2 Timothy 2:9
in which I suffer hardship to the point of chains as a criminal. But God's word isn't chained.
WEB
Wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil doer, even unto bonds; but the word of God is not bound.
KJV
What 2 Timothy 2:9 means
Writing from a Roman prison as a condemned criminal, Paul admits that he is bound in chains, then insists that the word he carries is not: God's message keeps moving freely even when the one who preaches it cannot.
Second Timothy reads like a last letter, and by tradition it is one. Paul writes from a Roman cell, aware that his execution is near, to Timothy, the younger colleague he is handing his work to. In the surrounding verses he tells Timothy to endure hardship like a soldier, an athlete, a farmer, and to keep remembering the risen Christ. This verse is Paul's own example of that endurance: he suffers “to the point of chains,” treated as a common criminal, and yet the sentence turns on a sudden, defiant “but.”
To be chained in Rome as a “criminal” was to be filed among the worst of society. The word Paul chooses is the same one the Gospels give to the two men crucified on either side of Jesus. He does not soften his situation; he places himself among felons and the condemned. In that world a prisoner was assumed to be finished, his cause discredited along with him. Rome had every reason to believe that chaining the messenger would silence the message.
The force of the line is a single repeated verb. Paul says he is bound, then says the word of God is not bound: the same word affirmed and denied in one breath. The translation keeps the play with “chained” and “isn't chained.” The contrast is the whole point. A preacher can be shackled to a wall, but the thing he preaches slips the chain and keeps traveling. A man can be imprisoned; a word, once loose in the world, can no longer be locked up.