Although we have no record of the second stage of his trial, we have reason to believe that it soon followed the first, and that it ended in his condemnation and death. But The Second Epistle To Timothy is the divine record of what was passing in his deeply exercised mind at this solemn moment. His deep concern for the truth and church of God; his pathetic tenderness for the saints, and especially for his beloved son Timothy; his triumphant hope in the immediate prospect of martyrdom, can only be told in his own words. "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: 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." (Chapter 4:6-8.)
The tribunal of Nero here fades from his sight. Death in its most violent form has no terror for him. Christ in glory is the object of his eye and of his heart—the source of his joy and of his strength. His work was finished; and the toils of his love were ended. Though a prisoner and poor—though aged and rejected—he was rich in God; he possessed Christ, and in Him all things. The Jesus whom he had seen in glory at the commencement of his course, and who had brought him into all the trials and labors of the gospel, was now his possession and his crown. The unrighteous tribunal of Nero, and the blood-stained sword of the executioner, were to Paul but as the messengers of peace, who had come to close his long and weary path, and to introduce him into the presence of Jesus in glory. The time was now come for the Jesus that loved him to take him to Himself. He had fought the good fight of the gospel to the end; he had finished his course; it only remained for him to be crowned, when the Lord, the righteous Judge, appears in glory.
"In all things more than conquerors
Through Him that loved us-
We know that neither death nor life,
Nor angels, rulers, powers,
Nor present things, nor things to come,
Nor even height, nor depth,
Nor any other creature-thing
Above, below, around,
Can part us from the love of God,
In Jesus Christ our Lord."
We have the concurrent testimony of antiquity that Paul suffered martyrdom during the Neronian persecution, and most probably in A.D. 67. As a Roman citizen, he was beheaded in place of being scourged and crucified or exposed to the frightful tortures then invented for the Christians. Like his Master he suffered "without the gate." There is a spot on the Ostian Road, about two miles beyond the city walls, where it is supposed his martyrdom took place. There the last act of human cruelty was executed, and the great apostle was "absent from the body, and present with the Lord." His fervent and happy spirit was released from his feeble and suffering body; and the long cherished desire of his heart was fulfilled—"to depart and to be with Christ; which is far better."