Well keep your Bibles in hand please and turn now to page 989 if you’re using a church Bible as we continue to consider the teaching of Paul’s letter, the second letter to the Thessalonians. And we’re turning our attention today to the first twelve verses of 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. This is an immensely intriguing passage; it provides some vital instruction for us on the subjects of the return of Christ and the rise of the anti-Christ, topics which, understandably, have fascinated and intrigued Christians down through the ages. It also has to be said it is among the more difficult texts of the New Testament to interpret well. One of the giants of 20th century evangelical New Testament scholarship, Dr. Leon Morris, said of it, “This passage is probably the most obscure and difficult in the whole of the Pauline writings and the many gaps in our knowledge have given rise to extravagant speculations,” which I hope to avoid this morning. The tantalizing details that are provided in the text have generated a veritable cottage industry in identifying when the end times will occur and who the anti-Christ is likely to be. Like Bigfoot hunters, you know, with fuzzy photographs attempting to prove their claims, there have been those in every age of the church’s history who have been unable to resist speculation and conspiracy theories.
And yet despite alleged anti-Christ sightings claimed by just about every generation of Christians in history, all of them convinced of course the end will occur in their lifetimes, despite all of that, the ambiguities of the text in front of us, along with the explicit warnings of our Savior the Lord Jesus that, “No one knows the day or the hour,” those things ought to warn us to be circumspect and modest in our reading of the passage. And so our goal as we examine Paul’s teaching will not be to piece together a timeline or build a forensic profile of the anti-Christ so we can vote for the other guy should he run for office in the next general election. No, our goal needs to align with Paul’s stated purpose in verse 2. Do you see it in verse 2? He’s writing to help the Thessalonians “stand firm.” “We ask you, brothers,” he says, “not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed,” verse 3 – “Let no one deceive you in any way.” So he’s not writing to fuel speculation. He is writing to allay fears and settle faith and anchor confidence in the unambiguous fact of the Christian hope.
And so with that in mind, we are going to look at Paul’s teaching here under four headings, four words really. The first of them in verses 1 through 3 is the word “reassurance.” Paul writes to reassure and to settle the faith of the Thessalonians. Then verses 3 through 12, where we’ll spend the bulk of our time, the second word is “rebellion.” Paul describes a coming apostasy, a rebellion, and focuses on its leader, the man of lawlessness. Reassurance. Rebellion. Then we’ll go back and look at verses 6 and 7 and notice the “restraint,” the restraint. For all the fearful power of the man of lawlessness and the rebellion that he will embody and lead, Paul reminds the Thessalonians who is really in charge. And then finally, verse 8, the “return.” We’ll back up and let our gaze linger as we conclude on the clear portrayal of Christ’s glorious return and final victory. And that is a great place for us to be fixing our attention. I think that’s where Paul would have our gaze linger last and longest. So there’s the outline. Do you see it? The reassurance, the rebellion, the restraint, and then the return.
Before we get into each of those, let’s pause and pray and then we’ll read the text together. Let us pray.
O Lord, we thank You that You have given us Your Word not to fuel idle speculation or debate about words, but You have given it to be the path of life, to be light in the darkness, to be manna in the wilderness, to be water from the rock. And so we come to You hungering and thirsting for righteousness, asking, Lord Jesus, keep Your promise and fill us, for we ask this in Your name. Amen.
Second Thessalonians chapter 2 at the first verse. This is the Word of God:
“Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”
Amen.
A few months ago I received a letter in the mail here at the church from a Christian law firm in Arizona offering me assistance in estate planning. Now this was an estate plan with a twist. It was called “The Rapture Plan” and it offered documents that I could complete to give me peace of mind about what would happen to my estate in the event of the secret rapture. That’s the view that teaches that before the final judgment Jesus will appear only to believers and take them out of the world, suddenly and secretly, leaving the unbelieving mass of humanity behind Him. In such a case, the attorney assured me, I would be gone from the earth and those whom I had left behind me would have to dispose of my assets somehow, and so he designed “The Rapture Plan” to provide a solution. Now let me be clear, I do not believe that the Bible teaches any such thing as a secret rapture of the church. Jesus will return once at the end of the age to judge the living and the dead and every eye shall see Him on that great and awesome day. But I kept “The Rapture Plan” in my files to remind me just how unsettling bad doctrine on this issue can be for people. This attorney has obviously met people for whom the notion of a secret rapture was generating some real anxiety and he was trying to provide some legal relief. Well that would probably be the first time a lawyer has helped relieve anxiety.
