Well, let’s take our Bibles for a few moments and turn to 2 Timothy. We’re going to be in and out of a few texts for a few weeks and then we’ll start the Sermon on the Mount in middle of June somewhere and go through that Matthew 5, 6 and 7 into the fall. But this morning I want to speak in the subject, the things that really matter. In the light of your impending death, in the light of the temporal nature of life, what are the things that really matter? And in 2 Timothy 4:9-22, Paul is writing his last letter to his son in the faith Timothy. It’s AD 67, Paul is in his second imprisonment. He will not survive it. He’s about to be martyred. He’s about to have his head severed from his shoulders by a Roman sword. He tells us here, “I’m about to be poured out like a drink offering, as in my blood will be spilt like a drink offering and my departures at hand.” So Paul’s impending death has caused him to write some final instructions.
And you’re going to see by the time we’re done from verses nine through 22, that Paul touches on the things that really matter in the light of death, in the light of the shortness of time and the frailty of life. Keep your text open. We’ll be hop skipping and jumping across it as we preach this message. British writer and wit Samuel Johnson famously said, “When a man knows he’s about to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” He’s right. The approach of death has a way of refocusing and reprioritizing life. When you and I know that death is near or death is a reality and we live in the light of that, it helps us separate the big from the small, the permanent from the passing, the spiritual from the material. The thought of death sobers us up in a good way.
In fact, death can be an elixir to life. As you and I meditate on our own death, it helps us live life with greater clarity, greater conviction, greater purpose, greater passion. Isn’t that why Psalm 90:12 says what? “Number your days and apply your heart to wisdom. Live life in the light of your death.” I love Ecclesiastes 7, well, love’s maybe not the right word. I appreciate Ecclesiastes 7. I’ve gone to it often because here’s what Solomon says, “A good name is better than precious ointment and the day of death than the day of one’s birth. Better to go to the house of mourning. Better to go to a funeral than to go to the house of feasting. Better to go to a funeral than to go to a party. For that is the end of all man and the living will take it to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter for by a sad countenance, the heart is made better that the heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of the fool is in the house of mirth.”
I love parties and I love barbecues as much as the next person, but they are not profoundly transformative. I’ve never gone to a party and found it life-changing. If anything, it’s an escape from the harsh realities of life. But if you go to a funeral, if you go to the viewing of a dead body, if you stand by an open grave, it’s sobering. It’s weirding. It separates the wheat from the chaff, the passing from the permanent. It helps us focus. Spurgeon said, “To be familiar with the grave is prudence.” Steve Jobs founder and CEO of Apple towards the end of his own life said this, “Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.” Because almost everything, all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure, these things just fall away in the face of death leaving only what is truly important.
So with that in mind, we’re going to come to 2 Timothy 4: 9-22 as Paul underscores the things that really matter in the light of death. Because when you read this passage the first time, you’re in danger of just concluding that it’s a jumble of final instructions, appeals, updates, travel logs and best wishes. But I think the more you read it, you come to see that Paul’s impending death is the backdrop of these closing words and one must conclude that this is Paul’s last letter. These are the last verses of Paul’s last letter, and one would assume as you read it that he’s underscoring things that really matter. Paul is about to be hanged in a fortnight, so to speak. As we’ve said, tradition tells us he was beheaded shortly after writing this letter. And if that’s the case, I think that his mind was wonderfully concentrated on the things that really matter.
Sitting over this text and wondering what I was going to do with this mishmash of material, I decided to reread it one day from that perspective and certain things jumped out. Do you know what matters? Friendship, faithfulness, forgiveness, faith, forever. Those are the things that matter most. So let’s delve in and challenge ourselves in the light of our approaching demise, in the light of our impending deaths. Let’s live this day as if it was our last day because someday it will be. And I don’t know about you, in fact, I’m sure you’re just like me. I want to die with the least regrets and I think Paul helps me prioritize my life here.
