, when compelled to abandon that hardened and obdurate city, and to shake off the dust from his garment as a testimony against it. He kept the faith at Ephesus, when he pointed his hearers not to Diana, but to Jesus Christ as their only Saviour. He kept the faith at Jerusalem, when stoned by the enraged and agitated mob--when stretched upon the torturing rack, and bound with iron fetters. He kept the faith at Caesarea, before the trembling, conscience-stricken Felix, when he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come. He kept the faith before Agrippa, and, by his earnestness, compelled the king to say, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian; and even in the closing hours of life, when the last storm was gathering over his head, when lying in the dark and dismal Roman cell, he wrote these triumphant words, I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall given me at that day. (J. R. Macduff.)
Keeping the faith
The apostle kept the faith. But does not the faith keep the man? It does; yet only as he keeps it. The battery keeps the gunners only as they stand to the guns. The fort keeps the garrison, yet only as they guard its walls. Never was a time when fidelity on guard was more needed than now, when the sappers are approaching the citadel of the faith, and there is treason in the camp of heaven- men in Christs uniform, having been so deceived by successful crime, and so blinded by dalliance with mammon as to give utterance and organisation to the shameless sentiment that the prosperity of a community can be built upon sin. It is a true soldiers business to guard the faith. The Roman sentinel that was exhumed at Pompeii, grasping his spear, perished rather than desert his post. He wears the immortality of earth. But he that guards the faith, when dug out of the forces that overwhelm him while he stands his ground, shall inherit the immortality of God, and walk with warrior feet the streets of gold, a living king over a lofty realm. (J. Lewis.)
A crown of righteousness.--
The crown of righteousness
I. Let us consider the prize the apostle had in view, a crown of righteousness. Royalty is the highest pitch of human grandeur. Those that wear earthly crowns have got to the very summit of earthly honour, and are in that station in which centres all worldly glory and happiness. What an idea is this similitude designed to give us then of that glorious world, where every saint wears an unfading, incorruptible and immortal crown?
1. This crown consists of perfect and everlasting righteousness. The sparks of this crown are perfect holiness and a conformity to God.
2. This crown was purchased by the righteousness of Jesus Christ. It cost a valuable price, and therefore is of inestimable worth.
3. We come to the possession of this crown in a way of righteousness. Its being purchased for us does not lay a foundation for our slothfulness, sin and security.
II. Consider the person by whom this crown is bestowed, and his character as a righteous judge. This illustrious person is everywhere represented to be our Lord Jesus Christ. Thus, Act_17:31. Christ is the appointed person, and He is every way fitted for the great and important work, He being God as well as man: He is absolutely incapable of committing the least mistake or error. And He is a righteous judge. He will display His righteousness in the last sentence that He will pass upon every creature.
III. Consider when this crown shall be completely possessed and be fully given. It is here said to be given at that day, viz.: The day of Christs appearance to judge the world.
IV. Consider the persons to whom this crown shall be given. To all those who love His appearing. The apostle was one of that happy number. They love His appearing, for then every enemy will be vanquished. (S. Hayward.)
The heavenly crown assured
This assurance is--
1. Attainable.
2. Tenable.
3. Desirable. (T. Hall, B. D.)
The crown of righteousness
I. The reward. It is described as a crown of righteousness; and, without question, such a phrase conveys the idea of some thing exquisitely pure, brilliant, and honourable. The crown is the reward of a conqueror; the righteousness is the diadem of deity Himself. And yet we cannot deny that it would be difficult to follow the idea into detail, and keep unimpaired its interest and its beauty. There is something indefinite in the phraseology, if we wish to ascertain from it the precise character of the recompense. When, however, we turn to the Being, by whom the recompense will be bestowed, and find Him described as the Lord, the righteous Judge, we may gain that precision of idea which is not elsewhere to be procured. For we should never forget that, by our thoughts and actions, we lie exposed to Gods righteous indignation. And from this we may proceed to another fact. We require you to observe that a surprising change must have been effected ere a sinner can dwell with anything of delight on the title now under review. We press on you the truth, that if the crown is to be bestowed by the hands of the Lord, the righteous Judge, the recipient must have been the subject of a great moral revolution; for he is not only to be acquitted, he is actually to be recompensed. The bliss of an angel may be great, the splendour of an angel may be glorious; but it was not for angels that Jesus died, it was not for angels that Jesus rose. There will be for ever this broad distinction between the angels and the saints. The angels are blessed by the single right of creation; the saints by the double right of creation and redemption. Who, then, can question that the portion possessed by saints will be more brilliant than that possessed by the angels?
II. the time at which the crown shall be bestowed. It must be that day when, with the cloud for His chariot, the archangels trump for His heraldry, and ten thousand times ten thousand spirits for His retinue, the Man of Sorrows shall approach the earth, and wake the children of the first resurrection. And from this we conclude that St. Paul did not expect the consummation of his happiness at the very instant of his departure from the flesh. He knew, indeed, that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord; he knew that in the transition of a moment the prison dungeon would be exchanged for the palace, the turmoil of earth for the deep rapture of peace which never ends; but he knew also that the crowning time of the saints shall not precede the second coming of their Lord. The crown, indeed, was prepared, but then it was laid up. It should never be forgotten, that the resurrection of the body is indispensable to the completeness of happiness. If it be not, the whole scheme of Christianity is darkened, for the Redeemer undertook to redeem matter, as well as spirit.
III. The persons on whom the crown shall be bestowed. There is nothing more natural to man, but nothing more opposed to religion, than selfishness. He who has earthly riches, may desire to keep them to himself; he who has heavenly, must long to impart them to others. It is an exquisitely beautiful transition, which St. Paul here makes, from the contemplation of his own portion, to the mention of that which is reserved for the whole company of the faithful: not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing. He could not gaze on his own crown, and not glow with the thought, that myriads should share the coronation. Ye wish to ascertain whether ye be of those who love His appearing. Take these simple questions, and propose them to your hearts, and pray of God to strengthen you to give faithful answers. Do ye so hate what is carnal that it would be delightful to you to be at once and for ever set free from the cravings of earthly desires? Do ye so long to be pure in thought, in word, and in deed, that you feel that perfection in holiness would be to you the perfection of happiness? But, finally, if we would win the crown of righteousness which is spoken of by St. Paul, we must use the means. (H. Melvill, B. D.)
