CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
2 Timothy 3:1. In the last days.—In the time just before the Lord’s appearing, in which wickedness will come to a head—a head that will be crushed. Perilous times shall come.—“Grievous seasons will ensue.”
2 Timothy 3:2. Lovers of their own selves.—“No man ever yet hated his own flesh,” says St. Paul. The men here spoken of are they who make undue provision for softness and ease, the self-indulgent. Covetous.—Obliterates the similarity of sound. As we might say, “lovers of selves” and “lovers of silver” as, it ministers to self. Boasters.—“The word originally designated the vagabond mountebanks, conjurors, etc., and from them was transferred to any braggart or boaster vaunting himself in possession of that which was not his” (Trench). Proud.—R.V. “haughty.” Such as out of a swollen estimate of their own importance look down on others. Quoting Proverbs 3:34, St. James and St. Peter remind us that “God resisteth”—sets Himself in battle-array against—“the proud.” Unthankful.—The graceless. The only other use in the New Testament describes those who take good from the hand of the all bountiful Father without grace (Luke 6:35).
2 Timothy 3:3. Without natural affection.—Especially that between parents and children. Trucebreakers.—R.V. “implacable.” “The absolutely irreconcilable” (Trench). False accusers.—R.V. “slanderers.” Gr. διάβολοι (whence “devils”). Despisers of those that are good.—Gr. “no friends of the good.”
2 Timothy 3:4. Traitors.—The word is used of Judas (Luke 6:16) and the Jewish authorities (Acts 6:15). It means men among whom there is no fidelity. Heady.—R.V. “headstrong”—lit. “falling forward”—the reckless, impetuous. Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.—R.V. “rather than lovers of God.” If the love of pleasure, coarse or refined, is paramount, it will be at the cost of the love of God.
2 Timothy 3:5. Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.—It is a new heathendom under a Christian name which St. Paul here describes.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— 2 Timothy 3:1-5
The End of the Christian Dispensation.
I. It will be a period of great moral danger.—“In the last days perilous times shall come” (2 Timothy 3:1)—difficult and grievous times, when it will be difficult to know what is to be done, what to believe, who to believe, how to act. There will be indifference to revealed truth, nay, to all truth; making light of error, and not reproving it; holding that all religions are so far right and acceptable, and that there are a thousand ways to heaven, if there be a heaven or a hell at all. Laxity of opinion and laxity of morals will prevail. Immorality will overflow in every form, and not be condemned. A loose faith, a loose practice, an easy law, an easy gospel, all the worst forms of a benumbing latitudinarianism will prevail.
II. It will be a period in which all kinds of vice will abound (2 Timothy 3:2-4).—The catalogue of sins enumerated in these verses indicate a relapse of the professing Christian Church into the worst vices of the rankest heathenism. Even the young will be infected with the degeneracy of the times. The leading characteristic of the sinners of that age is described in the phrase, “Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.”
III. It will be a period in which true godliness will be falsified.—“Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Timothy 3:5). Vice is only aggravated when it is practised under the garb of religion; its assumed guise renders it not less but more detestable: it is a daring attempt to drag God down to the level of our sins. Samuel Rutherford has said that there is a spice of hypocrisy in us all. This may be so; but it is another thing when we consciously and deliberately act the hypocrite. The hypocrite maps out the road to heaven, knows it well, has sounded with plummet the depths of the promises, and can talk about them. But he has accepted a two-parts Christ. There is a little pet sin snugly tucked up in a warm corner of his heart that he is unwilling to part with. Christ is his priest, his prophet, but he will not have Him as his king; he will not have this Man to reign over and in him.
IV. It will be a period in which there will be little hope of reclaiming the apostates.—“From such turn away” (2 Timothy 3:5). Their case is hopeless; all efforts to benefit them are unavailing; they must be left to the just recompense of their evil ways. It is the acme of obstinate wickedness when all hope of recovery has to be abandoned. If the gospel is persistently rejected, there is no possibility of salvation. It is a sad reflection that there may be those now in our midst who are as desperately vile as any in the last days can be.
Lessons.—
1. The last days will be conspicuous for abounding iniquity.
2. The last days will be a severe trial of faith.
3. The last days will witness the signal punishment of the unbelieving.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
2 Timothy 3:1-2. Self-love.
I. Self-love pursuing what is upon the whole absolutely best for us is innocent and good.
II. There can be no culpable self-love but in respect of temporal things.—Even in this respect there may be degree of self-love, not only innocent but praiseworthy.
III. A vicious self-love.—
1. Manifested in pride.
2. Sensuality.
3. Avarice or self-interestedness.
Lessons.—
1. Self-lovers are not greater enemies to others in intention than they are in effect to themselves.
2. There can be no such thing as true happiness separate from the love of God and our neighbours.—Waterland.
2 Timothy 3:5. A Form of Godliness without the Power.
I. A form of godliness.—
1. An outward profession of religion.
2. An affectation of godly discourse.
3. Affecting certain modes and fashionable gestures of godliness.
4. A reliance on outward duties of religion.
II. A man may have a form of godliness when yet he is very far from the power—the truth and reality of it.—Formalists are described in 2 Timothy 3:2-4.—Bishop Bull.