2 Thessalonians 1
WKelly2 Thessalonians 1:1-12
2 Thessalonians Chapter 1 The first Epistle to the Thessalonians dealt with a mistake of the saints there as to those who fall asleep in Christ. In their immature and absorbing occupation with the coming or presence of the Lord, they had too hastily affirmed that such saints as were not found alive and waiting for Him would lose their part, not of course in eternal life and salvation, but at that blessed moment of His advent. This error was dissipated, not only by bringing in the grand principle of a dead and risen Christ with whom we are associated, and of especial cheer to those who are put to sleep by Him, but by a special revelation which discloses the Lord descending to raise the dead in Christ, and change the believers surviving till His coming, in order to their all coming together along with Him. In the second Epistle, the delusion which false teachers sought to foist on the saints, and even with the claim of the Spirit, and a pretended letter of the apostle, concerned the living whom the enemy endeavoured to shake and trouble under the apprehension of the presence of the day. All knew that the day of the Lord is to be ushered in by darkness and divine judgments, and these Satan sought to inflict on the saints so as to fill them with terror and distress. Clearly this is the natural expectation of a Jew, who even if he fully confided in the faithfulness of God, cannot but look for an awful season of tribulation and of judicial dealings to precede the kingdom of glory for Israel on the earth. (Isa. 2 - 4: 13; Jer. 30, Joel 2, 3. Amos 5; Zeph. 1 - 3). As the enemy is ever at work to draw back the heart of the Christian to the law, if he cannot entice him into lawlessness, so did he at Thessalonica, and ever since, put forth his wiles to judaise the hope, presenting the Lord as about to appear in judgment, instead of letting him rejoice in His coming as the Bridegroom for the bride. The deception is the more perilous, because the day of the Lord is a weighty truth in itself, and the revealed period of divine intervention and blessing for the ancient people of God.
How the coming of the Saviour, for us who now believe and wait for Him from heaven, would fit in with the prophetic testimony, must have been as yet vague, for there was no written word to define the matter or solve the difficulty. Hence the importance of this fresh communication. For the question was raised by Satan’s attempt to pervert the saints from the enjoyment of their own proper hope. They were agitated under the false alarm that the day was actually come. This more or less completely obscured from their eyes their bright and longing expectation of the Saviour’s coming to receive them to Himself, and present them, perfectly like Him in glory, before the Father with exceeding joy. As in the first Epistle, the apostle does not immediately grapple with the error, but prepares the hearts of the saints gradually and on all sides so as to clench the truth and exclude the error once it is exposed. This is the way of divine grace and wisdom; the heart is set right, and not the mere point of error or evil dealt with. The very snare is thus made the occasion of fresh and deeper blessing; and as all truth is consolidated, so the Lord is more enjoyed. “Paul and Silvanus and Timothy to the assembly of Thessalonians in God our Father and [the] Lord Jesus Christ: grace to you and peace from God [the] Father and [the] Lord Jesus Christ.” “We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, even as it is meet, because your faith increaseth exceedingly, and the love of each of you all toward one another aboundeth; so that we ourselves glory in you in the assemblies of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and the tribulations which ye are enduring” (ver. 1-4). It is impossible to accept as sound and satisfactory Chrysostom’s remarks on the address to “the church” rather than to “the saints,” as in other epistles. (Field’s ed. v. 314, Oxon. 1855). It has nothing to do with comparative paucity of numbers, and their aggregation in a single company. For in no city perhaps were the saints more numerous than in Jerusalem, when we read of the church or assembly there (Acts 5:11; Acts 8:1; Acts 11:22; Acts 15:4; Acts 15:22). A similar remark applies to Antioch, Ephesus, Corinth, or to any other place where we know the numbers were great comparatively, and there might be, as in Jerusalem, not a few houses where the saints met to break bread, but all composed “the assembly” there. Never, in short, whatever the number do we in Scripture hear of “assemblies” in a city (as of a province), but always of “the assembly.” No doubt the apostle addresses those at Ephesus and Colosse and Philippi and Rome as “saints”, but this, because of the truth he was communicating by the Spirit of God, and not because of their greater numbers. In fact, we read of “the assembly in Ephesus” (Revelation 2:1) after his Epistle to “the saints” as well as before (Acts 20:17).
Nobody can deny that a long time had passed and the organisation was complete, when St. John wrote to “the assembly” there; and therefore Chrysostom’s reason is invalid. The true ground lies in the perfection of wisdom with which the Holy Spirit addresses according to the nature of that which He is making known. Thus the apostle again associates with himself in the salutation those dear fellow-labourers whom the saints in Thessalonica knew already when the assembly was founded there: and he again characterises the assembly as in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: the one severing them from Gentiles, as the other from Jews. Indeed at bottom both contrasted them with both. For what did a Jew more than a Gentile know of such a new living, and intimate relationship with God as Father? And what knew a Gentile more than a Jew of a rejected but risen Lord and Saviour in heaven? “Our” is added here, as compared with the opening formula in the first Epistle. Is is not to rivet emphatically those saints, who, however well they walked in most respects, needed to be reminded more than ever of their common relationship with him who wrote, and with all saints, to Him whose grace is the source of all blessing? Thanks as before he owns as due to God always for them, not simply because they were objects of His grace, but as was meet because their faith was greatly growing, and the love of each individually and of all mutually was abounding. This was much; but what of their joy of hope in the Holy Ghost? Of this he says nothing. And the absence is the more striking, because in the introduction to the first Epistle he had spoken of remembering without ceasing, not only their work of faith and labour of love, but also their patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. Here, to the close observer, there is an ominous silence on any such enduring constancy of hope. Yet there is nothing said to damp their hearts, but all he could say to encourage.
