Untitled Sermon

It’s an odd juxtaposition. While our social conditioning is adamant that life is valueless, that the decisions I make, particularly on the weekends and also weekdays between 5pm and 8am, need only align with my own particular version of morality (those decisions made during office hours should also accord with our institutional statement of ethics). Even while we maintain this position, we all also are convinced that our lives have meaning—that they’re going somewhere, that there is a narrative arc to life. I’ve had the opportunity to train students recently in interview-based research, and the instruction I continually give them is “Find the story. Invite Stories. People have stories they want to tell; draw those out.”

Up to this point, we’re in step with the way humanity in general thinks about life. There’s a journey, there’s a meaning system in place.

What is the gospel in this passage? The gospel in this passage is threefold. First, that Paul understands his life and his suffering according to the economics of the Kingdom, and in this vein he sees them not as an evidence of failure, but as evidence of the victorious purposes of God and the in-breaking of his kingdom. Second, that the faithless are redeemed through the faithfulness of Christ. Third that Christ does not abandon his servants.

What is the good life? What guides your decisions? All of us are engaged in a kind of mental calculus to minimize pain and to maximize the good.

How does this passage speak to Paul’s fear that Timothy may be ashamed of his suffering or may shirk his responsibility to suffer for the sake of the gospel?

When Paul says that he is a drink offering, notice that the boundaries of the kingdom have moved. This, Paul declares, this prison cell, this suffering is the kingdom, and my life is given over to God in celebration.

N. T. Wright’s Paul: A Biography – what would it be like to be a First Century Jew in the midst of the diaspora. In a world without Privacy. Imagine the Animosity. Zeal. Zeal for the Law.

Boys Town Fr. Flannigan.

Where are you going?

When Paul mentions Christ’s appearing (epiphany) he is referencing a theme that has been building throughout the letter.

Thus in a subtle way the closing phrase of v. 10 redirects the theology back to the point (made by Paul) that gave rise to it—“join with me in suffering for the gospel” (v. 8)—and delivers a reason anticipated by the earlier point—Why join in suffering for the gospel? Because preaching it is the divinely chosen means by which God’s salvation, crafted in and through the Christ-event, may be made available to the world.[1]

In 2020, a team of American sociologists published the results of a study they had conducted with parents from around the United States. They had sat down with folks from all over with varying backgrounds and from different religions to try to get a handle on what parents in general believe about life and the value of religion for their children. And one of the themes they came away with was that life is a journey, that part of what we do as parents is help our children to prepare for that journey. And I would say that as we come to this final passage in Paul’s letter to Timothy. We find a similar conversation. Paul has come to the end of his journey and he is trying to prepare Timothy for what lies ahead. Now, you go on in that study I just mentioned they talk about how parents want

As we get started today, I would like to ask you to imagine something. Imagine that you are a parent. You don’t need to be a parent for the sermon today, but as a starting place, imagine that you have a child that you are responsible for. What do you want for that child? What do you want them to know? What are your obligations towards them? That was the subject of a study published by a team of sociologists a couple of years ago. They interviewed parents from around the country of all different backgrounds and perspectives, and what they came away with was not particularly surprising. Parents across the board view life as a difficult journey and view it as their job to prepare their child to be able to live a happy and good life. Now, you didn’t need a study to confirm that, most of you would have gotten their on your own. Afterall, it’s essentially a part of human nature both to desire to live a good life and to view the attainment of that as a kind of journey. But the pivotal question? The one you immediately want to follow up with, because here we’re getting into he interesting stuff is: What is the good life? What kind of journey are we on? You know, sometimes you run into folks who say “oh well it doesn’t really matter where you’re going, all that matters is the journey.” Respectfully, those people have never been on a trip with children. Mei-Lyn and I recently had the pleasure of driving our family of 6 up to Chicago. 15 hrs each way. Let me guarantee you, we had the map running almost the entire time. Did we have a good drive? Yes, we did. Great conversations, saw some interesting things. But we absolutely had a destination in mind. And we absolutely cared that the choices we were making led to that destination. It would not have been a good car ride if we had ended up in West Virginia, or Massachusetts. Life works the same way. As we journey through life, we interpret our surroundings and our actions based on how they lead us toward the Good.

Paul loves Timothy. This is clear throughout the letters. Timothy, my beloved Child in the faith. XETC.X Which makes his instructions all the more confusing. Timothy, join me in suffering for the gospel. Timothy, hold fast to your ministry. Why? Because you will find yourself in the midst of people who will reject it. Hold fast to the Scriptures, because the time is coming when people will no longer want to hear it.

Paul, at the end of this letter begins to invoke a series of metaphors to try to frame for Timothy what is happening.

