We are continuing in our study of 2nd Timothy. In fact, we are getting close to the end in chapter 4 as we think about this wonderful epistle that is written in the midst of death being a certain reality for the one who is writing it, the Apostle Paul. It is his last letter that he writes, maybe a few weeks before he dies.
And as he sits in that dungeon that is filled with the stench of death, he has that sense of the reality of death and it fills his pen, it fills his spirit, but it also fills his hope, as we will see in this section that we’re looking at today in 2nd Timothy 4 and verses 6 through 8. Death is a reality that faces us, but often we’re not prepared for, isn’t it? And there was a time when a florist in the United States had a very unfortunate mix-up, usually when people buy flowers for a funeral, they go to a florist, right, and order them. And this florist, as they got two different orders from two different people, sent a bunch of flowers to a competitor who was in another building, another florist shop that had just started, and the letter read with a bunch of flowers, with our deepest sympathies. And as those people read it, they got back to the florist shop and they said, what are you sending us this for? And they said, oh no, we forgot, this was actually supposed to be sent to a funeral home, and they apologized.
But then they were even more embarrassed when they realized that the card that was supposed to be a card of congratulations for this new shop that had started had actually gone to the funeral home. And the people, as they opened up the flowers, the funeral director read the card, you know, with this beautiful bunch of flowers, there’s a dead body right there, and the card read, congratulations on your new location. And I think as we think about that, that is a humorous situation, but it actually, for the Christian, does have a sense of reality that death, even though it is filled with a sense of sadness, should actually have more of a sense of hope, because we are moving to a location that is much better than the location that we are in right now.
I think that’s the spirit that Paul had when he was just hours from his execution. He’s not bitter, and you’ve seen this throughout the expositions that we have gone through in 2 Timothy. He’s not filled with regret.
Instead, he is eager and even ready to die. We get a lot of teaching today on how to live, but today, through the Holy Spirit, we’re going to get teaching on how to die. And I think even that’s part of what it means to be a Christian that is faithful to the Lord Jesus, is that are you ready to die well for the Lord Jesus after you have lived for Him? And so with that in mind, 2 Timothy chapter 4 and verses 6 through 8 teaches us these truths of dying well.
Let’s read it together. 2 Timothy chapter 4 and verses 6 through 8. Paul says, for I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, verse 7. I have finished the course.
I have kept the faith. In the future, 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. Each verse is packed with a perspective, verse 6, verse 7, verse 8, that Paul has, that he’s been preparing for all of his life to know that this is inevitable.
It is appointed for all men to die, and then after that to face judgment. In the Lord Jesus Christ, praise God that the sting of that judgment is removed. But we all have to be ready for that moment.
Unfortunately, it may even be today for some of us. And I am not a prophet, thankfully, or the son of a prophet. Many years ago, when I was at TMU, the Master’s University, one of my professors that I worked for, Dr. Tim Turner, he was a biblical counseling professor.
He was in his mid-40s. He went to the gym every day. He was fit as a fiddle.
He had a wife and two children. And he just went out. We had finished our semester, went out to the golf course in the middle of the day to play a game of golf with one of our other professors, Stuart Scott, and he hit the ball.
And in God’s sweet providence, he had a heart attack and died immediately on the spot. Before the ambulance was even able to take him to the hospital, he went to heaven, leaving his wife and his children. Are you prepared to die? Because you think, you know, I got another 30 years, 40 years.
But today might be your last day. And so I think even these verses can become an encouragement to us to think about how will we die well so that even as we die, we would encourage those around us to live more for the Lord Jesus Christ. So there’s three perspectives, three verses, three perspectives that prepare us to die well in Christ in this passage in 2 Timothy 4, verses 6 through 8. We shouldn’t be scared about dealing with subjects like this by the grace of God.
I think the first perspective that we find in verse 6, as Paul looks at his life, he’s looking back, really, he says, I am already being poured out as a drink offering and the time of my departure has come. I think I would look at that as the first perspective. Paul doesn’t see that there is much more for him to do, but he’s looking back on his life and he’s saying, I have lived a life that has done something significant for the Lord Jesus Christ.
And there is that assurance. As you have lived as a Christian, it doesn’t matter whether you’ve lived as a Christian for a few years or for maybe 20, 30 years, every minute that you’ve lived through Jesus Christ has been useful for the kingdom of God. And you can look back at that and you can rest in that.
And so the first perspective that Paul teaches us as a Christian is, again, because of the grace of God, not because of our own merit, but because he saved us and gave us a purpose to live for him, we can rest in a life that is well-lived as believers. We can rest in a life that is well-lived for Jesus Christ. Now, how can we rest in a life that is well-lived? I think Paul gives us two clues that can help us to rest in a life that is well-lived.
Instead of being disturbed, oh, I wish I had done this and I wish I had done that. You know what? If you didn’t do it, it wasn’t part of God’s sovereignty. Don’t worry about the things that you didn’t do and rest in even the few things that God allowed you to do and give him praise and glory for that.
I think Paul gives us two clues or ways to rest in a life that is well-lived in terms of his attitude. The first thing that he shows us, he says, I am already being poured out. The idea there is even a passive, that is that I didn’t even do it.
This is the grace of God. That my life was a offering of being poured out for Jesus. That my life was useful to somebody so that they would know the gospel, so that they would know the word of God.
All of these things were a passive work that Jesus did through me because of his grace. He gave me gifts. He gave me usefulness and I just rested.
And I rest in the fact that my life is offered to Christ as a sacrifice. Now, I want to point out to you a contrast that’s very important. It may have been, I think, a month ago or a few weeks ago that you looked at the previous verse, which is an address to Timothy, right? You, verse 5, be sober in all things.