Number one, friendship matters most. Friendship matters most because one of the things that strikes you about verses nine through 22 is the multiple reference Paul’s makes to fellow soldiers and servants in the cause of the gospel. Paul goes to great lengths in this closing chapter to explain his own personal circumstances and the movements of certain individuals known to him and to Timothy. You see that in verse nine following and you see that in verse 19 following. He mentions Demas, Titus. He mentions Luke, Mark, Tychicus, Carpus. He mentions Priscilla and Aquila, Erastus. He mentions Aebulus, Pudens, Linus, Claudia, and all the brethren. Verse 21, it’s striking, isn’t it? In fact, what’s clear from the text is that Paul worked with and within a network of friends and co-laborers in the gospel. Paul was no lone ranger.
In fact, when someone has done the math, if you look at the book of Acts and you look at Paul’s several epistles or letters, he mentions about 100 people personally and individually throughout those letters and throughout that history. He lived within a circle of 100 friends who contributed to his comfort and his strength and his perseverance. If you look at Romans 16, he mentions about 26 people. If you look at Colossians 4, he mentions about 10, and here we are in his last letter, his final roll call so to speak, and he mentions 19 individuals, 16 men, two women, and the Lord himself. You love it. Paul understood the value of friends and what they brought in terms of investment and inspiration and balance to his own life. He was human and he needed companionship. And he was still in the game and he was still concerned about the gospel because his friends surrounded him and strengthened him.
In fact, it’s interesting to me that while Paul longs to see Jesus, he also longs to see his friends and Timothy especially. Just look at the kind of tension between verses six, seven and eight and then verse nine, where we begin in verses six, seven, and eight, he’s anticipating the end of his life. He’s anticipating going into God’s presence and seeing the Lord, which has been a passion of his. Remember what he said to the Philippians, to depart and to be with Christ is far better. So he wants to see the Lord, but interestingly also wants to see Timothy. Verse nine, be diligent to come to me quickly and bring me a cloak, a coat, bring me books, especially the parchments. Paul was going to be busy right up to the end. There was no time to waste. There was no coasting in his life.
But you’ve got this tension, although we desperately need the Lord and the Lord showed up in Paul’s life in verse 17, the Lord stood with me, the Lord strengthened me. We also desperately need each other. I mean, even Adam walked in the garden with God, but it was not good that Adam was alone and so God made someone comparable to him, his helper and companion in life and marriage. You and I need to favor friendships. Here’s Paul with his death impending, the clock is ticking and he’s celebrating and cataloging the value of friends in his life. Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, two is better than one. I don’t know where you’re at in life. You could be at the beginning of it, you could be at the middle, you could be at the end, but I hope with whatever stage in your life, maybe if you’re at the beginning, I hope you’re beginning to build a circle of friends. And if you’re towards the end, I hope you’re living smack dab in the middle of a circle of friends. Because no man is poor, who is rich in friends.
Friends come in when the world goes out. Friends make us better friends with God. Good friends know all about us and are still happy to keep company with us. Good friends are another room to live in. Good friends, half our sorrows, double our joys and triple our significance. I hope you’re the beneficiary of good friends. Take some time and re-read the book of Proverbs, which among many other things is a manual on friendship. If you read that book, there are several things about friendship that are highlighted. A description is given as to what friendship is about and what good friends look like. The first thing you’ll notice is that friendship requires thought. Proverbs 12:26, “The righteous should choose his friends carefully for the way of the wicked leads them astray.” Proverbs 13:20, “He who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will be destroyed.”
Friendship is a closed garden. Friendship is a closed garden with a gate that’s watched with lock and key. You and I have got to be very careful about who we led into our lives and who we designate to be our friends. Because if you hang out with the wise, you’ll become wise, if you hang out with a fool, you’ll become foolish. So friendship requires thought. In the very first place you need to choose your friends wisely. They need to be godly, faithful, sacrificial, all of that. It requires time, right? Proverbs 17:17, “A friend loves at all times.” That would seem to infer that friends spend a lot of times together, time together, and they grow in their friendship through different seasons and they prove loyal and trustworthy across that time and that’s where friendships indeed are forged and furthered. Proverbs 18:24, “A man who has friends must himself be friendly, but there is a friend who sticks closer, not a brother.” Which would speak about the fact that friendship requires thought and time and trust.
