Would you turn to the New Testament to 2 Peter chapter 3 where Peter makes kind of a strange statement But one that many people have resonated with over the years He said in 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 14 therefore beloved Since you're awaiting for these these things that he talked about concerning the end of time Be diligent to be found by him without blemish or spot and and at peace and Count the patience of our Lord as salvation Just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him as he does in all of his letters When he speaks in them of these matters There are some things in them that are hard to understand Which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction? As they do the other scriptures You therefore beloved knowing this beforehand Take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people In lose your own stability But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity amen Peter makes an interesting statement here He says in Paul's letters there are some things in them that are hard to understand and Yet he refers to these things that Paul writes as scripture He says that there are people who distort or twist these things as they do the other scripture So early on it appears even before Paul's death That some people at least the people in Rome to him Paul was writing We're familiar with at least some of Paul's letters and they considered them to be part of scripture Equal to the other scripture that was often being twisted and distorted commentators believe Because of the context of what Peter's writing about in second Peter which is the end times that he's referring To the things that Paul writes about eschatology thanks like first Corinthians 15 that we looked at this morning Or the things concerning the second coming of Christ in first and second Thessalonians and It is well agreed in fact. It's almost unanimous by commentators This may be the only thing that new testament commentators all agree on that the most difficult thing That Paul wrote is in second Thessalonians chapter two Which is the text that we look at tonight. He'll turn there Thomas Schreiner says Peter referred to the particular Pauline letters with which he was acquainted How many letters our in view is impossible to say but it is obvious that a number of Pauline letters were known to Peter and these he says Among these are things that are hard to understand Difficult to interpret because those who followed after Paul twisted and distorted Paul's writings so that they were perverting the things that Paul said They were as Dick Lucas says Using a word here that means to twist as to tie a knot To make something difficult to untangle No where in all of his 13 or 14 if you count Hebrews to be a Pauline letter No where in all of his letters is Paul more hard to understand Then in second Thessalonians chapter two in the 17 verses where he talks about the man of lawlessness And introduces us to the character known as the anti-Christ These are all ideas surrounding Christ second coming Um, it is unfortunate that we don't know the context that These letters were written in it appears from the way Paul writes They had had some face-to-face teaching some preaching and teaching to these people In which he introduced these ideas and explained them to the people and after they were distorted He comes back and writes about the things that they already knew But as many illusions and his oral teachings about these things Make it obvious That the Thessalonians understood more about what he was writing here than we do One commentator said readers of the New Testament Stumbling for the first time into the middle of second Thessalonians Maybe forgiven if they feel like Alice tumbling down some dark hole into wonderland Another commentator said second Thessalonians chapter two Is probably the most obscure and difficult passage in the whole of the Pauline correspondence in fact in all of the scripture We don't have a greater mind in the church than St Augustine And Augustine said Concerning this chapter I frankly confess that the meaning of this is completely One that escapes me With that let us stand for the benediction Who wants to try to explain something that St Augustine said it completely escapes me But how do we how do we approach these difficult passages? Well, let me let me just give you some introduction here before we jump into it I think there are five or six things you want to keep in mind first of all What Paul writes is inspired scripture It is what Peter refers to as part of scriptures comparing it to the other scriptures So even though it's hard to understand It bears the marks of scripture and that it is inspired by God and profitable for teaching and for training for For all of these things that will make us adequate and able to do every good work secondly Paul's probably not anticipating That the majority of his letters would be read by people other than the audience to whom he wrote them now There's exceptions when he writes collotions a letter He tells those collotions to have that letter read to the church of Leotusia and the letter he wrote to Leotusia to read to the collotions But most of the time he writes a letter To a specific group of people in a specific context taking for granted That they understand the context and the reason why he's writing these things thirdly Almost all of Paul's letters Supplement and enhance what he already had spoken and taught orally or face-to-face in these congregations when he visited them The only exception would be Romans We actually wrote that letter before he went to Rome Fourthly the original readers of Paul's letters would have had a better deeper richer and more contextual understanding of Paul's epistles than we do We moderns do not understand Paul's specific letters better than the first audiences did But fifthly