End your hardship. Do the work of an evangelist. Fulfill your ministry.
And the subject in that verse is you. And then you see the hinge in verse 6, for the reason why, you know, you, Timothy, can be faithful is because this hinge, I, he changes the subject now to I. I have already been poured out. In other words, the move and the shift from Paul exhorting Timothy to now thinking about his own life is, you know, I finished my work.
I’ve handed the baton to you. And I praise the Lord that even though I die, the work of the Lord doesn’t die. I die.
I move away. I have done what I can do in some limited way. And other faithful men are going to take it because at the end of the day, we go to the grave, but God’s work doesn’t go to the grave.
And so I think this perspective even of Paul saying, for I am already poured out, it’s really meant as a rest because he knows that he, in being poured out, can come to an end because the work is going to continue with faithful men like Timothy. Let me put it in this way. I think Paul rests in a life well lived because he has an assurance that God’s work will continue.
The work that he did will continue through Timothy. In fact, maybe the idea, even as he starts off, verse 6, is an incidental exhortation to Timothy. Timothy, you preach the word even in the face of opposition.
When it is popular, when it is not popular, because I am about to die, I’m handing you the torch to carry on. And with that, I can die well, right? One of the key things in dying well is to make sure that even while you’re living, you’re getting ready to hand over the work of Christ to other men and to other women. I think we don’t die well when we’ve clutched onto everything as just sort of our work, our ministry.
If I die, the ministry dies. You know, if you develop a ministry like that, it will create a lot of discomfort in your last dying breaths because you’ll have just this panic attack almost. Because in some senses, it isn’t Christ’s ministry, but it’s your ministry.
But when you have been handing it over to other faithful men, as Paul, even in this letter, basically, one reason why he’s writing this letter is, Timothy, please be faithful because I’m going away. But as he gets to the end of the letter, even he has this assurance, Timothy, I know you will be faithful because you are under God’s grip and I can die. I can die knowing that there are other men doing the work that is Jesus’s work.
It was never Paul’s work to begin with. I have this assurance. So he has an assurance that God’s work will continue because he’s handed it over to men like Timothy.
Even today, I know you’re studying at PTS, but who are you thinking about, even as the next generation, even before you plant the church, as you go into ministry to say, I don’t want this work to just be the work of one man, but I want this work to be the work of many men. Because who knows when we might die? Who knows when we might be disqualified? God’s work must continue because there are many hands in the world. And with that, we can we can fade into the distance, even into death with a sense of a smile on your face.
This is what led men like Martin Luther and John Calvin to die well, because they had discipled, I think Martin Luther in his life, he had discipled, estimates say something like a thousand plus men. John Calvin had established and trained so many men that went into England, into the rest of Europe, like John Haas and John Knox that impacted the rest of the world that numbers are not known even as to how many men he influenced. And they died well because they planted so many seeds of ministerial fires all over the place that it was very clear that it was not Luther, it was not Calvin, it was Christ.
To finish well, to finish with a sense of rest, you must hand over the ministry constantly to others. There must always be another junior person that you’re saying, let me teach you how to lead. Let me teach you how to sing.
Let me teach you how to preach. Whatever it is, small things, let me teach you how to disciple so that it’s never me and me alone as a one man show. Well, Paul says, I’m already being poured out and I can, I can do that because I know you will do the work of the ministry.
But then he goes on to give this idea as a drink offering. And these are sort of mysterious words at first to us because we’re not Israelis, we’re not Jewish people, we don’t have any heritage in what Paul is talking about. So we have to think a little bit about why Paul would say that the being poured out in death is as a drink offer.
What picture is he thinking of? And it’s a picture that he’s pulling from Leviticus and Numbers, for instance, just one reference, Numbers chapter 28, verses seven through eight, as the priest is being given instructions to have the sacrifice and the main sacrifice as well, an ox or a lamb that is representative of Jesus, isn’t it? As we look at the whole story of the Bible. And so as this sacrifice is being given to the Lord as the only means through which we can have a relationship with God. At the end, they take about four liters of the most expensive wine, Numbers chapter 28, verses seven and eight.
And then as this meat is just cooking and steaming with heat and fire, they pour that wine over the meat. I don’t know if you’ve ever done a barbecue and you pour marinade over the meat and immediately all the smoke and essence starts going all over the compound, right? And that’s what happened. And the main sacrifice is still the main sacrifice.
But on top, sort of like icing on the cake, is poured this drink offering of expensive wine, a huge quantity. And that is called in Numbers chapter 28 and verse eight, a soothing aroma to the Lord. It’s a final sacrifice that’s poured on the already existing sacrifice.
It’s not the main sacrifice, but it’s just something that goes alongside the main sacrifice. You get the picture, the illustration that Paul is saying? Paul is saying, who’s the main person that we give all glory to in terms of what happens in ministry? The Lord Jesus who sacrificed himself and built the church based on his death, life and resurrection. We don’t give the glory of Paul.
But on the top of that, sort of as a small little thing, I am being poured out on top of what Jesus has done, you know, and already established. I am being poured out and by the mercy of God, even that is a pleasing smell to the Lord. It’s a pleasing smell to the Lord as I die.
My martyrdom is, he’s saying as I die, he looks at his death, even as a martyr with his head going to be chopped off. I don’t know if he knew exactly how he was going to die, but he probably knew that it was going to be some horrible thing, but he didn’t look at it and say, I’m scared. He looked at it and said, this is going to be a soothing aroma.
