The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Thessalonians — Section 39

Satan. AB Goo work<>th in his sRints both to l\•ill and to do of his good p\e11sure, so Satan worketh in this his representative with Ali the awful energy of diabolical wioked- .:iess. The antichrist, SD.ys llengel, stands in !he same relation to Satan as Christ to llod. The anticliri~t will work miracles, but they are by the energy of Satan wond,.rs l)f falsehond. They are not mere deceptions, they are real miracles; but they are the works of h,m who is the father of lies; and they are lies, inasmuch as they aro intcn,led to mislead m<'n into worshipping him as God who is the personation or t-atan, the liar from tlie beginning. Lies, too, they are, because they are the signs of a power which is only a miserable impost11re, which must soon end in death and ruin. Our Lord has warned us (Matt. xxiv. 24) of false Christs and false prophets whose signs and wonders should be so startling as to deceive, if it were possible, the very elect. The false prophet, the second beast, of the RevelRtion doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire to come down from heaven, and deceiveth them that dwell ou the earth by the means of those miracles which he bath power to do. Then there may be, there will be false miracles, l~·ing wonders. Miracles alone do not always prove the ag;ency of God: but miracles with holiness, works of faith issuing out of a life filled with the presence of God. The blessed life of Jesus Christ our Lord is a mightier miracle than the physical wonders which he wrom:ht. A life of perfect purity and transcendent holiness in the weakness ofhumau flesh, amid all the temptations of this wicked world, is to us a more condncin;.:: proof of the Divine mission of Christ than the signs from heaven would have been which the Jews so often asked for. The Church must expect the coming of lying wondC'rs; she must stand unshaken amid all the developments of t-atanic energy. The elect will not be deceivecl, for they will recognize the notes of antichrist, "all the deceivableness of unrighteousness;" they will remember the warn- ings of lloly Scripture: "Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God," "He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sin11eth from the beginning." IV. ITS RESULT. 1. He deceiveth them that dwell on the earth; not the elect--the souls of the righteous are in the ha11d of God; but those who have not been sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise which is the earnest of our inheritance, the pledge of that seal of the living God which his angel shall one day set upon the foreheads of his chosen. But there are, alas! those that are perishing, who have not passed from death unto life through faith in the Son of God, but still abide in death. Such men the man of sin, the lawless one, deceives and engulfs in his own utter destruction. 2. Their own wuful11ess is the cause of their ruin. "God is not willing that any should perish." The true light lighteth every man. It came to them, but they received it not. They received not Christ. He is the Truth, and he is Love. He came into the world that the world through him might be saved. But they received not him who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. They had no love for the truth, no desire for it. They were quite indifferent to the truth, though their conscience told them that it was the truth; they were worse than indifferent, they rejected it. They might have been saved; the truth would have made them free. They mi~ht have been sa11ctified through the truth; for the tru1b of God, receive,! into the heart, hath power to cleanse, to purify, to save the soul. Il11L they loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 3. It end.a in judicial bli11dne&1J. God's Spirit will not always strive with man. In his awful justice he gives over to a reprobate mind those who per8cvere in disobedience. He sendeth them a strong delusion, a working of error. As virtue is its own reward, so sin ii its own puni8hmcnt. Eternal sin (see Mark iii. 29 in the best-supported reading) is the fearful end of the obstinate sinner. That hardening of the heart, in which l,abitual sin must at last re8ult, is ascribed in Huly Scriplure sometime~ to God, 1ome• times to the sinner himself, ~ometime~ to the dcccitfuluesH of sin. '!'hey are different modes of expressing the 1111me law of God'11 gover11ment. He has so ordered our moral nature, that sin, when it is full grown, briugeth forth death. He lets the rebel have his own will; he leaves him to be "lord of himself, that heritage of woe." The Spirit is witl1<!rnwn at last from those who vex, grieve, resist, his gracious influences. But there id something more awful still. Not only did the Spirit of the Lor,1 depart from Sau!, but" en evil ~pirit from the Lorrl troublerl him." God himself sends at the last, in his most a"·ful j,,6tice, the strung delusion, tho inworking of error. It is the lasl state, worse 1J,a11 tlie first; after which comes thnt rlreadful sentence, "It is Impossible . • • io renew til!'m again unto repentance." 'l'his thought gh·es a most terrible on. 11. 1-17.] THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANB. 17