Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Timothy 6:12

"Fight the good fight of the faith, lay hold on the life eternal, whereunto thou wast called, and didst confess the good confession in the sight of many witnesses." — 1 Timothy 6:12 (ASV)

We command.—This is the fourth time this severe word is used in this very chapter. Perhaps “we order” might convey the meaning still more sharply. But immediately, lest severity provoke rebellion, he adds, and we beseech, also stating the grounds on which his appeal rests: in our Lord—i.e., “on the strength of our union in the Body of Christ.” (Compare to 1 Thessalonians 4:1).

That with quietness they work.—The opposites of bustling and idleness.

Eat their own bread.—Not other people’s. This passage tempts us to take the marginal version in 1 Thessalonians 4:12: have need of no man. The phrase is not fatal to the idea of a communism being established. The bread would still be “their own”—i.e., they would have a right to it, supposing it had been earned for the community by hard work; otherwise, communism or no communism, the bread was stolen. The commentators aptly compare a rabbinical saying: “When a man eats his own bread he is composed and tranquil in mind; but if he is eating the bread of his parents or children, much more that of strangers, his mind is less tranquil.”

That the name . . .—This verse gathers up what has been said in 2 Thessalonians 1:8–10. Seeing the favors bestowed upon the Christians in the last day, all, the lost as well as the saved, will be forced to acknowledge the glory (that is, the divine perfection) of the Jesus whose Christship had been rejected, and the glory (that is, the true dignity) of the Christians who had been despised for their allegiance to Him.

It stands to reason that Christians must share Christ’s “glory” (that is, full recognition; compare the note on 1 Thessalonians 2:6) in that day, for when the lost recognize what He is, it is ipso facto a recognition that they were right and wise to follow Him.

The words “according to the grace” belong only to “and you in Him”: it is the gracious will (for “grace” here has hardly its strict theological sense) of God, in which Christ concurs, that we should be thus “glorified in Him.”

2 Thessalonians 2

Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life.—Then, again, with the old stirring metaphor of the Olympic contests for a prize (1 Corinthians 9:24; Philippians 3:13–14)—the metaphor St. Paul loved so well, and which Timothy must have heard so often from his old master’s lips as he preached and taught—he bids the “man of God,” rising above the pitiful struggles for things perishable and useless, fight the noble fight of faith; bids him strive to lay hold of the real prize—life eternal.

The emphasis rests here mainly on the words “the good fight” and “eternal life.” These things are placed in strong contrast with “the struggle of the covetous” and its “miserable, perishable crown.” “The good fight,” more closely considered, is the contest and struggle which the Christian has to maintain against the world, the flesh, and the devil. It is styled the “good fight of faith,” partly because the contest is waged on behalf of, for the sake of, the faith, but still more because from faith it derives its strength and draws its courage. “Eternal life” is the prize the “man of God” must ever have before his eyes. It is the crown of life which the Judge of quick and dead will give to the “faithful unto death” (Revelation 2:10).

Whereunto thou art also called.—The “calling” here refers both to the inner and outward call to the Master’s work. The inner call is the persuasion in the heart that the one vocation to which the life must be dedicated was the ministry of the word; and the outward call is the summons by St. Paul, ratified by the church in the persons of the presbyters of Lystra.

And hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.—More accurately translated, and you confessed the good confession... These words simply add to the foregoing clause another ground of exhortation: “You were called to eternal life, and you made the good confession.”

When—has been asked—was this good confession made? Several epochs in the life of Timothy have been suggested. Were it not for the difficulty of fixing a date for so terrible an experience in Timothy’s, comparatively speaking, short life, it would appear most probable that the confession was made on the occasion of some persecution or bitter trial to which he had been exposed. On the whole, however, it appears safer to refer “the good confession” to the time of his ordination. In this case the many witnesses would refer to the presbyters and others who were present at the solemn rite.

That they all.—This is God’s purpose in making them believe the lie—“in order that, one and all, they might be judged.” He who desires not the death of a sinner, now is said actually to lay plans with the intention of judging him: such are the bold self-contradictions of the Bible! It must not, however, be forgotten for a moment that God did not begin to will the sinner’s judgment until after He had offered him freely the love of His own blessed truth, and had been rejected. When once the sinner is incurable, the only way to vindicate truth and righteousness is by hastening on his condemnation, whatever that condemnation may mean.

Who believed not the truth. . . .—Once more the offense for which they are condemned is insisted upon. Theirs is no fancy sin. What God wanted them to believe was not some fantastical dogma, some fiction between which and the fictions of the Man of Sin there was nothing morally to choose, but the inviolable truth by which God Himself is bound. But had pleasure in the unrighteousness (so runs the Greek): i.e., consciously gave their moral consent to the unrighteousness of 2 Thessalonians 2:10, the unrighteousness which sought to impose itself upon them, and which they would never have been led into had they loved the truth.