When I die, Jesus is going to be smiling. It’s going to be pleasing to the Lord. Here’s a man that was willing to give his life for the church in a small way.
Ultimately, Jesus gave his life for the church, but in a small way, he also gave his life for the church. Philippians chapter two, verse 17, even speaks about this. Even if I am being poured out, Paul uses this quite a bit, this analogy of a drink offering.
Even if I’m being poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice. He doesn’t look at it as something to be scared by. He looks at it as something to rejoice in, that what I do in martyrdom is just a small picture of what Jesus did for his church.
And the key people that are useful in the church are people like Jesus that say, we will give our lives away so that others may grow. Those are the kinds of people that are useful to God. People that give their lives away as drink offerings.
People that are willing to say, there is nothing that I will not hold back, ultimately, even my own life, so that I may show a little bit of love for the church in light of the great love that Jesus has shown for his church. You know, to finish well, I think one of the first things you must see as you’re thinking about the work that you do for the Lord, you must hand over your work to other men. But to finish well, as you do your work also, you must see yourself as expendable for God.
I think that’s what Paul is saying. That all that I am, I want to offer everything to the Lord Jesus Christ, even to the point of dying, because God loves men that give their lives for him. Do you see ministry as just a part-time responsibility? Just something that you’ll do for a few hours? I think this is what the weakness in the church today is.
Even among us conservatives. And then you see that the rest of it is just an opportunity to just rest and enjoy yourself. Well, if you have that attitude, you don’t have a Christ-like attitude.
That’s what Paul is saying. And if you give sort of the least of your life to the Lord and keep the best for all the fun that you can have in life, you might have a good life here, but you’ll have a horrible death. You’ll have a lot of regrets when you’re dying.
Paul said, you know, I’m like the most expensive wine, the best part of my time, the best part of my brain, the best part of my joys, the best part of all that my gifts are. I don’t use it for secular things. I use it for Jesus Christ.
You know, people, when they saw the wine being poured on that on that lamb, some unbelievers, if they were there, you know, in a Jewish ceremony, you guys are wasting that wine. We could have had a party with it, you know. And Paul is saying, absolutely, I want to give the best to the Lord and give it all to the Lord.
That’s how I see my life, and that’s what helps me to finish well. So finish well in being assured that you have done God’s work and you have given yourself to the Lord. I think another thing that Paul speaks about in terms of finishing well is not just an assurance that God’s work is done and will continue, but also you look at the end of verse six, the time of my departure has come.
The time of my departure has come. When you read those words in the English, maybe it seems a little negative, but there’s actually even here a sense of delight in Paul’s heart. And I would put it in this way.
He has an expectation of a better home. Whatever miseries you’ve had here, whatever comforts you’ve had here, nothing compares to what you’re going to experience the moment you die. We just experienced Agnello’s funeral and something that I was reflecting upon with Moi and just talking with her and she echoed the same words with me is, you know, while we’re sad, we must also be jealous because he’s way happier than we are.
And that’s that’s reality, isn’t it? I don’t think there’s any good thing that we can experience in this life that can be compared to being absent from the body and being present with the Lord. And all those glories that go with that, serving him in a perfect way forever and ever in his presence. And so Paul speaks of it, the time of my departure has come.
Don’t look at this negatively, but look at this as positively. And he even speaks of it in a perfect tense in the sense that, you know, it’s kind of accomplished. I’m just waiting for the last few things to happen for my departure.
This word for departure is a Greek phrase that if you look at Robertson’s word pictures and sometimes when you do word studies, you don’t get anything. But when you look at this word, and I think Paul purposely chose this word, it’s got all kinds of pictures that are associated with it that show you the sense of expectation and eagerness that Paul has to go home. You know, the first idea that you see as this word is used in Greek usage, because all these Greek words are koine, used in common life, right? Is it was used of the idea of unyoking an animal from a plow or from a cart.
Maybe this animal has served faithfully plowing the farmer’s land and now it’s getting a little old and he just says, okay, now last few days of its life, I just want to release it so it can enjoy itself. So you’re unyoking this bull, you know, Paul is seeing himself in that way from his daily duties and saying, okay, you can retire. And so death for Paul, departure is seen with this picture of being freed from all the burdens that life has today and going into a life that has no burdens anymore.
Even if there’s work in heaven, it’s without sweat, it’s without struggle, it’s without toil. And Paul is saying, I’m looking forward to, there’s going to be no pain, there’s going to be no agony in the presence of Jesus Christ. You know, this word for, again, departure is also used in Greek secular literature for loosening the bonds of a prison, prisoner that’s been in chains.
And in those prisons, in those days, I don’t know, you know, they didn’t have things like handcuffs and things like that. They would build these wooden stalls and sometimes both the legs and the hands were just kind of stretched out and tied in there. Can you imagine for hours and hours every day, maybe just being free to go to the bathroom occasionally.
And Paul was going through that at this moment, being chained, being bound, you know, being restricted. Maybe there were sores on his hands and his feet. So even physically, he has this expectation that I’m going to be freed.
But I think there’s more of the spiritual idea that when I die, I’m going to be freed from a corruptible body and a limited body. I’m going to have a resurrection state where I can move from one place to the other like Jesus, you know, just in a moment because our bodies are going to be made like him. And I’m going to be freed from cancer and I’m going to be freed from common colds and I’m going to be freed from a sore throat.
And all the crazy burdens that we have of corruption that are on this earth, it’s all gone. That’s what Paul is saying. The time for my departure has come.
I think another picture, like I told you, I think Paul purposely chose this word so that we would think about these pictures. These were pictures that people used in his day and age is of a ship, you know, being cut loose from the dock. You know, ships are tied to the dock because as the ocean waves go, if you just let a ship roam around, it’ll just go off, lost in the ocean.
