John Calvin Commentary 1 Timothy 3:14

"These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly;" — 1 Timothy 3:14 (ASV)

These things I write to thee He holds out to Timothy the hope of his coming, partly to encourage him and partly to repress the insolence of those who grew more arrogant because of his absence. And yet he does not make any feigned promise to Timothy, or terrify others through a false presence; for he fully expected that he would come, as it is probable that he did, if he wrote this epistle at the time when he passed through Phrygia, as Luke relates (Acts 18:23).

Let us see this as a proof of how great his anxiety was for the churches, when he could not endure to delay even for a short time a remedy for a present evil. Yet immediately afterward he adds that he wrote this epistle to inform Timothy, should he be delayed longer than he expected.