The crown of righteousness
The crown of righteousness is a crown whereof righteousness is the material. This crown is of the same fabric and texture as that which it should decorate; it is a crown whose beauty is moral beauty, the beauty not of gold or precious stones, but of those more precious, nay, priceless things which gold and gems can but suggest to us, the beauty of justice, truthfulness, purity, charity, humility, carried to a point of refinement and of high excellence, of which here and now we have no experience. Once and once only was such a crown as this worn upon earth, and when it was worn to human eyes it was a crown of thorns. It may seem to be a difficulty in the way of this statement that the happiness is said elsewhere to consist in the beatific visions--that is to say, in the complete and uninterrupted sight of God, whom the blessed praise and worship to all eternity. We know we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. But what is it that makes this vision of God the source of its promised happiness? What is it in God that will chiefly minister to the expected joy? Is it His boundless power? Is it His unsearchable wisdom? Will they cry for ever, Almighty, Almighty, Almighty, or All-knowing, All-knowing, All-knowing? Will they, do they not say, without fatigue, without desire for change, Holy, holy, holy? And why is this? Because essentially God is a moral being, and it is by His moral attributes that He perfectly corresponds to, and satisfies the deepest wants in our human nature. The crown of righteousness means a share, such as it is possible for a creature to have in Gods essential nature, in His justice, His purity, and His love; since while we can conceive of Him, had He so willed it, as never having created the heavens and the earth, we cannot, we dare not, think of Him, in any relation with other beings as other than just, true, loving, merciful--in other words, as other than holy. He is, indeed, Himself, the crown of righteousness, the crown with which He rewards the blessed, and there is no opposition between the idea of such a crown and the beatific vision. They are only two different accounts of that which is in its essence the same. The crown of righteousness! Some crown or other, I apprehend, most men are looking for, if not always, yet at some time in their lives; if not very confidently, yet with those modified hopes which regard it as possibly attainable. Human nature views itself almost habitually as the heir apparent--of some circumstances which are an improvement on the present. An expectation of this kind is the very condition of effort in whatever direction, and no amount or degree of proved delusion would appear permanently to extinguish it. But the crowns which so many of us hope may be laid up for us somewhere, and by some one--what are they? There is the crown of a good income in a great mercantile community like our own. This is the supreme distinction for which many a man labours without thought of anything beyond. And closely allied to this is another crown--the crown of a good social position. I have made great efforts, tempered with due discretion; I have finished the course which has appeared to bring me unbounded pleasure, but which has really meant incessant weariness. I have observed those laws of social propriety, which are never to be disregarded with impunity; and so henceforth there awaits me an assured position, in which I indeed may be reviled, but from which I cannot be dislodged--a position which society cannot but award, sooner or later, to those who struggle upward in obedience to her rules. And, then, there is the crown of political power. I have fought against the foes of my party or my country; I have finished a course of political activity which has borne me onwards to the end. I have kept to my principles, or I have shown that I had reason to modify or to abandon them; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of political influence which is almost from the nature of the case independent of office, and which a great country will never refuse to those who served it long and have served it well. And once more there is the crown of a literary reputation. I have had a hard time of it; I have finished what I proposed to it; I have been true to the requirements of a great and exacting subject; henceforth there is reserved for me the rare pleasure of a reputation which wealth and station cannot command, and which envy cannot take away; henceforth I have a place in the great communion of the learned, those elect minds in whom genius is wedded to industry, and whose works are among the treasures of the human race. Here are the crowns, or some of them, for which men toil and with which are they not seldom rewarded. But do they last?… As we get nearer death, the exaggerations of self-love cease to assert themselves; we see things more clearly as they really are; we distinguish that which lasts from that which passes; we understand the immense distinction between all the perishable crowns and the crown of righteousness. That crown does not pass. It is laid up, it is set aside for its destined wearer by the most Merciful Redeemer, who is also the Eternal Judge, and who watches with an unspeakable, tender interest each conqueror as he draws nearer and nearer to the end of his earthly course, and as, in the name of the great redemption, he dares to claim it. (Canon Liddon.)
A crown of righteousness
If I had three things to wish, I should wish for Pauls threefold crown.
1. The crown of grace, a great measure of grace to do Christ much service.
2. His crown of joy, a great measure of joy to go through with that service.
3. The crown of glory which he was here assured of.
In the words we have first the concluding particle, henceforth, lastly, as for that which remains.
1. A crown is not given till the victory be gained (chap. 2:5).
2. It notes the perpetuity of the glory, incorruptible, never fading crown (2Pe_1:4; 1Co_9:24).
3. It notes the perfection of it, as the crown compasseth the head on every side; so there is nothing wanting in this crown of life. So the saints in glory shall be crowned with goodness when all the faculties of the soul and members of the body shall be perfect and filled with glory.
4. It represents to us the dignity of the saints and the glory of their reward. They are all kings and shall be crowned. The day of judgment is their coronation day.
Of righteousness--
1. Because it is purchased for us by the righteousness of Christ. By His perfect righteousness and obedience He hath merited this for us.
2. In respect of His promise, His fidelity bindeth Him to perform it. God hath promised a crown of life to such as serve Him sincerely (Jam_1:12; 1Jn_2:25; Rev_2:10; Rev_3:21).
3. It may be called a crown of righteousness, because it is given only to righteous men, and so it showeth who shall be crowned, and what is the way to it; but not for what merits or desert of ours it is given. (T. Hall, B. D.)
The crown of righteousness
It is not the diadem of noble, prince, or king, but the wreath of victory for those who have contended (See Mat_11:12). This crown can never fit the brows of the indolent, the lover of ease, the self-indulgent man of the world who acquiesces in Christian doctrines and Christian customs, whether of worship or social life, because he shuns the trouble of inquiry and of choice. To contend, to strive, to fight is the first condition of conquering, even as the conqueror alone can win the crown. Who, in that day, will deem the contest too hard when he has received the crown? Then, again, it is the crown of righteousness; and righteousness is the square and the perfection of all moral character and virtue, moulded and shaped by Christs Spirit after Christs example. Therefore, only that stage of character in which feeling, desire, choice and motive are genuine and pure, can be expressed by this word. This fabric of righteousness thus inwrought into the man himself will receive its topstone from Christ. No bye ways, no short cuts lead to heaven, only the narrow way of righteousness. (D. Trinder, M. A.)
A crown without cares
The royal life which Paul anticipated in heaven will not only be a life of dignity, and power, and grandeur, but it will be all that, without any of the disagreeable concomitants which earthly royalty has to experience. In this world greatness and care are twins. Crowns more commonly prove curses than blessings to those who wear them. Isaac, the son of Comnenus, one of the most virtuous of eastern rulers, was crowned at Constantinople in 1057. Basil, the patriarch, brought the crown to him surmounted with a diamond cross. Taking hold of the cross, the Emperor said, I, who have been acquainted with crosses from nay cradle, welcome thee; thou art my sword and shield, for hitherto I have conquered with suffering. Then taking the crown in his hand he added. This is but a beautiful burden, which loads more than it adorns. The crown of the triumphant Christian is a crown of righteousness, which will neither oppress the head, afflict the heart, nor imperil the life of any that receive it. (J. Underhill.)
Historic crowns
Napoleon had a magnificent crown made for himself in 1804. It was this crown that he so proudly placed upon his head with his own hands in the cathedral of Notre Dame. It is a jewelled circle, from which springs several arches surmounted by the globe and cross, and where the arches join the circle there are alternately flowers and miniature eagles of gold. After his downfall, it remained in the French Treasury until it was assumed by another Bonaparte, when Napoleon
III. made himself Emperor in 1852. It is now in the regalia of France, which have only just been brought back to Paris from the western seaport to which they were sent for security during the Prussian invasion, just as the Scottish regalia were sent to Dunnottar. If we may judge from some of the German photographs of the Emperor William, the crown of the new German Empire is of a very peculiar shape, apparently copied from the old Carlovingian diadem. It is not a circle, but a polygon, being formed of flat jewelled plates of gold united by the edges, and having above them two arches supporting the usual globe and cross. Of the modern crowns of continental Europe, perhaps the most remarkable is the well-known triple crown or Papal tiara, or perhaps we should say tiaras, for there are four of them. The tiara is seldom worn by the Pope; it is carried before him in procession, but, except on rare occasions, he wears a mitre like an ordinary bishop. Of the existing tiaras, the most beautiful is that which was given by Napoleon I. to Pius VII. in 1835. It is said to be worth upwards of £9,000. Its three circlets are almost incrusted with sapphires, emeralds, rubies, pearls and diamonds; and the great emerald at its apex is said to be the most beautiful in the world.
