I. "BUT BE THOU SOBER IN ALL THINGS."

1. The presence of false teachers necessitated a wakeful attitude, a constant presence of mind, a quick discernment of opportunities for advancing the truth.

2. There ought to be a consistently sober and watchful care extending through the whole life of the minister, who has to "give account of souls."

II. "SUFFER HARDSHIP."

1. If the minister fears the anger of men, he will not be faithful to God.

2. There is a reward for brave suffering. (1 Timothy 2:3-12.)

3. The example of the apostle's life was ever before Timothy as a powerful incentive to endurance. (1 Timothy 3:10-12.)

III. "DO THE WORK OF AN EVANGELIST."

1. There was a separate class of officers called evangelists in the apostolic Church (Ephesians 4:11), whose special business was to break new ground in the open fields of heathenism or the narrower confines of Judaism. They preached the gospel, while pastors shepherded the flocks. But we are not to suppose that pasters did not also "do the work of an evangelist." They had saints and sinners under their care in all places.

2. As Timothy had been lately occupied in organizing the Church life of Ephesus, the admonition was not needless that he should henceforth devote himself to the direct work of evangelization, as the best antidote to heresy and impiety.

IV. "MAKE FULL PROOF OF THY MINISTRY." This was to be done:

1. By constant labours.

2. By unswerving faithfulness to God and man.

3. By efforts to save sinners and edify saints, which were seen to be successful. Such a man fulfils his ministry, for he seeks not his own things, but the things of Christ. - T.C.

None are so likely to maintain watchful guard over their hearts and lives as those who know the comfort of living in near communion with God. They feel their privilege and will fear losing it. They will dread falling from their high estate, and marring their own comfort by bringing clouds between themselves and Christ. He that goes on a journey with a little money about him takes little thought of danger, and cares little how late he travels. He, on the contrary, that carries gold and jewels, will be a cautious traveller: he will look well to his roads, his horses, and his company, and run no risks. The fixed stars are those that tremble most. The man that most fully enjoys the light of God's countenance, will be a man tremblingly afraid of losing its blessed consolations, and jealously fearful of doing anything to grieve the Holy Ghost.

(Bishop Ryle.)

Some dyes cannot bear the weather, but alter colour presently; but there are others that, having something that gives a deeper tincture, will hold. The graces of a true Christian hold out in all sorts of weathers, in winter and summer, prosperity and adversity, when superficial counterfeit holiness will give out.

(R. Sibbes.)

I board with a poor Scotsman; his wife can talk scarcely any English. My diet consists mostly of hasty-pudding, boiled corn, and bread baked in ashes, and sometimes a little meat and butter. My lodging is a little heap of straw, laid upon some boards, a little way from the ground; for it is a long room, without any floor, that I lodge in. My work is exceedingly hard and difficult. I travel on foot a mile and a half in the worst of roads almost daily and back again; for I live so far from my Indians. I bare not seen an English person this month. These and many other uncomfortable circumstances attend me; and yet my spiritual conflicts and distresses so far exceed all these that I scarce think of them, but feel as if I were entertained in the most sumptuous manner. The Lord grant that I may learn to endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ!

(David Brainerd.)

We fancy we still see Dr. Wardlaw standing in the pulpit and beseeching the newly-ordained pastor to approve himself in all things as the faithful servant of God. Some of his sentences still linger in our recollection — "Oh, my brother I" he said, "never forget that the greatest triumph which can be accomplished on earth is the conversion of a soul; and a minister's labours are never so highly honoured as when men are born of God through his instrumentality. It may be of importance to polish the jewel after it has been found, but the chief thing is to dig it out of the mine. It may be, and it is, important to dress up the stone for the front of the building, but be does the greatest work who excavates it from the quarry in which it lay imbedded."

(Evangelical Repository.)

While waiting on one occasion in a gentleman's parlour, Vassar opened conversation with his wife, a very fashionable and proud-looking lady, who was sitting in the room. With great concern he began at once to urge the necessity of the new birth and immediate acceptance of Christ upon her. She was thunderstruck, and protested that she did not believe in any of those things. Then followed a most fervent appeal, texts of Scripture, warning against rejecting Christ, the certainty of a wrath to come for any found in impenitence, till my friend said he was fairly alarmed at the boldness of the assault. Suddenly the gentleman came in for whom he was waiting, and called him out. When the gentleman returned to his wife, she said, "There has been an old man here talking with me about religion." "Why did you not shut him up?" he asked gruffly. "He is one of those persons that you cannot shut up," was her reply. "If I had been here," he said, "I would have told him very quickly to go about his business." "If you had seen him, you would have thought he was about his business," was her answer.

(Memoir of Uncle John Vassar.)