The Reassurance
Well let’s look at 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 because we’re actually going to see Paul tackle false teaching about the end head on. And he does it to provide a much better source of relief to the troubled Christians than “The Rapture Plan” certainly could provide. Look at verses 1 through 3 with me first of all and the reassurance that Paul gives. The reassurance that Paul gives. He begins, you’ll notice, introducing the topic that is the subject of such controversy among them. “Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to Him.” So that’s the subject. The doctrine of the final return of Christ to bring all His people home to glory in the new creation has been under siege in some way by false teaching. They were arguing, if you’ll look at verse 2, that “the day of the Lord has already come.” The perfect tense there indicates these false teachers were alleging that in some perhaps metaphorical or purely spiritual way, the final return of Jesus has already occurred. Similar heresy seems to have been plaguing the church in Ephesus, so in 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 18, we find Paul writing to Timothy and warning him about those who have swerved from the truth saying, “The resurrection has already happened.” They are upsetting, he says, the faith of some.
That might seem to us to be a rather odd idea – to argue that the resurrection has already happened, the return of Christ has already taken place – but it’s not quite as remote to us as we might at first imagine. For example, in our day, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, they believe that Jesus has already supposed to have returned spiritually on October 1, 1941. Or even in allegedly Bible- believing churches there is a view that argues that all the prophecies about the coming of the Lord and the resurrection of believers and the day of judgment were fulfilled in some figurative and metaphorical sense with the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in AD 70, and so there is no future coming of the Lord to be expected. That’s a live, false teaching that is circulating in even so-called evangelical churches. There is nothing new under the sun, is there? Novel heresies, actually, on closer examination, rarely turn out to be all that novel. They’re just the same old errors repackaged for contemporary audiences. And something of that sort was being promoted in Thessalonica in a way that was clearly distressing the faith of many of the members. They were being “shaken in mind and alarmed,” verse 2.
And what’s more, the claims of these false teachers were being supported by an appeal they were making to apostolic authority. Did you notice that? Paul urges the Thessalonians not to give any credence to “a spirit or a spoken word or a letter seeming to be from us.” So these teachers are saying that they have had a prophecy or a teaching or even a letter originating from the apostle Paul promoting this very idea that Jesus’ return had already happened. But verse 3, “Let no one deceive you in any way.” The claims to Pauline authority were clearly false, and the way the Thessalonians can know that they are false is that they do not agree with what Paul has taught them elsewhere. In fact, verse 5, Paul reminds the Thessalonians he had already instructed them on these matters when last they had been together face to face. “Do you not remember,” he says, “that when I was still with you I told you these things?”
So how do you deal with unsettling new ideas, new teaching? In order not to be shaken in mind or alarmed by error or deceived, Paul says even when it claims to be apostolic truth, we turn to what we know for sure the apostle has actually taught. “Remember what I said to you about all of this when we were face to face, when we were last together. Nothing that is inconsistent with that clear apostolic word that you have heard from me should ever be admitted, ever be admitted as the truth of God, no matter the source from which it purports to come.” How do you settle your mind when you are troubled by some strange new doctrine? You run to the clear teaching of apostlic truth. In other words, do you get your doctrine from the Bible? Do you get your doctrine from the Bible? Are you a Berean, you know, searching the Scriptures daily to see if these things are so? Or does your doctrine derive from Christian celebrities and novels about the end times and internet conspiracy theories that read the Bible through the lens of the latest headlines? To the law and to the testimony. “If they will not speak according to this word, that is because they have no dawn” – Isaiah 8:20. When some new teaching or idea begins to trouble you, do not be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed; do not be deceived. Get yourself back to the clear testimony of apostolic Scripture. Nothing reassures and settles the believing heart like the safe paths of Biblical truth. The reassurance.
