I Have Fought the Good Fight
6 For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure has come. 7 I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith. 8 From now on, the crown of righteousness is stored up for me, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day; and not to me only, but also to all those who have loved his appearing.
Paul describes his death in two images, his life in three clauses, and then refuses to keep the reward to himself.
I am already being poured out. The verb is spendō G4689, used of a drink offering emptied beside a sacrifice — his life is not being taken but presented, and the present tense says it is already happening.
The second image is analysis G359, the time of my departure: a ship's cable loosed or a tent struck. Both are pictures of leaving rather than ending, which is the same instinct as calling death decommissioned in 2 Timothy 1:10.
Then three clauses in the perfect tense, each a completed thing. I have fought the good fight — agōn G73, the contest, so the emphasis falls on the struggle having been the right one rather than on winning it. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith, using the word for guarding a deposit that has run through the letter 2 Timothy 1:14.
Verse 8 names what is stored up: the crown of righteousness, given by the Lord, the righteous judge — the same judge invoked in verse 1, now described as the one handing out the wreath.
And the last clause opens it to everyone: not to me only, but to all those who have loved his appearing. The qualification is an affection rather than an achievement.
settled What this mark means