The Postscript

What would be your final words if you were to come? I invite you to turn to 2 Timothy and to Chapter 4, the concluding verses of Paul's, what is taken to be his concluding letter. We're probably dealing here with a final written words of the apostle Paul himself. Now, Paul seems like he ended at verse 18, doesn't it? The Lord will rescue me, he says. To him be the glory for ever and ever.

Amen. And you can imagine, perhaps, his secretary said, Is that it? Are we finishing with the amen? And he said, Yes, I think so.

And then he said, No, wait a minute. Just let's put a P.S. And the postscript is here in verses 19–22. What are we going to do with it? Well, as I studied it, I determined that I can learn three simple lessons. They're not new, nor are they unique to this passage. I can learn, again, about the nature of God's providence. I can learn about the importance of gospel partnerships. And I can learn something of what it means to part from my brothers and sisters in a way that is marked by graciousness and by grace itself. So first of all, then, this notion of God's providence. If you care to, you can turn to Acts chapter 18.

And it is at the beginning of Acts chapter 18 that Luke records for us the way in which the first two individuals mentioned in this postscript find themselves caught up into the life of the apostle Paul. When we think about our lives, all of us, we recognize that there have been people that have come across our path. When it happened, it may have seemed very significant or perhaps commonplace. But now, from the vantage point of time, we realize that God in his providence had so clearly ordered the steps.

And in this case, it is apparent. From the very beginning, Paul had been able to testify to this. When he was converted, God in his providence brought Ananias to him. Then he gave to him Barnabas so that he would be accepted in the Jerusalem church community.

Then he gave to him Silas when he and Barnabas had a bit of a bust up in order that he wouldn't have to travel on his own. And now, as he writes his final letter, as he reflects upon God's goodness and grace to him, he has occasion to rejoice in his providence. Now, in a similar way, you see his mention of Onesiphorus. He's mentioned Onesiphorus already in this letter. Some of you will remember, back in chapter 1, in verse 16, "'May the LORD grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus.'"

Why? Well, he tells us. He often refreshed me.

He wasn't ashamed of my chains. When he arrived in Rome, he searched for me, he did so earnestly, and he found me. Once again, the providence of God. God orders the steps of his servant, brings him into the realm of Paul's life and ministry. And although Paul is an apostle, and although he is significantly useful, nevertheless, he is eminently vulnerable. And in his vulnerability, God says, Here's Priscilla and Aquila. Here's the household of Onesiphorus.

Well, you say, That's fine. I can see that the providence of God would be in that. But what about in a little phrase, verse 20, Erastus remained at Corinth? Well, Erastus remained at Corinth. Anything else?

No. Okay, well, that's good. We can deal with that. And I left Trophimus, who was ill at Miletus. There's significance in both of these things. It will take eternity to reveal what went on with Erastus at Corinth. But in the providence of God, he remained in Corinth. And in the providence of God, at this point, Trophimus was sick, and he wasn't healed. Paul, who had exercised a healing ministry, obviously had no proviso granted him to exercise such a ministry in the life of Trophimus at this point in his life.

No surprise in as much as Paul himself was unable to be set free from his own besetting a thorn in the flesh. Simple reminder, but an important reminder, God's people get sick. God's people sometimes stay sick. All God's people will eventually die. It is to operate from a closed Bible in an empty head to suggest that is not the case. And both joy and sorrow, sickness and health, disappointment and encouragement all fall within the proviso of the providence of God.

When you think about the nature of this room, it's a microcosm of the city of Cleveland, of our world, represented ethnically, racially, intellectually, socially, financially. And every one of us has stories to tell where there are highs and there are lows. And the message that comes so clearly through this is that the same Paul, who had undergone all of these buffetings and beatings, who now finds himself in a dungeon and under the shadow of his own execution, is still to the very end of his day affirming the word of the psalmist in Psalm 121, I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. And that help is not mediated, does not come in isolation. That help came, as he highlights it here, in the relationships that God had granted him in his providence throughout his life. The Lord, Psalm 121, will watch over your going out, and your coming in from this time and even forevermore.

It's a wonderful picture, isn't it? Imagine him either with his own writing instrument or sitting there as somebody scribbles it down. Say this. Say, I want to send greetings to Priscilla and Aquila, and I want to send them to the household of Onesiphorus. Let Timothy know that Erastus has stayed in Corinth, and Trophimus hasn't made it all the way back to Ephesus.

He is sick in Miletus. Well, the precious nature of these memories—precious memories, how they linger. That's an old Jim Reeves song or something. It shows you how old I am. At the end of your life, you'll only have your memories in your photographs.

And in fact, you may only have your photographs. Secondly, not only a lovely picture of the providence of God but the reminder of the nature and the necessity of gospel partnerships. The apostle Paul was uniquely gifted. He was greatly used. But he wasn't a one-man band.

