Charles Spurgeon Commentary 2 Timothy 4

I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; preach the word;

We are not to use such strong language as this unless there is a sufficient reason for it. We must not be too heated about trivial matters, but even this is better than to be cold about matters that demand fervor.

When John Calvin wished to leave Geneva to complete his studies elsewhere, that man of God, Farrell, knowing how necessary it was for the Church that Calvin should remain at Geneva, charged him before God that he dared not go. Farrell also expressed the hope that a curse might fall upon all Calvin's studies if, for their sake, Calvin were to forsake what he held to be his duty.

So sometimes, like the Apostle, we may, before the Judge of the living and the dead, charge men not to forsake their work and calling.

Be instant in season, out of season;

The Greek word means, "Stand up to it," as when a man is determined to finish his work, he stands right up to it. Stand over your work, putting your whole strength into it, standing right over it.

"In season, out of season," because the Gospel is a fruit which is in season all the year round. Sometimes these "out of season" sermons, preached at night or at some unusual time, have been of more service than the regular services of God's house. Mr. Grimshaw used to ride on horseback from village to village throughout the more desolate parts of Yorkshire, and wherever he met ten or a dozen people, he would preach on horseback to them, preaching sometimes as many as twenty-four sermons in a week. That was being instant "out of season" as well as "in season." So should God's Timothys be, and indeed, all of us.

Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.

That is, do not exhort with mere declamation, but put some argument into your exhortation. Some men think it quite enough to appear to be in earnest, though they have nothing to say. Let such exhorters remember that they are to exhort with doctrine, with solid teaching.

When men do not have good preachers, they are sure to have a great many of them. Those nations which have the worst priests always have them in swarms. So let us be thankful if God sends us a glowing and zealous minister, for even those who count it an affliction to have a minister would be more afflicted if they did not have a good one.

But how evil is it when men get itching ears, when they want someone to be perpetually tickling them, giving them some pretty things, some fine pretentious intellectualism. In all congregations there is good to be done, except in a congregation having itching ears. From this may God deliver us.

When a man will not believe the truth, he is sure before long to be a greedy believer of lies. No persons are so credulous as skeptics.

There is no absurdity so gross that an unbeliever will not very soon be brought to receive it, though he rejects the truth of God.

How complacently he talks about it! It is only a departure, though Caesar's sword might strike his head from his body. And truly death to the believer is no frightful thing. "Go up," said God to Moses, and the prophet went up, and God took his soul to Himself, and he was blessed. And so, "Come up," says God to the Christian, and the Christian goes up, first to his chamber, and then from his chamber to Paradise.