The Apostle Paul - Poured Out For Christ

As we come to the end of this Lenten series on offerings to God, we are being brought back to the deepest offering of all.

For several weeks we have been asking what it means to give ourselves to God, but Lent reminds us that before we ever offered anything to him, Christ offered himself for us.

These forty days leading to Good Friday call us to pause and remember the cost of our redemption. Jesus did not give God a partial offering or a symbolic gesture.

He did not give up a thing, a habit or something he enjoyed. He gave himself fully, willingly, and perfectly.

He is the Lamb of God, slain for our salvation, the one whose sacrifice was in the heart of God’s saving plan before the foundation of the world.

And that means every true offering we bring to God begins with wonder at the cross.

And today we're going to think about the Apostle Paul, who played a very important role in the early church. Paul wrote the majority of the letters in the New Testament, and was very significant in the early growth of the Church.

Paul encountered Jesus when he was about the business of being a Pharisee who was passionate about destroying the early church. And so today we are going to look at how Paul offered himself to God. Sometimes it's good to start at the end of a person's life and look back. We're going to do that with Paul today.

In today's passage, Paul is writing when he is near death. He says, “For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near.”

Whenever I read this section of scripture, I find myself quite moved. As much as we will talk today about Paul pouring out his life as an offering to God in a real, costly, and deeply personal way, we should also remember that Paul has, in a sense, given something else to us.

In his letters, he opens a window into his own soul. He gives us an unusually vivid glimpse into the mind, the experience, the struggles, and the spirituality of a man we would otherwise know only as a distant figure from the ancient world.

When I read this passage as a young believer, full of fresh love for Jesus, it moved me deeply. I remember wanting to live a life that, in some small way, reflected the faithfulness of the Apostle Paul. Not his greatness, but his steadfastness. Not his prominence, but his wholehearted devotion to Christ.

And now, at this stage of life, I read these words differently as well. I think of men who helped shape me and who are now in the presence of God.

I think of Pastor Winston Nunes from Broadview Faith Temple, who helped ground this man, raised as an atheist, in the truth of the gospel and brought the Scriptures to life for me.

I think too of Rick Tobias, who led Yonge Street Mission for many years and who first brought me onto the summer missionary team in April of 1985. He inspired countless Christians in their walk and service.I last saw Rick just nine days before he went to be with the Lord in May of 2022. It was a privilege to see him one last time.

So when Paul says, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith,” those are not just ancient words to me. They are words that have shaped my life. They remind me of the kind of man I once hoped to become and still hope to become, and the kind of men I have been blessed to know.

And they remind all of us that what matters most is a life poured out faithfully for Jesus Christ.

Let's consider some of what Paul says.

2 Timothy 4:6 For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near.

That is a powerful image for Lent. Paul is aware that his time on this planet is short.

His whole Christian life had been a struggle...against leaders of religious systems that saw him as a threat, against false believers, against his own flesh. Even as he thinks about his coming death, and reflects on his life. he sees his very being as something poured out to God.

Only a little earlier in 1 Timothy 1:12–14, Paul looks back over his whole life and gives thanks for sheer mercy: “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service. Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy...”