By Adrienne Crist
Who is the main “character” of the Bible? Jesus. As we know the Bible is not a work of fiction, but a work of history, of prophecy and poetry. But the bible is also filled with literary devices. The entire bible is about Jesus. From Creation in Genesis to the New Heaven and Earth in Revelation all of it points to man’s need of a Savior. Jesus is the “protagonist” of the bible. And who is the “antagonist”? Satan.
From the Garden Satan has tried to thwart Jesus. At times he is forthright: For example in the Garden with Eve, or when he visited Jesus and tempted Him. Other than incidents of outward Satan worship, the enemy is covert. His minions work as smooth operators, hiding in the shadows. They use temptation, manipulation, lies and secrets to do their dirty work to control the masses and stumble the people of God.
We don’t need to look further than the headlines of the past six months to know that we are moving at breakneck speed to our Lord’s return. We are in the season of the end of the age.
It’s interesting to look through the lens of 2000 years to know that people in the church have always looked for signs of His return. Certainly when Jesus made the claim that He would return, the early church believed that it could be imminent and not be 2 millennium in the future. Jesus knew this, which is why he laid out in Matthew 24 what believers should be looking for before He returns. This portion of scripture specifically rebukes the false teachers in Thessaloniki who were making claims, in Paul’s name, that Jesus had indeed returned.
Let’s turn to 2 Thessalonians Chapter 2. Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you, 2 not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of [a]Christ had come. 3 Let no one deceive you by any means.
Last week I read a paper written by my daughter Ellie for her Early Church History class. She chose to tackle the premise that some of the letters that we attributed to the apostle Paul were not actually written by Paul. Interestingly among the list was 2Thessalonians. Of course, being a college paper she had to use scholarly sources as her references. And she specifically chose the book of Collosians to make her case that Paul was in fact the author of that epistle. But I was curious as to why 2Thessalonians made the list. Well this is in part because there were false teachers, using Paul’s name, claiming that they were in the days of the last judgment. In chapter 3, verse 17 Paul writes: The salutation of Paul with my own hand, which is a sign in every epistle; so I write. Paul was aware that false teachers were writing letters in his name. Paul dictated his letters, therefore they could be in anyone's writing. Once again, we see Satan at work looking to deceive and frighten God’s people. So, what are the first things that we should be looking for when He returns? Because we know Paul was accurate 2000 years ago when he told the Thessalonians that “He’s not back”
When Jesus returns we will be very aware.
1. Satan will not be troubling us because he will be bound Rev 20:1-3 and Jesus
will be personally executing His judgment upon the earth IS 11:4
2. The whole world will be witness to His return Acts 1:9-11
Jesus will descend from Heaven : Acts 1:9-11 9 Now when He had spoken these
things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their
sight. 10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two
men stood by them in white apparel, 11 who also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you
stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into
heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.”
All people will know that Jesus has returned : Rev 1:7 Behold, He is coming with
clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the
earth will mourn because of Him. Even so, Amen.
The physical world will be changed : Rev 6:14 Then the sky [a]receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place.
These passages contain are signs that His return is imminent(4)
1. The departure of a restraining force
2. The man of sin is revealed
3. Great deception of the World
4. The rebuilding of the Temple
V3-5 A summary of what will happen:
for that Day will not come (emphasis added) unless the falling away comes first, and
the man of [b]sin is revealed, the son of perdition, 4 who opposes and exalts himself
above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits [c]as God in the temple of
God, showing himself that he is God. 5 Do you not remember that when I was still with
you I told you these things?
Right away he is reminding them of the bare facts of the situation. And, Paul is reminding them that he already taught them these things. I guess first century Christians are no different than we are. We need to hear things over and over again! When the world is in the beginning of the Tribulation there will be a falling away, resulting in the son of perdition, or the anti-Christ, being revealed, who then deceives people to worship him as he sits in the rebuilt temple.
In these four signs are probably about 40 bible studies!
I do want to give credit here to Pastor Steve who taught today’s passages and recently in a home study, but he taught it in 2 parts! . So I will be very briefly covering each bullet point. However, I have copies of his notes in the back full of scripture references. The departure of a restraining force…
In verse 3 we are given the term “falling away”. In my bible the subtitle given to these scriptures is “The Great Apostasy '' As I was studying this I discovered that there’s differing opinions regarding the meaning of this. I thought it meant that many believers will walk away from their faith. That the church would depart from it’s teachings. Which we do see all around us today. And when I read Chuck Smith’s commentary he expresses the same ideas. However, I was surprised to read in Pastor Steve’s notes that the word for that is aphistemi meaning falling away from the faith, we see that in 1 Timothy 4:1 Now the Spirit [a]expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons. Which we definitely see now.
