Thoughts on 2 Timothy: Power and Love
First, let me apologize for the long introduction that follows. The length is necessary, as I hope you will see. Much is going on in Paul's last letter before his death—and all that is said there is easy to miss.
That would be a pity because Paul's swan song is as salient today as it was when Timothy first received the letter. While we may not have the swell of emotion that these words must have surely produced in Timothy, we would do well to pay as careful attention to the front, and back, and everything in between, to what is both a "goodbye, my child" and a "sally forth, once more, into the breach."
By way of introduction then, I want to first present the soil these words have grown in. Paul’s words in this letter don't stand naked; they are not esoterica nor are they some manageable form of pragmatic wisdom. And least of all are they a crass, albeit religiously oriented, emotional appeal to “win, win, win; fight, fight, fight.” No, the letter is none of this. We must therefore understand the soil to understand the plants.
Paul makes much of "I am a herald, gospel, and teacher" of this, I am suffering for this, and I am a prisoner for this. What is the “this” he talking about? It's most certainly not enough to answer back with the "gospel." Words must mean something, and they can only maintain their true meaning if they are rightly rooted.
Bearing in mind, there is no gospel without the Messiah; and to put a finer point on it, he is the good news; how did Paul frame the gospel in the letter? Since we are third parties to the letter, and lack the intimacy between father and son, we have to dig a little deeper than Timothy did. To do that, let's focus on his presentation of Jesus Christ.
1.1 Jesus Christ has special messengers. He is the Messiah
1:1 In him is the promise of life
1:9 In him are God's grace and purpose, and they were in him before the world began
1:13 In him are the faith and love
2:1 In him is grace
2:10 In him is salvation with eternal glory.
1:2 He is Lord and as Lord, he:
1:8 has a testimony
1:16, 18 is merciful
2:7 gives understanding of truth in application
2:19 knows whose are his
2:19, 22 has a name we can call upon
2:24 has servants of a certain disposition
3:11 rescues
4:8 is the Righteous Judge
rewards us with righteousness
4:17 will stand by you and strengthen you in times of trouble
4:22 is with our spirits (sorry, can’t get these tabs right)
1:2 He gives grace, peace, and mercy together with the Father
1:10 He has appeared. In that appearance, he abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
2:3 He has good soldiers
2:8 He rose from the dead
He was a descendant of David
2:11 He died, and he lives
We can die with him, and live with him
2:12 He reigns, and can deny us
2:13 He is faithful; he cannot deny himself
3:12 We can be in Christ Jesus
3:15 We can have faith in Christ Jesus
4:1 He has a presence with God; He will judge the quick and the dead; He has an appearance and a kingdom
We can talk about this briefly. Here, in Paul’s portrait, we have Christ from eternity to eternity, from faith to faith, and from glory to glory. It's wonderful, and it's all here for us to relish.
But centrally, this portrait of Jesus Christ frames the admonition, instruction, and encouragement that Paul gives, and intends Timothy to receive. Without this portrait, the letter descends into a bucking-up of a timid and meek young man. I don't think that is what the letter is about. While that thread may be in the letter, that thread could be removed and the portrait of Jesus Christ would remain.
Timothy's boldness is not being questioned here; he is not weak kneed. Rather, Paul is laying down a gauntlet, setting out a pattern for Timothy to follow; and he is making the good confession to Timothy that Jesus himself (now Christ our Lord) made before Pilate. Not a confessional for relief from guilt, but a full-on, fight-the-good-fight-of faith, declaration of power and love, as Jesus has committed to the saints to walk in obedience to.
Paul is not accusing Timothy of a spirit of cowardice. He is rebutting the supposed and apparent foolishness of the cross and weakness of a "king" put down without a fight by Rome, Herod, and the religious leaders. In sharp contrast to the fully flexed power of Rome, we as believers in Christ Jesus have instead been given authentic power and genuine love with the ability to weave those two together into a faith the world thinks is pathetic and pierced through. In light of the cross, and in light of the grace and purpose in Christ before the world began, real power, love, and self-control are needed to fall like a seed into the ground and die that the new life, the resplendent life of Christ Jesus, might burst forth from the soil of broken, and now redeemed, humanity.
In other words, all Paul is saying in a nutshell is this: be the man of God, for it takes a man to follow Christ Jesus and to live out of a different promise of life, and a different grace and purpose, than the world’s own view of power, and height, and glory.
In his last letter, while in Rome and in Roman chains, Paul is rejecting Rome in the same way Jesus did before Pilate. And he is soliciting Timothy to do the same after he is gone, because Paul has learned in his own experience that the lives of Timothy and his hearers—especially the men in whom Timothy will entrust the same message—depend upon the right manifestation of power and love.
Sorry, I have gotten carried away and I have varied wildly from my intended introduction. So, let's go on to the second part. Let me draw your attention to several words, and phrases, and verses:
For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.
I am his prisoner
He has called us to a holy calling
I am suffering as I do for my appointment as a herald, an apostle, and a rabbi of the gospel, and the fulfillment of that calling
Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.
I am suffering for the gospel, bound with chains as a criminal.
Because God's word is not bound (in profound contrast to my chains), I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory
But God's firm foundation stands, bearing this seal: “The Lord knows those who are his,” and, “Let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity.”
But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty [and opposition, and snares of the devil].
All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.
The man of God is to be complete, equipped for every good work, through diligent study and application of Scripture.
As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your service [or do your duty].
I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.
But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it.
So I was rescued . . . the Lord will rescue me . . . .
Alright then. I have selected these verses and phrases because they as a whole join Jesus's power and love (as N.T. Wright might say, kingdom and cross). Fighting the good fight, for Paul, meant his love toward God, and here live toward his Gentile neighbors (which love Paul always ascribes to God's grace and election despite his ignorance and insolence) brought real power and disciple to endure, to be poured out, to be finally complete—so that the message of this kingdom and cross of Christ Jesus might be fully proclaimed, that all Gentiles, not a few, might hear of a way to life—a promise to life, with glory—and that they might stand against the dark powers of this world, which seemed even up to the moment of Paul's death to have the upper hand.
But we in this present age are not to shrink back from being run over either. We should expect it perhaps. As all the evil was leveled against Christ, and seemed to have accomplished a great victory, a great casting off of all restraints (see Psalm 2), we too, if we follow Christ, can expect the world to laugh at our meekness, our unwillingness to strike back but to be struck instead on one cheek and then the other, to give the tunic when the cloak is stripped away, to be poor in spirit, and to be grievously at odds with the very people we love, our neighbors—all because we love him and eagerly await his appearing in glory.
Until that day, men will go from bad to worse, and glory in the shame of this world's systemic abuse of the image of God in man, and the derision the world holds for the weakling, ignoble Messiah, sweating blood in the garden, unable to heal himself before the eyes and sneers of the world, unable to descend from the cross.
And if we are to understand Paul here, we must accept what he is advocating—a lamb's life (Paul needed to be rescued from the mouth of a lion, he said), and one that was slain before the foundation of the world, like our Master's. We too out of our love for God and our neighbor will have to refrain from descending from our own cross, from shielding ourselves from our own derision, from defending against the pouring out of our souls for the hearing and salvation of many. Not in propitiation, not as substitute, not as atonement, but as a testimony, and a witness to the truth: our kingdom is not of this world; we reject the world’s power: we have him, and, in the final analysis, we want no other.
And so, like others before us (e.g., Polycarp, Lattimore/Ridley), we too must play the man and light such a candle by God's grace as I trust never shall be put out.
