This section has two verses:
2 Timothy 2:3-4
3 Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier
of Jesus Christ.
4 No man that warreth entangleth himself with the
affairs of this life; that he may please him who
hath chosen him to be a soldier.
We begin in the Barclay:
THE SOLDIER OF CHRIST
2 Timothy 2:3–4
Accept your share in suffering like a fine soldier
of Christ Jesus. No soldier who is on active service
entangles himself in ordinary civilian business; he
lays aside such things, so that by good service he
may please the commander who has enrolled him in his
army.
THE picture of every individual as a soldier and of
life as a campaign is one which the Romans and the
Greeks knew well. ‘To live’, said Seneca, ‘is to be
a soldier’ (Epistles, 96:5). ‘The life of every
man’, said Epictetus [ep-ik-tee-tuh s], ‘is a
kind of campaign, and a campaign which is long and
varied’ (Discourses, 3:24:34). Paul took this
picture and applied it to all Christians, but
especially to the leaders and outstanding servants
of the Church. He urges Timothy to fight a fine
campaign (1 Timothy 1:18). He calls Archippus [ahr-KIHP-uhs],
in whose house a church met, ‘our fellow soldier’
(Philemon 2). He calls Epaphroditus [ee-paf-ro-DAI-tuhs],
the messenger of the Philippian church, ‘my
fellow-soldier’ (Philippians 2:25). Clearly, in the
life of the soldier Paul saw a picture of the life
of the Christian. What then were the qualities of
the soldier which Paul wanted to see repeated in the
Christian life?
Quoted verses:
Philemon 2
And to our beloved Apphia, and
Archippus [ahr-KIHP-uhs]
our fellowsoldier, and to the church in thy house:
1 Timothy 1:18 [see
Lesson]
This charge I commit unto thee, son
Timothy, according to the prophecies which went
before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a
good warfare;
Philippians 2:25
Yet I supposed it necessary to send
to you Epaphroditus [ee-paf-ro-DAI-tuhs],
my brother, and companion in labour, and
fellowsoldier, but your messenger, and he that
ministered to my wants.
(1) The soldiers’ service must be a concentrated
service. Once soldiers have enlisted on a
campaign, they can no longer involve themselves in
the ordinary daily business of life and living; they
must concentrate on their service as soldiers. The
Roman code of Theodosius [thee-uh-doh-shee-uh s]
said: ‘We forbid men engaged on military service to
engage in civilian occupations.’ A soldier is a
soldier and nothing else; Christians must
concentrate on their Christianity. That does not
mean that they must not engage on any worldly tasks
or business. They must still live in this world, and
they must still make a living; but it does mean that
they must use whatever task they are engaged upon to
demonstrate their Christianity.
(2) Soldiers are conditioned to obedience.
The early training of soldiers is designed to make
them obey unquestioningly the word of command [in
our case, God]. There may come a time when such
instinctive obedience will save their lives and the
lives of others. There is a sense in which it is no
part of a soldier’s duty ‘to know the reason why’.
Involved as they are in the midst of the battle,
they cannot see the overall picture. They must leave
the decisions to the commander who sees the whole
field. The first Christian duty is obedience to the
voice of God, and acceptance even of what is not
fully understood.
(3) Soldiers are conditioned to sacrifice.
Professor A. J. Gossip of Glasgow, tells how, as a
chaplain in the First World War, he was going up the
line for the first time. War and blood, and wounds
and death were new to him. On his way, he saw by the
roadside, left behind after the battle, the body of
a young kilted Highlander. Oddly, perhaps, there
flashed into his mind the words of Christ: ‘This is
my body broken for you.’ Christians must always be
ready to sacrifice themselves, their wishes and
their fortunes for God and for other people.
(4) Soldiers are conditioned to loyalty. When
a Roman soldier joined the army, he took the
sacramentum, the oath of loyalty to his emperor. A
conversation was reported between the French
commander Marshal Foch and an officer in the First
World War. ‘You must not retire,’ said Foch, ‘you
must hold on at all costs.’ ‘Then,’ said the officer
aghast, ‘that means we must all die.’ And Foch
answered: ‘Precisely!’ The supreme virtue of all
soldiers is that they are faithful even to death.
Christians too must be loyal to Jesus Christ,
through all the chances and the changes of life,
even down to the gates of death. ~the Barclay
Commentary
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - The oldest manuscripts have no “Thou
therefore,” and read, “Endure hardship with (me).”