A lost crown
A lady in a dream wandered around heaven, beholding its glories, and came at last to the crown-room. Among the crowns she saw one exceedingly beautiful. Who is this for? It was intended for you, said the angel, but you did not labour for it, and now another will wear it.
Seeking to obtain a crown
A French officer, who was a prisoner upon his parole at Reading, met with a Bible. He read it, and was so impressed with the contents that he was convinced of the folly of sceptical principles and of the truth of Christianity, and resolved to become a Protestant. When his gay associates rallied him for taking so serious a turn, he said, in his vindication, I have done no more than my old schoolfellow, Berna dotte, who has become a Lutheran. Yes, but he became so, said his associates, to obtain a crown. My motive, said the Christian officer, is the same; we only differ as to the place. The object of Bernadotte is to obtain a crown in Sweden; mine is to obtain a crown in heaven.
More crowns left
On one occasion, preaching from the text of St. Paul, I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, he suddenly stopped, and looking up to heaven, cried with a loud voice, Paul! are there any more crowns there? He paused again. Then, casting his eyes upon the congregation, he continued, Yes, my brethren, there are more crowns left. They are not all taken up yet. Blessed be God! there is one for me, and one for all of you who love the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. (Life of Father Taylor.)
A congruous crown
There is such a congruity between righteousness and the crown of life, that it can be laid on none other head but that of a righteous man, and if it could, all its amaranthine flowers would shrivel and fall when they touched an impure brow. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Preaching for a crown
The Rev. H. Davies, sometimes called the Welsh apostle, was walking early one Sabbath morning to a place where he was to preach. He was overtaken by a clergymen on horseback, who complained that he could not get above half a guinea for a discourse. Oh, sir, said Mr. Davies, I preach for a crown I Do you? replied the stranger, then you are a disgrace to the cloth. To this rude observation he returned this meek answer, Perhaps I shall be held in still greater disgrace in your estimation, when I inform you that I am now going nine miles to preach, and have but seven-peace in my pocket to bear my expenses out and in; but I look forward to that crown of glory which my Lord and Saviour will freely bestow upon me when He makes His appearance before an assembled world.
Shall give me at that day.--
St. Paul a witness for immortality
As example is better than precept, so is the man more valuable than his doctrine, when he lives it. And when we study the apostle as he appears to us in his last written letter, we come face to face with the exemplification in living reality of a sublime doctrine, which proves itself stronger than adversity, animating and supporting a great soul amid circumstances which threaten to afflict and even crush its hopes. The chains hung round his hands and feet. Death menaced him with every approaching footstep. Only a tyrants breath stood between him and the executioners sword. In such a moment a man is likely to be true to himself. False reckonings are corrected, self-flatteries cease; then, if ever, he faces his real position.
I. St. Paul bequeaths the example of a finished career. Labour and suffering, threatenings and persecution, have failed to wrest from him the prize which, above all others, is most worth keeping--the faith of God as revealed in Christ.
II. What had he in the present? A certain conviction that a treasure was, at the very moment when he wrote, laid up in safe keeping for his future benefit. Though the Roman sword shall soon sever the apostles wearied head from his weakened, tired body, the crown shall survive, and he, too, who shall wear it. Death will not extinguish his being, nor bear him off into the great stream of existences that have passed away. The followers of Auguste Comte, the so-called Positivist, profess to hope for an immortality in the mass of human beings that follow in our wake, as if the fact that others are living were a compensation for our dying, or as if we could live again in those who carry on the race and profit by our example. Not so the great apostle. There is laid up for me, for that being who has wrestled, who has fought, who has kept the faith, the crown of righteousness, even as I am being kept to wear it.
III. How grandly does the prospect of the future burst upon the keen eye of the faithful warrior! The hope of this crown is not a privilege of a few, still less a monopoly for himself. Not only does he know that it is kept safe for him, but he tells the day and the manner of its bestowal. The day of labour gives place to one of rest, strife is followed by peace, suffering is forgotten in undying vigour of mind and body. This certainty of future recompense at the hand of Christ, the Righteous Judge, blends with what has gone before, and adds to this legacy all that was wanting to its completeness. The benefits of past experience, the certainty of present conviction, and the assured hope of a righteous award in the great day of account, from One who lives and has made His life felt in the holy strivings and faithful efforts of His redeemed servants on earth; these form a triple cord which cannot easily be broken. (D. Trinder, M. A.)
An assured hope
I. An assured hope is a true and scriptural thing. It cannot be wrong to feel confidently in a matter where God speaks unconditionally--to believe decidedly when God promises decidedly--to have a sure persuasion of pardon and peace when we rest on the word and oath of Him that never changes. It is an utter mistake to suppose that the believer who feels assur ance is resting on anything he sees in himself.
II. A believer may never arrive at this assured hope, which Paul expresses, and yet be saved. A letter, says an old writer, may be written, which is not sealed; so grace may be written in the heart, yet the Spirit may not set the seal of assurance to it. A child may be born heir to a great fortune, and yet never be aware of his riches; may live childish, die childish, and never know the greatness of his possessions.
III. Why an assured hope is exceedingly to be desired.
1. Because of the present comfort and peace it affords.
2. Because it tends to make a Christian an active working Christian.
3. Because it tends to make a Christian a decided Christian.
4. Be cause it tends to make the holiest Christians.
IV. Some probable causes why an assured hope is so seldom attained.
1. A defective view of the doctrine of justification.
2. Slothfulness about growth in grace.
3. An inconsistent walk in life. (Bp. Ryle.)
All them also that love His appearing:--
I. Who they are that love the Lords appearing:--I might answer such a question very shortly by saying, those who are prepared for it. But who, you may ask, is the prepared servant? I answer--he who has received that Lord as his Redeemer, who, he expects, will be his Judge.
II. Why they love it. If you had received a multitude of obligations from an unseen friend, you would surely long to set your eyes upon him. If you heard that you were soon to meet him, you would be pleased exceedingly; you would exclaim, Oh, come the day! And here then is a reason why the saved sinner loves to think of the appearing of his Saviour. The very sight of his Redeemer will be rapture to his soul. But look at the words immediately be fore our text, and there you will see a further reason of the fact we are considering. There are we told of a prize which the believer has to look for in the day of his Lords coming. It will be a day when the present evil course of things will be for ever over. Again, the Lords people love the day of His appearing, because then He will be All in All. (A. Roberts, M. A.)
The love of Christs appearance the character of a sincere Christian
I. I shall open the character of a sincere Christian.
1. There must be a firm persuasion, or assent of mind, upon just grounds, to the truth of this proposition, That Christ will appear; for it is a wise and reasonable love, not a rash and unaccountable thing. They dont love they dont know what, or without a sufficient reason. They look for these things according to His promise (2Pe_3:13).
2. It imports earnest desire of it. This is essential to the love of anything. Love always works by desire towards an absent good, and so it is constantly represented. Looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearance. And to them who look for Him shall He appear the second time. The word signifies earnest desire, looking with great expectation. The Church is represented making this return to Christ, Behold I come quickly: Even so come Lord Jesus (Rev_22:20). They often think it long, and are ready to say, in the warmth of their desire, and under the sense of present burdens, Oh, when will He come! why are His chariots so long a coming? But then it is not a rash and impatient desire, or an impetuous, unruly passion. Though they earnestly desire it, they are content to stay the proper season, and wait with patience notwithstanding the longest delay, and the greatest exercise in the mean time.
