By all appearances, it was not going well for Paul. It was AD 68 and he is imprisoned in Rome. He just lost his first legal hearing and knows the end of his life is at hand. He is going to be martyred. Paul knew that the time of his departure had come, but he was not in despair. He had fought the good fight and finished the race. Paul had kept the faith handed over to him by Jesus Christ. So he looked forward to the “crown of righteousness,” which the Lord would award to him by grace. So he writes to Timothy, his beloved child, and encourages him to “follow the pattern of the sound words” (2 Tim. 1:13) he had learned from Paul in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. In his second letter to him, Paul exhorts Timothy to remain faithful and work diligently in the proclamation of the Gospel. He also warns Timothy that in these last days “there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power” (2 Tim. 3:1-6). As such, Timothy must be prepared to preach the Word of God, to “reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Tim. 4:2), even though the people will “not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths” (2 Tim. 4:3-4). Paul knew what he was talking about.
Three of his closest associates have deserted him. Demas, in love with this present world, has abandoned Paul. It seems that Demas found it inconvenient to stay with the prisoner Paul and preferred to be somewhere else. So he leaves Paul in the midst of his trial. Crescens and Titus have also left Rome. Even worse, Alexander the Coppersmith did great harm to Paul, strongly opposing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Still, it appears Alexander remained in the Church and so Timothy should be careful. Paul’s warnings to Timothy about people falling away are born out of truth and experience. Even those who appeared to be devoted followers of Christ, the Way, fled Paul when persecution and hardship came to bear. Just as our Lord was abandoned at the hour of his suffering, so was Paul. Well, almost. Luke remained with him.
Today the Church honors St. Luke, the Evangelist. Early Christian testimony introduces Luke as “a native of Antioch, by profession a physician. He had become a disciple of the apostle Paul and later followed Paul until his [Paul's] martyrdom. Having served the Lord continuously, unmarried and without children, filled with the Holy Spirit he died at the age of 84 years” (Anti-Marcionite Prologue to Luke). From the book of Acts, we know that Luke was frequently Paul’s companion on his missionary journeys and faced many and great dangers. St. Paul also mentions Luke in his letters of Philemon and Colossians. St. Luke was faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and faithful to the Apostle Paul, even to the very end. While St. Paul waited in a Roman prison for his beheading, St. Luke alone was there. It is most likely that in that prison, St. Paul continued to instruct Luke in the teachings of Jesus Christ; in the fulfillment of the prophecies in Jesus Christ; and in the mystery of Christ’s Church. Based on all accounts of their ministry together, I am sure they shared in the daily offices of prayer together as well as the Breaking of Bread, the Holy Communion. Perhaps St. Luke was even there to witness the martyrdom of St. Paul, the moment his head was severed by a Roman sword and received that crown of righteousness reserved for him by Christ His savior. Perhaps.
Read the rest of this entry »