Παῦλος δὲ ὁ τρισμακάριος τὴν κεφαλὴν ξίφει ἀπετμήθη ὁ ἀνεκδιήγητος ἄνθρωπος.—PS. CHRYS. Orat.Enam.
“Testamentum Pauli et cycnea cantio est haec Epistola.”—BENGEL.
“Hoc praestat carcer Christiano, quod eremus Prophetis.”—TERT. adMart. 3.
“Mortem habebat Paulus ante oculus. … Quaecunque igitur hic legimus de Christi regno, de spe vitae aeternae, de Christianâ militiâ, de fiduciâ confessionis, de certitudine doctrinae, non tanquam atramento scripta, sed ipsius Pauli sanguine accipere convenit. … Proinde haec Epistola quasi solennis quaedam est subscriptio Paulinae doctrinae, eaque ex repraesenti.”—CALVIN.
HE began much in his usual form—
“Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God,1 according to the promise of the life which is in Christ Jesus, to Timothy my beloved son, grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God, whom I serve from my forefathers in a pure conscience—as the remembrance which I have of thee night and day in my supplications is incessant, longing earnestly to see thee—remembering thy tears2—that I may be filled with joy.3 [I thank God, I say] on being reminded4 of the unfeigned faith which is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and in thy mother Eunice; yes, and I feel confident that it dwells also in thee.”5
Perhaps the sadness of Timothy’s heart—the tears for his absent and imprisoned teacher—had hindered the activity of his work, and plunged him in a too indolent despondency; and so Paul, remembering all the hopes which had inaugurated his youthful ministry, continues—
“For which cause6 I remind thee to fan aflame the gift of God which is in thee by the imposition of my hands; for God gave us not the spirit of cowardice, but of power and of love, and of moral influence.7 Be not then ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me His prisoner, but rather share my sufferings for the Gospel in accordance with the power of God, who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own plans and the grace given us in Christ Jesus before eternal times, but now manifested by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who did away with death, and brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel, whereunto I was appointed a herald, and an Apostle, and teacher of the Gentiles, for which reason also I suffer these things; but I am not ashamed. For I know on whom I have believed, and I feel confident that He is able to preserve the trust committed to me till that day.”8
Then—having ended the double digression on the word Gospel, which suggests to him first what that word implies (9, 10), and then recalls to him his own mission—he returns to his exhortation—
“As a pattern of wholesome teachings,9 take those which thou heardest from me, in faith and the love which is in Christ Jesus. That fair trust preserve, through the Holy Spirit which dwelleth in us.”10
Then he touches for a moment on the melancholy circumstances of which we have already spoken—his abandonment by the Asiatic converts,11 and the zealous refreshing kindness of Onesiphorus, for whom he breathes an earnest prayer.12
“Thou therefore, my child, be strengthened in the grace which is in Christ Jesus, and the things which thou heardest from me in the presence of many witnesses, these things extend to faithful men who shall be adequate also to teach others. Share my sufferings as a fair soldier of Christ Jesus.”13
The conditions of this soldiership he illustrates by three similes, drawn from the life of the soldier, the athlete, and the labourer, and doubtless meant to suggest to Timothy the qualities of which at that depressed period he stood most in need. The soldier must abandon all business entanglements, and strive to please his captain. The athlete, if he wants the crown, must keep the rules. The toiling husbandman has the first claim to a share of the harvest.14 It was a delicate way of suggesting to Timothy the duties of increased single–heartedness, attention to the conditions of the Christian life, and strenuous labour; and that he might not miss the bearing of these similitudes he adds, “Consider what I say, for the Lord will give you15 understanding in all things.” By the example of his own sufferings he reminds him that the cardinal truths of the Gospel are ample to inspire toil and endurance.
“Bear in mind,” he says, “Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my Gospel—in the cause of which I suffer even to chains as a malefactor: but the word of God has not been chained. For this reason, for the sake of the elect, I am enduring all things, that they too may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Faithful is the saying—
‘If we died with, we shall also live with Him;16
If we endure, we shall also reign with Him;
If we deny, He also will deny us.
