2 Thessalonians

1Chapter
1Greetings from Paul, Silas, and Timothy. To the church of those in Thessalonica, who are in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
2Grace and peace to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3We thank God for you always. And that’s what we should do, because you give us good reason to be thankful: Your faith is growing more and more. And the love that every one of you has for each other is also growing. 4So we tell the other churches of God how proud we are of you. We tell them how you patiently continue to be strong and have faith, even though you are being persecuted and are suffering many troubles.

Paul Tells About God’s Judgment

5This is proof that God is right in his judgment. He wants you to be worthy of his kingdom. Your suffering is for that kingdom. 6God will do what is right. He will punish those who are causing you trouble. 7And he will bring relief to you who are troubled. He will bring it to you and to us when the Lord Jesus comes from heaven for all to see, together with his powerful angels. 8He will come with burning fire to punish those who don’t know God—those who refuse to accept the Good News about our Lord Jesus. 9They will be punished with a destruction that never ends. They will not be allowed to be with the Lord but will be kept away from his great power. 10This will happen on the day when the Lord Jesus comes to receive honor with his holy people. He will be admired among all who have believed. And this includes you because you believed what we told you.
11That is why we always pray for you. We ask our God to help you live the good way he wanted when he chose you. The goodness you have makes you want to do good. And the faith you have makes you work. We pray that with his power God will help you do these things more and more. 12Then the name of our Lord Jesus will be honored because of you, and you will be honored because of him. This can happen only by the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
2Chapter

Evil Things Will Happen

1Brothers and sisters, we have something to say about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We want to talk to you about that time when we will meet together with him. 2Don’t let yourselves be easily upset or worried if you hear that the day of the Lord has already come. Someone might say that this idea came from us—in something the Spirit told us, or in something we said, or in a letter we wrote. 3Don’t be fooled by anything they might say. That day of the Lord will not come until the turning away from God happens. And that day will not come until the Man of Evil appears, the one who belongs to hell. 4He will stand against and put himself above everything that people worship or think is worthy of worship. He will even go into God’s Temple and sit there, claiming that he is God.
5I told you before that all these things would happen. Remember? 6And you know what is stopping that Man of Evil now. He is being stopped now so that he will appear at the right time. 7The secret power of evil is already working in the world now. But there is one who is stopping that secret power of evil. And he will continue to stop it until he is taken out of the way. 8Then that Man of Evil will appear. But the Lord Jesus will kill him with the breath that comes from his mouth. The Lord will come in a way that everyone will see, and that will be the end of the Man of Evil.
9When that Man of Evil comes, it will be the work of Satan. He will come with great power, and he will do all kinds of false miracles, signs, and wonders. 10The Man of Evil will use every kind of evil to fool those who are lost. They are lost because they refused to love the truth and be saved. 11So God will send them something powerful that leads them away from the truth and causes them to believe a lie. 12They will all be condemned because they did not believe the truth and because they enjoyed doing evil.

You Are Chosen for Salvation

13Brothers and sisters, you are people the Lord loves. And we always thank God for you. That’s what we should do, because God chose you to be some of the first people to be saved. You are saved by the Spirit making you holy and by your faith in the truth. 14God chose you to have that salvation. He chose you by using the Good News that we told you. You were chosen so that you can share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. 15So, brothers and sisters, stand strong and continue to believe the teachings we gave you when we were there and by letter.
16-17We pray that the Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father will comfort you and strengthen you in every good thing you do and say. God loved us and gave us through his grace a wonderful hope and comfort that has no end.
3Chapter

Pray for Us

1And now, brothers and sisters, pray for us. Pray that the Lord’s teaching will continue to spread quickly. And pray that people will give honor to that teaching, the same as happened with you. 2And pray that we will be protected from crooked and evil people. Not everyone believes in the Lord, you know.
3But the Lord is faithful. He will give you strength and protect you from the Evil One. 4The Lord gives us confidence that you are doing what we told you and that you will continue to do it. 5We pray that the Lord will cause you to feel God’s love and remember Christ’s patient endurance.