The first metaphor we come to concerns this idea of a drink offering. Paul says, “For I am already being poured out as a drink offering.” The New English Bible puts it a little more clearly “Already my life is being poured out on the Altar”. Now—just a technical note—you’d be forgiven if you saw the word “drink offering” and thought this was something you were supposed to drink. It’s not. The drink offering is an offering of drink—specifically a mixture of wine—that is poured out on top of the Sacrifice. It’s part of the commandments given to the Jewish people for how they are to worship in the temple.

Now there are a few things to note about a drink offering. The first is that it is a total sacrifice. With the animal sacrifices, a portion of the meat was often given to the priests for them and their families. But the Drink offering was offered completely to the Lord. Paul was suggesting a totality. Looking back on his life, he notes with satisfaction that there was nothing left. He had offered it all to the Lord.

The Second thing I want to point out is that the Drink offering was one of the sacrifices that was restricted to the time when the people of Israel had come into possession of the land. Remember the Law was given to the people through Moses when they had not yet been given the land. They had come out of Egypt, but the promise that God made to Abraham had not yet been fulfilled. His descendants had not yet been given the land of Canaan. And in the law there were certain practices that they were supposed to enact immediately, and others that had to wait until they were in the land. And we know something about that waiting. Both as part of the Christian life, but also in our own particular experience as a church. My wife, Mei-Lyn, and I sometimes joke about how we have been attending Anglican Churches together for the majority of the last 15 years, and yet we’ve never been part of a church that has its own building. We’ve met in public school auditoriums and private school gymnasiums, we’ve been in borrow churches and here in this beautiful chapel. But wherever we go, there is always this expectancy. This recognition that there are parts of the liturgy that won’t work here. One time we were in a church that, as I said, was meeting in an auditorium. And, you know, here we have a kind of raised dais. There it was a fully raised platform, maybe 3 feet above the ground. And, to make matters worse the Deacon, bless her, was very short, maybe 5’ at a stretch. And so, because of that confluence, the elevated stage and the short deacon, they couldn’t go forward for the gospel reading. And there was a general expectancy ‘won’t it be great, when we have our own building and the gospel can come forward and be read amongst the people as it ought to be done.’ That’s part of what Paul is invoking in this reference to the drink offering. The drink offering happens in the temple. It happens in the place where God has established his presence. It happens when the people have come into the kingdom. And Paul, facing his own executions, is anxious that Timothy not become confused. Paul is able to offer his life, because Christ is already on the throne. Christ has already conquered death and given rest to his people. “Only after the Lord had defeated the enemies of His people, and given His people a restful dwelling in the land, would He accept the wine of the libations… In the context, the [commandment to eventually perform the] drink offering is a promise of eventual victory and settlement in the land.”

Finally, in Paul’s reference to a drink offering he is identifying his own suffering with that of Christ. Remember the language Jesus uses on the night he is betrayed. This is the cup of my blood poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.

INTRODUCTION:

CONTEXT: Clue in to the conversation about Christ’s appearing in the context of Paul’s death.

Point 1: What does it mean that Christ conquered death?

What does it mean that he reigns as Judge? How does this change the way we live?

God is the God of the Living.

How does death threaten us?

How does Christ conquer death? What does Christ conquer?

Scripture speaks of death in three ways. There is physical death, the separation of the soul from the body. There is spiritual death, the separation of the soul from God. And there is eternal death, the separation of both soul and body from God for ever. All are due to sin; they are sin’s terrible though just reward.

But Jesus Christ ‘abolished’ death. This cannot mean that he eliminated it, as we know from our everyday experience. Sinners are still ‘dead through the trespasses and sins’ in which they walk (Eph. 2:1, 2) until God makes them alive in Christ. All human beings die physically and will continue to do so, with the exception of the generation who are alive when Christ returns in glory. And some are going to die ‘the second death’, which is one of the fearful expressions used in the book of Revelation for hell (e.g. Rev. 20:14; 21:8). Indeed, Paul has written previously that the final abolition of death still lies in the future, as the last enemy of God to be destroyed (1 Cor. 15:26). Not until the return of Christ and the resurrection of the dead shall we be able to shout with joy ‘Death is swallowed up in victory’ (1 Cor. 15:54; cf. Rev. 21:4).

What is triumphantly asserted in this verse by Paul is that at his first appearing Christ decisively ‘defeated’ or ‘overthrew’ death.[2]

[1]Philip H. Towner, The Letters to Timothy and Titus, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2006), 473. [2] John R. W. Stott, Guard the Gospel the Message of 2 Timothy, The Bible Speaks Today (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1973), 37.