on the other hand over time We have an advantage that the early audiences did not have We have all of Paul's writings plus Peter's and John's and Jude's and the four evangelists and the writings of Dr. Luke in the book of Acts so that we have a more comprehensive understanding of the apostolic Proclamation the good news and we can cross reference one scripture against another John Stott says Paul had taught the Thessalonians about this man of lawlessness by word of mouth And consequently he introduces him without explanation and sees no need to repeat what he had already talked them You remember he says you know he writes and verses five and six So there was a background knowledge common to Paul and the Thessalonians which we do not share So when we come to a difficult text like it's where there's been a million Different opinions about what these things made How do we approach them? Well first of all cautiously We we we don't give way To wild and weird speculations that do more harm than good we approach them humbly We have to admit that there's certain things that we just will never know Thirdly we approach them historically We're not the first group of Christians or churches in the world To read a second Thessalonians and struggle to understand what it says And so what our forefathers believed and how they interpreted these things Should be important and informative to us and fourthly We understand these things biblically we have the advantage Of scripture interpreting scripture to help us understand these things In fact our Presbyterian forefathers and the Westminster Confession of Faith Give us a pretty good understanding of how to handle the scriptures The whole council of God Concerning all things necessary for his own glory and man's salvation Faith in life is either expressly set down in scripture or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from scripture unto which nothing at any time is to be added Whether by new revelations of the spirit or traditions of men Nevertheless, we acknowledge this inward illumination of the spirit of God to be necessary For the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the word And that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God and the government of the church Common to human actions in societies Which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence According to the general rules of the word which are always to be observed But all things in scripture are not alike plain In themselves nor like clear to all Yet those things which are necessary to be known believed and observed for salvation Are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of scripture or another That not only the learned but the unlearned in the due course of the ordinary means of grace May attain unto a sufficient understanding of eternal life We don't know everything is as clearly as we should but The things that are necessary for salvation are plain And we the confession says Have seven principles here by which we approach this is how pastors approach a passage like this when they grab hold of it They set forth things that are clearly stated in scripture There are other things that may be deduced from good and necessary inference The spirit illuminates them as they pray and study They use the light of nature and Christian prudence and the general rules of hermeneutics to interpret the Bible And they avoid interposing their own ideas onto the scripture Because the rule of what's called the analogy of faith that scripture interpret scripture is what guides them The confession says the infallible rule of interpretation Of all scripture is the scripture itself And therefore when there was a question about the true and full sense of any scripture Which is not manifold but one It may be searched and known by other places in the scripture That speaks more clearly to its subject matter So with that in mind, let's go to second Thessalonians chapter two It's a difficult passage because there's so much that Paul assumes the readers know that we don't know That it makes it difficult for us to understand it But Paul talks about four things He talks about a general worldwide rebellion A great restraint on this rebellion A grand revelation of one we know is the anti-Christ and a gospel redemption Let's look at these four sections of this passage that talk about these things First of all He talks about an age of general rebellion beginning in verse one Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and are being gathered together to him We ask your brothers not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed either by the spirit or spoken word or letters seeming to be from us To the effect that the day of the Lord has come Let no one deceive you in any way for that day will not come unless the rebellion comes first And the man of lawlessness is revealed the son of destruction Who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called God or object of worship So that he takes his seat in the temple of God proclaiming himself to be God Do you not remember that when I was still with you? I told you these things Paul of course is writing to these Thessalonians these Macedonian Christians About the second coming of Jesus Christ he introduces a little word here called perusia That comes in the word that means I am present And it's his word in first and second Thessalonians to talk about the second coming of Christ It's become a theological term now when theologians refer to the perusia They're talking about what the Old Testament called the day of the Lord with the apostles called the second coming of Christ He's concerned that these new Christians We're getting bad theology and teaching about this perusia some people proposing to be from Paul having the spirit of an apostle Or a bogus letter or some message that they said Paul told them