The fact is that their hope of Christ was consciously but seriously undermined and clouded, not by undue excitement but by agitation and trouble of mind as if the awful day of the Lord were upon them. This brought in fear which darkened their experience of persecution and of outwardly trying circumstances, though the apostle could boast in them among the assemblies of God for their patience and faith in all their persecutions, and the tribulations they were sustaining. But patience and faith need the power of hope to sustain in freshness. There will and must be a lack when Christ is not personally before the heart as One who may at any moment come to receive His own to Himself. But yet more, there cannot but be an exposure, as we shall find here, to the counter and disturbing influence of fear, which leaves the soul open to the positively delusive power of the enemy. Even in the first Epistle the apostle was not without apprehension on that side; and therefore did he send Timothy to establish them and comfort them concerning, their faith, that none might be moved by these afflictions; knowing as they did that hereunto we are appointed. For they had surely not forgotten that Paul, when with them, told them beforehand that we are to suffer affliction, even as, they knew full well, it came to pass. But this did not hinder, rather did it draw out, the solicitude of the apostle on their behalf, “lest by any means the tempter had tempted you, and our labour should be in vain” (1 Thessalonians 3:5). For the enemy has, of course, no real good or blessing to hold out; but he can and does work most effectively through fear of evil, especially where the conscience is bad or gets troubled. Therein lies his great power in awakening terror, availing himself of God’s own threatened judgments on a guilty world. He may deceive the unbeliever by flattering him with false peace and false hopes from this the believer is freed by the gospel, but if not filled with the hope of Christ, he might easily be distressed by the pressure and the variety and the continuance of affliction, especially if Satan got him under the fear that they were judicial inflictions from God on the world in which he was involved like others. Where the heart is kept in peace and confidence before God, the mind can judge soundly. Fear unnerves the soul that is occupied with painful circumstances and throws all into confusion; for God and the word of His grace no longer guide, in the calm trust of a love that never fails, and that gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. The apostle, on the contrary, would have them take fresh courage from all their persecutions and the afflictions they were enduring, as he lets them know that he himself was boasting in them on that very account. So he bade the Philippians at a later day be in nothing affrighted by the adversaries which is for such an evident token of perdition, as it is for the saints of salvation, and this from God; because it is a real privilege on the behalf of Christ not only to believe on Him but also to suffer for His sake. It is part of the great conflict ever raging between Satan and those who are of Christ. This the Thessalonians had to learn more perfectly; and we shall see in what follows how skilfully the apostle sets their souls right on general grounds before he broaches the direct correction of the error in the second chapter. It would seem that the Thessalonian saints had been engrossed with the day of the Lord, as indeed it occupies a large part, and is the grand issue, of Old Testament prophecy. If grace, righteousness, and blessing characterise that day, there can be no doubt that darkness, trouble, change and judgments beyond all previous experience are to usher it in. Hence the apostle felt the need of preparing the way, by a just determination of its true nature, for his correction of this special error foisted on them. This he proceeds to set before them that they might be clear in what was indisputable, and so the better able to judge the delusion. Their endurance and faith in all their persecutions and the distresses they were then enduring had been already treated as, to him and those like-minded, an object of glorying in them among the assemblies of God. He adds now, “a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God, to the end that ye be counted worthy of the kingdom of God for which ye also suffer; if so be that it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to those who trouble you, and to you that are troubled rest with us, at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with angels of his power in flaming fire, rendering vengeance to those that know not God and to those that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus” (ver. 5-8). This moral dealing with their troubles was of the deepest moment. For even saints easily miss their way in the prophetic word: but God abides and cannot deny Himself, as these saints ought not to have forgotten. Now they might be to the uttermost tried, and evil in unrighteousness, deceit, or oppression, might prosper for awhile; but even so the faithful are called to trust confidently and rejoice exceedingly, reaping better blessings far than if all ran smoothly as the heart could wish. But the righteous judgment of God is unshaken, and faith rests on it without wavering, but with a solemn sense of what is at hand for violence no less than corruption, and especially for the hatred which cannot endure the objects of God’s love in an evil world, where they, however unwelcome, are seen as lights, holding forth the word of life, not overcome of evil but overcoming it with good, and so much the more intolerable to the evil heart of unbelief which either rejects God or departs from Him. Does God then regard with indifference His children’s persecutions and distresses? On the contrary their patience and faith in all they are enduring is a demonstration of the just judgment of God; who, if He tries the righteous, loves righteousness, beholds the upright, and will surely rain fire and brimstone and a tempest of burning on the wicked. If he sees mischief, it is to requite it with His own hand. But His children meanwhile are being disciplined in the ways of Christ; and as faith perseveres without a sign, it may be, so patience must have its perfect work, that they may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. And is it not well worth while? “To the end that ye be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which also ye suffer.” So it is His good and holy will: through many tribulations we must enter into that kingdom. It was Christ’s way, it is or should be ours.