But here’s the idea, before a ship departs, they cut, sometimes if it’s a big ship, there’s these, have you seen the ropes they use? These thick five or six ropes tied to these tiers on the pier and they’ll cut them or they break them loose so that the ship can depart. And Paul seeing himself as in death, our earthly ship is leaving the shores of the storms of Earth and it’s going to go to the next destination, which is not America, but it’s heaven where there are no storms anymore. Have you considered your own departure? Do you think, you know, Jonathan Edwards used to say that one of the things he resolved, have you heard of the resolutions of Jonathan Edwards? He had, I think, over a hundred resolutions, but one of his resolutions that he made when he was about 19, 20 years old is to think upon my death every day, every day, to think upon it and say, what a weird guy you are.
Now, actually, if you’re a Christian, that’s healthy because it will give you that sense of homesickness, even as you’re doing the work here. That’s the way Paul lived so that when he was actually dying, he didn’t say, oh, this is a surprise. I don’t know what I’m going to do.
He said, I’ve been thinking about this for 40 years now. Praise the Lord, it’s here. You know, that’s, that’s the way, like, this is actually what my life is all about.
Everything else that I did was just preparation for this eternity with Jesus forever and ever. And so I hope you’re thinking about that. In a sense, you know, actually, it’s funny.
I don’t know if you’ve thought about as a pastor having to preach a funeral sermon. Maybe Timothy had to preach Paul’s memorial service. I don’t know, but he didn’t have to actually prepare a sermon because Paul already preached his own funeral sermon in these verses.
Timothy would just say, let me read what Paul said himself about his own funeral, that he didn’t die unhappy and saying, oh, no, I have regrets. But he said, whatever I did for Jesus, that was his sovereignty, pleasure. I was like a drink offering, and I’m so happy that I can pass it on to Timothy now.
And I’m ready to go home because home is so much better than anything that I had here on this earth. I’m ready. I’m ready.
It’s great to see the Apostle Paul, this kind of a rest, right? Resting in a life well lived is the first perspective that can prepare us to die well. Well, the second perspective is, again, Paul looking back in verse seven, but not looking back at necessarily his preparation for death, but looking back at the ministry that he had. Look at verse seven.
I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course and I have kept the faith. And so we can say the second perspective is this.
First perspective is resting in a ministry well done. The second perspective is remembering the good fight. And there are three arenas that he speaks of about the fight of life for Jesus Christ.
I love the fact that he refers to life for Jesus Christ as not a picnic, but as a fight. I think sometimes we have the wrong perspective, even though we’re not health, wealth, prosperity gospel preachers, that somehow there’s some, you know, ease and comfort in the Christian life. And I want to tell you again, and Paul will tell you again, that the Christian life is not a picnic on the beach in Goa, but the Christian life is a wrestling match.
It’s a wrestling match. And he uses three arenas here. He says, I’ve fought the good fight, arena one.
I finished the course, arena two. And I’ve kept the faith. I’ve kept the faith.
I think we can divide these into three reflections that Paul has as he looks back on the good fight, that he had a good fight in life, in his own personal life. I have fought, agonizomai, right? Which is, again, this word that is used only in athletics of the kind of strain that you have where you almost die as you’re seeking to represent that sport for your country. And it conveys, again, the struggle against the forces of evil that we have, first of all, in our own personal lives.
Christianity is a fight. It’s an agony. You remember Paul even saying, I strive not beating the air, but, you know, beating against struggles that I have so that lest I preach to others, I may not be disqualified.
And and so there is a sense, first of all, that Paul says that I was fighting every day for my own sanctification, especially in a fallen world. So important that you think about your fight first as a personal fight before it’s fighting for doctrine, fighting for other people. You know, sometimes even you can get prideful thinking about all the things I’m doing for other people and you lose your own sanctification.
So the first place that you must fight is not with work and with ministry. Those things are secondary. But the first place that you must fight is for your own holiness.
For your own walk with God so that you would not be disqualified, that you would have that fear every day. I think this is what enables Paul to die well, is he says that every day I was fighting for my own heart. He told Timothy the same thing, right? He said, Timothy, this is so important.
This is the secret to ministry. Secret to ministry is not be a guru in Greek, really know your cow perfect verbs in Hebrew or whatever. Those things have their place.
But the secret to ministry, First Timothy 4.16, pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching. Persevere in these things. For as you do this, you will ensure salvation.
Now that’s quite a bold statement. Let me read it again. If you fight for your own holiness and you stand with that sense of personal godliness in the pulpit, you will become a platform that will cause salvation through Jesus Christ for many people.
I could put it in another way that you will actually cause many young people to stumble if you’re a hypocrite. This is kind of the heartbeat and the secret of the ministry. Both for yourself, you will ensure salvation and for those who hear you.
So the first fight that we must fight is for our own souls. What are you doing right now? You know, I know each one of us have our own struggles. But what are you doing right now to kill sin before it kills you? To read books besides the Bible like J.C. Ryle on holiness.
Have you heard of him? I’m just giving you some examples of men that know how to fight the fight. John Owen, mortification of sin. Thomas Watson, the doctrine of repentance.
Well, I could go on and on, but start with one at least. Find one warrior like Paul who has been fighting the fight. I mean, all good godly pastors from the past will tell you the key issue is your personal holiness.
I remember Robert Murray McChain. You’ve heard of him, the Scottish pastor. He made this great statement.
He said, it is not great gifts that God blesses. But a godly man is an awful weapon in the hands of the living God. As he was thinking about training pastors.