He knew that. And as we've noted earlier, there are some hundred people who are referenced throughout his letters in the Acts of the Apostles who were actually very, very important to him in his ministry—and probably nobody more so than Timothy himself. Hence, Timothy gets two letters, and the baton of faith is passed on to him. He was a junior partner, but he was a partner nevertheless. Again, this is simple, but it's important to remind us of, isn't it?

To encourage one another with the fact that in Christ, in Christ, each of us has both the opportunity and the responsibility of forming and sustaining gospel partnerships, gospel relationships. Timothy was not a natural. Few of us are naturals.

He was, in the early days, too young, he was too diffident, he was too prone to tummy problems. And which of us can identify with that kind of thing? And yet God was pleased to put him in a position of usefulness. It is in relationships that the gospel works itself out, isn't it? In the same way that in a family, what it means to be a person works itself out. Siblings exist to help to fashion the development of one another within the nuclear family. And siblings in a nuclear family, if they're going to get on with one another, have to tolerate each other. And they have to be tolerated by each other. And unless we're prepared to do that, we can't exist.

We can't exist effectively. And tolerate, I think, is a good word. Put up with. To put up with each other's weaknesses. To put up with each other's sins. To acknowledge that if this family is going to function, this dynamic is going to have to take place. And that is actually true in the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because when Christ redeems us, adopts us into his family, not only do we get Christ, but we get the entire family.

Which is kind of like the good news and the bad news. I mean, this would be a great job if it weren't for you. And you say, I understand we feel the exact same way as you. In this little scenario here, in this little nine-person cameo, there is a reminder of what Paul has taught so effectively in his other letters—not least of all in Ephesians, certainly in 1 Corinthians—that the only way actually for the body to change the metaphor for the body itself to work is for there to be give and take within the mechanisms and systems of the body. No one particular part can simply champion all the others if everything is to work in the way it should. That's a pretty obvious illustration.

But it's important to recognize when we look around on one another. Paul says, I've got Trophimus in mind, I've Erastus in mind, I've got you, Timothy, in mind, and so on. And then he has Eubulus. Who in the world is Eubulus? Putin's. Linus.

Claudia. Oh, don't be smart, Alex. I mean, at least they're in the Bible. You're not in the Bible. I'm not in the Bible.

God knows who they are. I'm in the Bible. We would be in the Bible.

We would all be in under the final phrase of verse 21. And all the rest. Brothers there, it's plural. It can be brothers and sisters. I think it's probably best that way. And all the other brothers and sisters, all the siblings in the family, involved in one another's lives, saying no to isolation, saying yes to involvement.

Did you get that? No to isolation, yes to involvement. Parenting is some journey, isn't it? Kids are given to us for our sanctification.

I'm convinced of that. Whatever else is involved to teach us things about ourselves that we would never otherwise know, to teach us the importance of prayer, to teach us that we are entirely dependent upon God, to teach us that unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it. And in the process of raising our children, one of the things that is vitally important is that we do not allow them to become isolated from their siblings. Now, they may for a moment or two, for their own well-being or whatever, but not as a plan and pattern. Not the closed and locked bedroom door, not the slam bedroom door, not the I-am-alone stuff, not the I-don't-want-you-I-don't-need-you and so on. You can't do that, not if you want a family.

You can't do it in the church if you want a church family either. Every so often—and I don't say this in any spirit of judgment, it makes perfect sense to me—every so often someone will say to me, You know, I think that Parkside is just too big for us. Okay? Someone else might say more tellingly, I think it's too cold a place. Okay?

I think it's rather uninviting. Okay. And I say to them, I say, What do you do at Parkside? They say, What do you mean do? I mean do. Do you understand do-do?

The verb to be? Well, we come. Oh, you mean like a passenger on a bus? Well, no, I wouldn't say that.

Well, what would you say? This is what I've discovered. Individuals who begin to serve suddenly realize, This isn't as big a place as I thought. Suddenly they discover friendships and relationships that they never knew were possible.

Suddenly the idea of it being a rather uninviting cold and impersonal place is filled with a whole coterie of individuals that they're learning to tolerate and be tolerated by. And you see, in our culture, where sibling rivalry is often fierce, where a functional family is increasingly scarce, as staggering as it may be for us to face up to, it is nevertheless the case that it is in the church of Jesus Christ that that warmth and that affection is to be discovered in the nature of gospel partnerships. Gospel partnerships—it's because the gospel unites us. We're not united by the same school tie. We're not united by the same ethnic background. We're not united by our socioeconomic framework. Those are not the unifying factors. Not in the church.

