2 Tê-sa-lô-ni-ca 2

The man of lawlessness

¹Brothers and sisters, we have a request about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering to meet him. ²Do not let yourselves be quickly shaken out of your senses or thrown into alarm by a prophetic word, a spoken message or a letter that claims to come from us, saying that the day of the Lord is already here.^{a 3}No one must lead you astray, whatever they say. Before that day comes, the great rebellion must first take place, and the man of lawlessness must be unveiled, the one doomed to destruction. ⁴He will set himself against every so-called god and everything people worship, and lift himself above them all, until he takes his seat in God’s temple and presents himself as God.^{b 5}Surely you remember: I kept telling you this while I was still with you. ⁶And you know what is holding him back now, so that he will be revealed only when his time comes.^{c 7}For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work, but only until the one who now holds it back is taken out of the way. ⁸Then the lawless one will be unveiled, and the Lord Jesus will destroy him with the breath of his mouth and bring him to nothing by the brightness of his coming. ⁹The lawless one comes by Satan’s working, with all kinds of power, with false signs and wonders, ¹⁰and with every evil trick to deceive those who are on the way to ruin. They are lost because they would not welcome the love of the truth, which would have saved them. ¹¹That is why God sends them a deluding power, so that they put their trust in the lie, ¹²and judgment comes on all who refused to believe the truth and chose to take pleasure in what is wrong.

Chosen to be saved

¹³But we must always thank God for you, brothers and sisters whom the Lord loves, because God chose you, as the first of a harvest, to be saved, through the Spirit who makes you holy and through your faith in the truth. ¹⁴To this he called you when we brought you the gospel, so that you would come to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.^{d 15}So, brothers and sisters, keep standing firm, and keep a firm grip on the traditions you were taught by us, whether we spoke them in person or wrote them in our letter.

¹⁶Our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father loved us and gave us eternal comfort and a good hope by grace. ¹⁷May they comfort your hearts and steady them in every good deed and word.