Think about that as you think about your effectiveness in ministry and dying well. You will die well when you say, Lord, I fought the good fight. I fought the good fight first for my own soul.
Then he goes on to say a second arena. Not just it’s a good fight in life, but it’s a good fight. He says, I have finished the course.
And I think here he’s talking about in ministry. The word for finishing the course, Paul speaks about this long distance kind of track that is usually used in a marathon. I don’t know if any of you have ever run marathons.
They’re killing, right? But do you know the origin of the marathon that probably even Paul knew? It comes from 490 BC when the Persians had a battle with the Greeks. And in that battle with the Greeks, one of the crucial issues was the Greeks were fighting this battle in a city called Marathon. That’s where the name comes from.
And they wanted to get reinforcements from Athens, which was the capital of Greece. The distance between Marathon and Athens as the Greeks were fighting against the Persians. And this, by the way, in fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy became the landmark battle 490 BC where Greek became the replacement of Persia as the rulers of the world.
But one of the key things that happened was they sent one boy as a runner from Marathon to Athens to call for reinforcements. And he ran with all his might knowing that his whole army was dependent upon him 25 miles. They said he ran so fast and he ran so earnestly without stopping that he reached Athens.
He told them send soldiers to help them. The battle was won and the next few minutes he died because he had overexerted himself. And ever since then, they have named the games in the Olympics where they run 25 miles.
Today it’s 26 miles. The marathon games after that guy who gave his life for Greek victory. And that’s the picture that Paul was using.
He’s saying, I have run the marathon. You know, I just run the marathon. I didn’t give up halfway.
I finished the marathon. And that’s why I’m dying right now. Like that young boy.
I’m dying right now because I ran really hard. I gave myself out in ministry. Paul spoke about this even to the Ephesian church.
I think with every church that Paul ministered with whether it’s three years, four years, he gave his whole heart and soul to them. Now, of course, he could do this because he was a single guy and he was not married. But even so, I think he stands out as an example to all of us.
In Acts 20, 24, when he’s saying goodbye, you remember to the Ephesian church? He says this about the way he served them. He says, I did not consider my life of any account to myself. I ran so hard that I stressed myself out, he said.
In order that I might finish my course. He uses the same language. I see ministry as kind of, I don’t want to just start things.
I want to finish them. You know, young men are very good at starting things. They’re not good at finishing things.
We’re good at short distance, 50 meters. We’re not good at marathons. Marathons take a lot more out of you in terms of discipline, consistency, accountability, planning, working in a team, all of those things.
Paul did all of those things to the point of exhaustion. The writer of Hebrews even teaches us that we can’t do this, Hebrews 12, 1, unless we lay aside the sin that easily entangles and fix our eyes on Jesus. So that we may run the race for Him.
Brothers, ministry, as you’re getting into it, PTS, three years is like the short distance. I know it’s tough, but it’s just a 50-minute sprint. What you’re going to experience later is the marathon.
Are you preparing yourself for that marathon? To run it well? And the only way that you can run it well is, again, if you look at examples like Paul. Look at examples like Spurgeon. Read letters to my students.
Have you spent time with pastors that have run the marathon and just said, what are the things that you guys have done that have enabled you not to just start, but to finish? You know? I would say you should never graduate from PTS without reading lectures to my students. A modern version of that is John Piper’s book, Brothers, We Are Not Professionals. How to Run the Marathon.
He’s saying, brothers, we’re not CEOs, professionals looking for lives of ease. We are marathon runners. Let us finish the course for the Lord Jesus Christ.
So Paul says, I fought the fight in life for my personal holiness. I fought the life fight in ministry. But then he ends with this very personal interesting thing, right? He says, in all those arenas, I have kept the faith.
Who does that remind you of? Reminds us of Jude, isn’t it? As he was writing to the New Testament Christians and he said, I wanted to write about something else. But then when I saw the false teaching that was coming in, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing Jude 1, 3, that you contend earnestly for the faith, which was once for all delivered to the saints. So what’s Paul talking about here? He’s not talking about faith as just an attitude that we have of trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
But when he’s talking about keeping the faith, he’s talking about what? The body of sound doctrine. That’s the third fight that we have. We have a fight for our own sanctification.
We have a fight for the church, for ministry. But we also have a fight for doctrine. I think one of the key examples of this, and I know you’ve read his books, and some of you are here because of Pastor John MacArthur.
And he even says, I don’t want to be a fighter. But just as I teach through the word, God puts me into battles, you know, with false teaching. And it’s just part of being a teacher of the word of God.
Is you got to fight for sound doctrine. And you men know this. That there is very little sound doctrine in the church.
And you are going to create a lot of enemies. By teaching sound doctrine. Paul says, my whole life was a fight for keeping the truth.
Several times in these letters to Timothy, even he says, Timothy, you got to guard this deposit. That the world and even false teachers in the church are going to try to attack. 1 Timothy 6.20 O Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you.
Avoid worldly and empty chatter and the opposing arguments of what is falsely called knowledge. And dedicate yourself to fighting for the truth. Fighting for the core doctrines of the Christian faith.
You know, today if I meet you randomly in Mopsa Market or even somewhere on the streets of Porvaram. And I just say, tell me what justification by faith is. Without a Bible, can you defend it? That’s one of the most important things that our ministry and our life and our teaching is based on.
And I’m not trying to put you on the spot. But I’m saying you as the men that are the watchmen, the guardians. Do you know if somebody asks you, what’s the trinity and why is it important? Can you immediately defend these core doctrines? Do you know how to guard the deposit that was given to us through the scriptures? Or is it, hang on a second, I got to go back and look at my Logos software and you know this and that.
