Chapter 2 cannot be interpreted irrespective of what Paul has said in chapter one. At the end of chapter one, he has spoken of what is called the parousia, the second coming of the Lord. And while speaking of that, though he said some things which are specific to the church, actually the thrust of his comments are directed to the unsaved. He speaks of the dire consequences for the unsaved at the second coming of Christ, his focus is the coming judgement for the unbeliever, rather than supplying a lot of details about the parousia so that the church might be more informed about it.
Notice he says in chapter one vs 6 “For after all it is [only] just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and [to give] relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power.”
So you see the balance of his statement is concerning the retribution and punishment of the ungodly at His second coming. At the first coming of the Lord, He came to bring peace with God. To provide a way for man to enter into the kingdom of God, of which Christ is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
Jesus did that by being our substitute, taking the wrath of God which was due to us, and taking it upon Himself by dying on the cross in our place, and God transferred our sins upon Him and His righteousness upon us that believed in Him. He rose from the dead on the third day, and 40 days later after appearing to His disciples on numerous occasions He ascended into heaven to the right hand of the Father, after all power and authority on earth and in heaven were given to Him. But as the angels attending His ascension said to the disciples who were looking up into heaven in unbelief said, ““Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.”
Ever since that announcement by the angels, the parousia, or the day of the Lord, or the Lord’s coming, has been the subject of much speculation ever since. And unfortunately, a lot of that speculation, even a lot that claim scriptural support for their theories, are not doctrinally sound. We just spent several months going through a study of Revelation on Wednesday evenings and in the process we discussed several different views of eschatology that are prevalent today among Christians. They all cannot be right. But on the other hand, it is difficult to be dogmatic about which one you think is right. Revelation, for instance, is apocalyptic literature that speaks in symbols and pictures of things that are history, and things that are present, and things that are to come. And sometimes it’s difficult to know which time frame to assign them.
Then you have the passages in 1 and 2 Thessalonians. Many have used 1 Thessalonians 4 especially to propose another coming of the Lord, a secret rapture of the church which takes place before the parousia. But as I pointed out last time, that passage in 1 Thessalonians 4 uses the same Greek word, parousia to describe that day, indicating that it is the same day as described here in chapter 2, which is obviously not a secret rapture, but the day of judgment when Christ returns as King and takes vengeance upon His enemies.
But irregardless of all the different theories and speculations concerning eschatology, there are some things we can know, and there are some things which we cannot know for sure. But God has given us what we need to know and we should consider those, and not speculate about what cannot be known with certainty.
Someone has said that during His ministry Jesus spoke more about hell than He did of heaven. And to some extent, Paul does the same thing here speaking of the parousia. He spends a lot of time in this passage speaking of the evil leading up to the coming of the Lord, and Christ’s judgement of that evil, than he does speaking of the glory that awaits the saints.
But one thing he wants to do in this passage is clear up some misconceptions that the Thessalonians had developed concerning the coming of the Lord. Perhaps this was the result of false teachers, or just rampant speculation on the part of the church. We don’t know for sure. But it’s evident that a wrong view of eschatology can lead to disorder and confusion in the church, and that seems to be the case here. Some people were thinking that Christ was coming immediately, and thus stopped working and taking responsibility for daily life, and some thought that Christ had already come and had become disallusioned. Either way, it was disturbing the church and taking away their focus on ministry, which should be the purpose of the church.
So Paul says in vs 1, “Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.”
That the church was in a state of confusion about the day of the Lord is evident from his hope that they would not be quickly shaken from their composure. They were confused, and their faith was rattled. Our faith is founded on the sure promises of God that He will resurrect the saints in the last day, that He is coming to be joined with His bride, the church, to live with them forever, that we will rule and reign with Christ throughout eternity in a new heaven and new earth. To hear that the Lord had already come without seeing any of those other things occurring would have caused serious doubts about their faith.
Paul indicates that there were three possible methods of that false doctrine was being presented to the church. One was someone claimed to have received extra biblical information by a spirit. We still have a lot of those type of charlatans around today, claiming that they saw a vision, or God spoke directly to them and gave them some inside information that no one else is privy to. Another method was someone claimed that an apostle had told them something that was again, insider information. And the last possibility was a forged letter from an apostle. And during the formation of the canon of scripture, there were a number of spurious documents that were discarded because the author claimed to be someone he was not. So this type of false document was a very real concern.