In that day the darkness will pass for the world. All will be plain that is now obscure: uncertainty and complication will be no more. For us the darkness passes away and the true light now shines; and we who were once darkness are light in the Lord. Then for the world, and especially for that portion of it which is now darkest and most embittered, the light will have come and the glory of Jehovah be risen there. But the very contrariety of the world now to God and to His children only the more proves that the righteous Lord will surely intervene and vindicate in that day all that looks tangled now. One understands easily that, if Satan is as God calls him the god of this age, it can only be in the age to come when the Lord Jesus governs publicly and in power, that as a rule the wicked shall be put down and the righteous prosper. The unbeliever is hardened at the sight of the just man perishing in his righteousness, and of a wicked man prolonging his life in his wickedness. The believer awaits the kingdom of God and suffers for its sake. “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.” Unto the sons of God it is given in the behalf of Christ not only to believe on Him but to suffer for Him. When the day comes all will be changed. “If so be [it is] a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to those that trouble you, and to you that are troubled rest with us.” This none can dispute who believes that God is, and that He is a rewarder of those that seek Him out, and an avenger of all wrong against God and man. He is now dealing in grace; in that day He will judge the habitable world (and the dead also in due time) in righteousness by the Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance to all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead. In that day, as even a godly Jew did know, He will be merciful to His land and to His people, as surely as He will render vengeance to His enemies and reward those that hate Him. What then will be His attitude toward the persecutors of His children and to those of them who thus suffered? He will dispense to such as troubled them tribulation, and rest to His now troubled children - rest with Paul and His companions in loving service for their sakes. The danger is of allowing in this day of grace a judicial spirit, and this not only in our own minds like the sons of Zebedee who would have called down fire from heaven to consume the adversaries, but also in our interpretation of God’s dealings with others if not with ourselves. The apostle would have the saints bright in their severest troubles, joyfully anticipating the day of requital when the sufferings of the saints shall be swallowed up in the glorious rest of the saints, the rest of God we may add, while their troublers become the objects of His unsparing judgment. For it will be the day of God’s righteous award, in reversal of this day when Satan blinds princes and peoples, as he did when they crucified the Lord of glory. This being so, persecutions and trouble were no indications of the day of the Lord; rather were they proofs that that day had not yet dawned and that grace still calls and would arm the saints unto all endurance with joyfulness. How different it will be for saints and for sinners when that day of the Lord is really come! How solemn yet blessed the change when the wicked fall into the hands of the living God, who is not unrighteous to forget the work of faith and the labour of love on the part of His children meanwhile called as they are to endure a great fight of afflictions! For in that day of righteous judgment it will be a “revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with angels of His power in flaming fire, rendering vengeance to those that know not God, and to those that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus.” It will be observed that not a word here hints that this is the moment when the Lord comes to gather the saints to Himself. It is not the action of sovereign grace which translates the saints waiting for Him to heaven, but the display of judicial righteousness by the Lord when He appears in glory. Then, and not till then, will be the day of divinely apportioned trouble to the troublers, and of rest to the troubled who suffered for Christ’s sake and for righteousness. How unsuitable to be revealed “in flaming fire with angels of power” to receive unto Himself the children of God, His bride, and to present them with Himself in the Father’s house! Here it is a question of rendering vengeance, not to unbelievers distinguished by two marks, as Calvin says, but to two distinct objects of judgment, “to those that know not God,” the Gentiles, described thus expressly in 1 Thessalonians 4:5, and in substance throughout Scripture; “and to those who obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus,” as the Jews might well be regarded, who, outwardly owning the true God and boasting of His law, were now the most resolute, whether vehement or sullen, in disobeying the gospel. God is never indifferent to good or evil, and His children learn this and bow to it in His word now knowing that, if they suffer with Christ, they shall also reign together. Their adversaries despise, hate, and persecute His unwelcome witnesses of grace and truth, who seek to adorn the teaching of their Saviour God in all things. Is this day of grace to go on indefinitely? Not so; that day hastens when His judgment will be revealed. And as glory, honour, and peace will be the portion of every soul that does good, so tribulation and anguish upon every one that doeth evil, to Jew and Gentile, for there is no respect of persons: evil will be treated as nothing but evil, when the Lord arises to judge, and this in the most manifest way before the universe. Hence the importance, not only that sovereign grace should take to heaven the saints that are awaiting Him, but that righteous judgment should be displayed at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with angels of His power in flaming fire. For the day will then have come to render vengeance to His and their enemies, whether they be Gentiles that know not God or they be Jews, who (if not so ignorant as the nations) cannot deny that they obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus. As a man cannot shake off his responsibility according to what he once knew of God (Romans 1:19-21) and his conscience also as well as the law (Romans 2:12-15), so he must then be made to feel the guilt of his unbelief in his insubjection to God’s glad tidings concerning His Son. And this suitably comes into manifestation before the world when Christ is no longer hidden in God but revealed from heaven, in order to bring out and display the government of God in power and righteousness and peace; as all the prophets bore witness from early days, and now the New Testament (so-called) sets its seal to the Old. Thus was the balance of truth readjusted in the souls of the Thessalonians, who had been led to fear that their grievous troubles were the beginning of the day of the Lord. They were now to learn that this could not possibly be true from the essential character of that day, as one of rest to the troubled saints and of retributive trouble to their foes. For as it will be the time of divine recompence, so infallibly the Judge of all the earth will do right. It is not that the saints might not individually go to be with Christ meanwhile, nor even that He might not previously come for our gathering together unto Him. But there will be no public display of their righteously awarded rest and of vengeance on their adversaries till He is revealed thus in flaming fire. Such is the solemn fact, and this the distinctive principle therein, and the result of the revelation of the Lord from heaven, as here made known to the agitated saints in Thessalonica.