3. There is pleasure and satisfaction in the expectation and hope of it. This is the nature of love too. It is desire towards an absent object, but delight in it when present. Besides that there is a pleasure in the desire. Now, though the appearance of Christ is a future thing, yet the thoughts of it, and the hopes of it, are present things.
4. It is powerful and influential. The expectation of His appearance will not only give a pleasure, but form the mind suitable to it, and direct the conduct of the life. For example, it will engage to answerable diligence, excite to faithfulness, and promote a constant readiness and preparation for it.
II. I shall consider the reasons of it, and show why sincere Christians have such a love to His appearance.
1. With respect to Christ, who is to appear. This will be evident if you consider either His person or His appearance itself. He is the great object of their love now. Whom having not seen, they love, from the representations of Him in the gospel, and the benefits they receive from Him. And how can they but love His appearance whom they so great]y love? And His appearance will be most highly honourable to Him; for He will appear in the state of a judge and the majesty of a king. He will then appear as He really is, and not in disguise, or under a disadvantage. And how reasonable is the love of His appearance in this view, as every way most honourable to Him, and the greatest display of His glory before the world?
2. With respect to themselves. It will be every way to their advantage. Our Lord says, Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just: When He shall appear, they will be like Him, and receive a crown of life.
III. The privilege and blessing annexed to this character, and which belongs to it; the righteous Judge will give them a crown of righteousness. Conclusion! Let us often contemplate the appearance of Christ. This is the noblest subject of thought, and of the greatest concern to us. The consideration of this is proper to raise our love to Him, and reconcile our minds to His dispensations towards us.
2. The great difference between sincere Christians and other men. They love to think of His appearance, but others dread it; they wish and long for it, but others are afraid of it, and wish He would never come at all, or say in scorn, Where is the promise of His coming?
3. Can we make out this character? Are we lovers of His appearance? Is it the powerful motive to proper duty, and all suitable regard to Him?
4. How great is the Divine mercy in bestowing such a blessing upon sincere Christians. (W. Harris, D. D.)
Loving the Second Advent
See where St. Paul places a love of the Second Advent. He was writing as Paul, the aged, with his own crown of righteousness now full in view. But who shall share it? The rest of the college of the apostles? Those who had fought, his good fight--run his course--and kept his faith to the end? He stretches the bond of fellowship far higher. He makes the condition of the attainment very simple; but perfectly definite. All that is required to get the crown, is to love very dearly Him that brings it. There are four attitudes of mind in which we may stand respecting the appearing of Christ. By far the worst is indifference; and that indifference may be either the dullness of ignorance, or the apathy of the deadness of the moral feelings. The next state is fear. There is always something very good when there is fear. It requires faith to fear. But above fear is hope. Hope is expectation with desire; knowledge enough to be able to anticipate, and grace enough to be able to wish it. And here the ladder is generally cut off; but God carries it one step higher--love. Love is as much above hope as hope is above fear--for hope may be selfish, love cannot be; hope may be for what a person gives, love must be for the person himself. Therefore a man might deceive himself, by thinking all was right in his soul, because he hoped for the Second Advent; but he might, after all, be set upon the pageant; and the rest; and the reward. But to the individual that loves it, there must be something infinitely dear in it; and that one dear thing is the Lord Jesus Christ. All Rome hoped, for the return and the triumph of Caesar--but Caesars own child loved him. Remember no motive concerning anything ever satisfies God, until it is the reflex of His own motive; and Gods motive is always love. Christ will come lovingly--therefore He must be met lovingly. But the love of Christs appearing is, evidently, not a simple idea; but one composed of many parts. I would separate four, which four at least go to make it. The moment of the manifestation--the original word is the epiphany--epiphany, you know, is the same as manifestation the moment of the manifestation of Christ will be the moment of the manifestation of all His followers. Then, perhaps, for the first time in their united strength and beauty--declared, and exhibited, and vindicated, and admired, in the presence of the universe. And, oh! what a subject of love is there. Some we shall see selecting and individualising us, as they come, with the well-remembered glances of their loving smiles. But all sunny in their sacred sweetness and their joyous comeliness. Never be afraid to love the saints too much. Some speak as if to love Christ were one thing--but to love the saints were another thing; and they almost place them in rivalry! But the saints are Christ. They are His mystical body, without which Christ Himself is not perfect. Another part of the appearing--very pleasant and very loveable to every Christian--will be the exhibition that will then be made of the kingdom and the glory of Jesus. If you are a child of God, every day it is a very happy thought to you, that Christ gains some honour. Only think what it will be to look all around as far as the eye can stretch, and all is His! On His head are many crowns! His sceptre supreme over a willing world! Every creature at His feet! His own, all-perfect His name sounded upon every lip! His love perfect in every soul! But there is another thing after which you are always, panting--you are very jealous over it with an exceeding jealousy. You are m the habit of tracing the ebb and flow of it every night, with the intensest interest. I mean, the image of Christ upon your soul. Why am I not more like Him? Does His like ness increase at all in me? When shall I be entirely conformed--no separate will--no darkening spot upon the little mirror of this poor heart of mine, to prevent His seeing His own perfect mind there? But now you stand before Him--in His unveiled perfections--and you are like Him--for you see Him as He is! And if His appearing is to appear in you, is not that cause to love Him? Therefore all His Church love Him--because then they shall be as that sea of glass before the throne, wherein God can look and see Him self again in their clear truth, and their holy stillness, and their unsullied brightness! But why speak of the shadows when you will have the substance? We shall look on Him and there will not be a feeling which ever throbbed in a bosom which will not be gratified! There will not be a desire, which ever played before the eye, which will not be surpassed! Another mark of the believer is that he loves the person of Christ. Others may love His work--he loves Him--for His own sake--because He is what He is. He loves Him to be with him--to see him--to know him--to converse with him. This fills his heart. All that is love, and it is satisfied. But, will not all other love, that ever was loved, be as no love, to the love that will then fill the soul? (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
A crown for all the saints
A king rejoices in his crown, not only because it is rich in gems and a symbol of power, but because he is the only man in the kingdom who has one or who is permitted to wear one. Suppose that some peer of the realm or some rich commoner should have a crown royal made for himself, and should wear it in public, what would the king do? Would he be glad that there was somebody else who possessed and was worthy of that symbol of royalty? Would he say: I would that all my people were kings? No, indeed! That presumptuous, self-crowned subject would either be pat in an asylum as a lunatic or in prison as a traitor. Such is the Christian spirit in contrast with that of selfishness. Such is the joy of heaven in contrast with that of earth. Let us see how much purer and nobler it is. The Christian spirit, so beautifully illustrated by the great apostle when he could not think of his own without thinking also of the crowning of his brethren, is the spirit that will fill heaven with the joy that springs from love. Would that we had more of it here and now.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. For I am now ready to be offered.…
6. For I am now ready to be offered. Poured out as an offering by having his blood shed. See margin of Revision. The time of my departure. Death, to Paul, was simply a departure, a leaving the body and this world for a better state. At hand. His death had been predetermined by his enemies, and was near.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v6 2Ti_4:6. For I am now ready to be offered.—R.V.…
CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
2Ti_4:6. For I am now ready to be offered.—R.V. “I am already being offered.” R.V. margin, “poured out as a drink-offering.” When the gaoler took the cup of hemlock to Socrates, the philosopher asked, “Is it allowable to make a drink-offering of it?” Paul’s spirit was the libation. Note the emphatic I in contrast to “thou” (emphatic too) in 2Ti_4:5. The time of my departure is at hand.—R.V. “is come.” In Php_1:23 the desire for this weighing anchor is expressed. Now the hour has arrived. Socrates, again, prayed to the gods that they would bless the voyage and render it happy.