Friends are loyal, friends come in when the world goes out, friends will be there when you feel and help pick you up. Friends will stick close by. Love that. Proverbs 27 verse 10, “Do not forsake your own friend or your father’s friend.” See, friends can be trusted. I love that verse and most enriching things about my life and June’s life is that we are friends with our parents’ friends and my girls are friends with our friends. Thank you for being that to our family. Friendship requires trouble. You say, pastor, what do you mean? Well, back to Proverbs 17:17, “A friend loves at all times and a brother is born for adversity.” The furnace of life’s trials forges friendship. The greatest friendships have gone through adversity and survived it. In fact, that’s where friendship has proven in adversity and trials and troubles.
Then finally, among many other things we could say friendship requires tact. Be a smart friend, be a wise friend. Don’t abuse your friendship. Proverbs 27:14, “He who blesses his friend with a loud voice rising early in the morning, it will be counted a curse to him.” Proverbs 25:20, “Like one who takes away a garment in cold weather and like vinegar on soda is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.” Be smart, be tactful. Know when to speak. Know when to be quiet. Don’t arrive with a loud voice early in the morning at your friend’s house. Don’t leave late at night when everybody left 60 minutes earlier. Just be smart, be tactful. So Paul values friendship at the end of his life. No man is poor who’s rich and friends.
I recommended this book to several people recently. I just finished a book called The Wisdom of the Bullfrog by William McRaven, who was at CENTCOM, who was over the Navy SEAL teams. Brilliant man, brilliant soldier, brave, brilliant, tactician and a good man. And in the book he recommends a bunch of things about life. Number one, you can’t surge trust. Takes years to build trust, you can’t surge it. Now you can lose it in one night, but you can’t build it except over a bunch of days. He says when in command, command, if you’re in leadership, then lead. Don’t be passive. He has a chapter called Run to the Sound of Gunfire because running from the trouble doesn’t fix the trouble. Run towards the sound of gunfire, great chapter. He also has another chapter. No plan survives first contact with the enemy. So you need to have a plan, A plan B, and a plan C because life rarely works in a linear manner.
Expect what you inspect. If you want to live a quality life, if you want to have a quality marriage, if you want to have a quality business, then inspect. Measure, quality control. Expect what you inspect. And in the last chapters ties into what we’re talking about here. Always have a swim buddy. See in the Navy SEALs you have a swim buddy. There’s a guy on the team who’s going to be your swim buddy. In fact, he says this, the greatest compliment one frogman can bestow one another is to call him a swim buddy. Underwater at night when it’s the darkest, your swim buddy will swim beside you. When parachuting your swim buddy will check your parachute before you jump. In patrolling and combat, it’s your swim buddy who will walk on your flank covering your six. It’s your swim buddy who will lay down a base of fire so you can maneuver against the enemy.
He says this further swim buddies are a necessity in life. Call them wing men, co-pilots, first mates, shotgun riders, Skippy and Gilligan, Thelma and Luiz, Barney and Fred, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, partners, call them whatever you like, but without a good swim buddy, you will be destined to make bad decisions. You’ll be confronted with difficulties of life alone. You will sometimes wallow in self-pity and nothing will seem fulfilling to you or fulfilled. Every frogman knows that in the turbulent waters of life you will always need a good swim buddy.
Here’s the second thing Paul talks about. He doesn’t just talk about friendship, he talks about faithfulness. Faithfulness. Because the backdrop to this letter or the backdrop to this S section is unfaithfulness, apostasy, compromise, abandonment. We read in chapter one verse 15 that the believers in Asia had turned away from Paul. We read in chapter four of the desertion of Demas from Paul when it mattered most. We read in chapter 16 that at my first defense in Rome here, nobody stood with me. They were a no-show for my show trial. No lawyers, no friends apart from Luke, no one had Paul’s back. His trial before the Romans was not only political, it was personal in terms of his standing alone. His friends had evaporated like vapor or smoke from a car’s exhaust. But in the middle of all of that, he remained faithful. He remained faithful to the gospel. He was willing to pay a price for his commitment to Jesus Christ.