But the word used here is apostasia which means to depart, or forsake, removal or to leave.
V6 6 And now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in his own time. 7 For the [d]mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only [e]He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way. (or out of the midst)
So when we studied 1Thessalonians 4 in verses 16-17 Diane taught on the Rapture. This is the departure. Two things restrain the antiChrist; the Holy Spirit and the Church. The Spirit who is omnipresent will not leave this world, He will be saving the post Rapture Christians. . But we will be leaving and that’s exciting! Jesus said we are to be salt and light to the world. Salt is a preservative, light shines in the darkness. When the church is gone, there will be an acceleration of the rot and darkness on the earth. Our presence and perseverance as believers with God’s help has been the source of many great movements throughout history; It was the Gutenburg bible that helped introduce the printed word to the west, the abolition of slavery in England, which paved the way for America, founded on the principle of freedom of religion, because we don’t serve God because he demands us to. The formation of Higher Education was religious based. In our modern day, Christians are responsible for helping the poor and downtrodden through Missions work both at home and abroad. It has been Christian Pro-Life groups who have worked tirelessly to overturn Roe vs. Wade. The Spirit moving through the life of believers has accomplished these things and countless more. It’s not hard to imagine that the world will decline at lightning speed when the church is raptured.
8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming.
In Verse 7 is when Paul begins to mention lawlessness. He stated that the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. For over 2000 years, truly since the garden has lawlessness been a force at work. We would call this the Spirit of the Age nowadays. Lawlessness is akin to man not wanting to be constrained. Nowadays we see it in cultural issues such as Gay marriage, Trans-rights, the social justice movement and it creeps into the church when we see teachings within the Emergent Church and the acceptance of the identity politics. There’s even a movement in the church where people who struggle with their homosexuality still cling to their identities even if they claim to not be abstaining from their sin. Simply put the lines are blurred. There is no desire to adhere to biblical standards.
Regarding “the lawless one”; So we know we are not yet in the days of the tribulation because this lawless one or son of perdition, the anti-Christ has not yet been identified. I encourage you to pick up the outline notes that I discussed earlier as they lay out all of the scriptures regarding who the antiChrist is and the specific actions he will impose upon the world.
I want to share a few points that David Guzick has made regarding this lawless one. The man of sin is truly an Anti-Christ. Satan has planned the career of the man of sin to mirror the ministry of Jesus.
· Both Jesus and the man of sin have a coming (2 Thessalonians 2:1 and 2:9).
· Both Jesus and the man of sin are revealed (2 Thessalonians 1:7 and 2:3).
2Thess 1:7 - and to give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is
revealed from heaven with His mighty angels,
· Both Jesus and the man of sin have a gospel (2 Thessalonians 2:10-11). · Both Jesus
and the man of sin say that they alone should be worshiped (2 Thessalonians 2:4).
· Both Jesus and the man of sin have support for their claims by miraculous works (2
Thessalonians 2:9).
i. Clearly, the man of sin is Satan’s attempt to father a Christ. Yet in the end, the man of
sin can only show himself that he is God. The coming of Jesus and the judgment of
God will make it clear that the man of sin is not God at all. End quote
But Paul slips in probably some of the most encouraging news in the midst of this list of abomination; in v8 he states that the Lord will consume this beast with the breath of His mouth and destroy (him) with the brightness of His coming! That is a fantastic word picture!
Is 11:4 But with righteousness He shall judge the poor, And decide with equity for the meek of the earth; He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, And with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked. Even from the start of the bible we are told the ending of Satan’s story.
Genesis 3:15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.”
This is the promise that although Satan would cause injury to the woman’s seed, referring to Jesus, that He would ultimately crush (another translation for bruise) Satan’s head with a fatal blow. We can rejoice because we know that Satan will be defeated in the end.
9 The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, 10 and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, 12 that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
The Great Deception of the World
We look around at people who have been deceived by the world now and we think this
is bad, really bad. People are in a stupor to their own idolatry. They are unaware that
they are slaves to their sin. Every generation has its idols; some are venerated by the
people or cultures around them. I will put them in two camps, although they definitely
are interchangeable. The first camp has been glorified in the modern age: money,
prestige, power, pride. The second camp (which the first camp most likely has also
practiced) practices their worship in secret: Sexual sin, drug use, theft, abuse of others,
child trafficking, violence and murder. But as we get closer to Jesus’s return the
outward idols have become anathema. The current woke ideology eschews money and
power outwardly, but they too idolize and practice secretly. They now like to parade
their practices openly, and expect everyone to accept and approve of them publicly. It
will get worse.
