2 Timothy 4:6Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Here is another reason for suffering: "For I am already," he says, "becoming a sacrifice," σπένδομαι, "and the time of my departure has come." He did not say, "of my sacrifice," but something greater. From a sacrifice not everything is offered to God, but from what is poured out, everything is offered.

"For I am already becoming a sacrifice," σπένδομαι, literally, "I am being poured out" like wine upon the altar, "and the time of my departure has come." He did not say, "I offer myself in sacrifice," but something stronger. For in a sacrifice not everything is offered to God, whereas the sacrificial libation of wine was offered entirely.

Paul says that he is being given over for slaughter, not that he is dying. This does not mean that one given over for slaughter does not die, but not everyone who dies is given over for slaughter. Therefore to be given over for slaughter means to die for God. This verb is taken from the sphere of sacrifice. Everything offered in sacrifice perishes for God.

At times the Apostle desires departure to God and becomes a sacrifice. At other times he recognizes that it is more necessary for the faithful that he remain in the flesh. For he seeks not his own advantage, but the advantage of the children whom he begot in Christ through the Gospel. Such is the aim of every spiritual authority: in all things to despise one’s own interest for the benefit of others. Cf. Phil 1:22-24.

"For I am already being offered," that is, I am not dying an ordinary death, but as a sacrifice. "And the time of my departure has come." He speaks this way because through his offering he was being given rest from the persecutions to which he had been subjected for many years.

Since Paul truly felt inwardly that his martyrdom was drawing near, in the same epistle he cried out: "For I am already becoming a sacrifice, and the time of my departure has come."

I stand at the very end of my contests. The Apostle called his being put to death a slaughtering in sacrifice, because his blood was being shed for piety.

Paul, recognizing that he must never cease to act, even until death, by the power of the grace given him from Christ, spoke thus: "I press on, if I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus laid hold of me" (Phil 3:12).

He called endurance until the end of life "laying hold," as he wrote of this in the Epistle to faithful Timothy. He clearly showed him the approach of his end, saying: "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith" (2 Tim 4:7).

He did not appoint for himself a stopping point or temporal boundary, as though he had ceased his journey because of perfection and no longer needed labors that never cease on earth "for the body of Christ, which is the Church" (Col 1:24).

[...] the time of his departure has come, and the crown of righteousness is henceforth prepared, not now, but "which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on that Day," he says, "and not to me only, but also to all who have loved His appearing" (2 Tim 4:6-8).

The phrase "I am being poured out" means: I am being sacrificed, slain, and offered as a sacrifice.

See that the most blessed Paul knew not only that the time had drawn near when he was to depart to Christ, Whom he desired. He also knew that he would end his life by martyrdom and offer his blood to God as a sacrifice.

So it happened, for his head was cut off in Rome by Nero. Since, he says, I am preparing to be offered for the love of Christ, and the time has already drawn near when my soul must be separated from my body, I have written to you, O Timothy, these last exhortations and commands.

He also urges him to fulfill the commands by deeds, presenting his own virtues to him as an example.

"For I am already being offered as a sacrifice, and the time of my departure has come."

Saint Paul foretells his martyr's end, which he calls a sacrificial offering. As the Old Testament sacrifices were offered to please God, so Christ's martyrs, given over to suffering and death, willingly shed their blood for the name of Christ the Savior.

By this their earthly service was made more pleasing to God.

"I am already being offered as a sacrifice." The valiant athlete of Christ foresees the approach of his death. He looks upon his imprisonment in bonds as the beginning of his last struggle on earth for the glory of God, that is, his martyr's death.

"I am already being offered." This is clear and undoubted proof that death is drawing near. The Apostle already sees the sacrificial knife raised over him.

On the end of the Apostle's ministry (2 Tim 4:6-8).

Speaking of his death, the Apostle is not content merely to mention the event itself, that it is imminent, in verse 6. He also adds an indication of the labors he has undertaken in verse 7, and of what will finally crown the toilsome path of his life in verse 8.

All these indications had to act on Saint Timothy in a deeply stirring way. They were especially suited to the purpose Saint Paul had in this section of the Epistle.

On death (4:6): "For I am already being poured out, and the time of my departure is at hand." The Apostle speaks as though saying: carry on the work of an evangelist zealously, for my end has already come.

Having been acquitted before the court, the Apostle, they say, departed for his work of preaching. Then, coming to Rome a second time, he completed his life by martyrdom. While in prison he composed the second epistle to Timothy, where he speaks both of his first defense and of his approaching death.