The apostle too knew what tribulation was, and looked for this rest with them, as they were entitled to expect it with him, in that day which was still before them all. But as yet he and they were exposed to pass through trouble, and their persecutors were for the present in honour and ease and power without God. In that day the tables will be turned, His friends at rest and His enemies in trouble. It will be the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven in judgment of the quick. We have had the objects of the Lord’s dealing at His revelation from heaven; and they are clearly His enemies, in no way or degree His friends. It is His judgment of all the earth, Who cannot fail to do right. This is made yet more apparent by the solemn description which follows: - “Who (οἵτινες, men of the class which) shall pay as penalty everlasting destruction from [the] presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints and to be wondered at in all that believed (because our testimony unto you was believed) in that day. Whereunto we also pray always for you, that our God may count you worthy of the calling and fulfil every good pleasure of goodness and work of faith with power; so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and [the] Lord Jesus Christ.” (Ver. 9-12). Present tribulation then through persecutors differs essentially from the trouble of that day, which shall fall not on saints but on those that hate and injure them. In that day their persecutors shall pay the penalty of everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power. Like Matthew 25:31-46, it is not the great white throne judgment of the wicked dead; it is the judgment of the quick, yet is it final. Their perdition is irretrievable, being everlasting from His presence and from the glory of His power; the wicked here (like apostates in Israel, Daniel 12:2) are abandoned to shame and everlasting contempt. On the other hand, the Lord shall have come at that time to be glorified in His saints and to be wondered at in all those that believed. Blessed prospect “in that day!” and comforting in this day for the Thessalonians to hear themselves included, among those to be thus a marvel to His praise, for this appears to be the gracious motive of the parenthesis, “because our testimony unto you was believed.” The saints in Thessalonica might have erred as to the dead, and been misled as to the living; yet the apostle fails not to confirm their souls by the intimation that the divine testimony borne by himself and others had not been in vain, but had really taken effect upon them. The careful reader will observe that the Lord is not said in that day to come for the saints and receive them to Himself, and present them in the Father’s house, as in John 14. Here He will have come to be glorified in them, and to be marvelled at in all those that believed. It is an evidently different and subsequent part of His advent: not the hidden scene, so near to the Lord’s desire, that where He is, they also may be with Him, that they may behold His glory which the Father had given Him, but the outer display, Christ in them and the Father in Him, when they are in glory thus perfected in one. So we see in Revelation 21:23-24. The world will then know thereby that the Father sent the Son and loved the saints, appearing with Him in glory, even as He loved Him. Compare John 17:22-23. The translation of His saints to heaven is one thing; quite another and subsequent is their appearing with Him in glory and judgment of the world. Further, it is interesting to notice the accuracy of the preterite “believed,” instead of the “believe” of the Received Text, in verse 10. The former is not only the reading in the Complutensian edition, but that of all the uncials, almost all cursives, as well as the ancient versions and Fathers, unless a Latin copy or two. Erasmus seems to have misled Stephens, Beza, and others, and so our Authorised translators. No doubt the present is much the most frequent, but when the aorist occurs, there is always a special propriety as here. For the glorious display, which is predicated of the saints, refers with this reading expressly to the past believers’ The importance of this becomes the more impressive, on our learning that the great harvest of blessing for man on earth follows, He and the glorified reigning over the world, when the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah (and of His glory, Habakkuk 2:14) as the waters cover the sea, Isaiah 11:9. In that day it will be no longer a question of faith as now, and hence the monstrous error of the Peschito (not the Philoxenian) Syriac, etc., which connect the believing of “our testimony” with that day, and thus make it future, in Pat contradiction of the very Scripture before them. Whatever may be the dealings of grace in that day, the apostle carefully restricts the faith and the glorious reward here described to a reception of the testimony before the display of glory and of righteous judgment arrives. Thus was the way gradually made plain for the more complete and decisive correction of the error which had been foisted in at Thessalonica. The true nature of God’s intervention has been cleared. That day will be characterised by the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with the angels of His power in flaming fire. This it would be hard for the most resolute spiritualiser to apply to any such providential events as were then in progress, of which the enemy was taking advantage to mislead the saints. Nor had men gone so far in those early days as in later, for such as Macknight to say, that, when the apostles wrote, there were four comings of Christ to happen - three of them figurative, but the fourth a real and personal appearing; that these different comings are frequently spoken of in Scripture; and that, although the coming of Christ to destroy Jerusalem (!), and to establish His everlasting kingdom! be represented by His apostles as then at hand, no passage from their writings can be produced in which His personal appearance to judge the world is said or even insinuated to be at hand! The truth is that it is one and the same appearing of the Lord which shall overthrow the last head of Gentile power, destroy the man of sin, and display the saints in glory, as He will judge the world in righteousness in that day also.
Nothing can be farther from the truth than that the Spirit does not speak of one and the same day, which is invariably declared to be at hand, not at a great distance. Moreover, the presence of the Lord to gather His own to be with Him on high is not separate from the various aspects of His appearing we have just enumerated, though necessarily anterior to them; for they follow Him out of heaven for that day and appear with Him in glory, instead of being just then caught up to meet Him. His coming for the saints is sovereign grace completing its work for us; His revelation from heaven is to render vengeance to His enemies and be glorified in His saints in the righteous and retributive government of that day. Now the apostle lets the saints know his prayer for them, of course in view of their existing circumstances and need. “Whereunto we also pray always for you, that our God may count you worthy of the calling, and fulfil every good pleasure of goodness and work of faith in power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.” He had already, while introducing the preliminary topic of their persecutions, sought to lift up their hearts by speaking of their endurance and faith in all such troubles. It was a manifest token of God’s righteous judgment to the end of their being counted worthy of His kingdom, for which they too suffered, as the apostle might well remind them, instead of their tribulation being an indication that God’s judgments were let loose upon them. So now he also prays always for them that God would count them worthy of the calling. Elsewhere we hear of “His” calling, and of “your” calling, and again