The Obligation to Work

6Brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ we tell you to stay away from any believer who refuses to work. People who refuse to work are not following the teaching that we gave them. 7You yourselves know that you should live like we do. We were not lazy when we were with you. 8We never accepted food from anyone without paying for it. We worked and worked so that we would not be a burden to any of you. We worked night and day. 9We had the right to ask you to help us. But we worked to take care of ourselves so that we would be an example for you to follow. 10When we were with you, we gave you this rule: “Whoever will not work should not be allowed to eat.”
11We hear that some people in your group refuse to work. They are doing nothing except being busy in the lives of others. 12Our instruction to them is to stop bothering others, to start working and earn their own food. It is by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ that we are urging them to do this. 13Brothers and sisters, never get tired of doing good.
14If there are some there who refuse to do what we tell you in this letter, remember who they are. Don’t associate with them. Then maybe they will feel ashamed. 15But don’t treat them as enemies. Counsel them as fellow believers.

Final Words

16We pray that the Lord of peace will give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with you all.
17Here’s my greeting in my own handwriting— Paul. I do this in all my letters to show they are from me. This is the way I write.
18The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
Study
Chapter 2
ESV

Refuting the False Claim about the Day of the Lord. Paul reassures the Thessalonians that the day of the Lord has not come. In 1 Thess. 5:1–11 Paul responded to a question from the community relating to the timing of the day of the Lord. He has now heard that they have succumbed to the false notion that the day of the Lord has already arrived (2 Thess. 2:1–2). Paul first points out that, before that day, a final rebellion and the revelation of the “man of lawlessness” must occur (vv. 3–12). Then he reassures the Thessalonians that they are destined for glory (vv. 13–14), and calls on them to hold firmly to the traditions he passed on to them (v. 15). He concludes with prayer (vv. 16–17).

ESV

The False Claim. The Thessalonians were alarmed by a false claim concerning the day of the Lord.

ESV

Paul discusses Christ’s coming (Gk. parousia), his return in glory at the end of the age to save the elect and punish the wicked, and our being gathered together (Gk. episynagōgē) to him (see Matt. 24:31 with the related verb episynagō; cf. also 1 Thess. 4:16–17). The idea that the day of the Lord had already come (2 Thess. 2:2) may have made the Thessalonians fear that Jesus’ coming and the gathering of his people to him were no longer legitimate or realistic expectations.

ESV

The Thessalonians were shaken into mindless panic and were alarmed or frightened by the false claim that the day of the Lord had already come. Though the source of the confusion was unknown to Paul, he suggests a number of possibilities: a spirit. An alleged prophetic word. a spoken word. A word of teaching or a sermon. a letter seeming to be from us. Paul seems to have suspected that a letter forged in his name was circulating (3:17). the day of the Lord. See notes on Amos 5:18–20; 1 Thess. 5:2–3. Although some believe that the Thessalonians were thinking in terms of a complex of events that would lead to the second coming, Paul seems to assume here, as elsewhere (1 Cor. 1:8; Phil. 1:10; 1 Thess. 5:1–4; 2 Thess. 1:7–10), that the arrival of the day of the Lord and the second coming occur at the same time, as aspects of a single event. has come. The Thessalonians have fallen victim to the implausible notion that the day of the Lord has come, presumably because some source they regard as authoritative has claimed this. There is no reason to think that the idea was part of a developed heresy.

ESV

The False Claim Refuted. Paul insists that the Thessalonians can know that the day of the Lord has not come.

ESV

The day of the Lord will be preceded by two events, neither of which has been fulfilled. The first prerequisite is the rebellion. Although some have suggested that this refers to a Christian or Jewish apostasy, in view of vv. 9–12 a rebellion of humanity as a whole against God is probably in view. Just as humanity in Adam has rejected God and has been plunged into ever greater depths of sin as a result (Rom. 1:18–32), so it will move into all-out rebellion against God when the Antichrist appears (2 Thess. 2:4). the man of lawlessness is revealed. This second prerequisite, elsewhere called the “antichrist” (see 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 7), will personify hostility to God and his revelation. He will disclose who he is, the rebel par excellence. He is the son of destruction, the one whose destiny is to be defeated and destroyed when Jesus returns (2 Thess. 2:8).

ESV

Paul draws on Dan. 11:36–37 when he says that the lawless one opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship. The Antichrist will not countenance any rivals but will insist that he alone is God. The temple of God has been variously interpreted as the church, the heavenly temple, the Jerusalem temple, and a metaphor for supreme blasphemous arrogance modeled on the activities of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (see notes on Dan. 11:31–35). Whatever the meaning, the context seems to indicate a concrete and observable act of defiance against God.