But Paul says that any such “new revelation” that Christ had already come was wrong, and deceitful. There were certain things that had to occur prior to the parousia. In vs 3 Paul said, "Let no one in any way deceive you, for [it will not come] unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.”
According to Paul, two things must happen before the second coming of Christ. One is the world wide falling away, or apostasy from the faith, and secondly, the manifestation of the man of lawlessness, also known as the son of destruction. Now that sounds simple enough, but a thorough understanding of the subject of those verses is according to at least one theologian, one of the most difficult scriptures in the Bible. It would seem that Paul, in attempting to assuage speculation, engendered even more speculation by these references.
However, there are some things which can be understood. Of the two things which must happen, the apostasy is perhaps a little easier to deal with than the man of lawlessness. What the apostasy indicates is not just that the world will grow worse and worse, and lawlessness will increase, which is true of the end of the age. But more specifically, that the church will fall away from the faith. By the church, I mean the organized, visible church, not the true believers who are genuinely saved. But professing, so called Christians around the world will depart from the basic tenets of the faith. It should be evident that not everyone who calls themselves Christian are Christian, of course. In fact, I would contend that it is already a fact that the majority of so called Christians in the world have already departed from the faith.
Now a true Christian cannot fall from grace, cannot become apostate, because the Lord keeps him. But Jesus Himself predicted a falling away in the last days in Matthew 24:10, "At that time many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people's love will grow cold.”
So it is a certain sign of the end, that those professing to be Christians will fall away from the truth of the gospel. And I would suggest that has, for the most part, already happened in our day. Most mainline denominations have abandoned the truth of the gospel for some sort of social gospel that does not denounce sin, but embraces evil as good. Homosexual clergy are now accepted and embraced in most mainstream churches. Or even if that particular sin is not their failing, they have substituted other just as grievous doctrinal errors for the truth, and obscured the truth to the point that one cannot be saved by following their teachings.
But I suppose that things can always get worse. And Paul says it will become worse and worse as we approach the end time. In conjunction with the church’s apostasy, Paul says the other thing that must happen is that the man of lawlessness will be revealed. This is much more difficult to be certain about all the details, but some things are clear. The lawlessness that pervades the church and brings about apostasy will have a leader. And this leader is who Paul refers to as the man of lawlessness.
There are many titles that are used in scripture to speak of this person, but the one we are probably most familiar with is the antichrist. Now we could go totally off the rails this morning if we try to determine all that the Bible teaches concerning the antichrist. And so we want to limit that this morning. But the apostle John said in 1John 2:18 “Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour.” What we believe is that there has been a spirit of antichrist in every age, which works against the church, which is likened in Revelation 13 to the beast from the sea, that is anti christian government. But at the end of the age, there will be a person who embodies the spirit of the antichrist who is the eighth head of the beast of the sea, and He will magnify himself for a short while and the whole earth will worship him.
Paul says in vs4 “[he] opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.” During the age of the Reformation it was widely believed that the antichrist was the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church. He claimed to be the Vicar of Christ, and seemed to be the fulfillment of much of the prophesy concerning the antichrist. And revered theologians such as John Wycliffe and Martin Luther and John Calvin all believed that the Pope was the personification of the antichrist. Others down through the ages have believed that it was a Roman emperor, probably Nero, or during WW2, many thought that it was Adolf Hitler. But time has taught us that these theories and conjectures, though seemingly well supplied with numerous evidences, did not end up proving true.
While conjecture about certain figures in the world such as Nero, or Hitler, or a certain Pope have proved unfounded, Paul gives a few more clues about this person. He says in vs 5 “Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains [will do so] until he is taken out of the way.”
Paul had obviously spoken to the Thessalonians about certain things that were preventing the final manifestation of the antichrist. Unfortunately, though the Thessalonians knew what he was referring to, we do not. We can only guess, and guessing is not something we want to be dogmatic about. But something, or more particularly, someone was restraining the man of lawlessness. Already the spirit of lawlessness is at work, as in many antichrists are in the world. But someone restrains the final head of the beast who directly precedes the coming of Christ.
My guess, and I cannot be dogmatic about it, is that the restrainer is the Holy Spirit, who at the final hour will relinquish His restraint upon the world, so that lawlessness will increase, and the antichrist will be emboldened and manifest himself as god. Other suggestions are that it is law and order which restrains him, or civil government. But I don’t find that idea appealing for a number of reasons.