This word "ministry" does not refer exclusively to what we are accustomed to call the Christian ministry, meaning the teaching and pastoral office in the Church. That is but one of ten thousand forms of ministration or service, which may be rendered to our fellows at the call of God. To minister to any one, is to help or serve him; and so every course of action by which we can help and serve others is a ministry, and every such service is truly a Christian work. And as we cannot all render the same service, but can each render particular kinds of service to particular people — relatives, friends or neighbours — that particular description of service which each of us can render is our "ministry." It is a ministry, the object of whose functions lies without us, in contrast to activities which centre in self as their object. And it is "thy ministry," because it is that particular form of helpful activity which it is open to each, separately, to prosecute. Paul's was different from Timothy's, and neither has belonged to anybody since; nor will your ministry, or mine, ever be allotted to anybody else; for no one will be situated as We are, or have exactly our opportunities. But, in some respects, our ministry is like Timothy's and Paul's. It is directed to the same objects: the spread of Christ's truth and Christ's Church. And we are summoned to it by the same Divine Lord, to whom also we shall reader an account of its discharge; All the high, sublime elements, then, which belonged to their ministry or service in life, belong to ours, though ours may take less striking outward forms, and be rendered with no eye but God's to watch our performance of it. The sublime considerations, moving to fidelity in it, which Paul urged on Timothy, bear, then, on us. "I charge thee before God, make full proof of" — thoroughly fulfil — "thy ministry."

(T. M. Herbert, M. A.)

In the charge of the aged Paul to the young disciple Timothy, there seems to be an appeal which, though unexpressed, is perpetually addressed from the elder generation to the younger. What the one old man said to the single young one, all Christ's servants, whose work is nearly done, seem to say to all those whose work is just beginning. "Fulfil thy ministry, for I am now ready to be offered." Choose what time in the world's history you like, you will always find those two classes well represented; for it is always true that "one generation passeth away, and another cometh." And while the old are always passing to their rest, and the young rising to do their parts, the great aims for which Christian men strive and pray, and the great institution of the Church, through which they further them, lives on; and it is, or should be, the concern of each generation to hand it down invigorated and enlarged, to their successors. But if that is to be done, these successors must be ready to take up these toils and aims; to adapt them to the needs of the coming time, and engage in them with a spirit at least as devoted as that which their fathers showed. So they seem to hear from their father, "Fulfil thy ministry, for I am now ready to be offered." Now if we take our own time, and apply to it these considerations, which hold good of every time, what shall we say? New, as ever, there is a passing and a rising generation. And the great Church and kingdom of Christ, which has been in the hands of the fathers, will soon be in the hands of the children. That glorious institution will live, though the hands which now sustain it decay. But young hands must receive it from the failing hold of the elders, and by their efforts it must he upheld. Are they ready to take it? Are they prepared to "fulfil their ministry," because their predecessors will soon leave the task in their hands?

(T. M. Herbert, M. A.)

Several ancient rulers did not find management of their dominions sufficiently burdensome, and so one of them became a fiddler, another a poet, and another an orator. The world never had a worse fiddler than Nero, nor a more wearisome poet than Dionysius, nor a more blundering orator than Caligula; and we might fearlessly assert also that the world never had worse princes than these three. Such instances are exceedingly instructive, and remind us of the sculptor's advice to the cobbler to stick to his last. Each tub had better stand on its own bottom; for when tubs take to rolling about they spill all that they contain, be it either wine or water.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

Alexander, Aquila, Claudia, Crescens, Demas, Erastus, Eubulus, Linus, Luke, Mark, Onesiphorus, Paul, Prisca, Priscilla, Pudens, Timothy, Titus, Trophimus, TychicusCorinth, Dalmatia, Ephesus, Galatia, Miletus, Thessalonica, TroasAfflictions, Always, Assurance, Bear, Comfort, Completing, Discharge, Duties, Duty, Endure, Evangelist, Evil, Evils, Exercise, Fill, Fulfil, Fulfill, Full, Fully, Habitual, Hardship, Measure, Ministration, Ministry, News, Obligations, Office, Preaching, Proclaiming, Proof, Self-control, Self-controlled, Self-indulgent, Sober, Steady, Suffer, Suffering, Watch1. He exhorts him to preach the Word with all care and diligence;
6. certifies him of the nearness of his death;
9. wills him to come speedily unto him, and to bring Marcus with him;
14. warns him to beware of Alexander the metalworker.
16. informs him what had befallen him at his first answering;
19. and soon after he concludes.