In chapter one verse eight says, “Hey Timothy, don’t be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord nor of me his prisoner, but share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the power of God.” And chapter four verse seven, he talks about, “Hey, I have fought the good fight. I have run my race and I’ve kept the faith.” For Paul, everything was secondary to gospel clarity, gospel commitment, and gospel continuance. Despite his awful circumstances, despite personal pressures, he was committed to gospel advancement. In fact, he rejoices, we’ll come back to this in the fact that he was now able to preach more fully the gospel to all the Gentiles, verse 17. He wanted to hear the good and faithful servant statement that Jesus promised to those who stayed by the stuff. Aren’t you impressed by his gospel faithfulness? There was theological apostasy. We’ve identified that. There was cultural antagonism in the last days. Perilous times will come, men will be lovers of God, not lovers of God, but lovers of themselves and pleasure. There would be personal suffering. He’d be a prisoner, he’d suffer hardship. He’s in prison here.
He’s still serving Gospel ends right up until the end. I want that to be said of me. Want that to be said of you. In fact, our pastors and elders a while ago, we did a search to our great surprise and gladness was that the vast majority of our seniors at kindred are serving. They’re serving the gospel ends right until the end. That’s the way we’re to live and that’s the way we’re to die. There’s always the danger of mission drift, starting out strong and growing weak. In fact, part of the purpose of this letter is for Paul to encourage Timothy to fight mission drift because he says in chapter one, Timothy, you need to fan into a flame. You need to stir up the gift that was given to you by the laying on of the hands, by the presbytery. Timothy, you need to fulfill your ministry. Chapter four, verse five, the word fulfill there means to fulfill a vow or to pay down a debt. It seems to be that Timothy was not living up to his ministry vows to his ordination promises he was falling short of his potential.
And Paul says, “No, I have run the race. I have kept the faith. I’m about to hand the gospel baton of continuity to you and I don’t want it to drop to the ground.” In fact, one writer says this, looking at 2 Timothy alone, remember how Paul tells Timothy to fan into a flame God’s gift of the spirit received at start of his ministry. He needs to guard the original gospel. He needs not to slack off but to stir up the gift He needs to keep focus as a preacher of God’s word and preach it in season and out of season. He needs to avoid being sidetracked. He needs to keep his head in all situations. He needs to persevere regarding the original calling to the gospel and for the gospel. My friend, are you still on track? Are you enthusiastic about Jesus Christ today as you were the first day? Are you still witnessing soul winning? Are you still serving? Are you still giving? Are you still worshiping? Are you still befriending? All for gospel ends right up to the end.
In his book, Nothing Like It In The World, Stephen Ambrose writes about the building of the transcontinental railway here in the United States. A monumental task and ambitious vision linking one coast to the other coast. In 1863 at the beginning of the project, some Californians decided to sponsor a lunch ceremony. They thought this was so cool and so great, hey, we need to celebrate it, and they invited a lot of dignitaries and people well known and attached to the project. Colas Huntington, one of the most important financial backers was invited, but he declined it with these words. “If you want to celebrate the driving of the first spike, go ahead and do it. I don’t. Anybody can drive the first spike. But there’s going to be months of labor and unrest and tough hard times between the first and the last spike.”
So it’s kind of referring, hey, call me when the last spike has been driven in and we’ve accomplished the job. I’ll be there to celebrate that. If I was to change the metaphor, what are you saying is that every boxer looks good in the first round, but will he be the last man standing? I love the fact that Paul’s still standing. Paul’s there to drive in the last spike of a faithful life and going here, well done good and faithful servant. There’s another thing about things that really matter. Friendship, faithfulness, forgiveness. Did you notice this? Look at verse Psalm 16, but my first offense, no one stood with me, but I continued standing. But I want to say this, Lord may not be charged against them. I forgive them. I don’t hold it against them. I’m not bitter. I love the fact that Paul ends his life sweet, not sour. Have you not watched too many saints end their lives, sour, bitter, unforgiving? That’s not Paul.
In fact, this prayer was not original to him, right? Didn’t it start with Jesus on the cross? Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. That’s how Jesus died. Forgiving. What about Stephen the first Christian martyr Acts 7:60, when the stones were raining down upon him as his life was slipping away, “Lord don’t charge it to their account.” What happened to Paul needs to happen to us. Then when we come to the end and we have lived out a commitment to the gospel faithfully that will show itself in a willingness to forgive those who have heard us along the way. People can disappoint us, can’t they? They can let us down. Boy, they can hurt us, really hurt us. In fact, those nearest and dearest probably do it the most.