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2Ti_4:7. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.—“All three propositions denote the same thing. The second gives prominence to one particular form of contest, while the third clearly expresses how entirely Paul had done with life” (Hofmann).
2Ti_4:8. Henceforth.—Lit. “As concerns the rest.” At the end of his life there remains nothing more than to receive the reward. A crown of righteousness.—The just award of the impartial Umpire.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—2Ti_4:6-8
The Faithful Minister in the Presence of Death—
I. Undismayed by the terrors of approaching martyrdom.—“I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand” (2Ti_4:6). Whatever hopes Paul might have had of his probable release are now dismissed. Without a murmur, without seeking revenge upon his adversaries, he is ready to be poured out as a libation, to shed his own blood in the cause he loved more than his own life. Death has no terror; it is but a peaceful departure. The anchor’s weighed, the moorings are loosed, and he is starting on the last voyage.
II. Sustained by the consciousness of a well-spent life.—
1. The Christian life is a conflict. “I have fought a good fight” (2Ti_4:7).
2. The Christian life is a race. “I have finished my course” (2Ti_4:7).
3. The Christian life is a stewardship. “I have kept the faith” (2Ti_4:7).
III. Exulting in the certainty of adequate future reward (2Ti_4:8).—The “henceforth” marks the decisive moment. He looks to his state in a threefold aspect.
1. The present. “I have fought.”
2. The immediate future. “There is laid up for me a crown.”
3. The future. “The Lord will give in that day.” A crown, or garland, used to be bestowed at the Greek national games on the successful competitor. The crown is in recognition of righteousness wrought in Paul by God’s Spirit: the crown is prepared for the righteous; but it is a crown which consists in righteousness. Righteousness will be its own reward. A man is justified gratuitously by the merits of Christ through faith; and when he is so justified, God accepts his works and honours them with a reward which is not their due, but is given of grace (Fausset). Even at this solemn crisis the large-heartedness of the doomed apostle is apparent. He thinks not only of his own reward, but of the reward also of all believing souls who love and are longing for the appearing of their Lord.
Lessons.—
1. We truly live only as we live unto God.
2. We should ever be more concerned about living than about dying.
3. Death admits the faithful into a larger life.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
2Ti_4:6-8. The Christian’s Course, Conflict, and Crown.
I. The view in which the apostle represents his decease.—“I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.”
1. He expresses neither terror nor reluctance, but speaks of death calmly as a sacrifice and offering to God.
2. He regards death as the transferring of our life from the service of God on earth to the presence of God in heaven.
II. The reflections with which the apostle looks back upon his life on earth.—
1. He likens it to a good fight—a conflict which occasioned no remorse, in which he struggled to save and not to destroy—good in its object, in all its means, in its effect upon all employed in its labours, upon all interested in its success.
2. He likens it to a race. “I have finished my course.”
3. He is conscious of fidelity. “I have kept the faith.” He had not only run the Christian race, but had duly observed the rules of the contest.
III. The hope by which the dying apostle is cheered in his view of an eternal world.—“Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.” He looks forward with joyful assurance to a more than sufficient recompense of all his toils and perils—not as payment of a claim he had earned or deserved, but as a glorious and bounteous gift. Not a mere honorary crown or empty ornament like those bestowed on successful victors and warriors, but a crown connected with a kingdom—a kingdom of righteousness.—J. Brewster.
2Ti_4:7. “I have kept the faith.”
I. A phenomenon is to be accounted for—the origin of this remarkable language.—
1. The deep-seated sentiments of natural religion will not account for it.
2. Still less the ancient natural theology.
3. It is accounted for only in Christ the life.
II. The world with the gospel is a new world.—
1. The text reminds us that the Christian is charged with a sacred trust. “The faith.”
2. The discharge of this trust involves constant vigilance and effort.
3. A time may arrive in the prosecution of the Christian course, as it did with the apostle, when the mind turns from the past and gives itself up to the expectation of the future.
4. How can we sufficiently admire that gospel which, in turning our mind from earth to heaven, enables us to omit the mention of death, or to speak of it only in terms of disparagement!
5. A modest self-estimate of Christian fidelity is perfectly compatible with a sense of entire dependence on the grace of God.—Dr. J. Harris.
2Ti_4:8. Love, the Preparation for Christ’s Coming.
I. If any one would love that day he must have a clear and deep perception of the hatefulness of sin.
II. We cannot love the day of Christ except we be dead to this world.
III. This love of His appearing is the direct and natural effect of love to Christ Himself.—The love of His unseen presence now is the true and all-comprehending discipline to prepare us for the coming of our Lord.—H. E. Manning.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv6–7 2 Timothy
2 Timothy
A PRISONER’S DYING THOUGHTS
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2Ti 4:6-8
PAUL’S long day’s work is nearly done. He is a prisoner in Rome, all but forsaken by his friends, in hourly expectation of another summons before Nero. To appear before him was, he says, like putting his head into ‘the mouth of the lion.’ His horizon was darkened by sad anticipations of decaying faith and growing corruptions in the Church. What a road he had travelled since that day when, on the way to Damascus, he saw the living Christ, and heard the words of His mouth!
It had been but a failure of a life, if judged by ordinary standards. He had suffered the loss of all things, had thrown away position and prospects, had exposed himself to sorrows and toils, had been all his days a poor man and solitary, had been hunted, despised, laughed at by Jew and Gentile, worried and badgered even by so-called brethren, loved the less, the more he loved. And now the end is near. A prison-and the-headsman’s sword are the world’s wages to its best teacher. When Nero is on the throne, the only possible place for Paul is a dungeon opening on to the scaffold. Better to be the martyr than the Caesar!
These familiar words of our text bring before us a very sweet and wonderful picture of the prisoner, so near his end. How beautifully they show his calm waiting for the last hour and the bright forms which lightened for him the darkness of his cell! Many since have gone to their rest with their hearts stayed On the same thoughts, though their lips could not speak them to our listening ears. Let us be thankful for them, and pray that for ourselves, when we come to that hour, the same quiet heroism and the same sober hope mounting to calm certainty may be ours.
These words refer to the past, the present, the future. ‘I have fought - the time of my departure is come - henceforth there is laid up.’
I. So we notice, first, the quiet courage which looks death full in the face without a tremor.
The language implies that Paul knows his death hour is all but here. As the Revised Version more accurately gives it, ‘I am already being offered’ - the process is begun, his sufferings at the moment are, as it were, the initial steps of his sacrifice - ‘and the time of my departure is come.’ The tone in which he tells Timothy this is very noticeable. There is no sign of excitement, no tremor of emotion, no affectation of stoicism in the simple sentences. He is not playing up to a part, nor pretending to be anything which he is not. If ever language sounded perfectly simple and genuine, this does.
