Quote:
Originally Posted by deacon blues
EB---tell me who was the "man of sin, the son of perdition" that was revealed before Jesus came?
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I personally believe that it is the Judaizers who were in the church prior to they being exposed by the destruction of the temple. Paul understood that the temple was the Body of Christ, and while he was writing to the Thessalonian church he would warn that the man of sin (
Romans 5:12-19 says the man of sin is Adam, and Jesus pointed out that the son of perdition is Judas
John 17:12) would be within the Body of Christ. This spirit would be antichrist
1 John 2:18 (not just opposing but being the substitute).
Paul also mentions a falling away first, which its beginnings is spoken of
2 Timothy 1:15 when the apostle tells the young evangelist that all they (ministers) had turned their backs on Paul. Paul also points out in
2 Timothy 4:10 all those who left him, mentioning that Demas left because he loved that present age, which would refer to law keeping. One thing that has to be kept in mind, is that Paul gives the time indicator as being an apostasy which would indicate that the end was near, that would not be an apostasy 2,000 years in the future, because it had to happen while the church was still pristine, new born, and not 2,000 years after 2600 different denominations cropped up? It also couldn't refer to an apostasy of Israelism, because that was already deep in trouble by the time Jesus got on the scene. Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Hellenists, and Zealots. Paul is warning a fledgling church of a time indicator that was clearly going to happen in their time (hence the warning) and the apostasy which they would have to deal with.
The hellenized Judean Christians were the ones who primarily went to Asia Minor, since Israelism was unknown to the Roman empire (due to it being a religion primarily to Judeans and just a few Romans who lived among them) the religion would now go throughout the known world as Christianity. The Judaizers took advantage of the lack of understanding that these new Roman converts had, and taught things they ought not
Titus 1:11, 1 Timothy 6:5, 2 Timothy 3:6,
Philippians 1:15, and were super apostles of
2 Corinthians 11:4, they were bringing in heresy and destroying the church. But at the days of God's vengeance
Luke 21:22 all things written would be completed, this would be the proper time that he would be exposed. In
Romans 1:18 states that the wrath of God would come against those who suppress the truth by their wickedness. This was what the Judaizers were doing during the time of Paul, and when Jesus' words concerning the temple were vindicated the Judaizers were exposed. At the days of vengeance
Luke 21:22 the Lord would expose the Judaizers with the breath of His mouth, and the brightness of His presence, showing that Jesus was right and that the Judaizers had not a love for the truth.
2 Thessalonians 2:10 shows that the man is now the "they" who left in
1 John 2:19, and were finally exposed because they had not a love for the truth unto salvation.
I was told that it was a man in some distant future who would sit in a rebuilt temple in Israel, and that those who were destroyed were those who left Apostolic Pentecost. But while the preacher preached, and teacher told, while studying the verses it was saying that the time indicator first and foremost was an apostasy, this apostasy had to happen prior to whoever it was would sit wherever they sat. But I was 2,000 years later in a movement which came out of other movements, that came out of yet other movements. Hey, the Great Schism in Eastern Orthodoxy was in 1054 A.D.?!? Martin Luther nailing paper work to a Roman church door in 1517? Azusa street was supposed to be Pentecost coming back in 1906? Hey, whatever anyone may think of what I posted of who is the who sitting in the temple of God, you still have to deal with Paul specifically pointing to an apostasy which would indicate everything coming together. Not apostasies, but an apostasy, and it wasn't Trinitarianism which would get formulated way after a multitude of other apostasies.