But what happens to what happens to us is the real issue. I’m happy to listen to what’s happening to you. And I’ll give you a loving heart and a listening ear of you tell me something bad has happened and something did this and somebody did that. I’ll listen to what’s happening to you, but then I’ll turn it back and say, ‘Well, what’s going to happen to what’s happening to you? How are you going to handle that with what attitude are you going to deal with that? With what perspective are you going to bring to? Are you going to live that out at the foot of the cross?” See, we can fan the smoldering embers of burning resentment to a place of great destruction. We can hit back, we can become bitter. We can hold grudges or we can bury the hatchet at the foot of the cross.
And a sane person said, make sure when you bury the hatchet, you don’t leave the handle sticking up. You’re not going back there. It’s got to be total forgiveness. Paul forgave them fully. Isn’t it amazing? The saints in Asia have left me. Demas, one of my right-hand guys deserted me. And here in Rome, nobody showed up to my trial. I’m not bitter. I’m sweet, not sore. And Paul would be the first to say, and that’s because I’m treating others the way God has treated me. Didn’t Jesus teach us in Matthew 6:12 to pray, “Lord, forgive me my debts as I forgive others who have trespassed against me.” Ephesians 4:32 reminds us that we ought to forgive others as God has forgiven us.
I spent some time up in the Seattle area with the pastor about a year ago. He shared the story of how his daughter had been abandoned by her husband, a young man he had saw come to the Lord, a young man he had mentored, a young man who had spent time in their home before he ever married their daughter. And he was honest about how angry he initially was while he wanted to do a certain thing to that young man, given the heartache he had visited upon his daughter. In the light of all the goodness that family had shown to him, how can you do that? But he said he was able by God’s grace to deal with that. He didn’t succumb to the bitterness and unforgiveness that were some of his initial thoughts because he said one day he was reading Paul Tripp and Paul Tripp said that no one will ever sin against you more than you’ve sinned against God.
That young man had sinned grievously against that family, but he’d never sinned against them as much as they had sinned against God. And they had received the forgiveness of God, and through the gospel they started to extend that to him. I hope that you and I don’t allow root of bitterness to take root in our lives because death is coming. The judgment seed of Christ awaits. So what are the things that matter? Friendship, faithfulness, forgiveness, faith is another one. Faith. Trust a dependence upon God to help you get through the sorrows and the struggles of life. Notice verse 17, hey, no one stood with me, but I’ve found the grace to forgive in the light of the grace I’ve received.
And you know what? The presence of Christ has strengthened me and my faith is still in him that the God who displays his power and allows for his protection and works out his providence, but the Lord stood with me and strengthened me so that the message might be preached faithfully through me and that all the gentiles might hear and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion and the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me. Paul’s situation was dire. He was a prisoner in the Marmotime prison, which I got the visit some years ago and I was with Fred Whitman, which was a deep, dark, dank prison created by the Romans to suck the soul out of every prisoner to produce in them a state of hopelessness. But Paul overcomes it because while he was alone, he wasn’t alone. The Lord stood with him. His faith in Christ was a difference maker.
Is your faith in Christ a difference maker? Is it making a difference in your circumstances as challenging as they might be in the midst of betrayal or hurt? Is your faith in Christ making a difference at ought to? It did in for Paul. The Lord stood with me, amidst all the difference, he says. Paul got to experience the Lord’s power, protection and providence. Just quickly let me unpack that. The Lord’s power, the Lord has assisted me, preserved me, and I’ve been able to suffer valiantly. Verse 17, the word strengthen is not unlike Philippians 4:13. “I can do all things through Christ who pours his strength into me.” The indwelling presence of Christ, the comfort of the Holy Spirit often through the means of the word the spirit has written, acted like an intravenous drip to a dehydrated man. Have you ever been dehydrated and been given the IV? I mean give it a few R’s and all of a sudden, man, you feel a different person? You’re hydrated, your strength is coming back.
