2 Timothy 4:5

Note

Paul knows he is about to die, and he hands Timothy his work. The name he gives it is the evangelist's: the work of one who brings good news.

Chapter 4 opens with a solemn charge, given before Christ "who will judge the living and the dead" (2 Timothy 4:1): "Preach the word" (2 Timothy 4:2). Paul warns that a time is coming when people will want teachers to suit their own desires and will "turn aside to myths" (2 Timothy 4:4). This verse sets Timothy apart from them with two words, su de, "but you." Then comes the reason it cannot wait: "For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand" (2 Timothy 4:6). When Paul is gone, the work will be Timothy's.

The word here is euangelistēs, in the genitive: "of an evangelist." The noun is built on the verb for bringing good news, and the New Testament uses it only three times. Paul and his companions stayed at Caesarea in the house of "Philip the evangelist" (Acts 21:8), the same Philip who earlier "told him the good news about Jesus" on the desert road (Acts 8:35) and then went "preaching the gospel in all the towns" (Acts 8:40). Paul lists evangelists among Christ's gifts to the church, after apostles and prophets (Ephesians 4:11). And here, rather than giving Timothy the title, Paul tells him to do the work (ergon). There are four commands. "Be sober" is a present imperative, a standing condition; the other three are aorists, each task seen as a whole, to be taken up and carried through.

The BSB and the KJV both say "evangelist," which is simply the Greek word brought into English by way of Latin. The LSV unpacks it as "the work of one proclaiming good news," which shows a reader what the word meant to its first hearers. The first command varies more. The BSB's "be sober" keeps the image in nēphe, a clear head as opposed to a drunken one; the KJV's "watch" draws out the alertness that follows from it. The last command, plērophorēson, is "fulfill your ministry" in the BSB and "make full proof of thy ministry" in the KJV: fill it up, see it through to the end. The Korean Bibles divide the same way on the first command, the 흠정역 with "watch" (깨어 있고) and the 개역한글 with "be sober" (근신하여). For the noun the 흠정역 has 복음 전도자, bringing the gospel's own word to the surface, while the 개역한글 has 전도인, the older Korean church word for one who spreads the faith.

Wesley says of the evangelist's work that it "was next to that of an apostle" Wesley, and he fills out "watch" as steadfast faith, patient hope, labouring love and unceasing prayer. Matthew Henry, writing on the whole passage, expects that people "will grow weary of the plain gospel of Christ" Matthew Henry, and answers that "Those who love souls must be ever watchful" and must "take all opportunities of making known the pure gospel" Matthew Henry.

Writing in the early fourth century, the church historian Eusebius describes the generation after the apostles (Church History 3.37): many gave away their goods and set out on long journeys, doing the work of evangelists, eager to preach Christ to those who had not yet heard the word of faith and to hand on to them the written Gospels Eusebius, Church History 3.37.

The gospel has always travelled this way, from one person to the next. Whoever hears it today hears it because someone, somewhere along the line, did what this verse asks: endured the hardship and did the work.