Books · When Christ Returns — Complete Table of Contents
The Thessalonians knew what Paul meant.
Do we?
In Part VI, we examined what must precede the Day of the Lord. But Paul's explanation contains another question: something was already holding back the Lawless One's unveiling.
What was it—and does its removal tell us when believers are gathered to Christ?
2 Thessalonians 2:5–8
Berean Standard Bible (BSB)
5 Do you not remember that I told you these things while I was still with you?
6 And you know what is now restraining him, so that he may be revealed at the proper time.
7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work, but the one who now restrains it will continue until he is taken out of the way.
8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will slay with the breath of His mouth and annihilate by the majesty of His arrival.
1. What they knew—and what we have
Paul appeals to earlier instruction. He had discussed these matters while present with the Thessalonians, and he expects them to recognize his reference.
We possess his written reminder, but not a complete transcript of that earlier conversation.
That helps explain why a statement intended to reassure its first readers has become a disputed passage for later ones. Paul can refer briefly to something they know; we must work from the explanation preserved in the letter.
This does not make interpretation hopeless. It means our confidence should follow the evidence we actually possess.
The restraint has a recognizable function. Its identity requires investigation.
2. What is being held back?
Two things are happening at the same time in 2 Thessalonians 2:6–7: lawlessness is already operating, and restraint is also operating.
In this context, the mystery of lawlessness points to evil already working before the opponent is openly revealed. On an individual interpretation, this does not require that a future opponent was personally alive in Paul's day. Existing lawlessness and the later unveiling are distinguishable.
The restraint therefore does not eliminate evil. Its particular role concerns the Lawless One's revelation at the proper time.
This preserves the distinction established in Part VI. An opponent's unveiling need not be his birth, first public appearance, or first political appointment. What is being delayed is his emergence in the role Paul describes.
The presence of persecution or deception therefore cannot, by itself, show that this restraint has ended. Paul places existing lawlessness alongside continuing restraint.
Any proposed identification must also account for Paul's own historical setting. The restraining activity was already present when he wrote.
3. Does the grammar identify the Restrainer?
Paul changes grammatical forms between the two verses. The terms neuter and masculine describe those forms; they do not, by themselves, tell us whether the restraining agent is human, angelic, or divine.
In 2 Thessalonians 2:6, the expression is neuter: to katechon, referring to what restrains.
In 2 Thessalonians 2:7, it is masculine: ho katechōn, referring to the one who restrains.
The ESV makes the distinction visible with “what is restraining him now” and “he who now restrains it.” (Greek text, 2:6; Greek text, 2:7; ESV)
This could fit a restraining power and the person exercising it, or an institution and its representative. It has also been used in arguments for the Holy Spirit.
But grammatical gender does not supply a name. The shift is a clue that an interpretation should explain; it cannot decide between the candidates by itself.
4. What does being “out of the way” mean?
The wording in 2 Thessalonians 2:7 deserves attention before we identify anyone.
The Greek expression describes the restrainer coming to be out of the midst or out of the way. The BSB renders the result as being taken out of the way. The expression itself does not specify a destination, an ascent to heaven, or who causes the change. (2 Thessalonians 2:7, Greek text)
Within Paul's argument, the result is clear: the restraint no longer prevents the unveiling, and the Lawless One is then revealed.
That could involve the removal of an agent, the loss of an institution's authority, or the ending of a particular restraining activity. Which explanation fits depends partly on who or what the restrainer is.
The end of a restraining role does not, by itself, establish departure from the earth.
Paul also uses different wording here from the verb for being caught up in 1 Thessalonians 4:17. Different wording does not rule out a connection between the events, but that connection must come from the argument and context. Being out of the way is not itself a technical expression for the rapture. (1 Thessalonians 4:17, Greek text)
Paul gives an endpoint to the restraint without explaining what brings it about. He does not describe the Lawless One overpowering the restrainer.
