2 Timothy 4:6 For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
7 I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:
8 Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.
What a remarkable passage. Paul, aged and infirm, writes a message of hope to Timothy, his son in the Lord. His whole life since he met Christ on the road to Damascus, has been an offering to His Lord, but now he is ready to make his last offering. His tone is almost that of a man spending his last night in an inn, a place of temporary sheler, eagerly waiting for the morning, when he will take up the next leg of his journey. Except that this next leg will be into eternity, to meet his Lord at the Bema, the Judgment Seat of Christ, from Whom he is expecting the Crown of Righteousness, and then, wonder of wonders, he says something that will make our hearts rejoice. He says that the crown of righteousness is for “all them that love His appearing.” Do we love His appearing? Are we eagerly looking for the Rapture and the Judgment Seat? Then we can be sure of one crown, the Crown of Righteousness. Hallelujah!
Bibloscope 