2 Thessalonians 2:1-12
Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers, 2 not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us, saying that the day of the Lord has already come. 3 Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. 4 He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God.
5 Don't you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? 6 And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time. 7 For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming. 9 The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, 10 and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie 12 and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness. (NIV)
- What does 2 Thessalonians 2:1 say is the topic of this passage?
- What were the Thessalonians worried about? What did they think
had happened?
- HINT: Isaiah 61:2
- HINT: Jeremiah 17:17-18
- HINT: Obadiah 1:12
- HINT: Isaiah 34:8
- HINT: Revelation 3:10
- HINT: Isaiah 10:3
- HINT: Isaiah 13:9
- HINT: Isaiah 13:13
- HINT: Isaiah 30:25
- The Thessalonians knew that when the Lord comes to "dash the nations to pieces like pottery with an iron scepter", that he first gathers his body, (The Church is gathered up in the air in the clouds, to be with him forever). Knowing this, and fearing that the intense persecution that they were experiencing was the "Day of the Lord", they feared that they had been found unworthy, and that Jesus came, but rejected them, and so they thought that they were in the Time of God's Wrath.
- Paul is comforting the church by telling them that the Day had not yet come and would not until two things happened first.
- What are the two things that must happen first?
- HINT: 2 Thessalonians 2:3 - Daniel 8:12-13
- HINT: 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4 - Daniel 11:31
- When, exactly, does the Lawless one enter God's temple and setup
an image of himself, relative to his destruction in the lake of fire?
- HINT: Revelation 19:20
- HINT: Revelation 13:1-5
- HINT: Daniel 9:2
- How long is it from the middle of Daniel's 70th week to the end?
- HINT: 3 1/2 years
- HINT: 1260 days
- HINT: 42 months
- Now, Paul says that the church will see the abomination sign
and he said in 1 Corinthians 15:52 that the church is gathered up at the
last trumpet, that is, the seventh, can the church be gathered before any
of the judgments in Revelation fall?
- HINT: Revelation 8:7
- HINT: Revelation 8:8-9
- HINT: Revelation 8:10-11
- HINT: Revelation 8:12
- HINT: Revelation 9:1-11
- HINT: Revelation 9:13-21
- When, exactly, is the church gathered up?
- HINT: Daniel 9:27 & 2 Thessalonians 2:4
- HINT: Zechariah 14:4 & Revelation 12:6, 14
- FACT: Because we know that the church sees the abomination sign, and Daniel tells us that the sign is 3 1/2 years after the start , so the church cannot be caught up during the first 3 1/2 years of Daniel's 70th week.
- FACT: Zechariah 14:4-8 & Revelation 12:1-6, Revelation 12:13-16 Jesus comes and delivers the woman 3 1/2 years before the end.
- THEREFORE: The church is gathered at the mid-point of Daniel's 70th week.