to pass on We're twisting what Paul had taught to cause these Christians great along what they were doing is this We're Paul conflated as the scripture does The coming of Christ and the day in the Lord since they were one and the same These false prophets these bogus apostles these false teachers was separating the two They were saying that the second coming of Christ occurred in a series of events the first being the day of the Lord And then the coming or the appearing And they said the day of the Lord has already come and you people missed it Which was greatly disturbing Unsettling these brand new Christians He reminds them Not to be shaken from their mind or their composure Because they were as one commentator said if he paraphrases Paul saying they were scared out of their wits What scared them will they associate it rightly so From their understanding of the Old Testament through this rabbi named Paul that the day of the Lord Was a day of judgment and they were afraid That the day of the Lord had come That judgment had been rendered and they had been found lacking And therefore left behind And when Christ would come the second time To destroy the earth They would be destroyed with the general mankind who were in this great apostasy So Paul says Let no one unsettle you or deceive you the day of the Lord And the coming of Christ are one and the same and they cannot occur unless there is first the great rebellion Let no one deceive you in any way For that day will not come unless the rebellion comes first and the man of lawlessness has revealed the son of destruction The ESV calls it the rebellion the new American standard renders it much more accurately or literally It is called the apostasy from the the Greek word apostasyah Which means to leave To depart literally to stand away from to separate yourself In this case from God From the Christian faith from the gospel the church The Jerusalem Bible calls it the great revolt in the new English Bible The final rebellion against God Notice that he uses a definite article There are many apostacies and fallings away in rebellions, but this is the Rebellion that comes at the end of time John Calvin therefore He employs the term apostasy to mean a treacherous departure from God And that not on the part of one or a few individuals but such as would spread itself far and wide Among a large multitude of individuals For when apostasy is made mention of without anything being added to it It cannot be restricted to a few And now none can be termed apostates except those who have previously made a profession of faith in Christ in the gospel Paul therefore predicts a certain general revolt of the visible church The church must be reduced to an unsightly and dreadful state of ruin Before its full restoration can be affected Charles Erdman says that this Defection from the Christian faith takes place in the context of an age of rebellion It's as if the whole world is beginning to turn away from God and his laws and the light of nature And the church is caught up with that spirit that spirit of lawlessness the mystery of lawlessness he calls it And is added to the number of these people found in the great rebellion This means none other than to set oneself against God to revolt is what the word in Greek literally means And it's as if there is a spirit of revolution spiritual revolution and religious revolution and moral revolution That the people of God get caught up into. I mean how else can you explain My beloved friends what is happening to us At least in the western world and all around the globe in some measure With his aggressive antagonism Against the Christian religion and any concept of biblical or divine authority it just angriest people For God to assume That he has the right to order them to do things the wholesale rejection Of the creator and creation in favor of a godless pseudo-scientific view of evolution where God does not own us and has nothing to say In lordship over us the redefining of gender Same sex marriages the approval of and not only the approval about the promotion of homosexuality in defiance of God's law God's word and the light of nature natural law The rising and violent persecution of the church Unopposed around the world Sabbath breaking abortion rampant divorces widespread sexual immorality proliferation of pagan religions all in opposition to the 10 commandments And even more sad The increasing agreement with these things by the people of the church While millions of Americans and westerners in Europe and australian South Africa and Canada say that they are none They have none no preference for religion no loyal to God commitment to Christ none It is a great falling away The irony of these times is that as the gospel spreads worldwide In some places the church growing in leaps and bounds following it and its wake is this great rebellion This grand apostasy Right on its heels it appears from west to east from old to new from first world to second world to new world and out of this apostasy the cycle of repentance and faith Falling away from the church Rebellion against biblical authority Falling into complete apostasy and rebellion There rises one whom we know as the anti-Christ Paul does not call him that in this passage He calls him the man of lawlessness and the son of destruction He is the poster boy of this age of apostasy. He is born out of this age of rebellion. It's not that he causes it But he rises in flourishes in his godless ways in the midst of it And yet in the midst of this there is something restraining him There was the power of the great restraint in verses 6 and 7 and you know What is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way What an amazing statement and you know what is restraining him but of course I say We don't But Thessalonians did but we don't Paul why didn't you tell us With more