|
||||||||||||||
 |
|
|
||||||||||||
Commentary on "The Antichrist (2 Thess. 2:112)"
Day 6: Thursday, September 20, 2012 - Truth and Lies (2 Thess. 2:1012)
Again the author chooses to touch very lightly on the verses in view and focus more on the proposed papacy as the Antichrist. We are not told in scripture that the Catholic Church is or is associated with the Antichrist. Of course, it has been involved in antichrist activity, but it is far from alone in this.
“Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thessalonians 2:11-12).
This act of God is His judgment. We can see this elsewhere in scripture and understand that the God of scripture performs His own sovereign will to work salvation for those He wills and makes no apologies for it. In Exodus we see the stubborn resistance as Pharaoh hardened his own heart and then finally the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart. In the first chapter of Romans the rejection of God results in their release to unnatural desires. It is startling to consider that there are those that will resist the love of the truth to the extent that God will eventually make it so they cannot believe, but this is the teaching of scripture. My reading of the author’s words leads me to believe that he positions God as an open, permissive God whose hands are tied by the will of man and the deceptions of Satan, but God’s revelation of Himself in scripture portrays a powerful God, sovereign over all and who knows the end from the beginning and already knows who His elect are and He is working all things together for their good, including these end time events.
Furthermore, the author starts off the lesson with “The knee-jerk response to the text is something like, 'How can a God of truth send deception? How can He act the same as Satan at the end?’” There is no soft way to say this, but this question does not reflect the heart of a born again believer submitted to the Lord Jesus. We must read the word of God, believe what it says, obey our Lord and never blaspheme Him with offhand comparisons to Satan.
Copyright 2012 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised September 18, 2012. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Camp Verde, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
The Sabbath School Bible Study Guide and the corresponding E.G. White Notes are published by Pacific Press Publishing Association, which is owned and operated by the Seventh-day Adventist church. The current quarter's editions are pictured above.
Official Adventist Resources
Standard Edition Study Guide Week 12
Teacher's Edition Study Guide Week 12
Easy Reading Edition Study Guide Wk 12
Search the Complete Published Ellen G. White Writings
Please Support This Project