Revelation 13:13 He (the antiChrist) performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. 14 And he deceives [a]those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. 15 He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. 16 He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, 17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has [b]the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
This is just pure evil running the world, with little opposition.
In Matthew 16:4 Jesus said 4 A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign;
and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. And he left
them, and departed.
We are living in that wicked and adulterous generation. They have rejected the sign of the prophet Jonah: That Jesus would be like Jonah, three days in darkness, presumed dead. But just like Jonah, only better, Jesus was raised from the dead! Hallelujah!! While the Church is still present on this earth we must continue to speak of this sign. Because when we are raptured there will be few people to herald the news.
And they will be like the early church. They will be martyred for their newfound faith. Revelation 13:13 He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. 14 And he deceives [a]those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. 15 He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. 16 He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, 17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has [b]the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
It’s essentially communism, cooperate or we send you to Siberia.
Since people are not interested in the signs of old they will be more than captivated by
the signs and wonders that anti-Christ will display. Their idolatrous practices will
continue, but they will be signs of worship to the man of sin.
The rebuilding of the Temple
This is a complex topic because while we can see how things like state controlled
media, the suppression of speech, digital currency and vaccine passports can help us to
imagine how the anti-Christ can so easily trick and control people, it’s a lot more difficult
to imagine how the Temple will be rebuilt on a Muslum Temple Mount.
I will talk more about that in a moment. It is public knowledge that two groups The Temple Mount Faithful and The Temple institute have been working to fashion the temple implements. As per Pastor Steve’s handout they have cut a cornerstone, fashioned a Menorah, priestly garments and all utensils for sacrificing. They are also training priests.
But I wanted to share that finding a reference to the building of the third temple in scripture is not easy. Many commentaries do not believe that the temple will be rebuilt. They believe that the writings are figurative, not literal.
Lets look back at verses 3 & 4
for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of [b]sin is
revealed, the son of perdition, 4 who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called
God or that is worshiped, so that he sits [c]as God in the temple of God, showing himself
that he is God.
You decide, is this figurative or literal. Let’s look at a passage in Revelation 11 that may give us more information;
I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, “Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, with its worshipers. 2 But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months. 3 And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.”
John’s revelation clearly includes the temple of God. When we were in Israel on the temple mount Pastor Steve had us walk to a spot on the North side of the temple mount. There is a broad space that contains no buildings upon it. When the Muslim’s built the Dome of the Rock they assumed that was where the temple must have stood. Possibly. But others believe it was on that Northern corner. There is speculation that maybe the Dome of the Rock will not have to be removed in order for a Temple to be built, that maybe the outer court that “has been given to the Gentiles' ', refers to the locations occupied by the Muslim’s?
But we don’t need to forecast exactly how that will occur, we just need to have faith that it will occur because His word tells us that the Temple is a part of end times eschatology. The final lines of this passage are serious and grave, that those who do not believe the truth and take pleasure in unrighteousness will be condemned. It is even more urgent that we continue to speak the truth and share the Good News with people.
I want to share a little good news first, I have been praying for my daughter Megan, who had walked away from the truth as many of you have and there is finally a crack in that armor that surrounds her heart. I don’t want to go into details but at least she is now aware that she is choosing rebellion vs. telling herself that Jesus is not real and that Christianity is just hooey. Jesus has revealed Himself to her once more, so I am very thankful. She may not be ready to come back fully but she is no longer disparaging Christianity or The Church. Keep praying for your children.
Lastly, I want to remind you that we, the body of Christ who are filled with the Holy Spirit, are the restraining force for the antiChrist. For me this is encouraging. By the very nature of the Spirit living in us we have all power to repel the forces of evil. But we have to look evil in the eye. We have to recognize it and call it out to others. Our presence as believers helps to hold back even greater evil than we see around us today. You are not being mean or unkind when you stand on God's word. It’s unkind to not speak. I’m speaking to myself here. We as a generation have a purpose in today’s world. We must continue to seek out the Lord and serve Him only,
James 4:4 You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means
enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world
becomes an enemy of God. Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world
becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he
jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? 6 But he gives us more
grace. That is why Scripture says:
“God opposes the proud
but shows favor to the humble.”
7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you.
The pressure against the Thessalonians must have been immense for them to believe that they were in the midst of the tribulation. So what gave them the hope and the courage to endure the pressure campaign from Rome? We are in the beginning of the pressure campaign. The 2016 elections unlocked the gate Covid opened it open. The mob is coming after Christians next. But in the end they will not succeed. No one said following Christ would be easy, but we have the power and the tools of His Word, Prayer, Fellowship and Faith to stay the course, finish the race and overcome the world no matter what opposition comes against us.