commentary and more information Who this lawlessness one is and who is restraining him I want you to notice something in this verse This restraint Is presented as both neuter A thing And masculine a person And you know what is restraining him now and he who restrains him That is an accurate translation of the Greek Speculations abound The Holy Spirit the gospel the church the Jewish state of Israel the Roman Empire human government Rulers Elijah the apostles the saints of Jerusalem prior to 70 AD the mosaic law Paul The Roman stoic philosopher Seneca. It's amazing How many people and how many speculations there are about this restraining force But Paul I think is saying this Just as there is a power neuter a power of lawlessness So there is something that is restraining it that is a power what is restraining it And just as there is a person who's the incarnation of this lawlessness the man of lawlessness The lawless one So there is some individual Some person are being he is restraining this lawless one There is the power of lawlessness and restraint And there is the person of lawlessness and he who restrains him Opposing powers in a struggle with opposing personalities behind them John Stott says Paul sets forth four guidelines to understand what this restraint is this restraint must be socially effective capable of personal manifestation Historically removable and Delicate enough to be talked about in whispers and enigmas John Stott believes it is the Roman Empire He takes the view of Tertullian and some of the early church fathers that said that the emperor He who restrains and the empire what restraines evil When removed out of the way will lead to a great age of lawlessness and persecution But I find that very difficult to accept because in Paul's writings elsewhere And especially in John's writing in his his gospel and in the book of Revelation it is Rome and the emperor himself The take on the form of the anti-Christ and the persecution of the church. They're not restraining evil They are propagating it We're not certain who this Restrainer is but here's where the analogy of faith comes in where scripture interpret scripture where the Old Testament Can help the New Testament gain an inkling of who this person might be Who is that person? Well, if you look at the book of Daniel That Paul obviously has as a backdrop to this passage Then you come to the conclusion that the restrainer is the archangel Michael Daniel chapter 10 11 and 12 have a great parallelism To first and second Thessalonians Michael restrains the evil of godless empires from destroying God's Old Testament Church Then he said do you know why I've come to you But now I will return to fight against the Prince of Persia and when I go out be hold the Prince of Greece will come and oppose me But I will tell you what is inscribed in the book of truth There was none who contends by my side against these evils except Michael your prince Michael is presented as eventually being removed And now Michael shall arise Daniel says literally it means rise up or leave the earth go up into heaven And the great prince who is a charge of your people shall leave and there shall be a time of trouble Such as never have been since there was a nation till last time But at that time your people shall be delivered everyone whose name shall be found written in the book of life There is a time of great trouble when Michael leaves A time he says that there shall be a tribulation that has never been since there was a nation until that time And we hear that the lawless one will increase and there will be trouble There will be a final judgment Daniel says When God saints are delivered and God's enemies are judged And that's what Paul comes to in the conclusion of this paragraph in this chapter As he comes to the end of second Thessalonians chapter 2 Daniel's prophecy obviously connects to what Paul would write about the end times For the closing of Daniel chapter 10 11 and 12 are these words but you Daniel Seal up the words of this book Until the time of the end Many shall run to and fro but knowledge shall increase You can see Michael in the book of Revelation binding the dragon the evil one saint and casting him into a pit You can see him as the restrainer of this godless World opposed to the church until he's taken out of the way What is most convincing to me is that a Jewish rabrize interpreted The great restrainer of evil in the end times to be Michael They said in one of their writings Michael who restraints him whom they call the great dragon shall someday be removed Paul was one of these rabbis and I believe in just my humble opinion He was saying that there was angelic force Kind of embodied in Michael the archangel the defender of God's people and Old Testament and new That is restraining this evil one and this great evil but there will be a time When God says to Michael back off and let this thing follow its full course That leads to the man of the great revelation The anti-Christ in verse three Let no one deceive you in any way for that day will not come unless the rebellion comes first And the man of lawlessness is revealed The son of destruction who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship So that he takes a seat in the temple of God proclaiming himself to be God Now down to verse eight and then the lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of saint and with all power and false signs and wonders And with all wicked deception for those who are perishing because they refuse to love the truth and so be saved Therefore God sends them a strong delusion So that they may believe what is false In order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness now Though Paul never calls him the anti-Christ That in Christian theology and Bible studies is what this man is come to be known as We know this he's anti-nomean