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When missiles fly and bombs explode and Israel finds herself yet again in the middle of a major conflict, believers’ minds run to prophecy. I went to Ezekiel 37-38 to read about Gog and the northern coalition invading Israel when Israel is at peace sometime in the future. Iran is ancient Persia and part of that coalition. Of course, we don’t know when the Lord will come into the clouds for His church, but we always want to be ready. This morning we’re studying one of the more difficult passages of God’s Word about the coming Day of the Lord and the Antichrist. You may not agree on all points, but let’s think together. Through it all God will fulfill His predestined plan for humanity, right up into eternity future. As author David Breeze wrote, “The world is ruled from the throne of the eternal God.” We’ll read up to verse 8 this morning.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-8, Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, [2] 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. [3] 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, [4] 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. [5] Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? [6] And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. [7] 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. [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.
The Thessalonian believers were all upset thinking they were already in the Day of the Lord. False teachers were spouting this out and they were confused. Paul reminds them, “Don’t be deceived.” Two things will signal the Day of the Lord – the apostasy and the revealing of the Antichrist. Paul taught those brand-new believers about the end times.
Before we plow into verses 3-8, I have a couple questions. Do you remember the three major views on the end times? Amillennialism, Postmillennialism, and Premillennialism. We hold to the Premillennial view where Christ will come back to earth after the seven-year tribulation period and throw the Antichrist and false prophet into the lake of fire (Revelation 19).Then Satan will be bound for 1,000 years and Christ will rule from Jerusalem over the entire world for 1,000 years. Zechariah 14:9 says, “the Lord will be king over all the earth.”
PRE-TRIBULATION RAPTURE
Now I have another question. Do you know why we as a church hold to the pre-tribulation rapture of the church? We believe the church will be removed or raptured from the earth before the world goes through the seven-year tribulation period, before the Day of the Lord begins. Could you explain to a friend why our church believes it? Here are several reasons based on a literal, grammatical, historical hermeneutical principle. Or, as Bible student David Cooper put it many years ago:
“When the plain sense of Scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense. Therefore, take every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal meaning unless the facts of the immediate context, studied in the light of related passages and axiomatic and fundamental truths indicate clearly otherwise.”
First, the doctrine of imminency. We believe Christ could come at any moment, imminently. We aren’t looking for signs; we’re looking for Christ. Throughout the epistles the believers are urged to look for Christ to come. Titus 2:13 calls it our “blessed hope.” He could come today. Are you ready?
Second, in passages where Christ comes for His people, there is nothing said about Christ coming to earth or a general resurrection. John 14:1-3 says He is coming to receive us to Himself and take us to the Father’s house. First Thessalonians 4:13-18 says Christ descends into earth’s atmosphere and those in Christ who have already died are raised first, then we who are living are raptured or snatched from the earth to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. It’s not a “secret” rapture, as some have tried to paint it. The world will know as millions of Christians are suddenly missing.
Third, when Christ returns and sets up his 1,000-year kingdom there will be many Jews and Gentiles who were saved in the tribulation period and survived the tribulation period. These saved people will enter the millennial kingdom, marry, and have babies during those thousand years. Some of these children will become rebels and follow Satan at the end of the 1,000 years (Rev. 20:7-9). If Christ raptures all believers at the end of the tribulation period, then when He returns to set up His kingdom all believers would have glorified bodies and we know you can’t have babies with glorified bodies.
Fourth, there is no mention of the church in Revelation 6-20. Dick Mayhue in Christ’s Prophetic Plans notes that the best explanation of the church’s absence is that the church has been raptured before the tribulation period.
Fifth, there is a promise in Revelation 3:10 to the church of Philadelphia that has global implications. God is going to keep us out of the hour of testing that is to come upon the whole world.
Revelation 3:10, Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.
Admittedly, no rapture view is without difficulties. No passage says the rapture is now and then this and that, all nicely laid out. Our privilege is to study the Scriptures, comparing Scripture with Scripture, and try to get an understanding as best we can. Now let’s dig into this difficult passage about the Antichrist. By the way, the word Antichrist is only used in 1 John 2, 4, and 2 John.
IDENTIFYING THE ANTICHRIST
2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, 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, 4 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.
We’ve already talked about this great apostasy when the religious world will rebel against God and depart from any faith in the true God. This is probably the same as the Babylon of Revelation 17 called the mother of harlots who sits on many waters with world-wide influence.
Along with this apostasy is the revealing or unveiling of this man of sin or lawlessness. He arises to world prominence at the beginning of the seven-year tribulation period by bringing a covenant of peace to Israel for three and one-half years. God gave Daniel a message through the angel Gabriel about Israel’s future up to the coming of the Messiah. There will be 490 years allotted to Israel. Beginning with a decree from a king of Persia to rebuild Jerusalem in 445 BC, the prophecy takes us 483 years all the way to the coming of Christ and His crucifixion. Then the time jumps to the last seven years, the tribulation period, and the Antichrist.
Daniel 9:26,Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing, and the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood; even to the end there will be war; desolations are determined.