One thing that I think provides a certain parallel happened at the first coming of the Lord in the last hours before His death. Jesus said to those who arrested Him, “this hour and the power of darkness is yours.” That is, there was a certain restraint that was lifted in that hour, when Satan, the ruler of this world, was able to exert his influence and power over the world to kill Jesus. In John 14:30 in the upper room before His arrest and crucifixion, Jesus said "I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in Me.” So in that first coming, in the last hours of His life, Satan would seem to have been given the liberty to do his worst. Prior to that, Jesus said repeatedly that His hour had not yet come. Yet in those last hours, the power of darkness had sway. And perhaps in the same way, in the last hour before Christ’s second coming, Satan will be given liberty to do his worst, and the restraint will be taken away, that he might exalt himself, and draw all unbelievers to him, and then they will be destroyed.
So I think it is a reference to the restraining power of the Holy Spirit. But when that restraint is taken away, vs 8 “Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; [that is,] the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved.”
We see first of all, that God releases the restraint upon the antichrist only to bring about his sudden destruction at the coming of Christ. Christ will come when the power of the antichrist is greatest, and He will slay him with the breath of His mouth. What that means is that by the word of God he will be slain. This is not some drawn out battle between good and evil where the devil wins a few rounds and Christ wins a few rounds. But it will be immediate, at the appearance of Christ.
And also in that verse we see another couple of characteristics of this man of lawlessness. First, Paul says he is manifested in accord with the activity of Satan, or the power of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders. Everyone wants to see some sign from heaven, don’t they? All the false prophets and false teachers on the internet and television are always claiming some supernatural sign, or supernatural wonder that has given them special insight and knowledge. And people seem to be always looking for that sort of thing. They are drawn to that. There is a major denomination known as the Vineyard that has as the focus of their ministry that they will perform signs and wonders. To their thinking, that sort of thing supersedes the revealed truth of scripture. And so the man of lawlessness will have a ready audience of people that want to see something in order to believe. And they will see him perform signs and wonders and believe that he is god. He is the antichrist, that is, the opposite of Christ, yet he will be a Christ like figure that proclaims himself to be God, and has the signs and wonders to convince the world.
The result is deception of wickedness for those who will perish with him, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. Their hearts were hardened. They chose to believe a lie. Paul says in vs 11, “For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false.” It is only by the Holy Spirit’s influence that we are able to believe the truth. So as the Holy Spirit’s influence is taken away, then the world will easily believe a lie. It’s as Romans 1:25 tells us, “For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.”
For those who reject the gospel and believe the lie there remains only the judgment of God. The gospel is that Jesus took God’s punishment for our sins upon Himself at the cross, so that we might be made righteous through Him. But when you reject Jesus as your Savior, the judgment of God remains upon you. So Paul adds in vs12 “in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.”
We find an account of that judgement in Rev 20:11-15 “Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is [the book] of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one [of them] according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”
But that is not the finish for those who persevered in faith, who did not worship the beast, who did not believe a lie, but believed the truth. They are not affected by the second death, but live and reign with Christ forever. Paul says in contrast to the judgment of the world and the antichrist, in vs13 “But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth. It was for this He called you through our gospel, that you may gain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
We that have believed the truth of the gospel have a better inheritance. We have eternal life and glory in heaven. Salvation is available to all who believe in the truth. And the truth is that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, became man and took the judgment that we deserved because of our sins upon Himself, dying on the cross to pay our penalty, raised on the third day because of His righteousness, having triumphed over death and sin, and now sits at the right hand of God interceding for us, and one day, on the last day, He will come again and reward the faithful and judge the world which lies in wickedness. And He will reign in a new heaven and new earth with His bride the church, forever and ever.
That is the truth of the gospel, which if you believe it, you will be saved from the judgment which is to come upon the world. Romans 10:8-13 says, “But what does [the scripture] say? "THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART"--that is, the word of faith which we are preaching, that if you confess with your mouth Jesus [as] Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For the Scripture says, "WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED." For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same [Lord] is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him; for "WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.”
Paul concludes this section with a final appeal to those who are saved, who have believed in vs 15 “So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word [of mouth] or by letter from us. Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father, who has loved us and given us eternal comfort and good hope by grace, comfort and strengthen your hearts in every good work and word.”
Hold fast to the truth, stand firm in the faith, and be stedfast in proclaiming the hope of His soon appearing. Let us pray.
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