He's called the lawless one He is doomed the son of destruction He is blasphemous who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship He is the enemy who opposes God the law and the church Antichrist by the way does not meet against Christ Anting Greek means another He's just another false savior another one who propounds Some way to be saved from our troubles other than through Jesus Christ He is the progenitor of false religion and false gospels They are pseudo-Christian But they are not rooted in Christ John Stott writes the fundamental theme of opposition to God is long been in the history of the church Both in the New Testament references to the anti-Christ and the Old Testament background as well The prophets detected this arrogant spirit in the surrounding pagan emperors It was during the second century before Christ That the most notable embodiment of rebellion against God and his people took place And the idea of the anti-Christ was born Of course, we know who that is It was a man named Antiochus epiphanies the fourth The one who Daniel wrote about and Daniel chapter 11 and 12 Who exalted himself above God Who was guilty about Dan who called the abomination of desolation the defilement of the temple Who um according to Daniel Took no count of the gods of his fathers or the god of heaven but became his own god worshipping the power of his army And afflicting the people of God and taking them into defilement and desolation
This same person is talked about by Jesus Christ in Matthew For money will come in my name and say I am the Christ And they will lead many astray For false Christ and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders So as to lead astray even if possible the elect Paul is borrowing from the exact language of Jesus To explain to the Thessalonians This great evil event and Jesus says when you see this abomination of desolation spoken by the prophets standing in the holy place Let the readers understand Know that the end is near Mark would say for in those days there will be such a tribulation Has has not been from the beginning of creation Since God created it until now and never shall be again And if the Lord had not cut short those days no human being would be saved But for the sake of the elect whom he chose he shortened the days And then if anyone says do you look here is the Christ or over there there he is do not believe them For false Christ and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders to lead astray even possible to people of God Beyond your guard I have told you these things in advance Who is this antichrist John says he's many people John is the one who actually gives him the title antichrist In his epistles he said children We know that it is the last hour As you have heard that antichrist is coming and so now many antichrist are in the world He says this is the spirit of the antichrist To deny that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh He would say in second John for many deceivers have gone out into the world Those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ into flesh Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist It's not that this Antichrist this one called the man of lawlessness that Paul reports about here is any stronger or more evil than the other ones It's just that he's aided in his lawlessness By a great rebellion a great apostasy an age of lawlessness It's as if he was born for the apostate times in which he flourishes in his influence both political and spiritual Zith antichrist according to Paul will be revealed by God and then the lawless one will be revealed He will be empowered by Satan by the activity of Satan he says Aided by the ignorance of lawlessness because they refused to love the truth And destroyed by Jesus Christ whom the Lord Christ will kill or slay with the breath of his mouth Who is this antichrist? The Emperor of Rome Titus Flavius who destroyed Jerusalem in 7080 Aleric the Visigoth who sacked Rome in 410 the corrupt popes of the age of reformation Persecuting kings of England Muhammad Aidaf Hitler Joseph Stalin Mussolini Unpopular U.S. presidents Jane and I were chuckling on the way in when we were young people in church people said it was Henry Kissinger Can you imagine that most of you don't know who Henry Kissinger is? I'll tell you the antichrist is it's any coach of the Michigan Wolverines They defile godly people they're lawless They consider themselves the lords of the earth and if you went to Ann Arbor they'd say it's any coach of the Ohio state buck guys We don't know who it is there are many of them It's as if all these other Christ or offering us Another way to God Another way to escape judgment Another way to be acceptable To heaven itself Without Jesus Christ But there obviously will be one. I don't want to downplay this passage I don't want to explain it away because we can't explain who it is There will be one Much more powerful than all who before him Who is the last line of these false prophets Who will sway the world Away from Jesus Christ just as Jesus Christ is reaching the very ends of the earth for himself