of “the calling wherewith ye are called.” Here it seems better to leave “the” in its own generality than to restrict it simply to “your.” The next clause is that He would bring to completion every good pleasure of goodness end work of faith in power. Certainly this could not be, if they were driven from their steadfastness by listening to the delusions of false teachers. Confidence in the Master’s grace produces faithful service, and loves to own that, whatever purpose of goodness may be, whatever work of faith, it is only God that fulfils each and all in power; “so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.” As He is not here in fact nor yet reigning over the universe, the name of our Lord, the revelation of Himself, is given us that it may in the power of the Spirit be glorified in us, as we serve the true God and await His Son from heaven. It is a question of keeping His word and not denying His name, whatever the difficulty or discouragements. But the apostle adds, “and ye in him,” for his eye was ever on the bright day, and he would have theirs drawn from their troubles, and every possible misconstruction of them, to that manifestation of the glory of His might and righteousness. For as surely as His name is glorified in the saints now, still more fully, yea absolutely, in that day shall they be glorified in Him, as He is in them (ver. 10). It is no mere iteration of the previous intimation of the apostle, but fresh thoughts completing all, such as only the inspiring Spirit could furnish. To say “in it,” for “in Him,” would be havoc with the truth in general as well as the context; yet it has been said, doubtless through rage for novelty and lack of appreciating the truth. May we be kept walking firmly in the truth according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ, even as the apostle prayed for his dear Thessalonians. It is an admirable introduction, before directly touching the error by which they had been drawn aside from the freshness of hope into agitation and fear, the result of a misjudgment of the deep trials that were pressing on them. It is needless to discuss here at length the true bearing of the last clause, which some, out of zeal for the divine glory of our Lord, would have to designate His person only: “of our God and Lord Jesus Christ.” But, though this be grammatically a quite possible construction, as it is dogmatically also true in itself, its contextual suitability is another matter. That one article in the singular rightly in Greek designates even distinct persons if the object be to express their union in a common category (as here in “grace”), ought to be known not only to scholars in general, but familiarly to all students of the later body of revelation in its original tongue. Supposing God the Father to be here meant, as well as the Lord Jesus Christ, the insertion of the Greek article was not required, though English needs “the” before Lord Jesus Christ. On the contrary, its insertion in Greek would have been an intrusive error, if both were expressly to be united in a common object; for the repeated article would have had for its effect to present the persons as separate agents rather than as joined. And the nature of the case, as well as the clearly revealed truth of Scripture, shows abundantly that the joint agency of these blessed persons could not be, save in - that which lies behind all - the unity of the divine nature.
The second epistle takes up another difficulty. It was written in view of another abuse of the truth of the Lord’s coming — a danger that threatened the saints. As the first epistle was intended to guard the saints from an error about the dead, the second epistle was more particularly meant to correct them about the living. They were distressed at finding that some of their brethren died before the Lord came. So filled were they with the constant expectation of Christ from heaven, that it never occurred to them that a single Christian might depart from the world before His return, How they must have realized, in their habitual waiting, the nearness of that blessed hope! They now learnt that they need not sorrow on such a score; for the dead in Christ shall rise first, and then we, the living at His coming, shall be caught up with them to join the Lord together.
But the second epistle grew out of another and more serious error. We have seen that they were greatly alarmed and agitated. The apostle was really uneasy about them lest the tempter should tempt them, and his labour come to nought — lest, moved by their sore affliction, they should fall into fear about the awful day of the Lord, which the enemy knows well how to use. Everybody who has read Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the lesser prophets knows what they tell us of the horrors for men when the day of Jehovah comes upon the earth, — that it will be. a day of dismay and darkness, when all earthly things are utterly confused, and the people of God seem about to be swallowed up by their enemies. False doctrine ever sets one truth against another; and it was not wanting among the Thessalonians at this time. For some sought to persuade them that the day of the Lord was even then arrived. They probably argued that their troubles were part of the circumstances of that day. Certainly they sought to shake them by pretending that the day of the Lord was actually there. There was such fearful persecution and trouble among them, that this might be plausibly enough mixed up as supporting the idea that the day of the Lord was begun.
For this false rumour seems to imply that they must have given some sort of figurative colour to “that day” (as it was certainly so used in Old Testament prophecy). At any rate, they must have supposed that “the day of the Lord” did not necessarily require the presence of the Lord Himself. In other words, they might think, is many Christians since have imagined, that a dreadful time of trouble must befall the world before the Lord comes to receive His own to himself above. This second epistle was written to disabuse the minds of the Thessalonian saints; and indeed it directly tends to set all Christians free from any anxiety of the kind, though, of course, there may be persecution again, as there was then, and repeatedly afterwards, especially from Pagan and from Papal Rome. But this is wholly different from the dread which the enemy sought to infuse among the Thessalonians. The apostle accordingly sets himself to this task. First of all he comforts them. “Paul, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, unto the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth; so that we ourselves glory in you.” It may be noticed that he leaves out “the patience of hope.” How comes this? It was exactly the hope that was no longer bright in their hearts. So far the enemy had succeeded. They had been comforted, but they had lost somewhat of the light and joy of the hope. They were moved more or less by their tribulation; not perhaps so much by the outward pressure as by the insinuation of Satan through false teaching, which is a far more dangerous thing for the child of God.
It is plain that the apostle merely mentions their faith growing, and their love He no longer praises nor names their patience of hope, but rather prays for them in 2 Thessalonians 3:1-18 in such a way as to show there was a lack in this respect. That is, he takes up two of the qualities mentioned in the first epistle, and not the third. This, which was bound up with the whole structure of the first epistle, is left out of the second. There was too good reason for it. For the time they had let it slip, as I have just explained. It is true that the apostle tells them, “we glory in you in the churches of God for your patience, and faith” (he does not speak of their “patience of hope”) “in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure.” They were holding on, and not giving up Christ but their souls had not the former spring through Christ their hope.