And the occasion of the .whole section is as remarkable as the tone. He is led to speak about himself at all, only in order to enforce his exhortation to Timothy to put his shoulder to the wheel, and do his work for Christ with all his might. All he wishes to say is simply, do your work with all your might, for I am going off the field. But having begun on that line of thought, he is carried on to say more than was needed for his immediate purpose, and thus inartificially to let us see what was filling his mind.
And the subject into which he subsides after these lofty thoughts is as remarkable as either tone or occasion. Minute directions about such small matters as books and parchments, and perhaps a warm cloak for winter, and homely details about the movements of the little group of his friends immediately follow. All this shows with what a perfectly unforced courage Paul fronted his fate, and looked death in the eyes. The anticipation did not dull his interest in God’s work in the world, as witness the warnings and exhortations of the context. It did not withdraw his sympathies from his companions. It did not hinder him from pursuing his studies and pursuits, nor from providing for small matters of daily convenience. If ever a man was free from any taint of fanaticism or morbid enthusiasm, it was this man waiting so calmly in his prison for his death.
There is great beauty and force in the expressions which he uses for death here. He will not soil his lips with its ugly name, but calls it an offering and a departure. There is a widespread unwillingness to say the word ‘ Death.’ It falls on men’s hearts like clods on a coffin. So all people and languages have adopted euphemisms for it, fair names which wrap silk round its dart and somewhat hide its face. But there are two opposite reasons for their use - terror and confidence. Some men dare not speak of death because they dread it so much, and try to put some kind of shield between themselves and the very thought of it, by calling it something less dreadful to them than itself. Some men, on the other hand, are familiar with the thought, and though it is solemn, it is not altogether repellent to them.
Gazing on death with the thoughts and feelings which Jesus Christ has given them concerning it, they see it in new aspects, which take away much of its blackness. And so they do not feel inclined to use the ugly old name, but had rather call it by some which reflect the gentler aspect that it now wears to them. So ‘sleep,’ and ‘rest’ and the like are the names which have almost driven the other out of the New Testament - witness of the fact that in inmost reality Jesus Christ ‘has abolished death,’ however the physical portion of it may still remain master of our bodies.
But looking for a moment at the specific metaphors used here, we have first, that of an offering, or more particularly of a drink offering, or libation, ‘I am already being poured out.’ No doubt the special reason for the selection of this figure here is Paul’s anticipation of a violent death. The shedding of his blood was to be an offering poured out like some costly wine upon the altar, but the power of the figure reaches far beyond that special application of it. We may all make our deaths a sacrifice, an offering to God, for we may yield up our will to God’s will, and so turn that last struggle into an act of worship and self surrender. When we recognise His hand, when we submit our wills to His purposes, when ‘we live unto the Lord,’ if we live, and ‘die unto Him,’ if we die, then Death will lose all its terror and most of its pain, and will become for us what it was to Paul, a true offering up of self in thankful worship. Nay, we may even say, that so we shall in a certain subordinate sense be ‘made conformable unto His death’ who committed His spirit into His Father’s hands, and laid down His life, of His own will. The essential character and far-reaching effects of this sacrifice we cannot imitate, but we can so yield up our wills to God and leave life so willingly and trustfully as that death shall make our sacrifice complete.
Another more familiar and equally striking figure is next used, when Paul speaks of the time of his ‘departure.’ The thought is found in most tongues. Death is a going away, or, as Peter calls it {with a glance, possibly, at the special meaning of the word in the Old Testament, as well as at its use in the solemn statement of the theme of converse on the Mountain of Transfiguration}, an Exodus. But the well-worn image receives new depth and sharpness of outline in Christianity. To those who have learned the meaning of Christ’s resurrection, and feed their souls on the hopes which it warrants, Death is merely a change of place or state, an accident affecting locality, and little more. We have had plenty of changes before. Life has been one long series of departures. This is different from the others mainly in that it is the last, and that to go away from this visible and fleeting show, where we wander aliens among things which have no true kindred with us, is to go home, where there will be no more pulling up the tent-pegs, and toiling across the deserts in monotonous change. How strong is the conviction, spoken in this name for death, that the essential life lasts on quite unaltered through it all! How slight the else formidable thing is made! We may change climates, and for the stormy bleakness of life may have the long still days of heaven, but we do not change ourselves. We lose nothing worth keeping when we leave behind the body, as a dress not fitted for home, where we are going. We but travel one more stage, though it be the last, and part of it be in pitchy darkness. Some pass over it as in a fiery chariot, like Paul and many a martyr. Some have to toil through it with slow steps and bleeding feet and fainting heart; but all may have a Brother with them, and, holding His hand, may find that the journey is not so hard as they feared, and the home from which they shall remove no more, better than they hoped when they hoped the most.
II. We have here, too, the peaceful look backwards. There is something very noteworthy in the threefold aspect under which his past life presents itself to the Apostle who is so soon to leave it. He thinks of it as a contest, as a race, as a stewardship. The first image suggests the tension of a long struggle with opposing wrestlers who have tried to throw him, but in vain. The world, both of men and things, has had to be grappled with and mastered. His own sinful nature and especially his animal nature has had to be kept under by sheer force, and every moment has been resistance to subtle omnipresent forces that have sought to thwart his aspirations and hamper his performances. His successes have had to be fought for, and everything that he has done has been done after a struggle. So is it with all noble life; so will it be to the end.
He thinks of life as a race. That speaks of continuous advance in one direction, and more emphatically still, of effort that sets the lungs panting and strains every muscle to the utmost. He thinks of it as a stewardship. He has kept the faith {whether by that word we are to understand the body of truth believed or the act of believing} as a sacred deposit committed to him, of which he has been a good steward, and which he is now ready to return to his Lord. There is much in these letters to Timothy about keeping treasures entrusted to one’s care. Timothy is bid to ‘keep that good thing which is committed to thee,’ as Paul here declares that he has done. Nor is such guarding of a precious deposit confined to us stewards on earth, but the Apostle is sure that his loving Lord, to whom he has entrusted himself, will with like tenderness and carefulness ‘keep that which he has committed unto Him against that day.’ The confidence in that faithful Keeper made it possible for Paul to be faithful to his trust, and as a steward who was bound by all ties to his Lord, to guard His possessions and administer His affairs. Life was full of voices urging him to give up the faith. Bribes and threats, and his own sense-bound nature, and the constant whispers of the world had tempted him all along the road to fling it away as a worthless thing, but he had kept it safe; and now, nearing the end and the account, he can put his hand on the secret place near his heart where it lies, and feel that it is there, ready to be restored to his Lord, with the thankful confession, ‘Thy pound hath gained ten pounds.’
So life looks to this man in his retrospect as mainly a field for struggle, effort, and fidelity. This world is not to be for us an enchanted garden of delights, any more than it should appear a dreary desert of disappointment and woe. But it should be to us mainly a palaestra, or gymnasium and exercising ground. You cannot expect many flowers or much grass in the place where men wrestle and run. We need not much mind though it be bare, if we can only stand firm on the hard earth, nor lament that there are so few delights to stay our eyes from the goal. We are here for serious work; let us not be too eager for pleasures that may hinder our efforts and weaken our vigour, but be content to lap up a hasty draught from the brooks by the way, and then on again to the fight.
