---
title: 2 Timothy 4:11
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/2-timothy-4-11/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/2-timothy-4-11.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: 2 Timothy 4:11
testament: NT
section: Letters
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# 2 Timothy 4:11

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is useful to me in the ministry.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Only Luke is with me. Bring Mark along with you, for he is helpful to me in the ministry."

## JW Usage

Read as a glimpse of Paul's final imprisonment and the loyalty of faithful companions. The Watchtower uses such passages for encouragement about endurance and mutual support, without connecting them to the earlier quarrel over Mark.

## Protestant Usage

This is the last line of a story that started with a fight, and it is the reason to tell the story at all. Paul is near the end. Most of his companions have gone. And the man he asks for is the one he once refused to take on a journey — the young man whose unreliability split the mission in two at Acts 15:39. Bring Mark along, he writes, for he is helpful to me in the ministry. Nothing is being covered up here. Luke recorded the quarrel; Paul records the restoration; both stand in Scripture. That is what the fruit of the Spirit looks like across a lifetime rather than in a single moment — the patience and kindness of Galatians 5:22-23 working slowly through a real grievance. Raise it as a standard rather than as a weapon: this is the apostolic pattern for disagreement among leaders, and any movement's founding generation can be measured against it. Then let the Witness do the measuring. Compare Acts 15:39, Colossians 4:10, Galatians 5:23.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Paul Restored Mark — What Did Russell Restore?](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/founder-character-contrast.md) — Apostolic reconciliation vs Bethel schism — the fruit test applied to founders [Authority]