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Welcome to our look at 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 verses 9 to 12 today. This is
day 4 of our look at this chapter in daily drive time devotions. Let me begin by
reading those verses to you, verses 9 to 12.

The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan,
displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs, and wonders, and in every
sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they
refuse to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason, God sends them a
powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be
condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.

The center of these verses is about the perishing. We've talked about the man of
lawlessness the last couple of days, but these verses talk about the influence
that this man of lawlessness has on those who've refused to believe in God,
believe in Jesus. And the phrase it uses here is the perishing.

We're all perishing before we come to know Christ. We're all headed for an
eternity of separation from God before we come to know him. And these verses
talk about, they indicate the great dividing line in history, the dividing line
where the perishing will reject God's work and message and will be drawn towards
Satan's work and message.

But on the other side of that line, the called will reject Satan's work and
message and will be drawn towards God's work and message. And these verses talk
about what's going to happen, particularly to the perishing. We're going to talk
about the called tomorrow.

But the perishing, the word used here is they will be deceived. Remember Paul
talked at the beginning about not being deceived and he says here if you're
perishing you're inevitably going to be deceived. What will they be deceived by?

Well he says they'll be deceived by the work of Satan. Satan is a liar. Satan is
an accuser.

Satan is a deceiver. That's the kind of work that he does. Now I don't have to
buy the lie.

Those who buy the lie are those who have rejected God's message. And if you
reject God's message, if you think you're going to just believe in yourself,
that's not the way human minds work. We're always looking for some truth to
latch onto.

If you reject the truth, you're inevitably going to hold onto a lie. They're
going to be deceived by the work of Satan. They're going to be deceived
specifically by the lawless ones' display of the work of Satan.

They have set themselves up to believe in this lie. This lawless one is going to
come and he's going to have counterfeit miracles. Wow.

Counterfeit signs. Counterfeit wonders. Counterfeit by the way means it looks
like the real thing but it's a fake.

And Satan can counterfeit all of those things. If you're depending on some
miracle, some sign, some wonder for your faith, for your belief in God, then
you're setting yourself up. What you depend on is the fact that God in human
flesh came into this world and gave his life for you on a cross.

He loved you that much. That's what you lean on. That's what you depend on.

You don't depend on some wow, some firework show. You depend on love, reality,
relationship. Those who are looking for the wow, those who are looking only for
the spiritual excitement and thrill, they are setting themselves up to believe
this lie.

Because Satan lies. They're going to be set up by the work of Satan, by the
lawless one's display. In fact, it says here by every sort of evil.

Those who rejected God are drawn towards evil because we all want to somehow be
satisfied inside, be fulfilled inside. And the scary thing that happens is when
we reject God, we think somehow we can be fulfilled by evil and all evil does is
destroy us. These verses talk about those who are perishing, who will be
deceived.

Who are these who are perishing? Well, in verse 10, the Bible tells us they
perish because they refuse to love the truth and so be saved. These are people
who refused, who chose not to accept the truth that God had shown them about
their need of him.

And because of their choice, because of their choice, these verses say that God
will send them a powerful delusion. You read that and you think, what is this
talking about? Why would God delude people?

God wants to tell people the truth. Let me just walk you through the meaning of
these verses. God's not making up people's minds here.

God's not fooling people here. That's not what this means. God will send them a
powerful delusion.

It's not saying that God deludes them. They're already deluded. They've already
decided.

He's sending a delusion that, let me put it this way, it essentially fulfills
their choice. They've decided they're going to believe a lie and God says, okay,
I'm going to send you a lie and they follow that choice. They could have chosen
something different and they wouldn't follow the delusion.

And what he's doing in this delusion is he's making what is unclear to us, the
conditions of a person's heart, abundantly clear for all to see. When people
follow the delusion, it shows their heart. It's like waving a bunch of money in
front of people.

If everybody says, oh, I'm an unselfish person. I don't care about money, but
you wave, say, $100,000 in front of them, you're going to find out pretty soon
who is deluded by the fact that money is going to solve all my problems and who
really meant I'm unselfish about it. God's going to send a lie and those who
have chosen against him are going to follow that lie.

And these verses are reminding us that there's no neutral ground. The idea that
rejecting the truth puts you on some moral high ground. I'm neutral about this.

It is ridiculous. To reject the truth is to set yourself up inevitably to
believe the lie. And it is a lie that always appeals to our pride.