Paul’s kind of using that image. The Lord has strengthened me like an intravenous drip to a dehydrated man. He infused his strength into my failing spirit. I’m alone, but I’m not alone. That’s a wonderful thing. You’ll notice the word stood with me within my circumstances, just something very simple but very helpful. The Lord didn’t deliver Paul from out of his circumstances, but delivered him within his circumstances so that the danger he faced and the outcomes that could be were taken care of. The Lord didn’t saved Daniel from the lion’s den. He saved Daniel in the lion’s den. God didn’t save the three Hebrew children from the fiery furnace saved them with it as the fourth man walked among them like unto the son of man. God didn’t rewrite David around the valley of the shadow of death, he walked with him every step of that valley and through it. The Lord Jesus doesn’t promise to isolate us from our troubles, but he does promise to insulate us within our promises with his comforting presence and power.
Isn’t that the secret of David Livingstone? Evangelist explorer to Africa who faced physical sickness, environmental threat, spiritual warfare. And when he was back in his native Glasgow in Scotland receiving an honorary degree, he explained how he was sustained in all of those circumstances by the promise of Matthew 28:20, “Though I am with you always,” he said those words are the word of a gentleman of the most strict and sacred honor, and that’s the end of it. The Lord’s power, the Lord’s protection. The Lord saved him from the mouth of the lion, verse 17, and would deliver him from every evil work. There is a difficulty here because Paul’s a Roman citizen and Roman citizens were never sent to the arena and the lions, they were never crucified. If that’s true, then what’s Paul talking about? He may be talking about a spiritual reality, right? Satan’s a lion going about seeking him he may devour.
Whatever the case, Paul wants us to know that the Lord give him a reprieve. He got to enjoy a deliverance. God had undertaken for him in the presence of his enemies, and God will do that for you and me. He won’t deliver us from, but he will stand with us in and he will deliver us through. I love Psalm 23:4, don’t you? Five. “He spreads a table for us in the presence of our enemies. He takes care of us right under the nose of those who would do us harm.” Sometimes our deliverance is unknown to us. I think when we get to heaven, we’ll be surprised how many times the Lord delivered us. So we were just stupid enough not to know the danger we were in. Sometimes our deliverance is from the trouble. Sometimes he just doesn’t let you go through it, prevents it from happening. Sometimes, as we’ve said here, he delivers us within it. And ultimately is in heaven the greatest deliverance when you leave this sin-cursed, tear-soaked planet for a heavenly kingdom?
And then finally the Lord’s providence. But the Lord stood with me and strung to me. Notice this verse 17, so that the message might be preached more fully through me to the Gentiles. That’s amazing. This circumstance, like his first imprisonment had furthered the gospel. And Paul we’re not told high and in what way, but his pain had become a platform for the gospel. Remember back in Acts 9:15-16, Paul was called by God to be an apostle to the Gentiles and now he’s living it in troubling times and in crushing circumstances. And I think that’s just a challenge and a point. The Lord not only undertook for him and delivered him, but the Lord overruled in the midst of his circumstances. And I think by the end of it, Nero’s going to have buyer’s remorse forever ever dragging Paul to Rome.
But I want to challenge you in your pain, in your suffering, in a set of circumstances you don’t wish for or you wouldn’t wish on anyone else, but by the Lord’s power, through the Lord’s protection with the Lord’s providence, you can turn that pain into a platform. You can suffer in a manner that bad people and bad circumstances make the good news attractive. I read a book on 50 women that made an impact in the Christian faith some years ago. I think it was by an author DeRouche, but she told about Corrie and Betsy Temboum in the concentration camp in Germany. And Betsy was weak. Maybe she was weaker than she realized. In fact, she would be dead within a few days.
But in one particular cold morning when the roll call was given at 4:30 and she could hardly find the strength to stand up and go outside to the roll call, she turned to her sister Corrie and she said, “Corrie, you know what? Here’s my plans for the future. If we get out of here, I’m going to do three things. First of all, I’m going to go home to Holland and I’m going to create a home for survivors of the Holocaust, and we’re going to create a beautiful environment for them that they can see out some of their days in peace and quiet. And I’ll tell you another thing, Corrie, if I get out of here, the second thing I’m going to do is I’m going to get my hands on one of these concentration camps and I’m going to redo it and repurpose it, and we’re going to use it to rehabilitate those who hated us and we’re going to teach them how to love.”
