SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
10/10/2014 12:33 PM
My Worship Time
Focus:
Introduction to 2 Thessalonians Chapter Two PT-1
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: 1 Thess.
2:1-5
Message of the
verses: “1 Now we request you,
brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering
together to Him, 2 that you not be
quickly shaken from your
composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if
from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. 3 Let no one in any way deceive you, for it
will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 4
who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship,
so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being
God. 5 Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you
these things?”
I have mentioned the circumstances that the Lord used to
bring me to Himself, and one of the messages that I listened to during that
time back in January of 1974 was a study about the Antichrist, which is what we
are about to look at as we study 2 Thessalonians chapter two. I believe that the first mention of the
Antichrist is found in the book of Daniel and so in our study of Daniel we did
look at this coming man of sin, but as we look at him from Paul’s writings we
will see that Paul had already told the Thessalonians about him and that what
time period in human history he would come on the scene. That time period is what is called the
Tribulation Period where this man of sin will actually be running the
world. Whenever I think about that I think
about what Jesus said about if a man had power over the whole world but lost
his soul then he would lose everything, and that will be the case of the
Antichrist.
As we look back at history we see that there have been
many evil men as rulers over countries, causing the deaths of many innocent
people including women and children.
Pharaoh had all the male babies killed during the time when Moses was
born. There were even evil kings reining
in Israel and in the Southern Kingdom, like Ahab and his wife Jezebel, and then
Manasseh who ruled the longest of all the kings in the Southern kingdom and did
the most damage to that kingdom. As we
move forward in history we think of Nebuchadnezzar, and the rulers that
followed him from the Babylonian kingdom.
Alexander the Great had many people killed even though he is thought of
as a great military leader. Many of
those who ruled during the Roman Empire were very evil. Herod was an evil ruler who had many children
killed about the time Jesus was born is another evil ruler. Then we can go back to Stalin and of course
Hitler who are more in modern times, but very evil men who had millions of
people killed. The point here is that
none of these men will have the power and be as evil as the Antichrist. I once heard Erwin Lutzer say in a sermon
that I was listening to that the devil always had to have a man ready to step
into the role of Antichrist because he never knew when the time for him would
be needed.
John MacArthur writes the following on the word
“Antichrist.” Antichristos (Antichrist) is a compound Greek word, made up of the
preposition anti and the noun Christos.
Anti can mean both ‘against’ and ‘in place of.’ Both meanings are appropriate, for the
Antichrist will both oppose the true Christ, and seek to usurp His place.”
The Apostle John wrote that there are many antichrists in
the world, and of course this is true, for those who oppose Christ can be
called antichrist, however there is only one true Antichrist and that is who
Paul is referring to in the second chapter of Thessalonians. We know that it is Satan who opposes Christ
and therefore is the one behind the power of Antichrist and those who are now opposing
Christ. In my Bible reading today I was
actually listening to the eight chapter of John, and whenever I read that
chapter I look forward to hearing Jesus say that the father of those Pharisees
was Satan, and then at the end of the chapter He says “Before Abraham was I
Am!” We can say that these men had the
spirit of Antichrist for after all they were involved in His death. And as far as the other statement we see that
Jesus is telling them that He truly is God, for He uses the same words that
were spoken to Moses at the burning bush when Moses ask what His name was and
the answer he got was “I Am that I Am.”
That is why the Pharisees wanted to kill Jesus as seen in John chapter
eight.
Since the fall of man Satan has attempted to completely
destroy man and during the time of Noah he nearly succeeded. In Genesis 3:14-15 we read “14 The LORD God
said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, Cursed are you more than
all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you will go,
And dust you will eat All the days of your life; 15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed
and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the
heel."” We see in verse
fourteen that the serpent would change features and begin to crawl on the
ground, and then in verse fifteen we see that God gives the first promise of
the coming Messiah. God promises that
this coming Messiah would kill Satan and that He would be born of the seed of
woman. This is the only time in
Scripture we see this term and it refers to the virgin birth of Jesus
Christ. Ever since then Satan had done
everything to destroy the seed that would bring the Messiah into the
world. We can see the bloodline of Jesus
Christ in both Matthew and in Luke and we can look back and see how Satan tried
to stop this bloodline on different occasions.
We already mentioned Noah and his family. The book of Matthew goes from Jesus back to
Abraham, and this is the line of Joseph.
The book of Luke gives the bloodline of Mary and it goes back to God. Both Joseph and Mary were descendants of King
David but Mary’s bloodline goes through Nathan and not Solomon where Joseph’s
bloodline comes from. There was a very
wicked king in David’s line and that is why Mary’s line comes through
Nathan. Satan was involved in the
wickedness of that king in his trying to destroy the bloodline of the
Messiah. This is not a new “trick” of
Satan in trying to destroy the people of God, the Jewish people and we can see
that in our world today as there are still many people and nations who want to
eliminate the Jews today. God told
Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3 the following “1 ¶
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go forth from your country, And from
your relatives And from your father’s house, To the land which I will show you;
2 And I will make you a great nation,
And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing;
3 And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who
curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be
blessed."” God has kept His
promise for those that have cursed the nation of Israel have been cursed and it
was Satan who is always involved in that cursing of the people of Israel. We even see it going on during the
Tribulation period as recorded in the book of Revelations. Look at chapter twelve and you will see this
taking place.
We will look at more of this introduction in our next SD.
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: The more that I
study about Satan the more I realize how tricky and ruthless he is. I need to avoid temptations for some come
from him.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Proverbs 3:5-6.
Memory verses for the week: Colossians 3:5-10.
5 Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as
dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to
idolatry. 6 For it is because of these
things that the wrath of God has come upon the sons of disobedience; 7 and in
them you once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive
speech from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to
one another, since you have laid aside the old self with its evil practices, 10
and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according
to the image of the One who created him-
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “In the temple” (Luke 2:4).
Today’s Bible
question: “Who said ‘"However,
there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and He has made known to King
Nebuchadnezzar what will take place in the latter days.’”
Answer in our next SD.
10/10/2014 1:50 PM
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