We shall have the evidence of this more fully soon. There was “a manifest token,” says he, “of the righteous judgment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which ye also suffer.” So far it was well. “Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; and to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Observe the reason why he brings in “that day.” It was a false doctrine about the day, which draws out an explanation of its nature and its relation to the coming of the Lord. When that day comes, it will not fall with its troubles on the children of God. In truth the Lord will then execute judgment on their enemies — I do not mean on the dead till the close, but on the quick or living. It will be no more in some figurative and preparatory sense of exceeding affliction, or of natural overthrow; but its description here is the Lord Jesus revealed from heaven in flaming fire. There will be no doubt about its nature or effects. Every eye shall see Him. That is, even 2 Thessalonians 1:1-12 plainly prepares us for the complete discomfiture of the illusory and alarming dreams which these false teachers had been foisting in under false colours among the Thessalonian saints. But he pursues the matter farther. He will take vengeance on two classes — on those that know not God, and those that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. These seem the Gentiles and the Jews respectively; but why do not we find here some allusion to the third class — His relation to the church of God? Because those who compose the church are no longer here. Thus it is shown that the Lord will deal with all on earth, — not merged in one, but discriminated; for He executes judgment, and hence does not confound those who differ in a common class. There is thus a definite distinction drawn; but this so much the more precisely leaves out the Christian. Its force is more understood the more it is weighed. The apostle does not declare all at once, but prepares the way with much circumspection. When he says “them that know not God,” he means the idolatrous Gentiles. Then he adds with another article, “and those that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ” (not, as we have it in English here, “and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus;” as if all were one and the same class).
There are two classes, and therefore accuracy would seem to call on us to make the sense more definite — “and on them that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” At all events, whatever mode of rendering may be preferred, I have no hesitation in saying that such is the sense of the Greek, and nothing else. They are the Gentiles, who knew not God, (or, as Bengel has it, “qui in ethnica ignorantia de Deo versantur,”) and the Jews, who might know God after a sort and to a certain point beyond Gentiles, but who did not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. (“Judaeis maxime, quibus evangelium de Christo praedicatum fuerat.”) For unbelief is always convicted by the test that God employs; and the day of the Lord will deal with every form. The Gentiles that know not God will be punished, and the Jews that abuse the forms of Old Testament revelation to disobey the gospel will not escape, still less nominal and apostate Christendom. The reason why no notice is taken of Christians as then on earth we shall see assigned a little lower down: I merely now remark that he could not put himself in either of those two classes. It is evident that on whomsoever that day is to fall it has no bearing on such. If therefore the Christians were troubled now, it was in no way the same character of trouble as that which shall be in the day of the Lord. The teaching of those who had spread this impression was utterly false; and if they claimed the highest sanction for it, they were worse than mistaken — they were the guilty tools of Satan. But as to both the classes we have seen described by the apostle, they “shall be punished with everlasting destruction,” both “from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power; when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believed:” for this is the full force of it. In the new age people will be blessed abundantly, but the blessing of the millennium does not exactly take the shape of belief. They shall behold the glory of the Lord. Such is their form as assigned by scripture. The earth shall be filled with the knowledge — not with the faith, but with the knowledge — of the glory of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea. It will be in countless cases the fruit of true divine teaching; but knowledge describes it better than faith; and we may easily understand the difference. They will behold the glory, they will look upon the Lord, no longer hidden but displayed.
The blessed spoken of in our chapter are clearly those that have already believed. So indeed the apostle states: “Wherefore we pray always for you, that our God would count you worthy of the calling, and fulfil all the good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of faith with power; that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.” Next (2 Thessalonians 2:1-17) he comes to the special error in question. “Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . . that ye be not soon shaken in mind nor troubled, neither in spirit nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of the Lord is present.” It is well known that “of the Lord” (not of Christ) is unquestionably required by the best manuscripts, and other ancient witnesses. Ἐνέστηκε does not mean “at hand,” but actually come. I do not enter into any long proof of this just now, having already done so elsewhere. Suffice it to say, that the word occurs in half a dozen places in the New Testament, and nowhere can bear any sense but the one alleged. Nor does it ever convey any such meaning as “at hand” in any correct Greek author. It has been so thought; but it is a mistake. It always means present, in contrast with future ever so imminent.
So in two instances of the New Testament it stands over against future things; as when it is expressly said (in Romans 8:1-39 and 1 Corinthians 3:1-23), “things present and things to come.” The latter might be “at hand,” but not the former. The things to come are in pointed opposition to those actually arrived. Again, we have (Galatians 1:4) “this present evil world.” This is now only. The age to come is not evil but good. It is in contrast with the present. And so as to “for the time then present,” (Hebrews 9:1-28) and “for the present necessity.” (1 Corinthians 7:1-40) It is not a question of the future, but solely of the present; a necessity now, and at no other time.
In short, it is the regular word for “present.” If a Greek meant to say “present” in contrast with the future, there was no more emphatic word to use. What, then, can be conceived more calculated to destroy the right understanding of this epistle than the common mistranslation? Such is the true sense of the word, I am bold to say. But clearly this gives an immense help to the understanding of the passage. The apostle appeals to the saints. It is not a question of teaching in this verse, but the apostle beseeches them by a certain powerful motive, which was still in their souls. He does not mean, “We beseech you concerning,” as some conceive, but as our English version says, “by.” It is a legitimate meaning of the preposition with words of entreaty. He uses the hope of being gathered to Christ at His coming as a motive why they should not listen to those misleading the saints. Now mark the character of this false teaching.
It was not the excitement of hope, but of terror produced on the spirit. It caused them to shake, hindering them from a settled, holy, hearty waiting for Christ. The error occupied them with the terrors of some intervening trouble. The pretence was that all the afflictions they had been enduring were parts or signs of the well-known day of trouble, the day of the Lord. Not at all, says the apostle: the trouble of that day will befall the enemies, not the friends, of the Lord. As they knew that every believer loved His name, the notion propagated was wholly astray.