And finally, and she said this the day before she died, not realizing that her time was up, she says, “Corrie, when we get out of here, we must tell people that there is no pit so deep that he’s not deeper still and they will listen to us because we have been here.” What she saying? My bad circumstances brought up by bad people. That has done bad to me. I’m going to live it in such a manner that it’s going to create a platform for the gospel. And we’re going to be able to say that grace is enough and nothing can separate us from God’s love and we’re going to preach the gospel to people and they’re going to listen because we lived it. Paul’s living it. Betsy Tin Boom lived it. And you know what? Let’s be honest. As life accumulates, it tends to accumulate sorrows and challenges. But are you going to allow your pain and the challenges of your final years to become a platform to preach the sufficiency of Christ and the greatness of his saving power and presence?
Finally, quickly, forever matters most. Remember what I said at the beginning? We’re here at the end. When I first read that passage, I go, what am I going to do with this? It’s one of those salutations at the end of Paul’s letter, travel log a jumble of ideas. No, it’s actually not. It’s profound. Here’s a man writing his last letter and he’s now telling us about the things that matter. And right at the end here, he talks about forever really matters. Verse 18, “And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for his heavenly kingdom.” Paul was running out of time, but he wasn’t running out of hope. He had been born again as his companion. Peter would say, unto a living hope, Paul’s back did to enjoy eternity with God.
If you go back to chapter one, verse 10, he talks about how Jesus has brought life and immortality through the gospel, an abolished disarmed death. He tells us in chapter two verses 10 to 11, if we die with him, we’ll live with him. If we endure, we’ll reign with him and we’ll enjoy eternal glory. And here in chapter four, he prefaces his final remarks with, you know what? I’m looking forward to a crown of righteousness, which is led up for me when the righteous judge will give it to me on that day. Paul was living this day for that day. He was trading the here for the hereafter, which meant that while he was in the here he was living the henceforth. Look at the wording of verse 10. There is henceforth led up for me, the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will give. The henceforth of a new body, the henceforth of a nature that doesn’t sin, the henceforth of full knowledge, the henceforth of being beyond the reach of one’s enemies, the henceforth of Jesus glorious presence.
Look, as we close, Paul knew that his end was really just the beginning. Paul knew that his presence suffering would give way to boundless joy and breathtaking glory. Paul knew that he was about to cash in on his faithfulness to Jesus. Paul knew that in one second in heaven, he would instantly forget the losses and crosses of a lifetime. Paul knew that he was not in the land of the living, but in the land of the dying, going to the land of the living. And all of that, upheld him and supported him. Police officer pulled over a distinguished looking older couple and asked why they were speeding, to which the old gentleman replied from the passenger seat. He said, “Well, young man, we were speeding to get to the place before we forget where we were going.” I like that. You start to lose your memory a little bit, right? And they were speeding to get to the place before they forgot where they were going.
Paul never forgot where he was going. And where he was going, kept him going because the destination made the journey worthwhile. If you’re going to be hanged in a couple of weeks, it’ll wonderfully concentrate in your thoughts and it will separate the chaff from the wheat, the passing from the permanent, the spiritual from the material, the primary from the secondary. Take a look at this list and you’ll see the importance of friendship, faithfulness, forgiveness, and abiding faith and trust in Jesus, and a forever perspective on life. Amen.
Lord, we thank you for this closing chapter on the story book of Paul’s life. And as we have turned the page to it, it’s challenging us to turn a new page in our own lives and to make sure we’re living for those things that we will not regret on the day of our death. What a wonderful thing it would be to die in the company of the saints in the context of a life of Godful faithfulness. What a wonderful thing it would be to die sweet and not sorrow because you didn’t collect your hurts along the way and keep them like a set of baseball cards, but you threw them away along the way motivated by Calvary love and the amazing grace of God in one’s own life?
Lord, we want to come to the last hour believing in a life that will last forever. And we want to come to our final days, secure in your abiding presence with stories of your abiding and ongoing deliverance, marveling at the providence of God that works all things together for good, that allows us to turn pain into platforms and problems into pulpits. So Lord, help us to number our days and we may apply our hearts to wisdom. Help us to remember it’s better to go to the house of mourning than into the of mirth. For the wise take at the heart. And we pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.