“Take thy share in suffering” [Conybeare and
Howson]. ~Jamieson, Fausset, Brown
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - Such hardships as a soldier is called
to endure. The apostle supposes that a minister of
the gospel might be called to endure hardships, and
that it is reasonable that he should be as ready to
do it as a soldier is. Soldiers often endure great
privations. Taken from their homes and friends;
exposed to cold, or heat, or storms, or fatiguing
marches; sustained on coarse fare, or almost
destitute of food, they are often compelled to
endure as much as the human frame can bear, and
often indeed, sink under their burdens, and die. If,
for reward or their country’s sake, they are willing
to do this, the soldier of the cross [stake]
should be willing to do it for his Savior's sake,
and for the good of the human race. Hence, let no
man seek the office of the ministry as a place of
ease. Let no one come into it merely to enjoy
himself. Let no one enter it who is not prepared to
lead a soldier’s life and to welcome hardship and
trial as his portion. He would make a bad soldier,
who, at his enlistment, should make it a condition
that he should be permitted to sleep on a bed of
down, and always be well clothed and fed, and never
exposed to peril, or compelled to pursue a wearisome
march. Yet do not some men enter the ministry,
making these the conditions? And would they enter
the ministry on any other terms? ~Barnes Notes
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - Another admonition: that the ministry
of the word is a spiritual warfare, which no man can
so travail in that he pleases his captain, unless he
abstains from and parts with all hindrances which
might draw him away from it. ~Geneva Bible
Translation Notes
Endure hardness as a good soldier.
The Christian soldier
Every Christian, and especially every Christian
minister, may be regarded as a soldier, as an
athlete (2 Timothy 2:5). as a husbandman (2 Timothy
2:6); but of the three similitudes the one which
fits him best is that of a soldier. Even if this
were not so, Paul’s fondness for the metaphor would
be very intelligible.
1. Military service was very familiar to him,
especially in his imprisonments. He must frequently
have seen soldiers under drill, on parade, on gourd,
on the march; most have watched them cleaning,
mending, and sharpening their weapons; putting their
armour on, putting it off. Often, during hours of
enforced inactivity, he must have compared these
details with the details of the Christian life, and
noticed how admirably they corresponded with one
another.
2. Military service was also quite sufficiently
familiar to those whom he addressed. Roman troops
were everywhere to be seen throughout the length and
breadth of the empire, and nearly every member of
society knew something of the kind of life which a
soldier of the empire had to lead.
3. The Roman army was the one great organization of
which it was still possible, in that age of
boundless social corruption, to think and speak with
right-minded admiration and respect. No doubt it was
often the instrument of wholesale cruelties as it
pushed forward its conquests, or strengthened its
hold, over resisting or rebelling nations. But it
promoted discipline and esprit de corps. Even during
active warfare it checked individual license, and
when the conquest was over it was the representative
and mainstay of order and justice against
high-handed anarchy and wrong. Its officers several
times appear in the narrative portions of the New
Testament, and they make a favorable impression upon
us. If they are fair specimens of the military men
in the Roman Empire at that period, then the Roman
army must have been indeed a fine service. But the
reasons for the apostle’s preference for this
similitude go deeper than all this.
4. Military service involves self-sacrifice,
endurance, discipline, vigilance, obedience, ready
cooperation with others, sympathy, enthusiasm,
loyalty.
5. Military service implies vigilant, unwearying and
organized opposition to a vigilant, unwearying, and
organized foe. It is either perpetual warfare or
perpetual preparation for it. And just such is the
Christian life; it is either a conflict or s
preparation for one. (A. Plummer, D. D.)
~Biblical Illustrator
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - The best mss. give one compound verb
instead of pronoun conjunction and simple verb,
take-part in-suffering-hardship. As our A.V. stands,
the words may seem hard and severe, with little
allowance for difficulty and weakness. But the
phrase in the Greek is a volume of tenderness and
yearning confidence, of a father’s claim to loyal
imitation. ‘Take your share in the enduring of
hardness. Take up my mantle. I say not—go and brave
hard fighting in the trench, hard words, hard deeds,
for Christ your Master. I rather say—being such an
one as Paul the aged—come with me, come after me, be
one with us all who war the good warfare. My own son
in the faith, I crave (strange though it seem),
to nerve me for my last crowning effort, the sight
of your young heroism. The standard that must fall
from my failing hands you will grasp will you not?’