5. Could the Restrainer be the Holy Spirit?
The Spirit interpretation has a substantial theological rationale. The opponent's activity is empowered by Satan, and the Spirit possesses the power to oppose him. Jesus describes the Spirit's work in confronting the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment. (John 16:8–11)
That makes the proposal coherent. Yet the Spirit's opposition to evil does not automatically identify Him as the particular restrainer in this passage.
The proposed removal also needs explanation. A careful version of this view understands an end to a particular restraining ministry while the Spirit continues other work. It need not claim that God the Spirit becomes absent from the earth.
Jesus' teaching supplies a concrete example of the Spirit's work amid persecution. When His disciples are arrested and brought before authorities, He tells them:
“for it will not be you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.”
The Spirit enables threatened disciples to bear witness. His activity is not exhausted by the particular restraining function proposed in 2 Thessalonians 2. Feinberg likewise appeals to this passage when explaining why the cessation of restraint need not mean the end of the Spirit's other work. (Feinberg, section III)
This comparison does not, by itself, locate the promised help in Mark before or after the ending of Paul's restraint. Its contribution is more modest: a proposed change in one ministry must be distinguished from a claim that all the Spirit's work has ceased. Neither the Spirit's continuing activity nor His divine presence, considered alone, settles the timing of the gathering.
That distinction matters. A change in the Spirit's activity does not inherently require a change in the Church's location.
The Spirit interpretation remains plausible. Its connection to the rapture requires an additional argument.
6. Could it be the Spirit working through the Church?
This is where the restraint question most directly enters the rapture debate.
One proposal identifies the Church itself as the restraining presence. Another identifies the Holy Spirit as the personal agent and the Church as His present instrument.
There is a biblical basis for linking the Spirit with the believing community: Paul describes that community as God's temple, indwelt by His Spirit. (1 Corinthians 3:16–17)
The proposed interpretation involves three steps:
First: the Spirit exercises this particular restraint through the Church.
Second: Christ gathers the Church, ending that ministry of restraint through it.
Third: the Lawless One is then revealed.
If those connections are established, they would support a gathering before the unveiling. This is a meaningful argument and deserves to be examined on its strongest terms.
Its central difficulty is establishing the connections. The Spirit's indwelling of believers does not itself show that He performs this particular restraint exclusively through them. Nor does the cessation of restraint automatically identify the gathering as its cause.
Paul Feinberg makes this distinction while defending a Pre-Tribulation rapture. He favors identifying the restrainer with the Holy Spirit, yet explains that using this identification to establish the rapture's timing requires showing that the relevant restraint operates only through the Church. (Feinberg, “The Rapture and 2 Thessalonians 2,” section III)
The question is therefore more precise than whether Christians oppose evil. It is whether Paul identifies their removal as the necessary condition for this opponent's unveiling.
The passage leaves that connection to be argued.
7. Could Roman authority or civil government be restraining him?
The governmental interpretation has an early history.
Tertullian explicitly identifies the restraining power with the Roman state in chapter 24 of On the Resurrection of the Flesh. He understands its dissolution as preparing the way for the opponent's appearance. The Roman proposal therefore appears in Christian interpretation before Chrysostom. (Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh, chapter 24)
That early witness deserves weight. It shows how an interpreter closer to the ancient imperial setting understood the passage. But proximity does not demonstrate that Tertullian possessed Paul's oral explanation, and accepting his testimony as historical evidence does not require accepting his whole account of Rome's division and the ensuing events.
John Chrysostom discusses both the Spirit and Roman interpretations, then favors Roman imperial authority. He suggests that Paul spoke cautiously because openly predicting the empire's dissolution could expose Christians to danger. This is Chrysostom's explanation of Paul's wording, rather than an explanation Paul supplies. (Chrysostom, Homily 4 on Second Thessalonians)
His discussion also needs to be read precisely. The Spirit interpretation he rejects is described in terms of the Spirit's grace or gifts, and his objection appeals to their cessation. We should not automatically treat that particular proposal as identical to every modern interpretation involving the Spirit's restraint through the Church.