The people of the prince who is to come were the Romans under Titus who destroyed Jerusalem in AD 70, crushing a Jewish revolt. Ever since, the Jews have been tossed from pillar to post, hated, scorned, and rejected among the nations. The prince who is to come is the Antichrist, who will rise up at the beginning of the last seven years, the beginning of the tribulation period.
Daniel 9:27, And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.”
This man of sin, this lawless one, will make a peace treaty (“firm covenant”) with Israel right there in Jerusalem. But at the midpoint, three and one-half years into the tribulation period, he will show his real colors and assert himself not only as a world-wide dictator, but even demand people worship him and then enter the inner holy place of the temple in Jerusalem and declare himself to be God! This is the abomination of desolation. He is Satan’s messiah. He is evil incarnate. He’s called the lawless one and son of destruction in verse three.
2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, 3 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,
4who 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.
At some point the third Jewish temple will be built in Jerusalem. There’s Jewish interest in building this third temple today. Jesus referred to this abomination of desolation in Matthew 24 so we know this is still future, kicking off the last three and one-half years of the tribulation period, called by Christ the great tribulation.
Matthew 24:15,21-22, “Therefore when you see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand)…. 21 For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will. 22 Unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.
THE MYSTERY OF LAWLESSNESS AND THE RESTRAINER
2 Thessalonians 2:5, Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? 6 And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. 7 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.
The Mystery of Lawlessness. Paul taught these new believers about the details of eschatology: “I was telling you these things.” Paul told them what or who the restrainer was, but he didn’t tell us. Before we try to figure out who the restrainer is, let’s find out what the mystery of lawlessness is. A mystery is something we wouldn’t know if God hadn’t told us. Here He tells us that this lawless spirit is already working. Ever since Genesis 3 this lawlessness has been energizing the human heart. Paul identified this inner sinful, lawlessness heart in Romans 1:18-25. There Paul exposes the depraved heart of man that exchanges the truth of God for a lie, worshipping the creature rather than the Creator. He also describes it in Ephesians 2:1-2.
Ephesians 2:1-2, And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, [2] in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.
You can trace this mystery down through the centuries. Darwin’s theory of evolution was the manifestation of this mystery of lawlessness. Remove God from creation and human history and you’ve got the devil’s lie multiplied to an infinite degree. Kevin Swanson in his book Epoch asserts, “Darwin more than any other single person deceived the nations.” Karl Marx promoted communism with its atheistic materialism that brought death and hardship wherever it went. It’s Satan’s determination to push God off His throne. The devil said, “I will be like the Most High” (Isaiah 14:14). The mystery of lawlessness is the Satan-driven sin-cursed human heart at war with God. In the Antichrist this mystery of lawlessness becomes fully visible, blaspheming God with every ounce of his being. He is Satan’s man incarnate.
The Restrainer of Lawlessness. For now, God is restraining lawlessness and the Man of Lawlessness. But what is the restrainer? He restrains sin and evil and lawlessness from doing its worst. History could have been much worse without this restrainer. So what is more powerful than lawlessness and what is more powerful than this man of lawlessness? We know Satan can go no further than God allows. So the restrainer is God’s restrainer. Most commentators believe the restrainer is at least the Holy Spirit. The Spirit exerts a restraining influence in this world. Jesus said the Spirit convicts the world of “sin, righteousness, and judgment to come” (John 16:8-10). Many believe it’s the Holy Spirit as He indwells the Church. The church is salt and light in this increasingly dark, defiled, depraved, and doomed world. If you remove the church worldwide, a huge influence for God and righteousness will suddenly be missing so that lawlessness will have its heyday. One author said in the same way the Spirit came at Pentecost, indwelling every believer in the church ever since, so when the church is raptured the Spirit indwelling the Church is removed. This may be the answer. We must remember, though, that the Holy Spirit is still present on earth during the tribulation period and will be turning multitudes of Jewish and Gentile hearts to repent and trust in Christ, the Lamb of God. In spite of the Antichrist demanding universal worship, God will still be saving His elect people during the tribulation period.
THE END OF ANTICHRIST
2 Thessalonians 2:8, 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;
In God’s sovereign timing the restraining influence is removed and this incarnation of pure evil will demand universal worship, employ a global reign of terror, and literally fight against the Messiah. He will have three and one half years to execute his reign of terror, determining the slaughter of every Gentile and Jew who believes in and worships Christ and who refuses to worship him or receive his mark on their foreheads or right hands (Rev.13:15-18). How much will it take to eliminate him? Paul tells us here in 2 Thess. 2:8, “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.” John describes the end of his evil career.
Revelation 19:20, And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone.
Remember Luther’s words in A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. “The prince of darkness grim—We tremble not for him; His rage we can endure, For lo! His doom is sure—one little word shall fell him.” Luther was talking about Satan, but it applies as well to this Antichrist.
SO WHAT?
We were all cursed with this mystery of lawlessness through our father Adam. Our hearts are desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). But God is compassionate and full of mercy, grace, and power. Like Paul said in Acts 26:18, God sent him to the Gentiles “to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.”
We don’t know how Epic Fury will turn out, but we thank God that we know He is in charge right now and nothing happens among the evil forces of this world outside of His control and sovereign plan. We love, trust, and worship our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and look every day for His imminent return! Are you ready?