Sabbath School Lesson 22 SEP 2012- The Antichrist

Sabbath School Lesson 22 SEP 2012- The Antichrist

 

2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 (Translation from the Greek):

 

However, we implore you, brothers, concerning the coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and his gathering together of us, to not be quickly shaken of mind nor troubled neither by means of spirit, nor through word, nor through letter, even through us, even because the day of the Lord is at hand.

 

Let no one be deceived in any manner, for not until first the apostasy comes may the man of lawlessness be revealed,  the son of destruction; he who opposes and exalts himself above every self-proclaimed god or object of worship so as to sit in the temple of God- exhibiting himself as proof that he is a god.  Do you not remember yet while being with you I told you these things?  And now you perceive that which is restraining he who is to be revealed in his own time.  For the mystery of the coming lawlessness is already working (ἤδη- eide).  Only He who presently restrains until out of the midst emerges and then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will subdue by the breath of His mouth and render powerless by the glorious appearance of His advent(παρουσίας-parousias).

 

Those who are perishing, which the love of the truth they had not received to be saved, exchanged it for the advent(παρουσία-parousia) of the work of Satan, which is in every power and mark and wonder of falsehood and in every deceit of injustice.  And on account of this, God permits a deceiving work to go to them, leading them to believe the false one; in order that they may all be judged, not having believed the truth but having delighted in unrighteousness.

 

1.       Should we be troubled over the coming of the Lord?

2.       What will reveal the man of lawlessness?

3.       How is this man of lawlessness described?

4.       To whom else did Jesus ascribe lawlessness? (Matt 23:27-28)

5.       Who is restraining the man of lawlessness?

6.       Why do you think he is restrained?

7.       Is the mystery of lawlessness already at work?

8.       Who reveals the man of lawlessness?

9.       What happens to him?

10.   How does Paul use the term "Advent" to contrast two groups of people?  What causes the contrast?

11.   What causes God to permit the deceiving work to go out?

12.   What does it accomplish?

13.   What is the difference in experience between those Paul is writing to and those Paul writes about?

14.   How does this difference relate to the first question?