Augustine provides a useful reminder of the limits of this historical evidence. Discussing the passage in The City of God, he writes:
“I frankly confess I do not know what he means.”
He considers Roman and other interpretations while acknowledging that Paul's first readers knew something later readers must try to recover. Early testimony gives the Roman reading a substantial history; it does not establish unanimous certainty or supply the missing conversation with the Thessalonians.
The proposal has several strengths. Civil authority can restrain disorder. Paul elsewhere describes governing authorities as servants responsible for punishing wrongdoing. An imperial institution and its ruler can also provide a plausible explanation for the grammatical shift. (Romans 13:1–4)
We should distinguish two forms of the view.
A historical Roman interpretation connects the restraint to a particular imperial order and interprets the opponent's emergence in relation to changes in that order. Its historical identifications and its account of Christ's destruction of the opponent must be tested together.
A broader governmental interpretation understands civil order as a continuing restraint that eventually collapses or gives way to the opponent. It must explain why Paul's description points to that general function and what ends it.
If an interpretation places the end of restraint in the past, Rome's decline may be part of its proposed fulfillment. Pointing out that ancient Rome no longer exists does not refute that reading. The test is whether the proposed history fits Paul's account, including the opponent's eventual defeat by Christ.
There is also a tension to acknowledge: government can restrain wrongdoing, but Daniel and Revelation portray political power becoming an instrument of oppression. The proposal concerns authority performing a restraining function; it cannot assume every government is righteous.
8. Could the Restrainer be Michael—or another angel?
The angelic interpretation deserves serious consideration because Daniel portrays heavenly conflict connected with earthly kingdoms.
In Daniel 10:13, Michael assists the heavenly messenger against the prince of Persia. In Daniel 10:20–21, the conflict also involves the prince of Greece, and Michael is identified with Daniel's people. This supplies a biblical setting in which an angelic agent opposes hostile powers. (Daniel 10:13,20–21)
Revelation gives an even more direct example of an angel exercising restraint. John sees an angel descend from heaven with the key to the Abyss and a great chain. Then:
“He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.”
The following verse connects this binding with preventing Satan from deceiving the nations until the appointed period ends. The vision supplies biblical grounds for considering restraint exercised through an angelic agent. God's supremacy over Satan does not require every act of restraint to be performed immediately by a divine person.
This does not identify the unnamed angel as Michael or equate Satan's binding with the restraint of the Lawless One's unveiling. Nor does it transfer Revelation's thousand-year setting into Paul's paragraph. It establishes the possibility of delegated angelic restraint; the particular identity and timing still require their own evidence.
Daniel then places Michael alongside extraordinary distress and deliverance:
“At that time Michael, the great prince who stands watch over your people, will rise up. There will be a time of distress, the likes of which will not have occurred from the beginning of nations until that time. But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered.”
Who are “your people” in this setting? Daniel is speaking about his people, Israel. Earlier he explicitly refers to “my people Israel” in Daniel 9:20. The promise in Daniel 12:1 further identifies those delivered as the people whose names are written in the book. (Daniel 9:20)
Michael's connection with Israel gives the proposal its immediate setting. Relating that guardianship to Paul's congregation or to a wider restraining role requires an argued comparison of the passages. We should neither substitute the Church automatically for Daniel's referent nor assume that Michael can have no wider role.
These connections explain why Michael is proposed as Paul's restrainer. He is already portrayed opposing hostile powers and defending God's people, and he appears in a passage concerning unparalleled distress.
Advocates of a withdrawal interpretation also appeal to an ancient Greek form of Daniel 12:1. The Greek witnesses need to be distinguished here.
