In 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 Paul continues to address Christ’s coming, the Day of the LORD. As we learned while looking at chapter one, it appears that false teachers have come into the congregation and begun telling the Thessalonians that Christ had already come; some apparently even carried forged letters from Paul as evidence. Being believers struggling under persecution and trial—people whom Paul had urged to remain faithful because God has promised to make things right—this false teaching would have been a gut-punch and tantamount to advising the Thessalonians to give up hope.

“God promised you that He would make it right at His second coming. Well, that has happened, and He didn’t do that for you.” Think Job’s three friends and his wife. Paul writes:

“Now we ask you, brothers and sisters, regarding 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 No one is to deceive you in any way!”

He urges the Thessalonians to not give into a feeling of despair or believe the words of these liars or to be tricked into thinking that Paul has changed his message. Let “no one…deceive you in any way!” And then to counter any “But what ifs” that will likely enter their hearts and minds he continues.

“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.”

Readers are told here that the Day of the LORD will not come until there is first “the apostasy.” This belief in an increasing lack of moral integrity and lack of faith arose in the intertestamental period within Judaism. That is, in the period between the end of the Old Testament and the start of the New Testament. Referring to the last chapter, those who commit apostasy are those who “disobey the gospel of Jesus Christ” and will face olithros aionion, “eternal destruction”.

This belief in a great falling away before the coming of the LORD is found in numerous Apocryphal and Deuterocanonical writings. Although not considered canon by the majority of the Church today, the teachings found in these writings impacted the zeitgeist of the 1st century. Indeed, you can find their influence outside of Paul’s letters in Jude and Revelation—two texts much younger than 2 Thessalonians.

1 Enoch 91:7,8—which was likely composed over the course of the 1st and 2nd centuries BCE during this intertestamental period—reads:

“And when sin, and unrighteousness, and blasphemy, and violence, increase in all kinds of deeds, and apostasy, and transgression, and uncleanness increase, a great discipline will come from heaven on all these, and the Holy Lord will come out with wrath and discipline to execute judgement on earth. In those days violence will be cut off from its roots, and the roots of unrighteousness together with deceit, and they will be destroyed from under the heavens.”

In the Book of Jubilees, another such book, recognized today by some traditions as canonical but not by most, it, too, composed in the intertestamental period, states in chapter 23:14-22 that God’s people will fall away from Him before the Last Day, and in verses 23 and 24 we are told,

“And He [God] will wake up against them the sinners of the nations who have neither mercy nor compassion, and who will respect the person of none, neither old nor young, nor anyone, for they are more wicked and strong to do evil than all the children of men. And they will use violence against Israel and transgression and transgression against Jacob, and much blood will be shed on the earth, and there will be none to gather and none to bury. In those days they will cry aloud, and call and pray that they may be saved from the hand of the sinners, the nations, but none will be saved.”

I don’t bring these two texts up to say that they should be part of canon, only that in Paul’s day within Judaism there was already an established belief that before the Last Day, when God reconciles and makes things right, things will be bleak. It’s always darkest before the dawn. This would not necessarily have been the case for the Greek, pagan Thessalonians. Perhaps this is why Paul asks in verse 5, “Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things?”

“…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.”

Back in 2 Thessalonians 1:7 Paul speaks of Jesus’ being “revealed from heaven with His mighty angels…” So it is not as if He has been away, playing golf in the Maldives. Christ has always been here, always been present and not far off—as Luke puts it in Acts 17. Here, too, this “man of lawlessness is revealed,” as if he also has been here all along, lurking in the shadows working against the Thessalonians’ faith.

This unnamed and unspecified entity—I refrain from saying Paul is necessarily talking about an individual here—is destined for apoleias. The Knox Bible translates this lawless one to be “destined for perdition,” thereby making it clear that this destruction is due to God’s judgement. He is characterized by anomia: that is willful opposition to all faith; and not just faith in the LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and considers himself greater than all religions’ beliefs and even objects of worship. All these paltry gods are beneath him. Or more to the point, next to him in priority and importance.

This enemy of faith has the goal of usurping God—with a capital G—and of becoming the object of worship himself, “…he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God,” even though he is “destined for perdition”. Since Paul does not tell the Thessalonians who this guy is, what is the apostle getting at here?

Many Christians who focus their faith on the end-times believe that Paul is speaking here about and event that will happen in Jerusalem someday. They believe that at some point the Temple will be restored and, after this, the Antichrist will declare himself God.

Contrary to this position, other Christians believe that this event has already happened with the emperors of Rome being deified, starting with Julius Caesar. But even before this, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, who considered himself a manifestation of Zeus, desecrated the Temple c.167 BCE by erecting a statue of Zeus—made in his own likeness—there and then by sacrificing a pig.

Regardless of their differences, these two positions have one thing in common: They believe that Paul is talking about a single, historical event—something that we can see with our own eyes and maybe watch a clip of it on You Tube. However, I don’t think that this is what Paul has in mind.

In Paul’s next letter, 1 Corinthians, penned just two to four years later, he describes the Corinthian church as God’s temple. The structure around which Jerusalem is built is now not of any consequence to him or to his faith. I find reasonable to believe that he had already started to come to this conclusion when writing to the Thessalonians. Recall what Paul writes to the Gentile Galatians in 4:26, “But the Jerusalem above is free; she is our mother.” So, it is necessary for Paul, a Jew, to teach and remind his Gentile audience of the necessity of these two events—the apostasy and the lawless one—happening before the end times, since they would have no experience of such things. However, to restrict the actions and consequences of the lawless one to historic figures or to real-world, real-time events is questionable and spiritually limiting.

