Thursday, December 11, 2014

Thursday, December 11, 2014

2 Thessalonians 2:1-12

Thessalonica was the second town (Philippi was the first) Paul and his companions visited on their missionary journey to the area that is now northern Greece.  Paul was poorly received at the Jewish synagogue (see Acts 17:1-15), and the church he started was mainly Greek people, who would not have known the Hebrew Scriptures very well.  Because of mob violence, Paul soon had to flee south (via Beroea to Athens and then Corinth), leaving an infant church of new believers in Thessalonica.  Paul was concerned about them and left his companions Timothy and Silas to continue teaching and guiding the new church.  Timothy, being younger than Paul and with a Greek father, could travel more safely and easily between Thessalonica and Athens/Corinth; he would not be seen as foreign like Paul, who was Jewish.

It was during this time that both Paul’s first and second letters to the Thessalonians were written. In the first letter, Paul says (1 Thess. 3:1-6) that Timothy has just arrived from Thessalonica, and the letter is clearly responding to Timothy’s report.  I think it’s likely that Timothy, carrying Paul’s letter, then went back to Thessalonica, continuing to teach and coach the believers there.

The second letter has form and contents rather similar to the first, and it too may be following up a report Timothy brought to Paul on a later visit to Athens or Corinth.  This second letter may be Paul’s response to this second visit, and again it may have been taken back to Thessalonica by Timothy (or by Silvanus = Silas, now also mentioned as being with Paul).  If this is correct, the purpose of 2 Thessalonians is to re-emphasize parts of the first letter, answer some of the questions from the church, and help them through their doubts and difficulties.

When he wrote the second letter, Paul was concerned (2 Thess. 2:1-2) that some people in the church had been upset and alarmed by word they had received that the Day of the Lord had already come.  So Paul is reassuring them that this is not true, that before the Lord Jesus returns there must be an unmistakable sign revealing extreme rebellion and wickedness.

But today’s passage leaves many questions unanswered, and we need to put it into its context.  The primary context would be the teaching Paul gave the Thessalonians in person (see 2:5), but we have no way to know this.  We do, however, have the context of what Paul had written not long before in his first letter.  He discusses the return of Christ in 1 Thess. 4:13-5:11, and this forms the framework in which we should place today’s passage. This framework is very positive and encouraging for all Jesus followers.  Twice Paul writes (4:18 and 5:11), 

“Encourage one another.”

This is Paul’s intention for the Thessalonians, and we too need to be encouraged and equipped to live in anticipation of Christ’s coming in glory and eternal presence with us.  Monday’s reflection in this blog was on this very passage, and it celebrates the light, the love, and the life that we have as we patiently anticipate Christ’s coming in glory.  I suggest we re-read Monday’s reflection as of primary importance, and we should consider today’s passage for what it is, little more than a footnote, but one the Thessalonians needed to help them clear up a possible misunderstanding.

Today’s footnote-passage counsels us to avoid being deceived (2 Thess. 2:3) by the evil that is present in the world and which will become worse and worse as the return of Christ approaches.  There will be rebellion, and this will culminate in revealing someone Paul calls the lawless one (or man of lawlessness, or man of sin), who is the epitome of wickedness (2 Thess. 2:4):

He opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, declaring himself to be God.

We can’t really tell if this “lawless one” is a human being, or some kind of evil spiritual being controlled by Satan, or a manifestation of Satan himself.  But he embodies the most horrible rebellion by exalting himself above all so-called gods (that is, above all religions) and declaring himself to be God Almighty.  What sacrilege!

This tradition of a “lawless one” does not originate with Paul.  In the first century, many scholars in Judaism were fascinated by the “time of the end” and the “Day of the Lord”, and especially with the cryptic visions recorded in the prophecy of Daniel.  One of these includes the statement (Dan. 11:36):

He shall exalt himself and consider himself greater than any god, and shall speak horrendous things against the God of gods.

Compare this statement with the one from Paul just above.  Do you see how similar they are?  Paul may well have derived his statement from Daniel.

Frightening indeed this “lawless one” is, but Paul doesn’t leave us there.  Instead, he assures us (v. 8) that “the Lord Jesus will destroy [the lawless one] with the breath of his mouth, annihilating him by the manifestation of his coming.”  And so our footnote-passage today encourages us that, even though such horrible evil will briefly be revealed in the time of the end, it will quickly be destroyed, completely annihilated, by the glorious coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Therefore, again, 

“Encourage one another, and build up each other, as indeed you are doing.” 

(1 Thess. 5:11)

– Robert Kruse