The Old Greek has pareleusetai (παρελεύσεται), rendered “will pass by.” Theodotion, another ancient Greek form of Daniel, has anastēsetai (ἀναστήσεται), “will arise.” These are different renderings of Michael's action; speaking simply of “the LXX” can conceal the difference. (Daniel 12:1, Old Greek and Theodotion)
In his explanation of Colin Nicholl's argument, Alan Kurschner appeals to the Old Greek wording as part of the case for Michael's withdrawal from a restraining role. On this proposal, Michael's prior guardianship supplies the background, his passing by is understood as a cessation of that restraint, and the extraordinary distress follows. The argument seeks to connect Daniel's heavenly protector with the change Paul describes. (Kurschner's presentation of the Michael interpretation)
Here we should apply the same distinction already granted to the Spirit interpretation. A proposed end to Michael's particular restraint need not mean his disappearance, loss of power, or abandonment of every protective task. He could cease one form of restraint while continuing other activity. That is a possible formulation of the proposal, not something these passages have already established. The question is whether Daniel and Paul actually describe the proposed change of role.
But the proposal encounters an important limitation.
In the Hebrew-based wording quoted above, Daniel says Michael rises up. It does not explicitly identify that action with ending the particular restraint Paul describes.
The Hebrew verb behind Michael's action comes from the root ʿāmad. Daniel uses the same root when describing kings who arise in Daniel 11:2–3. Those nearby uses give us concrete examples of emerging into a position of authority. (Hebrew text, Daniel 11:2; 11:3; 12:1)
The root has other uses too. The Brown–Driver–Briggs Hebrew lexicon includes standing still, stopping, or ceasing; in 2 Kings 4:6, it describes the oil ceasing to flow. It would therefore be too strong to say that the Hebrew word can never express cessation. But a meaning attested in one setting cannot simply be transferred to another. We must ask what Michael's action means within this particular account of guardianship, distress, and deliverance. (BDB, ʿāmad)
In the setting of his guardianship and the promised deliverance, rising to intervene is a natural reading. Turning that action into withdrawal requires further argument. We should not make the English expression carry a meaning supplied by a preferred timeline.
The Old Greek broadens the evidence to be weighed, but reading “will pass by” as the ending of Michael's particular restraining role remains an interpretive step. That meaning must be established from its context. Paul uses a different expression for coming to be out of the way, and he does not identify Michael by name.
Daniel's setting also includes more than distress. Deliverance is promised in verse 1, and resurrection follows in verse 2. A proposed interpretation must account for that whole movement. The association of Michael, suffering, deliverance, and resurrection makes the passage relevant to our investigation; it does not independently prove that every event corresponds to the same moment in Paul's argument. (Daniel 12:1–3)
Revelation adds another relevant scene. Michael and his angels fight the dragon, who is expelled from heaven. The announcement that follows warns of the devil's fury on earth because his remaining time is short. Heavenly victory has consequences for earthly suffering. (Revelation 12:7–12)
This strengthens the plausibility of heavenly conflict behind the crisis. To identify that battle with the ending of Paul's restraint, however, we would need to establish both the connection between the events and the battle's timing. Revelation's scene cannot simply be assigned a place in a future timetable without argument.
An angelic restrainer is a serious possibility. Michael is a plausible candidate. Neither identification is established by an explicit cross-reference.
The wider investigation of supernatural powers belongs in Part XX. Here its contribution is limited: it broadens the evidence we should consider without independently settling chronology.
9. Is the ultimate answer God's own restraint?
Paul connects the unveiling with its proper time and concludes with Christ destroying the opponent. Read within that argument, the restraint supports a theological conclusion: the opponent's emergence remains subject to God's purposes.
God may exercise restraint directly or through an agent. That allows the Spirit, angelic, and governmental proposals to overlap at the level of divine sovereignty while differing about the immediate means.
But saying that God ultimately governs events does not identify the particular restrainer Paul expected the Thessalonians to recognize.
We should keep those two questions distinct: Who governs the outcome? And through whom or what is the present restraint exercised?
The passage gives us greater confidence about the first than the second.