2 Timothy 4:5

     5157   head
     7026   church, leadership
     7725   evangelists, identity
     7726   evangelists, ministry
     8418   endurance
     8713   discouragement

2 Timothy 4:1-5

     1614   Scripture, understanding
     7760   preachers, responsibilities

2 Timothy 4:2-5

     7755   preaching, importance
     8492   watchfulness, leaders

Truth Hidden when not Sought After.
"They shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables."--2 Tim. iv. 4. From these words of the blessed Apostle, written shortly before he suffered martyrdom, we learn, that there is such a thing as religious truth, and therefore there is such a thing as religious error. We learn that religious truth is one--and therefore that all views of religion but one are wrong. And we learn, moreover, that so it was to be (for his words are a prophecy) that professed Christians, …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII

A Last Look-Out
We have mainly to do with the second description which he gives of his death. What does he say when the hour that this grim monster must be grappled with is at hand? I do not find him sad. Those who delight in gloomy poetry have often represented death in terrible language. "It is hard," says one-- To feel the hand of death arrest one's steps, Throw a chill blight on all one's budding hopes, And hurl one's soul untimely to the shades." And another exclaims-- "O God, it is a fearful thing To see the …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871

Sermon for St. Peter's Day
Of brotherly rebuke and admonition, how far it is advisable and seemly or not, and especially how prelates and governors ought to demean themselves toward their subjects. 2 Tim. iv. 2.--"Reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all long-suffering and doctrine." THIS is the lesson which St. Paul gives to his beloved disciple Timothy, whom he set to rule over men, and it equally behoves all pastors of souls and magistrates, to possess these two things,--long-suffering and doctrine. First, it is their office to …
Susannah Winkworth—The History and Life of the Reverend Doctor John Tauler

Demas
BY REV. PRINCIPAL DAVID ROWLANDS, B.A. Many a man who figures in history, is only known in connection with some stupendous fault--some mistake, some folly, or some sin--that has given him an unenviable immortality. Mention his name, and the huge blot by which his memory is besmirched starts up before the mind in all its hideousness. Take Cain, for example. He occupies the foremost rank as regards fame; his name is one of the first that children learn to lisp; and yet what do we know about him? …
George Milligan—Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known

Some Other Writers of the New Testament
[Illustration: (drop cap L) Ancient engraving of man reading scroll] Let us now look at the rest of the books which make up the New Testament. In the days when Paul preached at Athens, the old capital of Greece, much of the ancient splendour and power of the Greek people had passed away, for the Romans had conquered their country, and they were no longer a free nation. Yet, although the Greeks had been forced to yield to Rome, their conquerors knew that the Grecian scholars and artists were far …
Mildred Duff—The Bible in its Making

Epistle Liii. To John, Bishop.
To John, Bishop. Gregory to John, Bishop of Constantinople [1503] . Though consideration of the case moves me, yet charity also impels me to write, since I have written once and again to my most holy brother the lord John, but have received no letter from him. For some one else, a secular person, addressed me under his name; seeing that, if those were really his letters, I have not been vigilant, having believed of him something far different from what I have found. For I had written about the …
Saint Gregory the Great—the Epistles of Saint Gregory the Great

Paul's Departure and Crown;
OR, AN EXPOSITION UPON 2 TIM. IV. 6-8 ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR How great and glorious is the Christian's ultimate destiny--a kingdom and a crown! Surely it hath not entered into the heart of man to conceive what ear never heard, nor mortal eye ever saw? the mansions of the blest--the realms of glory--'a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.' For whom can so precious an inheritance be intended? How are those treated in this world who are entitled to so glorious, so exalted, so eternal, …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3

How the Meek and the Passionate are to be Admonished.
(Admonition 17.) Differently to be admonished are the meek and the passionate. For sometimes the meek, when they are in authority, suffer from the torpor of sloth, which is a kindred disposition, and as it were placed hard by. And for the most part from the laxity of too great gentleness they soften the force of strictness beyond need. But on the other hand the passionate, in that they are swept on into frenzy of mind by the impulse of anger, break up the calm of quietness, and so throw into …
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

A Fulfilled Aspiration
'So that I might finish my course....'--ACTS xx. 24. 'I have finished my course....'--2 TIM. iv. 7. I do not suppose that Paul in prison, and within sight of martyrdom, remembered his words at Ephesus. But the fact that what was aspiration whilst he was in the very thick of his difficulties came to be calm retrospect at the close is to me very beautiful and significant. 'So that I may finish my course,' said he wistfully; whilst before him there lay dangers clearly discerned and others that had all …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts

The Glory of Jesus and Mary.
Before entering upon the contemplation of the excellent glory which surrounds the blessed in heaven, we must endeavor to form a correct idea of God's grace, which enabled them to perform the great and noble actions we are now to consider. They were all, except Jesus and Mary, conceived in sin, and, therefore, subject to the same temptations that daily assail us. They never could have triumphed and reached the supernatural glory which now surrounds them, had they been left to their own natural strength, …
F. J. Boudreaux—The Happiness of Heaven