The Rebellion
Then secondly, and this is, like I say, this is where we will spend the rest of our time – the rebellion. The reassurance and now the rebellion. Paul reminds them, actually, the false teaching cannot be true because the return of Christ will not take place until two other things happen first. You see the two things in verse 3? The day will not come unless, number one, the rebellion comes first, and number two, the man of lawlessness is revealed. There will be a rebellion, and then in due course, one chief rebel among them to lead them – the man of lawlessness, the son of destruction.
Let’s think about the rebellion first. The term translated “rebellion” is the Greek word “apostasia.” It’s apostasy. We’re not just talking about political rebellion, revolution. We’re talking about religious revolt; apostasy from the truth. It’s locus is the visible church. The time will come, Paul is saying, when many who have made a profession of faith in Christ will turn their back on Him and reject what they once believed. Now let me pause there and remind you that those who have truly been converted by the grace of Jesus Christ cannot finally fall away. Remember the words of the Lord Jesus Himself, the Good Shepherd, in John 10:27-28. “My sheep hear My voice and I know them and they follow Me. I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one can snatch them out of My hand.” So those who are truly converted can never be lost, but it is possible, tragically possible – and every pastor knows this and has seen it to his great sorrow – it is possible to make a formal, public profession of faith in Jesus, an outwardly persuasive commitment to the truth of the Gospel, without that truth ever really touching the heart. And people can look like Christians and sound like Christians and never truly be united to Christ by faith. And it ought not to surprise us then, even though it should break our hearts, when people like that simply walk away from the truth that they’ve been taught and once claimed to embrace. As John puts it in 1 John 2:19, “They went out from us but they were not of us, for if they had been of us they would have continued with us, but they went out that it might become plain that they are not all of us.”
So there’s a warning here, isn’t there? I don’t think we can afford to pass over it too quickly. One day, a great apostasy will come and many who have claimed to follow Jesus will actually deny Him and turn their backs on Him. In fact, if you look down at verse 7, you’ll find Paul acknowledging that the mystery of lawlessness, this spirit and attitude, is already at work, already even in his own day. This principle of wickedness and lawlessness and turning against the truth, this principle that results in apostasy was already insinuating itself into the hearts and minds of the Thessalonians. That’s why Paul is writing to them with such urgency. He wants them to be aware and alert and forewarned.
And let’s be clear, the same deadly principle is at work insinuating itself into hearts and minds in our generation and in our context too. We are being warned here about a clear and present danger. This isn’t pie in the sky, you know, down the road in some distant, hypothetical future. The mystery of lawlessness, he says, is already at work. Apostasy is a terrible, tragic reality. I was talking to a pastor in another city this past week who called for advice in a very difficult pastoral situation where an apparently very godly, faithful couple, the wife had suddenly declared she no longer believed in Jesus and has rejected the Christian faith out of hand and broke this pastor’s heart, not to mention the heart of her faithful husband. This is a reality that we see all the time, a tragic but very real possibility. And so we need to be sure that we ourselves will not get swept away by it. How can you be sure? How can you be sure you will not be swept away by this terrible counterfeit, this form of godliness that denies its power? “Unless you are born again,” Jesus told Nicodemus, “you cannot see the kingdom of God.” There is only one defense against apostasy. You must be born again. Scrutinize your heart. Am I the real thing? Have I been born again? Scrutinize your heart and then flee to Jesus Christ, the only sure refuge for any of us. So there is the rebellion itself.
Then, let’s look at what Paul tells us about the leader of this rebellion, this great apostasy, beginning in verse 3. Look at his title. He is the man of lawlessness. The mystery of lawlessness that is already at work finds its embodiment, its incarnation we might almost say, in this one man. Lawlessness defines him. It is his distinguishing characteristic. And you’ll notice Paul says he will be revealed. Do you see that word in verse 3? You’ll see it again in verse 8. It is the word “apocalypto.” Verse 9, Paul speaks about the coming of the lawless one. That’s the word “parousia.” Both words, “apocalypto” and “parousia” are used in the New Testament, actually in this very passage, as almost technical terms for the revelation, the unveiling and the final coming of the Lord Jesus Christ at the end of the age.