If we are faithless, He abideth faithful,
For He is not able to deny Himself.’”17
“These things call to their remembrance;” and from this verse to the end of the chapter he reverts to the false teachers among whom Timothy is labouring, and against whom he has warned him in the First Epistle, testifying to them before the Lord not to fight about “views”—a thing entirely useless—to the subversion of the hearers.18 “Strive to present thyself approved to God, a workman unshamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”19 He is to shun the vain babblings of men like Hymenæus and Philetus,20 with their ever–advancing impiety and the spreading cancer of their doctrine, which identified the resurrection with spiritual deliverance from the death of sin, and denied that there was any other resurrection,21 to the ruinous unsettlement of some. Fruitlessly, however, for God’s firm foundation stands impregnable with the double inscription on it,22 “The Lord knoweth them that are his,” and “Let every one who nameth the name of Christ stand aloof from unrighteousness.”23 Yet there should be no surprise that such errors spring up in the visible Church. It is like a great house in which are vessels of wood and earth, as well as of gold and silver, and alike for honourable and mean purposes. What each one had to do then was to purge himself from polluting connexion with the mean and vile vessels, and strive to be “a vessel for honour, sanctified, serviceable to the master, prepared for every good purpose.”24 He is therefore to “fly” from the desires of youth,25 and in union with all who call on the Lord from a pure heart to pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace, having nothing to do with those foolish and illiterate questions which only breed strifes unworthy of the gentle, enduring meekness of a slave of the Lord, whose aim it should be to train opponents with all mildness,26 in the hope that God may grant them repentance, so that they may come to full knowledge of the truth, and “awake to soberness out of the snare of the devil, after having been taken alive by him—to do God’s will”.27
The third chapter continues to speak of these evil teachers and their future developments in the hard times to come. A stern sad picture is drawn of what men shall then be in their selfishness, greed, conceit, ingratitude, lovelessness, treachery, besotted atheism, and reckless love of pleasure. He bids Timothy turn away from such teachers with their sham religion, their creeping intrigues, their prurient influence, their feminine conquests,28 resisting the truth just as the old Egyptian sorcerers, Jannes and Jambres29 did, and destined to have their emptiness equally exposed.30 But Timothy—who has followed all that Paul has been in the teaching, the purpose, and the sufferings of his life, and well knows how the Lord saved him out of many trials and persecutions in his first journey31—must expect persecution, and be brave and faithful, making his life a contrast to that of these deceived deceivers, in accordance with that training which from a babe he had received in the Holy Scriptures, which were able to make him wise unto salvation through faith in Jesus Christ: since “every Scripture inspired by God is also profitable for teaching,32 for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”33
The fourth chapter begins with a solemn appeal to him to do his duty as a pastor “in season, out of season,”34 because the time would soon come when men would turn away from truth to the fantastic doctrines of teachers who would answer them according to their own lusts.
“Do thouthen be sober in all things, endure sufferings. Do the work of an evangelist, fulfil thy ministry. For I am being already poured in libation, and the time of my departure35 is close at hand. I have striven the good strife, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me in that day; and not to me only, but also to all who have loved His appearing.”36
That is practically St. Paul’s last word. The remainder of the letter is occupied with personal information, given in the natural, loose, accidental order of a letter, mingled with earnest entreaty to him that he would come at once. “Do your best to come to me quickly.” Demas, Crescens, Titus, are all absent from him; Erastus did not come with him farther than Corinth; Trophimus was taken ill at Miletus; Luke only is left. Mark is useful to him for service—perhaps because he knew Latin—and therefore Timothy is to take him up somewhere on the way, and bring him.37 Tychicus is already on the way to Ephesus,38 so that he can take Timothy’s place when he arrives. Timothy is to be on his guard against the pronounced hostility of Alexander the coppersmith. Then follows the touching allusion to his first trial and deliverance, on which we have already dwelt. Greetings are sent to Prisca, Aquila, and the house of Onesiphorus. Once more, “Do your best to come before winter;”—if he comes after that time he may be too late. “Eubulus greets thee, and Pudens, and Linus, and Claudia, and all the brethren.The Lord Jesus Christ be with thy spirit. Grace be with you.”39
