Some preliminaries
After working with 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 a bit, I caught myself thinking that it would have been okay with me if this particular text had never made it into the biblical canon! It could be like the letter Paul alludes to in 1 Corinthians 5:9 that served its purpose in the first century but wasn’t preserved for future generations. Then after reading the self-confessed cluelessness of many commentators (and some who would have been better off adopting such a position), these thoughts were only reinforced.
But it is part of the biblical witness. God has seen fit to preserve it for His people. In light of 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and other passages, we are to pursue, to the best of our ability, an understanding and application of this text to our lives so that’s what we’ll do.
In sharing the good news of Jesus with the Thessalonians, Paul had spoken about His return. This prompted a watchful attitude (1 1:10) as well as some questions (1 4:13-5:3). The latter is not surprising. Whenever the subject comes up, people always have questions they seem to have been carrying around for some time. That is how it should be.
When we get to Paul’s second letter then, it shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that the Thessalonians were still working out their understanding of the return of Jesus. And I suppose that we also shouldn’t be shocked to learn that they had some “help” that wasn’t very helpful (2 2:3). (Eschatology always seems to attract diverse and creative thinking). In this case, someone had advanced the erroneous idea that Paul, Silas, and Timothy were teaching that the Lord had already returned (2 2:2).
Initially, this is mind-boggling because we can’t even see how such a thought could even be taken seriously. How could they possibly have thought Jesus might have returned and yet they somehow didn’t know about it? Especially in light of what Paul had told them in 1 4:15-17? It would be like someone suggesting today that the sun had mysteriously disappeared overnight—I think we would all know about that. It’s difficult to make sense of this.
Unless . . .
. . . someone had suggested Jesus had returned spiritually rather than physically. Then things start to come together a bit. Paul will later speak of two disciples who had gone off the rails by saying that “the resurrection has already taken place” (2 Timothy 2:17-18). Something like this was apparently going on at Thessalonica as well.
Interestingly, Paul doesn’t take the tack of telling them what they had heard misunderstood the nature of Jesus’ return (as he will later do in 1 Corinthians 15 in regard to the resurrection body). Instead, he responds to their mistaken understanding by pointing them to some things that must take place before Christ returns. This allow him to build on some things he had previously spoken to them about (2 2:5ff).
A Taste of Grace with Bruce Green 