And so you see what that means. By using these two terms of the man of lawlessness, Paul is saying this man is a mockery and a counterfeit of the Lord Jesus Christ when he comes. He will have his own coming and his own revelation just as Jesus will have His true and final coming and glorious appearing at the end of the age. He is a counter-Christ. He is the anti-Christ. That’s why in verse 4 he “opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God.” The man of lawlessness, this anti-Christ, wants more than simply to deny and repudiate God’s law; he wants to be worshiped himself in place of all gods as God.
Now look at that phrase, “he takes his seat in the temple of God.” You see it there in verse 4? Let me acknowledge here the interpretation of that one phrase has been the cause of countless gallons of ink being spilled by commentators over the years. “He takes his seat in the temple of God.” Some people believe Paul is referring there to the temple, the physical temple in Jerusalem that will one day have to be rebuilt and become again the center of the true worship of God. And then when the anti-Christ comes, he will defile that temple just as Antiochus Epiphanes did in 168 BC, prophesied by Daniel in Daniel chapter 7 and 8. And certainly Paul is using that language from Daniel as he speaks about the man of lawlessness to whom Antiochus Epiphanes certainly points us.
But two factors, I think, rule that interpretation out decisively. First of all, nowhere else, nowhere else does Paul use the phrase, “the temple of God” to refer to a physical temple and especially not to the temple in Jerusalem. Every single time he uses it, it refers always to the church, to the people of God, united to Jesus Christ, the true, spiritual temple. That’s certainly, I think, what it means here. And secondly – and for me this is the final nail in the coffin of that other idea – Jesus’ coming, His first coming has rendered the need for any temple, any physical temple, forever obsolete. There is now no need, nor will there ever be again, a need for blood sacrifices. Christ our Passover Lamb has made atonement for sinners once and for all. Neither will there be any need for a succession of high priests to serve in a temple, “for we now have a perfect High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, who ever lives to make intercession for us.” And there will not be any need for a temple, “for the hour is coming and is now here,” Jesus said, “when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship God, for those who worship God must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” Jesus Himself is the temple of God and everyone united to Him by faith, like bricks fitted into the cornerstone, become part of that spiritual temple.
So what does Paul mean when he says this man of lawlessness takes his seat in the temple of God? He means this man will seek to usurp the place of Christ as King and Head of the Church and pervert and twist the visible church to his own purposes. The man of lawlessness will arise within the church and pollute and pervert the teaching of the church and cause a great apostasy from the true church. You see something then of his character and we’ve seen something of his actions, his behavior. Verse 9 even tells us of his dynamic – the power by which he will accomplish all of this. And I suspect, you would agree, Paul is really stating the obvious by this point. Verse 9, “The coming of the lawless one will be by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception.” He will appear impressive. He will affect man, attracting man. He will perform lying miracles, all by the power of the devil. It is a very sobering glimpse into one aspect of the church’s future.
But as fascinating as all of that may be, Paul isn’t sharing it with us simply to satisfy our curiosity. He’s not sharing it with us even to correct faulty thinking, although that’s certainly closer to his design. No, Paul intends all of this to drive home the critical importance of knowing the truth as it is in Jesus for ourselves. Notice what he says in verses 10 through 12. These Satanic signs and lying wonders are “for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” So Paul is drawing the curtain back a little for us, isn’t he? He shows us behind the coming of anti-Christ and his lying miracles there is the power of Satan. And then he draws the curtain back a little further. Behind the power even of Satan, animating as he does, the lies and the deceptions of anti-Christ, behind it all stands the sovereign God Himself.
All of this – this grim future apostasy, this terrible man of lawlessness, all of it is but part of a greater, divine design to do justice and treat people as their sins deserve. Those, Paul says, who reject the Gospel, will be given over to the lie, taken in by the deception they have preferred, with all the terrible consequences of their own choices finally falling upon them in the wrath and curse of God. “They did not love the truth that they might be saved, so God sent them a strong delusion leading to final condemnation.” “Is this what you really want? Okay, that’s what I’ll give you.” That’s what’s going on here, Paul is saying. That is what God will say to those who reject His offers of mercy. It’s terrible. So be warned. There is no escaping the Judge of all the earth.
