05/18/14 Blinded By The Light!
“BE OF
GOOD CHEER!” Series: Week 4 – (2 Thessalonians 2:6-10)
Text: 2 Thessalonians
2:6-10 (NKVJ)
“And now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in
his own time. 7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He
who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way. 8 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. 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.
“If
the Good News we preach is hidden behind a veil, it is hidden only from people
who are perishing. 4 Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds
of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the
Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is
the exact likeness of God.” 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 (NLT)
Intro: My message last
week centered on the current Apostasy in the church, apostasy meaning a falling
away from the truth. The antichrist who is the lawless one is hard at work with
deceiving the masses. “Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has
come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist,
which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.” 1 John 4:3
Satan,
who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe.
The antichrist will disguise himself as an “ANGEL OF LIGHT” and deceive the
whole lost world. Revelation 12:9 (NLT) “This great dragon—the ancient serpent
called the devil, or Satan, the one deceiving the whole world—was thrown down
to the earth with all his angels.”
Having discussed the act of apostasy by
which the Antichrist will reveal himself for who he really is, Paul takes a
deeper look at the man himself. He lists four aspects of Antichrist’s career:
his revelation, destruction, power, and influence.
1. His Revelation: vs. 6-8a
“And
now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in his own time. 7 For
the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will
do so until He is taken out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be
revealed.” DEF: Restrains – “to hold back.” It is only the power of God that
can hold back the purpose of Satan for his Antichrist. We must realize God does
the restraining so that in his time he will be revealed. Satan, of course, does
not want to operate on God’s timetable. If he could, he would have revealed
Antichrist long before now. Isaiah 46:9-10 (NLT) “Remember the things I have
done in the past. For I alone am God! I am God, and there is none like me. 10 Only
I can tell you the future before it even happens. Everything I plan will come
to pass, for I do whatever I wish.”
God will not allow Antichrist to be
revealed until all the redeemed, whom He chose for salvation in eternity past,
are gathered into the kingdom. Evil will not overstep its divinely ordained
bounds. The true Messiah was revealed “when the fullness of the time came, and
God sent forth His Son”; the ultimate false messiah will likewise be revealed
in God’s perfect time. Though the Antichrist may be restrained, evil will not
be!
When the restraint is removed and Antichrist appears, the true character of
evil will be manifested. Christians there is good news: ‘When He, the Spirit of
truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His
own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things
to come.” John 16:13
At the present time the worst that Satan can do is promote
the spirit of lawlessness. Romans 1:18-25: “For the wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress
the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because what may be known of God is manifest
in them, for God has shown it to them. 20 For since the creation of the
world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without
excuse, 21 because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God,
nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish
hearts were darkened. 22 Professing to be wise, they became fools, 23 and
changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible
man--and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God
also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor
their bodies among themselves, 25 who exchanged the truth of God for the lie,
and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed
forever. Amen.” COULD YOU IMAGINE THIS BEING READ ON THE PLATFORM OF A
POLITICAL AGENDA?
For the third time in this passage, Paul notes that the lawless
one will be revealed when the Holy Spirit’s restraint ceases. Antichrist will
expose the depths of his evil nature by desecrating the temple and proclaiming
himself to be God. God’s judgments, which will begin during the first half of
the Tribulation, will intensify dramatically as the Day of the Lord arrives in
all its judgmental fury. But Antichrist’s reign of terror will be short-lived.
This is just a glimpse of his revelation.
2. His Destruction: vs. 8b
“Whom the
Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness
of His coming.”
Just as the Antichrist will be revealed at God’s appointed
time, so also is the moment of his destruction divinely ordained. At the height
of his power, when he seems invincible, he will meet his end. Daniel 7:26 (NLT)
“But then the court will pass judgment, and all his power will be taken away
and completely destroyed.”
The most hellish and powerful ruler in human history
will be effortlessly crushed; the Lord will slay (Destroy) him with the mere
breath of His mouth. The term slay does not mean that the Lord will kill the Antichrist,
since Revelation 19:20 says that he will still be alive when he is cast into
the lake of fire. “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.” Isaiah
11:4
The devil will be abolished, rendered ineffective. Not only will the Lord
(destroy) Antichrist’s person, He will also bring to an end his empire. Christ
will annihilate both the man and his enterprise by the brightness (appearance)
of His coming, a reference to the visible manifestation of Christ at His second
coming. So Antichrist will rule from the midpoint of the Tribulation until
Christ’s return—1,260 days or forty-two months, both of which equal three and a
half years. During that brief reign, so suddenly ended, he will exercise power
unparalleled in human history. This moment of fame (Power) for the Antichrist
will be short lived!
3. His Power: vs. 9-10a
“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.”
Antichrist’s great power will not be his own
but will be in accord with the activity of Satan. Satan will have complete
control over the life of the antichrist. He will be totally surrendered to
Satan, and Satan will be energizing him. He will be turning as many as he
possibly can away from God. Millions will be listening, watching, and following
the antichrist and his government upon the earth. He will demonstrate the power
and signs and wonders, to bring peace to earth, to adequately grow and
distribute the food so that all may have adequate provision, to solve the
problems of adequate health coverage, full employment, homelessness, energy
crunches, and the other problems of this world.
What is wrong with this?
Nothing. These are wonderful things and they all need to be solved. But the
antichrist will not stop with this. He will claim supernatural power for
himself and his state and its science. Because he has done so much for men, he
will insist that religions and gods take a back seat to him and his government.
He will institute the seat of imperial worship. He will do all he can to turn
men away from God and lead them to worship him and his state.
The problem with
these claims is the problem with all the claims of men: they go no further than
the grave. Men die. No matter how much peace, food, clothing, shelter, and
material possessions we are able to enjoy, it all ends. All the pleasures of
this earth end, for we die. We are here only a few years—barring accident and
disease—and then we are gone. Therefore, the power, signs, and wonders of the
antichrist can benefit a person only for the briefest of times. But not God—not
the living and true God. He is interested in saving men eternally—forever and
ever. This is the mammoth difference between the lies of Satan and the truth of
Jesus Christ.
4. His Influence: vs. 10
“Among those who perish, because they
did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.”
The followers
of the antichrist are those who are perishing. Even while a follower of the
antichrist lives on the earth, their perishing. There on the road to being
lost. They have turned away from God and is traveling in the opposite
direction along the road that leads to perdition. The word
"perishing" means to be lost, to be in the process of being destroyed
or ruined, corrupted and put to death. When a person is on the road to
perdition, they have turned away from God and is pointed in the opposite
direction. Here is where the real blindness is evident! The gospel is hid from
them and their perishing, because they would rather travel the road of the
lost, the road of those who are perishing.
The followers of the antichrist will
be those who have not welcomed the love of the truth—those who have rejected
the love of the gospel. “And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light
came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for
their actions were evil.” John 3:19 (NLT)
Illustration: In the old days a
photographer would go into a dark room to develop a picture, and he could not
allow the light in the other room to expose the picture that was in the process
of being developed in the dark room, this would destroy the final product. Those
that are blinded by the truth will not see Christ in their life until we who
are in the other room open the door to show them the light of Christ!
The
Antichrist will have an impressive career, understand his revelation, and know
of his destruction, don’t be blinded by his power, and he is an angel he will
try to influence you.
In : Sermon
Tags: "be of good cheer series"
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