That’s not enough. You’re not strong enough to be a soldier of the cross. If you don’t know how to fundamentally, I’m not talking about complex things.
I’m talking about the basics. The deity of Christ. Or let’s talk about even the gospel.
If I ask you, can you just right now, stand up, I’m done. Give the gospel to us. Five minutes, that’s all you have.
And you don’t have a Bible, you know. You just have your head and your memory. I hope and I believe most of you can do that.
But I’m saying we should be able to do that with all. Right now even, would you create a list of, as you’re thinking about your ministry and going home, what are the attacks that the enemy has had against maybe the people that are in my region? Because the enemy has different strategies, right? Sometimes he attacks us in the gospel. Sometimes he attacks us in terms of the deity of Christ.
Sometimes he attacks us maybe in terms of spiritual gifts or the sufficiency of scripture or different things or women in leadership. All of these are gospel issues. Don’t make them just practical issues.
And would you think about, Lord, right now, I wanna memorize some verses and I wanna know how if anybody catches me in the middle of the night at 4 a.m. and they ask me, can you defend this truth without thinking, I just have it in my head so that I can protect what you have given for the church. That’s your job discourse, brothers. Defend the truth, defend the truth.
MacArthur is going like Paul, you know, way to glory. I was sitting with Nathan Busenitz and I was saying, after R.C. Sproul’s funeral, I said, this is like the changing of the guard, isn’t it? One warrior has gone to heaven. Now, when you study the recent church history, you can see these guys fought for a lot of key important things.
Go back to the fight for the inerrancy of scripture. R.C. Sproul was there in that debate. John MacArthur became friends with him there.
Go to the fight for the lordship salvation controversy. MacArthur began that fight and then Sproul and Boyce and others and even Piper later on joined him. And now, I was talking to Nathan.
I said, when MacArthur dies, who’s gonna be the next warrior? Are we gonna be left orphaned? You know, I was just chatting with him. He said, Sammy, I don’t know, but I know that Jesus will raise warriors and we don’t have to worry. But I’m looking at this room and I’m hoping that some warriors for even the fight.
And I’m not asking you to become Martin Luther and become big shots and famous. Even Martin Luther didn’t want to become a big shot. But to just become a small warrior in your area for the Lord Jesus Christ and make sure that there is a fortress for the word of God in Nepal or in North India or in South India, wherever God is sending you, that you are called to be a man who keeps the truth.
Who keeps the truth. That’s what Paul did. That’s what every man who is called to ministry does.
We are fighters. Not because we like to fight, but because we love Jesus. Because we love Jesus.
And as Paul thought about the good fight that he had fought and he’s coming to a close of his fight, he says, just remembering the fight makes me say hallelujah. Jesus, thank you for allowing me to fight a good fight. And there’s that sense of accomplishment.
Even as he was going to heaven. So he was able to die well, first of all, because he rested in a life well lived. He was able to die well, verse 7, because he remembered the good fight.
And then finally, we’ve seen hints of this already, but he really emphasizes this in verse 8. What’s he thinking about in verse 8? He’s thinking about heaven. He’s thinking about heaven. And I think every funeral sermon, the conclusion should be heaven.
And this is the way Paul ends his funeral sermon. He says, I am ready to die well because I’m not walking. I’m not crawling.
I am running towards heaven. I am running towards heaven with every fiber of my being because everything that I long for is in heaven. He says, in the future, there’s laid out for me the crown of righteousness.
I’m going to see the Lord, the righteous judge. I’m going to receive reward on that day. And I’m going to be a representative of not just a reward for me, but the reward that Jesus is going to give to all who love his appearing.
So you can see that sense of just ending enthusiasm even in his last words in verse 8. The third way in which Paul has a perspective that prepares himself to die is that he’s running towards heaven. Why? Because it is certain. It is certain.
He says, in the future, literally in the Greek, in the remaining part of my life, which is so much more than this life. This life is a vapor. The remaining part of my life is eternal.
In the remaining part of my life, there is laid up for me, again, in a passive sense, stored up by God, stored up by Christ. That’s why it’s certain. The future is not based on me.
The future is based on Jesus who promised, I am preparing a… My father’s house, there are many rooms. I am going there to prepare a home for you. Isn’t that amazing? I don’t know if I ever shared with you, and I don’t think this is really accurate, but it’s fun nonetheless that Keith Green, who was a great singer from previous years, he made this statement.
He said, if God created this world in six days and it’s beautiful, can you imagine what our home that he’s been preparing for 2,000 years looks like? And I think, I don’t know whether that’s totally accurate, but I think there’s a sense of, yes, there is no way that any beautiful waterfall, or mountain, or Himalayan peak, which is beautiful, that God created in an instant, is going to compare to the home that He has prepared for you and me. I think revelation is just kind of analogies and figures because John was just so floored by what he saw that he couldn’t even describe it. He had to use all kinds of diamonds, precious stones.
He was just using human language, but it’s going to be better than even what John said. Paul said, it’s stored up for me. It’s stored up for me.
My Jesus is preparing that home for me. I may not have a proper home here on earth. It doesn’t matter.
I’ve got a home there now. It’s ready for me. It’s safely, literally, that idea of laid up is safely stored up so that no thief or no enemy can be able to take it away.
Jesus is guarding it for me for my rest on that final day. You know, this is the certainty that helped people to die well in the early church. You remember Tertullian, early on one of the church fathers said, the blood of Christians dying is the seed of the church.