I have purposely omitted the one simple, touching message, introduced so incidentally, and with such inimitable naturalness. “When you come, bring with you the cloak that I left at Troas, at Carpus’ house, and the books, especially the parchments.”40 The verse has been criticised as trivial, as unworthy the dignity of inspiration. But men must take their notions of inspiration from facts, and not try to square the facts to their own theories. Even on these grounds the verse has its own value for all who would not obscure divine inspiration, nor obliterate the true meaning and sacredness of Scripture by substituting a dictated infallibility for the free play of human emotions in souls deeply stirred by the Holy Spirit of God. But even on other grounds how little could we spare this verse! What a light does it throw on the last sad days of the persecuted Apostle! The fact that these necessary possessions—perhaps the whole that the Apostle could call his own in this world—had been left at the house of Carpus, may, as we have seen, indicate his sudden arrest, either at Troas or on his way to it. A prisoner who is being hurried from place to place by unsympathising keepers is little able to look after his property. But now the Apostle is settled again, though his home is but a prison, and he feels that it will be his home for life. Winter is coming on, and winter in a Roman prison, as he knows by experience, may be very cold. He wants to get back his rough travelling cloak. It was one of those large sleeveless garments which we should call an “overall” or “dreadnought.” Perhaps St. Paul had woven it himself of the black goat’s hair of his native province. And, doubtless—for he was a poor man—it was an old companion—wetted many a time in the water–torrents of Asia, whitened with the dust of Roman roads, stained with the brine of shipwreck when Euroaquilo was driving the Adriatic into foam. He may have slept in its warm shelter on the chill Phrygian uplands, under the canopy of stars, or it may have covered his bruised and trembling limbs in the dungeon of Philippi. It is of little value; but now that the old man sits shivering in some gloomy cell under the palace or on the rocky floor of the Tullianum, and the winter nights are coming on, he bethinks him of the old cloak in the house of Carpus, and asks Timothy to bring it with him. “The cloke that I left at Troas with Carpus, bring with thee.” “And the books, but especially the parchments.”41 The biblia—the papyrus books—few we may be sure, but old friends. Perhaps he had bought them when he was a student in the school of Gamaliel at Jerusalem; or they may have been given him by his wealthier converts.42 The papyrus books, then, let Timothy bring, but especially the parchments—the vellum rolls. What were these? Perhaps among them was the diplomaof his Roman franchise; or were they precious rolls of Isaiah and the Psalms, and the lesser Prophets, which father or mother had given him as a life–long treasure in the far–off happy days when, little dreaming of all that would befall him, he played, a happy boy, in the dear old Tarsian home? Dreary and long are the days—the evenings longer and drearier still—in that Roman dungeon; and it will be a deep joy to read once more how David and Isaiah, in theirdeep troubles, learnt, as hehad learnt, to suffer and be strong. A simple message, then, about an old cloak and some books, but very touching. They may add a little comfort, a little relief, to the long–drawn tedium of these last dreary days. Perhaps he thinks that he would like to give them, as his parting bequest, to Timothy himself, or to the modest and faithful Luke, that their true hearts may remember him when the sea of life flows smooth once more over the nameless grave. It would be like that sheepskin cloak which centuries afterwards the hermit Anthony bequeathed to the Archbishop Athanasius—a small gift, but all he had. Poor inventory of a saint’s possessions! not worth a hundredth part of what a buffoon would get for one jest in Cæsar’s palace, or an acrobat for a feat in the amphitheatre; but would he have exchanged them for the jewels of the adventurer Agrippa, or the purple of the unspeakable Nero? No, he is much more than content. His soul is joyful in God. If he has the cloak to keep him warm, and the books and parchments to teach and encourage him, and Mark to help him in various ways, and if, above all, Timothy will come himself, then life will have shed on him its last rays of sunshine; and in lesser things, as well as in all greater, he will wait with thankfulness, even with exultation, the pouring out in libation of those last few drops of his heart’s blood, of which the rich full stream has for these long years been flowing forth upon God’s altar in willing sacrifice.43