They may be in a club, they may be in an institution, they may be in an old schoolboy's operation, but not in the church. Our world is broken. We live in a broken world. It is fractured, and it is broken. It will eventually be repaired in its entirety when a new heaven and a new earth is established. But in the meantime, the place for the brokenness restored, for the sinfulness forgiven, for the dysfunctionality addressed, is supposed to be in the church. Now, if you just want to ride the bus and criticize the driver, fair enough.

We got all different drivers, different hats, different speeds, and so on. Some of you made partner. Some of you are accountants, and you managed to get it into that strange little place where you made partner. Well, that's not how it works in the church. You have a responsibility to be a partner.

It's not possible to be in the church without a God has defined you and called you to partnership. Some of us are tempted, I think, to sell ourselves short in relationship to these things. The growing good of the world—according George Eliot in Middlemarch—the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts. And that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been is half owing to the number who live faithfully a hidden life and rest in unvisited tombs. You are vitally important to the people around you, whether you realize it or not, either for good or for ill. Some of you don't sing, and you should sing.

Some of you sing. Finally, a simple lesson about God's providence, a simple lesson about gospel partnerships, and finally, a simple lesson about gracious parting. Gracious parting. It's time to say goodbye. Verse 22 is probably Paul's last written word.

Quite a thought, isn't it? I had a book given to me many years ago called Famous Last Words. Let me just give you two quotes from it randomly. William Pope, atheist, died 1797, led an atheistic cult who delighted in desecrating religious places and objects and whose meetings the Bible was richly kicked around the floor.

Closing words. I have done the damnable deed, the horrible damnable deed. I cannot pray God will have nothing to do with me. I will not have salvation at his hands.

I long to be in the bottomless pit, the lake which burns with fire and brimstone. I tell you, I am damned. I will not have salvation. Nothing for me but hell. Come, eternal torments. O God, do not hear my prayers, for I will not be saved. I hate everything that God has made. Quite a way to go out into eternity, eh?

Contrast John Bunyan. Weep not for me but for yourselves. I go to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will, no doubt, through the mediation of his blessed Son, receive me though a sinner, where I hope that we, ere long, shall meet to sing the new song and remain everlastingly happy, world without end. Paul now awaits his execution. How does he finish? He parts graciously. He parts in many ways the way in which Jesus parted from his disciples, where it says by Luke that he lifted up his arms and he blessed them, and he was taken up out of their sight. Paul ends with a blessing. The Lord be with your spirit. That's in the singular, presumably for Timothy himself. And then grace be with you. That's in the plural, for the whole church as it hears this letter read.

Well, that's a wonderful way to end, isn't it? Because Timothy would never outgrow his need for the presence of Jesus. The church would never outgrow its need for grace. They'd been saved by grace.

They were shaped by grace. And now as he parts from them, he commends them to God's care. Well, as we part company with Paul in this letter, at least, we want to go with that notion ringing in our ears, To him be glory. May his presence be our portion. May his grace sustain our relationships.

You're listening to Truth for Life Weekend. That's Alistair Begg reminding us that our walk of faith was never intended to be a solo journey. We need others. Others need us. And it's God who determines when and where our paths may cross.

Keep listening. Alistair will be back in just a minute to close with prayer. Today's message was the final message in the Guard the Truth series. If you benefited from the example the Apostle Paul set for us as he faced imminent death, I want to remind you that the complete four-volume study, that's 38 messages from the book of 2 Timothy, that's available on a convenient USB drive. You'll find it online at truthforlife.org slash store. At Truth for Life, we carefully select and recommend to you books that will help you and your family grow in your walk of faith. Today's book was an easy one for us to choose, and we couldn't be more excited to tell you about it.

It's Alistair's brand new book. It's titled Truth for Life, 365 Daily Devotions. Each daily reading in this book includes a scripture verse, Alistair's commentary. There are prompts to help you apply each lesson and additional verses so you can dig deeper or read through the Bible in a year. Alistair compares reading the Bible to an exercise routine. Some days you're excited to get started and it feels amazing.

Other days you struggle to begin and it's an effort just to push through. Regardless of how you're feeling, if you commit to reading the Bible each day, you'll reap the benefits in the long run, and this devotional is a helpful guide to keep you on track. Find out more about the book Truth for Life, 365 Daily Devotions when you visit our website truthforlife.org. Now here's Alistair to close with prayer. Father, how we pray that your Word will find a resting place in our lives, that the reality of your grace and goodness to us, both as individuals and as a family, may quicken our resolve to engage in the partnerships which are your gift to us and which are necessary for us, that you will help us to see both our joys and our sorrows as coming to us under your providential care, even the hard things that seek to trip us up and destabilize us. O Lord, help us to trust in you. And we pray that your grace may be our portion for Jesus' sake. Amen. I'm Bob Lapine. Next weekend we're kicking off the Advent season with a short series titled Songs for a Savior. How could Mary sing God's praises when she was placed in such an awkward and potentially disgraceful position? Find out when you join us again next weekend. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.