It was morally false, as ignoring in the first place His unfailing and perfect love for them. Therefore he could say, “We beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, nor troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as by us, as that the day of the Lord is present.” Do you not know that Christ is coming for you, and that the first aim and effect of His coming will be your gathering together to meet Him in the air? Why, therefore, be uneasy at such a rumour about His day, with all its awful associations? You have been taught that from God; why be disturbed by this effort of the enemy, who falsely pretends to the Spirit and word, and an alleged letter of mine? That day will fall on the world. Indeed, the apostle had implied in the opening of this epistle, as well as in the latter part of his first, that the day of the Lord does not concern the saints, who were sons of light and of day. They would come accordingly with that day, instead of its overtaking them as a thief by night, because so it comes on whom it may. It comes from the Lord in His execution of judgment on a guilty world; and the very fact of their being sons of light ought to have proved that it cannot surprise such, because they belonged to the region whence it comes. With striking pithiness he briefly points to the ways of deceit and darkness which accompanied the notion, and betrayed its real source. Truth refuses an admixture of falsehood; and the pretence that any had a spiritual intimation to themselves, or a word for others, that the day of the Lord was really come, was manifestly of the serpent, not of God. Such and so rapid are the steps of evil, one wrong leading to another. But the allegation that they had the apostle’s own authority for the delusion gave him a direct opportunity to contradict the error. “Let no man deceive you by any means: for lit shall not come] unless there shall come the apostasy first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.” These are two different things. The apostle affirms that the day cannot be before both. Christendom will have abandoned the faith, and the man of sin must be revealed.
What a prospect! Do the children of God believe it? We know the world has wholly opposite expectations. Those who allow themselves with so little seriousness to bear the excellent name of the Lord will openly fall away from the confession of the gospel; and then a suited leader into the gulf of perdition will soon appear for the apostates. I am perfectly persuaded that some of the most important parts of Satan’s means of bringing about the apostasy are now actively at work. God has been graciously filling many hearts with joy and comfort of the truth. He has given not a few to believe these words, the moral signs of which are becoming daily more and more manifest. The apostasy again must come, and, in contrast with the man of righteousness, the man of sin be revealed, even the final Judas, “the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above every one called God, or an object of veneration; so that he sitteth down in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.” How sharply in contrast with the Lord Jesus, who, though really God, in love became man, in order to accomplish the glorious counsels of God and man’s salvation by grace! This one is the son of perdition to the ruin of those who trust him. Although he be but a man, and the man of sin, he takes the place of being the true God here on earth, and this too, not in the world, but in the temple of God of that time.
Thus he not merely takes the place of God here below, but actually as such enters His temple. I do not doubt that the temple will then be in Jerusalem; so that as Christendom began at Jerusalem, the holy city will be its last scene of sinful pride and of divine judgment, though not its only place of judgment. Jerusalem! Rome! — they are two names of most solemn import as to the subject to which I am briefly alluding. “Remember ye not that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time.” It is no absolute restraint, but provision only; for he must be revealed in his own season. The reference to previous teaching left the matter in comparative obscurity, and has given rise to a great deal of discussion. I think the true answer neither difficult nor uncertain. It is evident that what withholds or restrains must be a power superior to man or Satan, and of a nature totally opposite to the man of sin. As this is the embodiment, or rather head, of evil, so that which restrains his revelation would naturally be the power of good which suppresses as long as God pleases the full manifestation of the lawless one. There seems to be a good reason why the matter is put in this general, if not vague, manner. What withholds is presented as a principle or power in an abstract way, and not as a person only. It might, I suppose, assume a different shape at different times. Thus we find ourselves within narrow limits in order to fix the restraint and the. restrainer. The Thessalonians, who were but young in truth, already knew what restrains, “that he might be revealed in his own time. For the mystery of iniquity” [or “lawlessness,” which is the true force of the word] “doth already work: only there is one who restraineth now until he be taken away; and then shall the lawless one be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus shall consume with the breath of his mouth, and shall destroy with the appearing of his coming” or presence. Evidently, then, we find here a power that hinders the manifestation of the lawless one — a power which is also a person. Where do we find one that effectually checks the plans of Satan, a person no less than a power? We need not consider long, but answer, without hesitation, the Spirit of God. Undeniably He is both a power and a person; and save in Him it will be far from easy, if possible, to find an answer that combines these two distinct intimations, as well as both the character and the extent of the power involved. It can hardly be said to be the Spirit of God dwelling in the church, except in the most general way. We must recollect that the Holy Spirit not only dwells there, but also acts providentially in the government of the world. I am far from meaning that, when the church is gone, He will restrain the powers of the world much longer. There are men of the world who have no confidence in its stability; though it exercises no salutary fear over their souls, and they cling to it all the same. I am sure that no Christian man should trust it for a moment.
They are not called to promise fair things to that which cast out and slew the Lord of glory. They know that its doom is coming quickly, but not till they have formally rejected the truth, and accepted the man of sin.
But no matter what the wicked will of man and the wiles of Satan may be, they will not be able absolutely to extinguish divinely-controlled government among men as soon as they desire. There is One that still restrains, who could always indeed, but who will cease only when, according to God, the time for the final outburst arrives. It does not, I think, terminate at once, even when the Lord shall have come and taken up His saints, both those that sleep and all those alive and waiting for Him. I say “all,” for, you must remember, it is invariably assumed in scripture that every saint waits for Christ. The notion that a person may be a saint, and not looking for His coming, does not enter into the mind of the Holy Spirit. One may fall, of course, into a wrong state from bad teaching or careless ways; but if Christ is my life and righteousness, I shall surely love Him; and if so, I must want to see and be with Him in the condition of glory, where alone such life and righteousness, and the love that gave them, have their just display and results.