Now we read these verses about God sending a delusion and it bothers some of us
because many people think of God like a hallmark card. He's nice no matter what.
He has good sentiment towards us no matter what the truth.

The fact is God responds to us as God with strength and sovereignty. Choose
against him and God will fulfill that choice. He'll give you the opportunity to
follow that lie to its logical end, destruction.

But choose to love him and God will fulfill that choice. God has sovereignly
decided to give you a choice. But that does not put you in ultimate control.

God is still God. So he talks here about people who reject the truth. They
accept the lie and then inevitably when you reject the truth and you accept the
lie inevitably you become the lie.

As I read these verses, it points out to me what I believe to be a false picture
in many people's minds about those who are perishing. Those who are perishing
believe the lie all the way to and through the end. We think sometimes that when
these who are perishing are rejected by God in the end, that they're going to
see the error of their ways and they're going to beg God to let them into
heaven.

As I read the Bible that is simply not true. Once you become the lie, you can't
see past the lie. Listen, I have seen enough people face hell on earth and let
that turn them even further from God.

Let that turn into even a deeper hatred of God that I have no doubt that in the
face of this actual hell, this actual separation for eternity from God, that
people will not express a desire to turn to God in that moment. They're going to
express a greater rejection of God. If you read the Bible carefully, people
don't go to hell wanting to accept God.

If they had a heart to accept God, they would have done it while they were here
on earth. People go into hell with a heart of rejection towards God. Someone on
our research team asked me a great question about this chapter, these verses.

They asked the question, how do I practically pass on this information to a
non-believer without turning them off to the Bible? These are difficult verses
to understand. So how do I share these kind of verses when an unbeliever is
asking about it?

Behind what they're asking, there is this idea that I need to be able to explain
perfectly in the Bible everything that's there if an unbeliever is going to
trust God and trust his word. And what I'd say to you about that is this. You
trusted God even though you didn't understand everything.

You believe the Bible even though there are some things that are difficult for
you to understand. So I'd say give people credit. Give people who have not yet
believed credit.

Truth is, I have never met a person who refused to believe in Jesus or in the
Bible because they couldn't figure out what the man of lawlessness meant. It's
okay to give people a simple explanation. The man of lawlessness is talking
about the fact that an evil one is going to come and a lot of people are going
to be drawn to him instead of God.

But I found that that's not the question that people are struggling with. I've
never met a person who's got that question and is keeping them from God. But
I've met hundreds who won't believe because they simply don't want to change
their lifestyle.

Their question is about, hey, I can't do this anymore with my life. I can't
drink this anymore in my life. I can't act this way.

I can't say this way. I can't believe this way anymore. I can't do the selfish
things I want to do anymore.

And so that keeps them from believing. So when you're talking about difficult
verses like this with an unbeliever, I would say trust them as God has trusted
them. God trusted the Bible into all of our hands.

Believer and unbeliever alike. And that is refreshing to me. It reminds me that
I don't have to try to be God and explain the reason that God put certain verses
in the Bible.

I can trust him. And I can trust the fact that he can work in people's hearts
even though there are difficult places in the Bible to understand. Now the last
thing you want to do is act like you understand it all.

I think the most refreshing thing sometimes an unbeliever can hear is, I haven't
figured it all out yet. But I have figured this out. It's clear to me that Jesus
loves me.

And it's clear to me that I'm understanding it better and better every day. I'm
growing closer and closer to him. I can have a relationship with him that lasts
all the way into eternity.

These are verses about the perishing. I would remind you that that is not the
end that God wants for any of us. The Bible tells us that God does not desire
that any of us should perish.

He wants all of us to come to know his son, Jesus Christ. So as we end, let's
thank God for his desire, for his will at work in this world today. Let's give
God thanks right now that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ
Jesus.

Thank him that those of us who come to know him are not perishing, but we're
looking forward to an eternity of joy with him. Thank Jesus that he came not to
condemn the world, but to save it. And if you're worried, if you're concerned
and anxious somehow that you're perishing, that you're apart from God, it
doesn't have to stay that way.

Jesus came to save you. Jesus came to give you a new life. So right now, say to
him, Jesus, my life's heading in the wrong direction.

Help me to do a U-turn. Head me in your direction, Jesus Christ. Give me a new
and fresh hope.

I don't want to be perishing. I don't want to believe the lie. I want to live
for your truth.

Help me to live the way that you made me to live. In your name I pray, Amen.
Well, I encourage you don't miss tomorrow.

We're going to be looking at verses 13 to 17. These are the verses that bring
this entire chapter together.