~Cambridge Bible commentary
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - He considers a Christian
minister under the notion of a soldier, not so much
for his continual conflicts with the world, the
devil, and the flesh, for these are in a certain
sense common to all Christians, but for the
hardships and difficulties to which he must be
exposed who faithfully preaches the Gospel of
Christ. ~Adam Clarke
Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of
Jesus Christ - In the passage before us he makes use
of all three figures: but the one of which he seems
to have been most fond is the one which he places
first, -that of military service. "Suffer hardships
with me," or "take thy share in suffering, as a good
soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier on service
entangleth himself in the affairs of this life; that
he may please him who enrolled him as a soldier." He
had used the same kind of language in the First
Epistle, urging Timothy to "war the good warfare"
and to "fight the good fight of faith". (1 Timothy
1:18; 1 Timothy 6:12) Every Christian, and
especially every Christian minister, may be regarded
as a soldier, as an athlete, as a husbandman; but of
the three similitudes the one which fits him best is
that of a soldier.
Quoted verses:
1 Timothy 1:18 [see
Lesson]
This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy,
according to the prophecies which went before on
thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare;
1 Timothy 6:12 [see
Lesson]
Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal
life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast
professed a good profession before many witnesses.
Even if this were not so, Paul’s fondness for the
metaphor would be very intelligible.
1. Military service was very familiar to him,
especially in his imprisonments. He had been
arrested by soldiers at Jerusalem, escorted by
2. Troops to Caesarea, sent under the charge of a
centurion and a band of soldiers to Rome, and had
been kept there under military surveillance for many
months in the first Roman imprisonment, and for we
know not how long in the second. And we may assume
it as almost certain that the place of his
imprisonment was near the praetorian camp. This
would probably be so ordered for the convenience of
the soldiers who had charge of him. He therefore had
very large opportunities of observing very closely
all the details of ordinary military life. He must
frequently have seen soldiers under drill, on
parade, on guard, on the march; must have watched
them cleaning, mending, and sharpening their
weapons; putting their armor on, putting it off.
Often during hours of enforced inactivity he must
have compared these details with the details of the
Christian life, and noticed how admirably they
corresponded with one another.
Military service was not only very familiar to
himself; it was also quite sufficiently familiar to
those whom he addressed. Roman troops were
everywhere to be seen throughout the length and
breadth of the Empire, and nearly every member of
society knew something of the kind of life which a
soldier of the Empire had to lead. ~Expositor's
Bible Commentary
Thou therefore endure hardness - "Or afflictions";
as in 2 Timothy 4:5. The same word is used there as
here, and properly signifies, "suffer evil"; and
means the evil of afflictions, as persecutions of
every kind, loss of name and goods, scourging,
imprisonment, and death itself, for the sake of
Christ and the Gospel:
As a good soldier of Jesus Christ. - Christ is the
Captain of salvation, the Leader and Commander of
the people, who are made a willing people in the day
of his power; or when he raises his forces, and
musters his armies, these are volunteers, who
willingly enlist themselves into his service, and
under his banners fight his battles; and such who
manfully behave against sin, Satan, and the world,
are his good soldiers; such are all true believers
in Christ, and particularly the ministers of the
word, whose ministry is a warfare, and who fight the
good fight of faith; and besides the above enemies,
which they have in common with other saints, have to
do with teachers, who are wolves in sheep's
clothing. ~John Gill
“A Good Soldier of Christ Jesus”
2 Timothy 2:1-9
Soldier, 2 Timothy 2:1-4 : There is grace enough in
Jesus for every need, but we must avail ourselves of
it. We can expect nothing less than hardship, since
life is a battlefield. Our one aim should be to
please Him who chose us to be soldiers. In order to
be all that he would have us be, we must avoid
entangling ourselves in the conditions around us. We
must resemble a garrison in the town where it is
quartered, and from which it may at any hour be
summoned away. The less encumbered we are, the more
easily shall we be able to execute the least command
of our Great Captain. How high an honor it is to be
enrolled among His soldiers! ~F. B. Meyer
Recap of what we have learned tonight.
1] You are a soldier of Jesus Christ.
2] Accept your share in suffering like a fine
soldier of Christ Jesus.
3] Fight a fine campaign as you journey through the
Salvation Process.
4] Your service must be a concentrated service.
5] Obey God who is your commanding officer above
Jesus Christ.
6] Follow Christ.
7] Be loyal to God the Father and Jesus Christ.
8] Be faithful unto death.
9] Welcome trials and hardships as they come.
10] Part with or abstain from all hindrances that
might draw you away from your calling.
11] Invoke endurance, discipline, vigilance,
cooperation with others, sympathy, enthusiasm and
loyalty.
12] Profess a good profession; lay hold on eternal
life.
13] There is grace enough in Jesus for every need
you have. We must avail ourselves of this grace.
14] Avoid entangling ourselves in the conditions
around us. |