2 Timothy 2.26-If the Apostate Christians Repent, They Will Become Sober Again Spiritually and Be Freed from the Devil's Trap
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Thursday June 18, 2015
Second Timothy: Second Timothy 2:26-If the Apostate Christians Repent, They Will Become Sober Again and Be Freed from the Devil’s Trap
Lesson # 61
2 Timothy 2:22 Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 23 But refuse foolish and ignorant speculations, knowing that they produce quarrels. 24 The Lord’s bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged. 25 with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will. (NASB95)
“And they may come to their senses” presents the result of the previous indirect question in Second Timothy 2:25.
“They may come to their senses” is the third person plural aorist active subjunctive form of the verb ananēphō (ἀνανήφω), which means “to become sober again (spiritually)” since it pertains to recovering a proper state of mind or way of thinking.
Specifically, it speaks of becoming sober again spiritually as the result of regaining one’s fellowship with God and the filling of the Spirit.
This is accomplished by confessing one’s sin to be restored to fellowship and which fellowship is maintained by obeying the Word of God.
“And escape from the snare of the devil” is composed of the following: (1) preposition ek (ἐκ), “from” (2) articular genitive feminine singular form of the noun pagis (παγίς), “the snare” (3) articular genitive masculine singular form of the noun diabolos (διάβολος), “the devil.”
At this point in Second Timothy 2:26, the English translations insert the phrase “and escape” (NASB95, NET, ESV, LEB, TNIV, NIV).
They do this to smooth out the syntactical edges of this verse and to bring out the sense of the passage.
However, this is not necessary since we can translate the previous result clause καὶ ἀνανήψωσιν and the prepositional phrase ἐκ τῆς τοῦ διαβόλου παγίδος, “so that they will become sober again, removed from the devil’s trap.”
The noun pagis means “trap” and refers to the various temptations such as false doctrine, pride, money, sex and ambition that lead one into sin and losing one’s fellowship with God and prevents the Christian from being influenced by the Spirit’s teaching in the Word of God.
The noun diabolos means “the devil” and refers to God’s greatest enemy among the fallen angels.
The noun diabolos is also the object of the preposition ek, which means “removed from, freed from” since it is functioning as a marker of separation.
This would indicate these apostate Christians will be removed from the devil’s trap as a result of the Father granting them repentance which would result in their possessing an experiential knowledge of the truth.
“Having been held captive” is the nominative masculine plural perfect passive participle form of the verb zōgreō (ζωγρέω), which means “to be taken or captured as a prisoner of war.”
It speaks of these apostate Christians being Satan’s prisoners of war as a result of adhering to false doctrine which originates from Satan’s kingdom.
It speaks of these apostate Christians being taken as prisoners of war by Satan and his army of fallen angels.
The participle form of this verb is a temporal participle.
The perfect tense of this type of participle is almost always antecedent with reference to the main verb.
Here it is antecedent of the main verb ananēphō indicating that these apostate Christians were taken prisoner of war by Satan’s kingdom prior to repenting and becoming sober again.
“By him” refers to the devil which is indicated by the fact that diabolos is the word’s nearest antecedent.
This prepositional phrase indicates that Satan is the ultimate agency who captured these apostate Christians.
The false doctrine taught by the Judaizers was the intermediate agency.
“To do his will” is composed of the following: (1) preposition eis (εἰς), “to do” (2) genitive feminine singular form of the demonstrative pronoun ekeinos (ἐκεῖνος), “his” (3) articular accusative neuter singular form of the noun thelēma (θέλημα), “the will.”
The noun thelēma means “will” and is used of Satan and thus, it speaks of Satan’s will and the articular construction of the noun thelēma is employed with the demonstrative pronoun ekeinos in predicate position to indicate attributive function.
So therefore, this demonstrative pronoun means “his” since it has an attributive function in relation to the noun thelēma.