Paul connects apostasy to the lawless one. You can’t have one without the other. Put another way, you can’t have the Antichrist without the falling away, and the falling away invariably leads to the Antichrist. When we choose to go our own way—when we choose to embrace unrighteousness, what WILL happen is that something WILL take precedence in our lives over God. This is what I think Paul has in mind, and it is a sobering thought. Since we KNOW that Paul is not concerned with the actual, physical Temple in Jerusalem—and Jesus wasn’t either—and since it is reasonable to assume that Paul already had cooking within that brain of his a redefinition of what the Temple of God actually is—that it is within the hearts of God’s faithful people—then that means that we all need to watch out for the lawless one setting up shop in our hearts.

Our choice to not obey the gospel of Jesus Christ will open our hearts to the possibility that the lawless one will come a-calling. Msgr. Ronald Knox writes in his commentary on these verses,

“There has been much speculation, what person or influence in his own day St. Paul is here identifying as Antichrist. But it may be observed that he neither expects the Thessalonians to know, not claims to know himself, anything about the nature of this Rebel who has not yet appeared; all he tells us (in verse 7) is than an influence which makes for evil is already at work in the world; and this does not need to be particularly identified.”

The lawless one takes over when we turn away from the life that Christ Jesus gives to us.

“6 And you know what restrains him now, so that he will be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will do so until He is removed.”

Paul, here, lays the foundation for one of fundamental beliefs of evil—if not THE fundamental belief about evil. It is the enemy—what Paul will later call the “spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places” in Ephesians 6—that would cause people to turn away. But this enemy is kept at bay; the lawless one is not permitted to run amok. Christ restrains this evil and stimies the apostasy, Paul says. Just think about how bad things would be if God’s Spirit weren’t at work. Notice that Paul does not blame human being for the lawlessness but the LAWLESS ONE.

Paul reminds them in verse six that they have already been taught about this restraint. Therefore, they shouldn’t allow themselves to believe what these false apostle’s are telling them about the End Time. “And you know what restrains him now…” Things may be looking bad for the Thessalonians right now, but that is right now. Yes, bad stuff is happening already, but it won’t last forever. Don’t let despair overcome you!

“…the mystery of the lawlessness is already at work…” The church is already undergoing the effects of and consequences for evil in the present day and may be misinterpreting the signs of the times, allowing themselves to believe that the end is nigh, when it’s just another day at the office for Satan/the spiritual forces of wickedness. What will come from this lawlessness if the Thessalonians persevere has yet to be realized. Yes, Satanic activity is present, but the time has not yet come for him to be let-loose upon the world, for God is restraining him.

When apostasy begins to rise to levels it has never reached before, Paul tells us, and the lawless one declares itself to be superior to all things, then we will know that the time is close; “…the lawless one will be revealed…” then we will learn what lies at the root of all the evil that we experience. This has yet to happen because God has not yet chosen to lessen His restraints.

“8 Then that lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will eliminate with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; 9 that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not accept the love of the truth so as to be saved.”

This lawless one will present itself to be true, “with all power and…signs and wonders,” and many people will be deceived and perish. They will receive the penalty of eternal destruction that was discussed in the last episode.

Paul is presenting the Gentile Thessalonians with the same choice that Moses did with Israel: life and death, blessings and curses. The lawless one will present to the world the same way as Jesus will, yet latter will destroy the former with the breath from His mouth (i.e., the Spirit). We are either in the process of being saved or in the process of being ruined or perishing or dying—depending on how we interpret the verb apollymi in verse 10, “for those who perish.” In Greek, the verb translated here as perish is a middle participle, which indicates that the action is not finalized but is, in fact, ongoing.

“11 For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, 12 in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.”

Psalm 81:11-16 states,

“11 ‘But My people did not listen to My voice,
And Israel did not obey Me.
12 So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their heart,
To walk by their own plans.
13 Oh that My people would listen to Me,
That Israel would walk in My ways!
14 I would quickly subdue their enemies
And turn My hand against their adversaries.
15 Those who hate the LORD would pretend to obey Him,
And their time of punishment would be forever.
16 But I would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
And with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.’”

Note verse 12, “So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their heart, to walk by their own plans.” So what Paul tells us here in 2 Thessalonians is not novel. But note that God turns them over so that they might return. Only “Those who hate the LORD would pretend to obey Him, and their time of punishment would be forever.” (15)

In 1 Kings 22 Ahab, the king of Israel, asks Jehoshaphat, the King of Judah, to join him in a campaign against the Arameans. The kings consult the prophets about this, and they all encourage the kings to war—well, all but one, the prophet Micaiah, whom Ahab says that he hates, dares to offer a contrary prophecy.

“19 And Micaiah said, ‘Therefore, hear the word of the LORD. I saw the LORD sitting on His throne, and all the angels of heaven standing by Him on His right and on His left. 20 And the LORD said, “Who will entice Ahab to go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?” And one spirit said this, while another said that. 21 Then a spirit came forward and stood before the LORD, and said, “I will entice him.” 22 And the LORD said to him, “How?” And he said, “I will go out and be a deceiving spirit in the mouths of all his prophets.” Then He said, “You shall entice him, and you will also prevail. Go and do so.” 23 Now then, behold, the LORD has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these prophets of yours; and the LORD has declared disaster against you.’”

What Paul tells the Thessalonians here in verses 11 and 12 is not that God as chosen to delude good people into doing bad—tricking the righteous into unrighteousness. Those who are deluded are those who actively hate righteousness, who willfully “disobey the gospel of Jesus Christ.”