Such a view of life makes it radiant and fair while it lasts, and makes the heart calm when the hour comes to leave it all behind. So thinking of the past, there may be a sense of not unwelcome lightening from a load of responsibility when we have got all the stress and strain of the conflict behind us, and have at any rate not been altogether beaten. We may feel like a captain who has brought his ship safe across the Atlantic, through foul weather and past many an iceberg, and gives a great sigh of relief as he hands over the charge to the pilot, who will take her across the harbour bar and bring her to her anchorage in the landlocked bay where no tempests rave any more forever.
Prosaic theologians have sometimes wondered at the estimate which Paul here makes of his past services and faithfulness, but the wonder is surely unnecessary. It is very striking to notice the difference between his judgment of himself while he was still in the thick of the conflict, and now when he is nearing the end. Then one main hope which animated all his toils and nerved him for the sacrifice of life itself was ‘that I might finish my course with joy.’ Now in the quiet of his dungeon, that hope is fulfilled, and triumphant thoughts, like shining angels, keep him company in his solitude. Then he struggled, and wrestled, touched by the haunting fear lest after that he has preached to others he himself should be rejected. Now the dread has passed, and a meek hope stands by his side.
What is this change of feeling but an instance of what, thank God, we so often see, that at the end the heart, which has been bowed with fears and self-depreciation, is filled with peace? They who tremble most during the conflict are most likely to look back with solid satisfaction, while they who never knew a fear all along the course will often have them surging in upon their souls too late, and will see the past in a new lurid light, when they are powerless to change it. Blessed is the man who thus feareth always. At the end he will have hope. The past struggles are joyful in memory, as the mountain ranges, which were all black reek and white snow while we toiled up their inhospitable steeps, lie purple in the mellowing distance, and burn like fire as the sunset strikes their peaks. Many a wild winter’s day has a fair, cloudless close, and lingering opal hues diffused through all the quiet sky. ‘At eventide it shall be light.’ Though we go all Our lives mourning and timid, there may yet be granted us ere the end some vision of the true significance of these lives, and some humble hope that they have not been wholly in vain.
Such an estimate has nothing in common with self-complacency. It co-exists with a profound consciousness of many a sin, many a defeat, and much unfaithfulness. It belongs only to a man who, conscious of these, is ‘looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life,’ and is the direct result, not the antagonist, of lowly self-abasement, and contrite faith in Him by whom alone our stained selves and poor broken services can ever be acceptable. Let us learn too that the only life that bears being looked back upon is a life of Christian devotion and effort. It shows fairer when seen in the strange cross lights that come when we stand on the boundary of two worlds, with the white radiance of eternity beginning to master the vulgar oil lamps of earth, than when seen by these alone. All others have their shabbiness and their selfishness disclosed then. I remember ones seeing a mob of revellers streaming out from a masked ball in a London theatre in the early morning sunlight; draggled and heavy-eyed, the rouge showing on the cheeks, and the shabby tawdriness of the foolish costumes pitilessly revealed by the pure light. So will many a life look when the day dawns, and the wild riot ends in its unwelcome beams.
The one question for us all, then, will be, Have I lived for Christ, and by Him? Let it be the one question for us now, and let it be answered, Yes. Then we shall have at the last a calm confidence, equally far removed from presumption and from dread, which will let us look back on life with peace, though it be full of failures and sins, and forward with humble hope of the reward which we shall receive from His mercy.
III. The climax of all is the triumphant look forward. ‘Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.’
In harmony with the images of the conflict and the race, the crown here is not the emblem of sovereignty, but of victory, as indeed is almost without exception the case in the New Testament. The idea of the royal dignity of Christians in the future is set forth rather under the emblem of association with Christ on His throne, while the wreath on their brows is the coronal of laurel, ‘meed of mighty conquerors,’ or the twine of leaves given to him who, panting, touched the goal. The reward, then, which is meant by the emblem, whatever be its essence, comes through effort and conflict. ‘A man is not crowned, except he strive.’
That crown, according to other words of Scripture, consists of ‘life,’ or ‘glory’ - that is to say, the issue and outcome of believing service and faithful stewardship here is the possession of the true life, which stands in union with God, in measure so great, and in quality so wondrous that it lies on the pure locks of the victors like a flashing diadem, all ablaze with light in a hundred jewels. The completion and exaltation of our nature and characters by the illapse of ‘life’ so sovereign and transcendent that it is ‘glory’ is the consequence of all Christian effort here in the lower levels, where the natural life is always weakness and sometimes shame, and the spiritual life is at the best but a hidden glory and a struggling spark. There is no profit in seeking to gaze into that light of glory so as to discern the shapes of those who walk in it, or the elements of its lambent flames. Enough that in its gracious beauty transfigured souls move as in their native atmosphere. Enough that even our dim vision can see that they have for their companion ‘One like unto the Son of Man.’ It is Christ’s own life which they share; it is Christ’s own glory which irradiates them.
That crown is ‘a crown of righteousness’ in another sense from that in which it is ‘a crown of life.’ The latter expression indicates the material, if we may say so, of which it is woven, but the former rather points to the character to which it belongs or is given. Righteousness alone can receive that reward. It is not the struggle or the conflict which wins it, but the character evolved in the struggle, not the works of strenuous service, but the moral nature expressed in these. There is such a congruity between righteousness and the crown of life, that it can be laid on none other head but that of a righteous man, and if it could, all its amaranthine flowers would shrivel and fall when they touched an impure brow. It is, then, the crown of righteousness, as belonging by its very nature to such characters alone.
But whatever is the essential congruity between the character and the crown, we have to remember too that, according to this Apostle’s constant teaching, the righteousness which clothes us in fair raiment, and has a natural right to the wreath of victory, is a gift, as truly as the crown itself, and is given to us all on condition of our simple trust in Jesus Christ, If we are to be ‘found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless,’ we must be ‘found in Him, not having our own righteousness, but that which is ours through faith in Christ.’ Toil and conflict and anxious desire to be true to our responsibilities will do much for a man, but they will not bring him that righteousness which brings down on the head the crown of life. We must trust to Christ to give us the righteousness in which we are justified, and to give us the righteousness by the working out of which in our life and character we are fitted for that great reward. He crowns our works and selves with exuberant and unmerited honours, but what he crowns is His Own gift to us, and His great love must bestow both the righteousness and ‘the crown.’
The crown is given at a time called - by Paul ‘at that day,’ which is not the near day of his martyrdom, but that of His Lord’s appearing. He does not speak of the fulness of the reward as being ready for him at death, but as being ‘henceforth laid up for him in heaven.’ So he looks forward beyond the grave. The immediate future after death was to his view a period of blessedness indeed, but not yet full. The state of the dead in Christ was a state of consciousness, a state of rest, a state of felicity, hut also a state of expectation- To the full height of their present capacity they who sleep in Jesus are blessed, being still in His embrace, and their spirits pillowed on His heart, nor so sleeping that, like drowsy infants, they know not where they lie so safe, but only sleeping in so much as they rest from weariness, and have closed their eyes to the ceaseless turmoil of this fleeting world, and are lapped about for ever with the sweet, unbroken consciousness that they are ‘present with the Lord.’ What perfect repose, perfect fruition of all desires, perfect union with the perfect End and Object of all their being, perfect exemption from all sorrow, tumult, and sin can bring of blessedness, that they possess in over measure unfailingly. And, in addition, they still know the joy of hope, and have carried that jewel with them into another world, for they wait for ‘the redemption of the body,’ in the reception of which, ‘at that day,’ their life will be filled up to a yet fuller measure, and gleam with a more lustrous ‘glory.’ Now they rest and wait. Then shall they be crowned.