ESV

Paul is apparently surprised that his own teaching on the end times had not stopped the Thessalonians from believing the false claim (v. 5; cf. v. 2), so he rehearses that teaching (vv. 6–7). The man of lawlessness cannot be unveiled while what is restraining (Gk. to katechon, neuter participle of katechō, “to prevent, hinder, restrain”) him now is at work. In v. 7 Paul refers to he who now restrains (Gk. ho katechōn, masculine participle of the same word). Scholarly theories on the identity of this restrainer include the Roman Empire/emperor, the Holy Spirit, and the archangel Michael. According to Dan. 10:13, 20–21, Michael restrains satanic principalities (cf. Rev. 12:7), and in rabbinical traditions and the Septuagint of Dan. 12:1, Michael is said to “pass away” when the Antichrist pitches his tents in Judea (Dan. 11:45) just before the great tribulation begins (Dan. 12:1). The restrainer functions to make sure that the man of lawlessness is revealed (see 2 Thess. 2:3) in his time and not before. Prior to the revelation of lawlessness personified, it operates as an impersonal mystery, stirring up hostility to Christ and his people. Lawlessness remains in mystery form until the restrainer is taken out of the way.

ESV

And then the lawless one will be revealed. As soon as the restrainer is removed, lawlessness is free to manifest itself in unrestrained fashion in the Antichrist. In God’s providence, Jesus’ second coming overthrows the rule of the Antichrist. the breath of his mouth (cf. Isa. 11:4). The Lord will destroy the Antichrist with overwhelming ease when he comes again.

ESV

The coming of the lawless one. The Antichrist has a “coming” (Gk. parousia) which is a poor substitute for Jesus’ coming (Gk. parousia, v. 8). Satan is the power behind the Antichrist, working with unrestricted power on his behalf through signs and wonders—which (though they are false) lead people to believe that the Antichrist is God. Unbelievers are those who are perishing because they have failed to embrace the gospel, God’s only way of salvation.

CSB

On the basis of v. 11, God is sometimes charged with deceiving people. But vv. 10-11 sets the critical context: “They perish because they did not accept the love of the truth . . . For this reason” they experience delusion. As in Rm 1:24-25 (“God delivered them over . . . They exchanged the truth of God for a lie”), so here: The delusions certain people experience reflect God’s response to a prior decision on their part.

ESV

Because unbelievers have rejected God’s offer of salvation in the gospel, God sends them a strong delusion. As part of his righteous judgment, God is instrumental in causing these unbelievers to embrace the Antichrist (believe what is false) so that they advance to a whole new level of rebellion and are thus condemned as allies of the Antichrist at the second coming.

ESV

Reassurance. Paul reassures the Thessalonians that, in contrast to unbelievers (vv. 10–12), they have accepted God’s call and so have demonstrated that they were elected by God to be saved when Jesus returns.

ESV

ought. See 1:3. give thanks. This is technically the second thanksgiving in the letter (see 1:3; cf. 1 Thess. 1:2; 2:13). beloved by the Lord … God chose you. See note on 1 Thess. 1:4. This may echo Deut. 26:18, where the reference is to God’s choice of Israel. as the firstfruits. This indicates that the Thessalonians, as early Christians, are the firstfruits of the new humanity, or of Thessalonica. (On firstfruits offerings, see Ex. 23:19; 34:26.) However, as the esv footnote indicates, some manuscripts read “from the beginning” (Gk. ap’ archēs) rather than “as firstfruits” (Gk. aparchēn; see note on 1 Cor. 15:20). In that case, Paul’s point is that God’s choice was in eternity past. Either way, Christians were divinely elected to be saved, and this was to be the ultimate end of a journey marked by sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, in contrast to the way of unbelievers, who are marked by unrighteousness and will believe the Antichrist’s lie (2 Thess. 2:10–12). Note the involvement of each person of the Trinity: the Father elects, the Son loves, and the Holy Spirit makes holy.

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To this (i.e., salvation) he called you through our gospel. The divine call was effectual and was actualized in history through Paul’s preaching. obtain the glory. See 1:10; 1 Thess. 5:9.

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Exhortation. Paul exhorts the Thessalonians to hold on to the true traditions that were passed on from him to them. This verse contrasts with v. 2, where Paul warns them not to be shaken by a false prophecy or teaching or by a forged letter attributed to the missionaries. Rather, they are to stand firm and hold to the traditions that were communicated directly to them by our spoken word during his ministry among them and later by 1 Thessalonians (our letter).

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Prayer. Paul prays that the Thessalonians will be divinely comforted and established in every good work and word.