The noun thelēma is also the object of the preposition eis which is a marker of purpose indicating that Satan captured these apostate Christians in Ephesus “for the purpose of” doing his will.
Second Timothy 2:22 Now you continue making it your habit of avoiding youthful lusts. Instead continue making it your habit of zealously practicing so as to exemplify divine-righteousness, Christian doctrine, divine-love, peace along with those who make it their habit of calling upon the Lord from a pure heart. 23 But continue making it your habit of avoiding foolish, yes ignorant pointless debates because you know for certain that they do produce quarrels. 24 However, in the interests of the Lord’s slave, he must never, as an eternal spiritual truth, be characterized as contentious but rather to be characterized as gentle for the benefit of each and every person, a skillful teacher, patient. 25 The purpose of which is to be characterized as correcting with gentleness those who in their own selfish-interests are in opposition. Perhaps, God (the Father) will grant them repentance resulting in knowing experientially the truth. 26 Consequently, they will become sober again, freed from the devil’s trap after having been captured as a prisoner of war by him to do his will. (Author’s translation)
In Second Timothy 2:26, the apostle Paul presents the result of the Father granting these apostate Christians in Ephesus repentance which leads to an experiential knowledge of the truth.
He states that these individuals will become sober again.
He is speaking of becoming sober again spiritually as the result of regaining one’s fellowship with God and the filling of the Spirit.
This is accomplished by confessing one’s sin to be restored to fellowship and which fellowship is maintained by obeying the Word of God.
To become sober again spiritually speaks of recovering the filling of the Spirit which refers to being influenced by means of the Spirit.
This takes place when the Christian is exercising faith in the Spirit’s teaching in the Word of God which results in obedience to the Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions in the Word of God.
So to be in one’s right mind as a Christian is to be influenced by the Spirit.
The idea of becoming sober again implies that being out of fellowship with God due to adhering to false doctrine which is lies from Satan’s cosmic system is like recovering from a drunken stupor.
It is like recovering from an intoxicated state.
So therefore, in Second Timothy 2:26, Paul is teaching that as a result of repenting these apostate pastors and their disciples would regain a proper mental attitude and specifically regain the filling of the Spirit which is necessary to experience fellowship with God.
This would require these apostate Christians to confess their sins to be restored to fellowship with God and maintaining that fellowship is through obedience to the Word of God.
This obedience to the Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions in the Word of God constitutes being influenced by the Spirit or filled with the Spirit.
Therefore, this verb speaks of recovering the filling of the Spirit which enables one to experience fellowship with God.
By exercising faith in the Spirit inspired apostolic teaching of the apostle Paul which resulted in obedience to the Spirit inspired commands and prohibitions of this teaching, these apostate Christians in Ephesus would be filled or more accurately influenced by the means of the Spirit.
Ephesians 5:18 And do not permit yourselves to get into the habit of being drunk with wine because that is non-sensical behavior, but rather permit yourselves on a habitual basis to be influenced by means of the Spirit. (Author’s translation)
The apostle Paul also teaches in Second Timothy 2:26 that these apostate Christians would be freed from the devil’s trap as a result of repenting.
This trap refers to the various temptations such as false doctrine, pride, money, sex and ambition that lead one into sin and losing one’s fellowship with God and prevents the Christian from being influenced by the Spirit’s teaching in the Word of God.
These apostate Christians would be removed from the devil’s trap as a result of the Father granting them repentance which would result in their possessing an experiential knowledge of the truth.
By obeying false doctrine which originates from Satan and his kingdom, these apostate Christians were doing Satan’s will rather than the Father’s will.
The NET Bible writes “Some have construed ‘for his will’ with the earlier verb and referred the pronoun to God: ‘come to their senses and escape the devil’s trap (though they have been captured by him) in order to do His will.’ In Classical Greek the shift in pronouns would suggest this, but in Koine Greek this change is not significant. The more natural sense is a reference to the devil’s will.”