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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadEzekiel, Jonah, and Pastoral Epistles by Patrick Fairbairn - 1 Timothy 4:10 - 4:10
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Ver. 10. For to this ( åἰò ôïῦôï , with a view to it, in order that we may in our own case realize the good contained in the promise) we toil ( êïðéῶìåí , which is somewhat stronger than å ̔ ñãá ́ æïìåí , labour) and strive ( ἀãùíéæüìåèá ), (This is undoubtedly the best supported reading, being that of à , A, C, F, G, K, while the ï ̓ íåéäéæï ́ ìåèá of the received text is found in only three uncials at first hand, D, L, P, though it has the support of the Vulg., Greek, Syr., Cop., Arm., and Ethiop. versions. The unanimity of the versions is certainly entitled to weight, yet is scarcely sufficient to counterbalance the evidence of so many of the most important MSS. The omission of the first êáὶ has the support of all the versions, and that also of N, A, C, D, P.) because we have hoped upon the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, especially of those who believe. This statement being presented as a reason or ground of procedure in respect to the promise of life mentioned immediately before, clearly enough shows in what sense the apostle understood the life; for, so far from aiming at mere animal existence or corporeal satisfaction and repose, as if this were the summum bonum of life, he and his fellow-labourers readily parted with the things pertaining to that lower sphere, cheerfully encountered hardships, and persevered in a great life-conflict, that they might become partakers of life in that higher and nobler sense which the grace of God in Christ had rendered it possible for them to attain. They felt, in short, that their grand interest, alike for time and eternity, lay in the service and blessing of God; and without disparaging anything naturally pleasant or advantageous which the course of divine providence might place within their reach, or shunning as unclean what God had given to be used, they still showed that they were prepared to undergo any sacrifice of fleshly ease or worldly honour that might be required by their devotion to the cause of Christ, assured that thereby they gained more than they lost—that they advanced their interest in what alone is of supreme and imperishable moment. The ground of this assurance is made to rest in God: it was because they had hoped upon the living God (the ἐðὶ , with the dative, indicative of the solid basis they had obtained for their expectations), that they could so confidently reckon on an endless heritage of peaceful and blessed life, and so willingly submit to all privations and toils that might meet them in the pursuit of it; for He who is Himself the living One, having the very fountain of life in perpetual freshness and inexhaustible sufficiency, is in this case the surety and the promiser. Such a hope, therefore, must be one that shall not make ashamed.
In this direction also points the further description given of God: who is the Saviour of all men, especially of those who believe. The term Saviour ( óùôὴñ ) represents Him as the deliverer and preserver of life; but in what sense, or to what effects, must be inferred from the connection. As the living God, He may be said to be the Saviour of all men, since by His watchful and beneficent providence they are constantly delivered from destruction and preserved in being. Actually He is not more to all men, although more in manifestations of goodwill and acts tending toward salvation, since He sets before men generally, and often even presses on their acceptance, the benefits of a work of reconciliation, which, from its essential nature, is perfectly sufficient to meet the necessities of all, and recover them to life and blessing. As it is in the character of a Saviour-God that He does this, there seems no valid reason why it should not be comprised in the sense we put upon the apostle’s language. Yet, as the language indicates rather what God actually is to men, what they actually receive from Him, than what He reveals Himself as ready and willing to give them, we are led by the natural and unconstrained import of the words to think mainly of the relation in which God stands to men indiscriminately as the Author and Preserver of their present life. And from this as the less, the apostle rises to the greater. From what God is and does in behalf of such as are dependent on Him for the common bounties of providence, he proceeds to indicate what God is and does besides, in respect to those who are related to Him as His redeemed in Christ—the Saviour, especially of those who believe: in them the character of God as Saviour reaches its proper culmination. Put in the form of an argument, the idea might be thus expressed: If in that character God does so much for sinful and unbelieving men, how much may He not be justly expected to do for His own chosen people, who are partakers of His grace, and have trusted in His word! In their case there is nothing to hinder the outgoings of His loving-kindness, or to restrain the riches of His beneficence, but everything rather to encourage them to expect all from His hand. Expressing the Father’s mind towards them in this respect, our Lord said, “I have come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (Joh_10:10).