Exhortation to Workers and Ministers
In conclusion I feel that the Lord would be pleased for me to say a few words for the encouragement of young ministers and workers. In my work in the ministry I have come through many varied experiences that, I trust, will be helpful to you in the trials through which you will have to pass before you get settled in the Lord's work. The first difficulty met by most young ministers and workers is in regard to their call. Unless the call be clear and definite, they are likely to be in some doubt as …
Mary Cole—Trials and Triumphs of Faith

Author's Introduction,
In Which the Sources of This History Are Principally Treated A history of the "Origin of Christianity" ought to embrace all the obscure, and, if one might so speak, subterranean periods which extend from the first beginnings of this religion up to the moment when its existence became a public fact, notorious and evident to the eyes of all. Such a history would consist of four books. The first, which I now present to the public, treats of the particular fact which has served as the starting-point …
Ernest Renan—The Life of Jesus

Meditations of the Blessed State of the Regenerate Man after Death.
This estate has three degrees:--1st, From the day of death to the resurrection; 2d, From the resurrection to the pronouncing of the sentence; 3d, After the sentence, which lasts eternally. As soon as ever the regenerate man hath yielded up his soul to Christ, the holy angels take her into their custody, and immediately carry her into heaven (Luke xvi. 22), and there present her before Christ, where she is crowned with a crown of righteousness and glory; not which she hath deserved by her good works, …
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety

Perseverance
'Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.' I Pet 1:1. The fifth and last fruit of sanctification, is perseverance in grace. The heavenly inheritance is kept for the saints, and they are kept to the inheritance. I Pet 1:1. The apostle asserts a saint's stability and permanence in grace. The saint's perseverance is much opposed by Papists and Arminians; but it is not the less true because it is opposed. A Christian's main comfort depends upon this doctrine of perseverance. Take …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity

Conflict and Comfort.
"For I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for you, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh; that their hearts may be comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ."--COL. ii. 1, 2. Although he was in prison the Apostle was constantly at work for his Master, and not least of all at the work of prayer. If ever the words …
W. H. Griffith Thomas—The Prayers of St. Paul

Concerning God's Purpose
1. God's purpose is the cause of salvation. THE third and last thing in the text, which I shall but briefly glance at, is the ground and origin of our effectual calling, in these words, "according to his purpose" (Eph. i. 11). Anselm renders it, According to his good will. Peter Martyr reads it, According to His decree. This purpose, or decree of God, is the fountainhead of our spiritual blessings. It is the impulsive cause of our vocation, justification, glorification. It is the highest link in …
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

Second Missionary Journey
Scripture, Acts 15:36-18:22 +The Inception+--After the Jerusalem Council Paul returned to Antioch where he spent some time, "teaching and preaching the Word of the Lord with many others also." "And some days after Paul said unto Barnabas, Let us go again and visit our brethren i+The Companions+ (Acts 15:37-40).--Barnabas proposed to take John Mark, his nephew, with them on this second journey. But Paul strenuously objected, basing his objection on the ground that this young man had deserted them …
Henry T. Sell—Bible Studies in the Life of Paul

How the Gospels came to be Written
[Illustration: (drop cap B) Early Christian Lamp] But how did the story of the Saviour's life on earth come to be written? We have seen that many years passed before any one thought of writing it down at all. The men and women who had really seen Him, who had listened to His voice, looked into His face, and who knew that He had conquered death and sin for evermore, could not sit down to write, for their hearts were all on fire to speak. But as the years passed, the number of those who had seen Christ …
Mildred Duff—The Bible in its Making

Because There is not a Single Scripture in the Church Epistles Which, Rightly Interpreted, Teaches a Partial Rapture.
How could there be? Scripture cannot contradict itself. If the Pauline Epistles explicitly teach and expressly affirm that "all shall be changed in a moment," that "they that are Christ's at His coming shall be raised from the dead, that "we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ" and that when our lord returns to the earth to be glorified in His saints He shall be "admired in all them that believe" then these same Church Epistles can not teach that a part of the Church only shall be …
Arthur W. Pink—The Redeemer's Return

Curiosity a Temptation to Sin.
"Enter not into the path of the wicked, and go not in the way of evil men. Avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away."--Proverbs iv. 14, 15. The chief cause of the wickedness which is every where seen in the world, and in which, alas! each of us has more or less his share, is our curiosity to have some fellowship with darkness, some experience of sin, to know what the pleasures of sin are like. I believe it is even thought unmanly by many persons (though they may not like to say …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII

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