Hence it is always assumed that every Christian is, in the knowledge of His love, waiting for Christ to come and receive us to Himself, that we may be with Him in the Father’s house before He executes judgment on the world. Till then the Spirit of God acts as a cheek on the designs of Satan; and even after the church is gone (as I think) He will restrain for a short space. From the Apocalypse we learn that for a little while God carries out certain agencies of blessing. Not only does He not immediately cease to deal with souls, but we do not at once see either the apostasy or the man of sin. This is a consideration that bears on the question; for undoubtedly it is not the will of man that either sheds blessing on souls or restrains the proudest effort of Satan. After the church is taken up, then the Spirit of God works; and this doubly. He will bring souls into the knowledge of the testimony that God will then raise up to meet the existing circumstances, for His own glory as well as in His pitiful mercy to man. But, besides, He will even then restrain the powers that be from falling instantaneously into the devices of the devil.
At a certain given moment, which the Revelation clearly defines, Satan will be cast down from heaven, and will then bring forward his long-meditated plan. The empire that has disappeared from among men for so long, that the wise men of the world think its resurrection impossible — the Roman empire will come forward clothed with a diabolical energy. This is the moment when the Spirit ceases to restrain. Accordingly the Western empire will use all its might, and Satan will help it, to establish a politico-religious power in Jerusalem, who will be the head of the Jews, and at the same time the religious chief of the West. Such is the issue of idolatrous Christ-rejecting Judaism and of apostate Christendom. The man of sin will sit and be worshipped as God, in His temple at Jerusalem. This will enable the Roman empire still to carry on its political game of opposition to the Eastern powers. The West, I say, will support and be supported by the Antichrist, and consequently must share in the awful destruction that the Lord will Himself execute when He appears. Angels will do their part, and the breath of the Lord like a stream of brimstone; for they will be caught red-handed in their opposition to the Lamb, little knowing that He is Lord of lords and King of kings.
As for the civil and religious leaders, the beast and the false prophet, they will be consigned to everlasting destruction, without even the form of trial. Nothing less awaits these last and seemingly greatest leaders of the world’s false glory. But, remember, the flower of the West (of these lands that boast of religion, and civilization, and progress) shall perish in this destruction of the revived imperial power and its Jewish ally. I dare not prophesy smooth things to our own country and race. I believe that all these kingdoms of the West, now so confident in their resources and power, will fall helplessly into the hands of Satan at last. At Jerusalem the man of sin, as at Rome, the civil head of empire, with his confederate but subject kings, will be the two beasts of Rev 13:1-18. It is not the time to enter into further details now; but I may state ray conviction, that the man of sin, whom 2 Thess. shows enthroned in God’s temple, will be the accepted Messiah of the deceived Jews in Jerusalem, as the first beast is the imperial head at Rome; for the civil power will then be separate from the religious, and we all know how ardently men desire this now. But its accomplishment will have results far different from what most look for. I confess I am struck by the solemn fact, that one cannot speak of these subjects, even at short intervals of time, without perceiving new features which, in principle, bring us more and more up to the brink of the precipice. I do then, from every point of view, warn all those who are looking for bright hopes on the earth, and promising improvement to men. It is serious to observe that the lawless one here described and reserved for such a destiny is related very nearly to the mystery of lawlessness which was then at work, as the apostle let us know, and which has gone on increasing, and is immensely increased now. It is true that the lawless one will not be revealed until the restraint of the Spirit of God over the world is removed. This appears to me to be the unforced deduction from the apostle’s statement, compared with the light thrown on the subject by other Scriptures, which, by common consent, treat of the same time and point. It is the Spirit of God ceasing to restrain in the world as well as in the church, since He will for a brief space both act on souls and restrain Satan in the world, after the church has been caught up to heaven. This I consider a comprehensive and correct view of what, is revealed. It is put generally here both as “he who withholds” and as “that which withholds.” The particular from of withholding power might differ according to varying circumstances. The Christians of old used to think the Roman empire withheld them. Nor was their idea far from the mark; because the empire was assuredly among the powers ordained of God, as I do not doubt emperors, kings, presidents, etc., are still. But the hour hastens when the powers that be will cease to derive their authority from God; when the West above all will openly renounce the true God, and the beast will rise up from the abyss. Our chapter adds a true picture of the extent to which the man of sin will be allowed to go in diabolical imitation of what God wrought by Christ when here below.
It is the hour of retribution, when the proud apostates who refused the truth accept and perish in the lie of the enemy. How blessed the lot of the saints which the apostle contrasts with this! (Verses 13-17.) The next chapter (2 Thessalonians 3:1-18) closes the epistle with divers desires, and a prayer for them that the Lord would direct their hearts into the love of God, and into the patience of Christ. The key-note is thus maintained from first to last. As Christ waits to come, so should we, that we may meet Him then. But the apostle would not have this hope nor the Lord Himself dishonoured by the reproach of disorderly ways. And thus he nowhere more enjoins the duty of honourable industry, appealing to his own example, than in the epistles which most insist on Christ’s coming as the proximate and constant hope of the Christian. If any would pervert such a truth, or any other, to idleness and disorder, he was to be marked as unworthy of Christian companionship, not of course counted an enemy (like the wicked or heretics), but admonished as a brother. Idleness is fruitful of disorder and the foe of peace, which the apostle desired for them from the Lord of peace Himself always and in every way. May we seriously heed the truth, and its immediate application to our consciences and ways! May God give us quiet energy without restlessness or excitement, but so much the more calmly, because of the realized nearness of the Lord’s return, and the solemn consequences for all mankind! Oh for an earnest, burning zeal; for self-denying love; for hearts devoted to Christ, which might warn men of their impending destruction, that, if they have not been won by His love, they may at least tremble at the hopeless inextricable ruin in which their unbelief will soon leave them for ever.