And he was right because around 8125, as Christians were being persecuted in the early church, a Greek secular historian, 8125, okay, this was not yesterday, this was quickly after Jesus had been raised and his disciples were spreading the gospel. A Greek historian by the name of Aristides wrote to one of his friends, he was an unbeliever, saying, you know the reason why this Christianity cult is so successful? I think I’ve figured it out. He said in his letter, it’s because of this, when any of their righteous men among the Christians passes from this world, they rejoice and offer thanks to God and they accompany his body with songs and thanksgiving as if they were setting out from one place to another nearby.
He says, they’re not even scared of death, that’s why they’re so successful. And Paul is explaining why we aren’t scared of death, it’s because the moment that we die, we have this assurance that we’re going to a place that is kept for us by Jesus Christ, that is certain for us. You heard of Charles Simeon? You know, by the way, we’d, and praise the Lord for historical accounts, deathbed accounts of godly men.
One of the most precious memory in my life is when my grandfather on my mom’s side, he was a godly man who was only eight standard pass, but brilliant, Mangalorean man. And he had run away from Mangalore in his early days from the Catholic church, came to Pune, became a tailor, used to stitch suits and things like that. And then he decided because he wanted to learn Marathi, you know, to speak with those people, that let me teach myself.
He was so brilliant. And the one book that he thought would be a good lexicon and dictionary to learn Marathi was the Marathi Bible. So he started with the Marathi Bible.
He said he started reading the Marathi Bible to learn Marathi and he got saved. After that, he read the Bible and he knew Tamil, he knew Malayalam. They said to the day he died, he knew English.
He used to write hymns in English even. Just eight standard pass, but he educated himself just using the Bible in various languages. He was dying of stomach cancer.
I remember I was very young, but even before he died, he was kind of like a patriarch. God just made him this godly patriarch. All of his daughters and his son are all serving the Lord in some part of the world because of the way in which he lived.
But the day he died, again, he had gone blind through the cancer. He was in great agony, but he had just memorized verses of scripture. He called every member of the family to his bedside individually and he gave them a short sermon of exhortation.
He called me even. I barely remember what he said, but I remember just crying and saying, Grandpa, how come you have so much strength even as you’re dying? It’s because heaven was more real to him than his cancer. And I praise God for, hopefully you have some godly, maybe men mentors that have died well, that even sitting at their deathbed, you’ve received some precious words from them because they knew that heaven was more certain than death.
Read biographies of men that are dying so that you will gain the certainty. Charles Simeon, you know about him? Famous expositor in England. Faced a lot of opposition.
As he was dying, this British preacher had about a hundred people in his room with him, on his deathbed. You know, the best sermons are preached by godly men in the best pulpit ever, their deathbed. Their deathbed.
He smiled at all the people around him, even in the agonies of his death. And he said to them, last sermon, you know, what do you think gives me comfort at this time? They were like, they didn’t know what to say. Like, he’s dying, we’re sad.
And he’s asking them, what do you think gives me comfort at this time? So, because they were all silent, he shouted out to them. He said, the creation. I asked myself, did Yahweh create the world or did I? Now, if He made the world and all the rolling spheres of the universe, He can take care of me.
Into Jesus’ hands, I can safely commit my spirit. And so there is that sense of certainty that Paul has, as he says, in the future, there is laid out for me. But he goes on to talk about the glory of heaven.
And look at these descriptions. The crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day. Heaven is going to be a place of great glory, not because of the place, the buildings, the streets, the walls.
If that’s what you’re expositing when you’re thinking about heaven in the book of Revelation, you missed the point. It’s because of being with the Lord of glory. Meeting Him, hearing well done from Him, receiving rewards from Him.
And so Paul talks about the glory of heaven, first of all, through this idea of the crown of righteousness. Now, people have puzzled about what this means. The crown, which has the quality of righteousness, or literally you can say the wreath of righteousness.
It’s a reward that we’re going to receive. Is this something that only Paul is going to receive? No, I think when we speak about the wreath of righteousness, we’re speaking about a synonym that is just speaking about the reward and the blessing that all believers are going to receive when they go to heaven. The idea is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, which is given to us initially in justification.
It’s going to be given to us in full perfection at that time. And so Paul says the key thing that I’m looking forward to when I get to heaven is no sin anymore. That’s the greatest aspect of the glory of heaven, that we will be like Him as we gaze into His glory face to face.
He says, who’s going to give me this crown of righteousness? Well, it has to be Jesus, right? The righteous judge. You remember the context of even 1 Timothy 4.1, I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead. Now, why would Paul, when he’s thinking about meeting Jesus, think about Jesus as the judge? Why wouldn’t he think about Him as a friend? Why wouldn’t he think about Him as just a good shepherd? Because I think when you think about Jesus’s ultimate role in the eternal state and in heaven, even for believers, it is that He’s no longer the meek lamb.
He’s no longer the incarnate one that has humbled Himself. But forever, He stands as King. He stands as judge.
You remember in Philippians, what Paul says, as a result of Him laying down His life and emptying Himself and giving His life on the cross, what did God do? God highly exalted Him and gave Him the name that is above every other name. So that what? Every knee may bow and every tongue can… This is a prophecy. What heaven is going to be like.
And I don’t think it’s just speaking about unbelievers. I think it’s more primarily speaking about what heaven is going to be like every day. Every day, heaven is going to be like just looking at the glory and the grandeur of the King of Kings and just bowing before Him, saying, give me commands for day and confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
God is delighted in heaven for an exaltation of Christ. And Paul is saying, I just want to see Jesus not as this meek lamb, but as a glorious judge. That’s the picture of Jesus that he’s longing for.