But there are no complaints, no murmurs—there is nothing querulous or depressed in these last words of St. Paul. If the Pastoral Epistles, and above all this one, were not genuine, they must have been written by one who not only possessed the most perfect literary skill, but who had also entered with consummate insight into the character and heart of Paul;—of Paul, but not of ordinary men, even of ordinary great men. The characteristic of waning life is disenchantment, a sense of inexorable weariness, a sense of inevitable disappointment. We trace it in Elijah and John the Baptist; we trace it in Marcus Aurelius; we trace it in Francis of Assisi; we trace it in Roger Bacon; we trace it in Luther. All is vain! We have lived, humanly speaking, to little or no purpose. “We are not better than our fathers.” “Art thou He that should come, or do we look for another?” “I shall die, and people will say, ‘We are glad to get rid of this schoolmaster.’” “My order is more than I can manage.” “Men are not worth the trouble I have taken for them.” “We must take men as we find them, and cannot change their nature.” To some such effect have all these great men, and many others, spoken. They have been utterly disillusioned; they have been inclined rather to check the zeal, to curb the enthusiasm, to darken with the shadows of experience the radiant hopes of their younger followers. If in any man such a sense of disappointment—such a conviction that life is too hard for us, and that we cannot shake off the crushing weight of its destinies—could have ever been excusable, it would have been so in St. Paul. What visible success had he achieved?—the founding of a few Churches of which the majority were already cold to him; in which he saw his efforts being slowly undermined by heretical teachers; which were being subjected to the fiery ordeal of terrible persecutions. To the faith of Christ he saw that the world was utterly hostile. It was arraying against the Cross all its intellect and all its power. The Christ returned not; and what could His doves do among serpents, His sheep among wolves? The very name “Christian” had now come to be regarded as synonymous with criminal; and Jew and Pagan—like “water with fire in ruin reconciled,” amid some great storm—were united in common hostility to the truths he preached. And what had he personally gained? Wealth?—He is absolutely dependent on the chance gifts of others. Power?—At his worst need there had not been one friend to stand by his side. Love?—He had learnt by bitter experience how few there were who were not ashamed even to own him in his misery. And now after all—after all that he had suffered, after all that he had done—what was his condition? He was a lonely prisoner, awaiting a malefactor’s end. What was the sum–total of earthly goods that the long disease, and the long labour of his life, had brought him in? An old cloak and some books. And yet in what spirit does he write to Timothy? Does he complain of his hardships? Does he regret his life? Does he damp the courage of his younger friend by telling him that almost every earthly hope is doomed to failure, and that to struggle against human wickedness is a fruitless fight? Not so. His last letter is far more of a paeanthan a miserere. For himself the battle is over, the race run, the treasure safely guarded. The day’s work in the Master’s vineyard is well–nigh over now. When it is quite finished, when he has entered the Master’s presence, then and there—not here or now—shall he receive the crown of righteousness and the unspeakable reward. And so his letter to Timothy is all joy and encouragement, even in the midst of natural sadness. It is the young man’s heart, not the old man’s, that has failed. It is Timotheus, not Paul, who is in danger of yielding to languor and timidity, and forgetting that the Spirit which God gave was one not of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. “Bear, then, afflictions with me. Be strong in the grace of Jesus Christ. Fan up the flame in those whitening embers of zeal and courage. Be a good soldier, a true athlete, a diligent toiler. Do you think of my chains and of my hardships? They are nothing, not worth a word or a thought. Be brave. Be not ashamed. We are weak, and may be defeated; but nevertheless God’s foundation–stone stands sure with the double legend upon it—one of comfort, one of exhortation. Be thou strong and faithful, my son Timothy, even unto death.” So does he hand to the dear but timid racer the torch of truth which in his own grasp, through the long torch–race of his life, no cowardice had hidden, no carelessness had dimmed, no storm had quenched. “Glorious Apostle! would that every leader’s voice could burst, as he falls, into such a trumpet–sound, thrilling the young hearts that pant in the good fight, and must never despair of final victory.”44 Yes, even so:
“Hopes have precarious life;
They are oft blighted, withered, snapped sheer off
In vigorous youth, and turned to rottenness;
Butfaithfulnesscanfeedonsuffering,
Andknowsnodisappointment.”45