Nor must self-absorbed thoughts be allowed to bound our anticipations of that future. It is no solitary blessedness to which Paul looked forward Alone in his dungeon, alone before his judge when ‘no man stood by’ him, soon to be alone in his martyrdom, he leaps up in spirit at the thought of the mighty crowd among whom he will stand in that day, on every head a crown, in every heart the same love to the Lord whose life is in them all and makes them all one. So we may cherish the hope of a social heaven. Man’s course begins in a garden, but it ends in a city. The final condition will be the perfection of human society. There all who love Christ will be drawn together, and old ties, broken for a little while here, be reknit in yet holier form, never to be sundered more.
Ah, friends, the all-important question for each of us is how may we have such a hope, like a great sunset light shining into the western windows of our souls? There is but one answer - Trust Christ. That is enough. Nothing else is. Is your life built on Jesus Christ? Are you trusting your salvation to Him? Are you giving Him your love and service? Does your life bear looking at to-day? Will it bear looking at in death? Will it bear His looking at in Judgment?
If you can humbly say, To me to live is Christ, then is it well Living by Him we may fight and conquer, may win and obtain. Living by Him, we may be ready quietly to lie down when the time comes, and may have all the future filled with the blaze of a great hope that glows brighter as the darkness thickens. That peaceful hope will not leave us till consciousness fails, and then, when it has ceased to guide us, Christ Himself will lead us, scarcely knowing where we are, through the waters, and when we open our half-bewildered eyes in brief wonder, the first thing we see will be his welcoming smile, and His voice will say, as a tender surgeon might to a little Child waking after an operation, ‘It is all over.’ We lift our hands wondering and find wreaths on our poor brows. We lift our eyes, and lo! all about us a crowned crowd of conquerors,
‘And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which we have loved long since, and lost awhile,’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v8 (See Scofield "1Jn 3:7").
righteousness
(See Scofield "1Jn 3:7").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v6 Paul’s Fight and Victory.
Paul’s Fight and Victory.
v. 6. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
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v. 7. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith;
v. 8. henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing.
In this paragraph the apostle gives the reason for making his admonitions to Timothy so comprehensive and explicit. He himself was about to withdraw from the field, and so his successors in the work of the Gospel-ministry should always keep his example in mind: For I am about to be poured out as a drink-offering, and the time of my dissolution is at hand. As in Php 2:17, the apostle here uses the term for making a drink-offering to designate his approaching death. He knows that he must soon die, that he must seal the testimony of the truth as preached by him with his blood. And still he speaks of his impending martyrdom with all the quiet confidence in God which knows no fear of death. His dissolution, his departure from this world, is at hand; his soul was destined soon to leave the body which had suffered so much in the interest of the Gospel. Death has not even a remnant of horror for him that trusts in Christ’s death and resurrection.
A true believer may rather call out with the apostle: The good fight I have fought, my course I have run, faith have I kept. The great warfare for Christ against sin and unbelief had engaged the apostle ever since his conversion. It was a continual, hard, and fierce battle, but he had persevered to the end, he had not given way one inch, he could claim the honor of the victor. The course, furthermore, which had stretched out before him through the long years, like the track before a runner, he had finished; lie had reached the end of his life of faith. No matter whether he had often stumbled by the way, no matter whether he had often been on the brink of losing courage, the Lord had enabled him to endure to the end. He had kept the faith; he had not only been faithful in the work of his ministry, but, through the grace of God, he had held his faith in his Redeemer secure against all attacks, in all persecutions.
With this blessed assurance in his heart the apostle was able to look forward beyond death and grave into the glorious future of eternity: Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord will deliver to me on that day, the righteous Judge, but not only to me, rather to all whose love was firmly placed in His manifestation. The apostle speaks so confidently, so cheerfully, as though he had death behind him and were even now about to receive the reward which had been promised to him. It is a characteristic of every Christian’s faith that it trusts absolutely and implicitly in the promises of God, that the believer is altogether sure of his salvation. Of course, if the redemption of a man’s soul depended upon his own works and merit, even in the most infinitesimal degree, this joyful confidence would be out of the question. But the true believer places himself altogether into the hands of the heavenly Father, knowing that no enemy can pluck us out of His hand. The prize and reward of grace is the crown of righteousness, the final declaration of righteousness by God, the final imputation of the righteousness of Jesus, by which we are free from all guilt and condemnation. This assurance is given to us before the throne of God, as the wreath was placed upon the head of the victor in the games of the Greeks. Christ, who will Himself be the Judge on the last day, will be acting in His capacity as just Judge in awarding this prize, not to works, but to faith. Since we shall appear before the judgment-throne of God with a firm reliance upon the imputed righteousness of Christ, it will be a merciful and yet a just judgment which will award to us the crown of righteousness. This is by no means a special privilege of the apostle, but, as he assures us, will be the happy experience of all those that have looked forward to the final revelation of the Lord, to His second advent, with the love that grows out of faith. All true Christians long for the redemption of their body, for the coming of their Lord to take them home. The words of the apostle therefore contain an earnest admonition to the believers of all times to be faithful and patient to the end, since the goal toward which they are striving will repay them a thousand fold for all the misery and tribulation of this short earthly life.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v6 I am already being poured out
I am already being poured out
Paul speaks of his readiness to die as if he were a cup of wine ready to be poured out as a sacrifice to God. (See: Metaphor)
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The time of my departure has come
Here "departure" is a polite way of referring to death. AT: "Soon I will die and leave this world" (See: Euphemism)
I have competed in the good contest
Paul speaks of his hard work as if he had been an athlete competing for a prize. AT: "I have done my best" (See: Metaphor)
I have finished the race
Paul speaks of his life of service to God as if he had been running a race on foot. AT: "I have completed what I needed to do" (See: Metaphor)
I have kept the faith
Paul speaks of his trust in Christ and his obedience to God as if they were a valuable object that he kept in his possession. Possible meanings are 1) "I have been faithful in doing my ministry" or 2) "I have kept the teachings about what we believe from any error" (See: Metaphor)
The crown of righteousness has been reserved for me
This can be stated in active form. AT: "God has reserved the crown of righteousness for me" (See: Active or Passive)
crown of righteousness
Possible meanings are 1) the crown is the prize that God gives to people who have lived the right way or 2) the crown is a metaphor for righteousness. Just as the judge of a race gives a crown to the winner, when Paul finishes his life, God will declare that Paul is righteous. (See: Metaphor)
crown
a wreath made of laurel tree leaves that was given to winners of athletic contests
on that day
"on the day when the Lord comes again" or "on the day when God judges people"
but also to all those who have loved his appearing
Paul speaks about this event as if it has already happened. It can be stated as a future event. AT: "but also he will give it to those who are eagerly waiting for him to return" (See: Predictive Past)
translationWords
faith
crown
righteous
lord
judge, judges
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv6–8 4:6-8 Paul’s faithfulness, vindication, and reward are a model…
4:6-8 Paul’s faithfulness, vindication, and reward are a model and a challenge to others—particularly Timothy—to follow Paul’s example after he is gone.
4:6 Paul pictures his death as a drink offering that is poured out . . . to God (see Exod 29:40-41; Lev 23:13; Num 28:7; Phil 2:17); this offering participates in Christ’s own sacrifice (see Col 1:24; see also Rom 12:1).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.