Though there is, I think, a little glimmer of comfort in all of this as well for those who have in fact trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ. Doesn’t this also remind us whose devil the devil is and who yet presides upon His throne? In the darkest moments of human history yet to unfold, when such terrible apostasy and deception will seem to fill the world and the man of lawlessness himself will arise with these lying miracles and wonders, even then our God will not have abdicated His throne. We are reminded, I think, that He is working still His purposes out as year succeeds to year and nothing, nothing – no calamity, no sorrow, no darkness, no evil, no wickedness, no rebellion, not even the rise of anti-Christ himself – nothing can thwart His grand, divine design. We don’t have to understand how that can be so, we simply rest in the fact that it is so and that should enable us as believers to face the future confident in His grace and in His keeping.
The Restraint
So first, the reassurance. Then, the rebellion. Then very, very briefly the last two things – the restraint and the return. The restraint first. Look at verses 6 and 7. “You know,” he says, “what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed.” The mystery of lawlessness is already at work, but God restrains it. He holds it in check by His common grace. His grace restrains the wickedness of our hearts so that we are not as wicked as we might be. His grace restrains the overflow of evil in society so that as dark as our world sometimes gets, there remain vestiges of God’s image in human beings and remnants of kindness and mercy and justice in the world. God is patient with us, you see, not willing that any should perish. And so He is holding back the flood.
Like the waters in the exodus when the Israelites crossed through the Red Sea, the flood of evil is being held back and piled up in a heap. But one day, Paul says, that restraint will be removed. As one scholar suggests the phrase be translated, “He will leave the scene.” He will withdraw His restraining hand, and then the mystery of lawlessness and the apostasy and the man of lawlessness himself will have their day. “But today, today while there is yet time, today while you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.” Today, while God is still being patient with you, today, while the window is held open by His restraining grace, today, come and bend the knee to Jesus Christ. The reassurance. The rebellion. The restraint.
The Return
And then finally, verse 8, and with this we are done – the return. The return. Look at verse 8. “The lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of His mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of His coming.” This man of lawlessness, empowered by Satan, performing mighty wonders and lying signs, for all his power, all his influence in a wicked world, he will be defeated not – notice this now – by some titanic battle. There will be no struggle, no wrestling match between equal and opposite forces. No, Jesus will simply appear. He will come in glory and breathe out His Word and the darkest power of hell will be vanquished and the strongest might of man overthrown. He will kill him with the breath of His mouth. The one who said to the storm, “Be still,” and the wind was silent and the waves ceased, that One will come again and speak in that same tone of quiet, utter surety and effortless power. And He will speak into the raging vortex of human rebellion and in His might and power, with His mere breath, He will conquer. And on that day, darkness will at last give way to light and sin give way to sanctity and wickedness to righteousness. On that day, death will give way to life and every tear will be wiped from our eyes. On that day, all wrongs will at last be righted and final, perfect justice will be done. On that day, Christ will come as Victor and every eye shall see Him and every knee bow to Him and every tongue confess Him Lord to the glory of God the Father.
However much we are meant to tremble at the terrible picture of a coming rebellion and a coming man of lawlessness in this text, if we are Christians, we are meant to rejoice even more deeply and find our hearts aching with renewed longing for the day when all of that will be undone and a new creation, a new heavens and a new earth, a home of righteousness will come when Jesus appears in His majesty. So yes, search your hearts. Make your calling and election sure. You, you must be born again! There is no defense against apostasy apart from the new birth. And yes, tremble, tremble and flee the wrath to come while the restraining hand of sovereign grace holds back the flood of wickedness. There is yet time, but the window one day will close. But then, having trusted in Christ, look forward with eager expectation, with longing in your heart, to the dawn of that bright, eternal day when the trumpet will sound and Christ shall come. And then rise and say with the apostle John, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”
Let’s pray together.
Our Father, these are hard truths, they are challenging and sobering and we bow before You praying for grace that Your Word might not, like seeds sown on rocky soil, sit merely on the surface of our hearts, bounce across the surface of our consciences. Instead, would You plant it deeply within us and cause it to sprout and bear much fruit. Bring to repentance those who still resist You. Cause them to see that Christ alone is a Savior for sinners, and so flee to Him. And those of us who are passing through trials, help us to long for the great and glorious day when Christ shall come and death and sin and sorrow will be no more. O Lord Jesus, come soon. Give us grace to wait for Your appearing and to run our races with perseverance till that day dawns. For we ask this in Your name, amen.