You know why that’s precious? It’s at this moment, Paul is facing an unrighteous needle. And even today, maybe you’re thinking, there’s so much injustice in the world, isn’t it? Right is no longer seen for what it is. Wrongs are being elevated as good.
The world is so twisted. You know, when are we going to see righteousness? And that’s why I think Paul is even saying, the only time that we’re going to see righteousness is when we see the judge on that final day. And that’s when all injustices are going to be resolved.
And that allows me to take a little bit of, you know, a painful sword hacking my head off right now and say, it’s okay. It’ll all be sorted out when we see the King of Kings. And everyone will receive payment for what they’ve done.
Those that are persecuted Christians will ultimately have to bow their knee before this judge. Paul says, this judge, because I am saved, will not throw me to hell. What will he do? He will reward me on that day.
He will reward me on that day. I think this is amazing. After the crown of righteousness, and I think you men know this, I don’t want to go into great detail.
Each one of us is going to be receiving a reward on top of the crown of righteousness based on the deeds that are done in our Christian life for the good or bad, right? Some of us will receive cities. Some of us will just receive well done, but you know, you kind of wasted your time. I think heaven’s going to be full of surprises.
You know, I think we’re going to be thinking that all these famous guys, John Piper and all of that are going to be in front of you. We’re going to find some old auntie from some village in India that we didn’t even know about going to be at the front of the line because Jesus is not going to reward on the basis of the things that we saw here on earth, but he’s going to be rewarding on the basis of actual discerning the heart. I think it’s that person served the Lord.
Wow, you know, and there’s going to be an amazing sense of just justice as Jesus rewards and creates even a sense of different rule and reign under him on the basis of how you did your ministry in your life here. Don’t live just on the basis of what your professors are evaluating you for. Sermon evaluation forms, quizzes in class.
They don’t know your hearts. Are you living on the basis of him who knows your health? That’s what Paul is saying. He’s saying not only to me, he’s saying, by the way, in case you’re thinking, hey, Paul, that’s nice for you.
He ends with a great sense of comfort, not only to me, but to all you who love his appearing. What a description of a Christian, isn’t it? If you want to define a Christian, who is a Christian? A Christian is somebody who loves his appearing, his second coming. That’s the, the word there even is epiphania from which we get epiphany, his appearing.
On January 23rd, 1956, Martin Luther at the end of his life from Wittenberg in a busy ministry traveled to his birth town of Eiselben to settle a dispute between two brothers. And they said, we will not be friends with each other unless the pastor Martin Luther comes. And so he left his wife Katie, he left his children, even in his old age.
And he went to his birthplace, his hometown to settle this dispute. It was a bitter winter and the journey took its toll. Luther wrote back to his wife Katie about bitter winds and freezing rain, threatening chunks of ice, as a result of which he was able to get to Eiselben.
He was able to be a minister of the truth of Jesus and make these brothers reconcile. But then he fell sick with a fever and he wasn’t able to travel back home. Unexpected.
But again, like Paul just saying, I will just give my life in ministry. And he gave his life so much that he fell with a fever that he never recovered from. While he was burning with fever and out of control, fire broke out outside of his room and threatened his life.
The walls began to fall on the feverish Luther. I told you we should read accounts of how great men of God died. You’ll be surprised.
His wife got all panicky and she wrote a letter saying, Luther, should I come? Because it was a few weeks that he was suffering in this way. He wrote back to her and he said, I have a caretaker who is better than you and all the angels. He lies in a manger and nurses as his mother’s breath, yet he sits at the right hand of God, the Almighty Father, don’t come.
So she didn’t even come. Because he told her not to come. He wrote that letter on February 7th.
11 days later he died. Now the Roman Catholics were ready to attack Luther and speak all kinds of bad things about him because they believed in their superstition that if a man dies and he dies in fear and he dies with a lack of courage, then that shows that he was an unrighteous man. And so they were ready to start gossip about how Luther died.
So they send a biographer, one of Luther’s friend, Justice Jonas, to sit at his bedside. And that’s why I can’t recount all the words. It’s fascinating.
Every single thing that he said before he died was written down so that they could show the Roman Catholic Church that he died with courage. He didn’t die with fear. And it was true.
It’s amazing. It’s amazing. I don’t know if I would want a biographer sitting by my bedside while I’m dying, you know.
But Luther said, come, come, Janus. Write everything that I’m saying. Knowing that his end was near, he asked Janus, you know, can you write my last will and testament? And it began with the words, I am well known in heaven and on earth and even in hell because of what I have done.
In his last moments, Luther was asked by Janus, Justice Jonas, his friend, do you want to die standing firm on Christ and on the doctrine you have taught? Luther didn’t have much strength, but the only thing he said was this. These were his last words before he died. Yes, we are beggars.
This is true. And then he went to be with Jesus. Dying well is something that happens when we think about these realities that Paul talks about.
And I pray that the Lord would help us not just to live well, but to even die well, because he is that great of a savior. Amen. Let’s pray.
Father, we thank you so much for sober words and important words that remind us of the reality of death that may come upon us quickly or faster than we thought. Oh Lord, we don’t have the strength. We don’t have the courage.
We don’t have the physical willpower to stand against that pain and that agony when it comes in whatever way. But we know that you do. And so we ask that in our weakness, you would continue to give us gospel power, ministry power, so that even now we may live lives that are ready to die at any moment because of the work that you’ve given us, the gospel that you’ve entrusted us with, and the home that you have assured us of.
Give these men, Lord, encouragement and strength in the work that they do day by day, because what we have in store is so much better than anything that we can struggle with now. And so we give you thanks. We give you all the glory in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