We best not speculate who it is that's worthless There's really no way to resist his coming that is futile it is ordained by God We just need to be aware of the reality That we are living in times right for his coming But we don't want to despair This is the last thing Paul says there is this great rebellion this grand restraint and this This revelation of God But then There is a gospel redemption Look at verses 13 through 17 But we ought always to give thanks to God for you Beloved of the Lord Because God chose you as the first fruits to be saved through the sanctification by the spirit And in belief in the truth To this he called you through our gospel so that you may obtain glory of our Lord Jesus Christ So then brothers Stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us either by our spoken word or by our letter Now may the Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace Comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and good word Here's the most lovely word in this complicated and discouraging passage but But we ourselves Will always give thanks to God for you brothers Beloved by the Lord Because God chose you as the first fruits to be saved The people at the end of the last paragraph will be destroyed Those who go into lawlessness with the anti Christ But their church will be redeemed because they are beloved of the Lord God loves them They are chosen by God his elect They are sanctified by the spirit And belief in the truth There are people who attend to the Bible And they are called through the gospel They have repented of their sins and put their faith in Jesus Christ and are trusting him now And on the day of the Lord the day of judgment They will obtain he says glory in Christ Comfort and establishment Notice this inclusio I want you to notice how Paul brackets this passage Look at verse two Do not be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed either by a spirit or a spoken word or a letter Now look at verse 15 So then brothers stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught to us either by our spoken word or letter It is through the preaching of the gospel that spoken were in the letters The New Testament the Bible the word is spoken and the word written for us That we find the apostolic tradition the Krugma the proclamation And the writings of God Who though maybe difficult to understand as Peter says at times Give us the assurance of things hope for in the conviction of things not seen And guide us in the way of salvation Paul's prayer at the close of this passage sums it all up Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself And God our father who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace Comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word He says in effect don't buy into all this weird eschatology Don't try to figure out when Christ will come Who the antichrist will be who this restrainer really is These are speculations that are beyond your capacity or your permission
Don't get caught up into an age of lawlessness or apostasy Lawlessness comes from being angry with what the Bible says you ought to do every good work And apostasy comes from boredom Drifting away from the things you've heard again and again every good word There are two ways to enter into this Rawlessness and apostasy through boredom and rebellion Through resentment of what God tells us Or through just taking for granted the church the Christ The gospel the Bible And yawning in great boredom and difference He says don't make those mistakes But do this Focus on Jesus Christ on the love of God the grace of the Holy Spirit and establish your lives and God's good word and good work in His word And in his work that is in the Bible and in the church What God is saying to mankind and the people through whom God is working in the world He ends the same way here as he ends and the passage to look at this morning Therefore my beloved brothers be steadfast Inmovable always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain this much we do know We know that apostasy is coming the lawlessness will increase and that Jesus is coming again We know that we must endure and be faithful That's all we can do and all that's required of us And Jesus Christ knows the rest And we'll figure it out in due time
And then many will fall away And betray one another and hate one another And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray And because the lawlessness will be increased the love of many will grow cold But the one who endures to the end is the one to be saved And this gospel of the kingdom We'll be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all the nations And then the end will come That's what Jesus said That's all we need to know And the rest is speculation that leads to lawlessness and apostasy Things we want to avoid Because we don't know when he's coming But Jesus is coming again Soon Let's pray Father, we look at this passage and we come away from it in some ways dissatisfied There are things we would like to know But there are some things the scriptures tell us that we don't need to know In fact, there are certain things that if we knew them they would unsettle us greatly And we would not be able to handle them properly Like the date you would return And who this evil one is that will arise at the end of time And how the restrainer is working today in the world You have withheld these things from us and from the church at large for obvious reasons But not because you were negligent or you didn't know these things or you didn't care It is out of great love for us that you've given us what you have in the scriptures These writings of the prophets and the apostles and the sayings of Jesus Christ your son To prepare us to be steadfast and movable always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing that what we do Is never a waste of time in Jesus Christ But it's preparing for us an eternal weight of glory in the end time and a great reward if we endure to the end Use this passage to stir up our interest in the Bible To make us more zealous to serve Christ in this church To me more urgent and insistent with our loved ones In calling them to repentance and faith and to the kingdom of God knowing that the day of the Lord is at hand And judgment is coming Jesus is coming again And help us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as Peter says With what we have in these means of grace These writings of Paul These things are sufficient on to eternal life Godliness and glory and for this we find comfort and give you thanks in Jesus name amen