10. Does identifying the Restrainer settle the gathering's timing?
The timing argument requires more than a proposed name.
For the familiar Pre-Tribulation argument from the Restrainer to work, we would need to establish that the Church's gathering ends the relevant restraint, while accounting for Paul's whole argument.
Identifying the Spirit alone does not tell us that the Church must be gathered for the restraint to end.
Even if those connections were established, before the unveiling would not automatically mean before an entire seven-year tribulation. That further conclusion depends on where the unveiling belongs within the proposed chronology. These verses do not specify a seven-year period.
The same discipline applies to competing models. Identifying Michael would not, by itself, establish a Pre-Wrath or Post-Tribulation gathering. We would still need to connect his activity, the Lawless One's unveiling, the Day, and the gathering through the relevant passages.
Part VI remains our starting point. Second Thessalonians 2:3 directly places the rebellion and the unveiling before the Day. The relationship of those conditions to our gathering depends on the surrounding argument.
Part VI concluded that the continuous reading gives strong contextual support for placing our gathering after both the rebellion and the Lawless One's unveiling. That remains this study's preferred reading. The connection emerges from Paul's discussion of Christ's coming, our gathering, the Day, and the opponent's defeat; it is not a claim that verse 3 explicitly names the gathering.
This conclusion does not place the rebellion before the unveiling, specify whether they overlap, or measure their distance from the Day. Nor does it require every action associated with Christ's coming to occur at the same instant. Uncertainty about the immediate restraining agent does not erase the argument already made from the surrounding passage.
An uncertain restrainer identification should contribute to that investigation in proportion to its evidence. It should not become an assumed fact used to decide the entire chronology.
The conclusion is limited but useful: the Restrainer passage does not independently establish a rapture timetable.
11. The certainty Paul gives his readers
The identity remains open, but Paul's explanation still gives us something substantial.
Lawlessness is already active. Restraint delays the opponent's unveiling. That restraint reaches its endpoint, the opponent is revealed, and Jesus destroys him at the manifestation of His coming.
We are not given a duration between each of those events. Nor does the unnamed restrainer resolve the relationship between the gathering and the opponent's defeat. That question remains for Part XIV.
Paul's reassurance finally rests on Christ's victory. The opponent whose unveiling troubles readers is the opponent whom Jesus will bring to an end.
The chapter therefore leads its readers toward steadfastness. Paul calls them to hold to the instruction they received and prays that they will be strengthened in faithful words and actions. (2 Thessalonians 2:15–17)
We can acknowledge an unresolved identity while remaining confident in that promised outcome. Honest uncertainty about the Restrainer need not become uncertainty about Christ.
But another question now comes into view. Revelation portrays faithful witnesses who face the dragon and the Beast. How do those witnesses relate to the churches addressed at the beginning of the book?
Why does Revelation prepare the churches to overcome—and what does that preparation tell us about the suffering it describes?
Next: Part VIII — Why Does Revelation Prepare the Churches to Overcome?
Scripture and source notes
1. Paul’s wording. Compare the neuter expression in 2 Thessalonians 2:6 with the masculine in 2:7. Grammatical gender does not identify the agent. Coming to be out of the way specifies neither an ascent nor a destination; compare the different wording for being caught up in 1 Thessalonians 4:17.
2. The Spirit and the Church. John 16:8–11; 1 Corinthians 3:16–17; and Mark 13:11 inform this proposal. Paul D. Feinberg, 2 Thessalonians 2 and the Rapture, section III, favors the Spirit while acknowledging that a rapture argument requires establishing that this particular restraint operates exclusively through the Church. Ending one ministry does not mean ending all the Spirit’s work.
3. Early Christian interpretations. Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh 24, and Chrysostom, Homily 4 on Second Thessalonians, support the Roman interpretation. Augustine, The City of God 20.19, considers proposals while acknowledging uncertainty. These witnesses establish an early history of interpretation; they do not demonstrate unanimous certainty or recover Paul’s earlier oral instruction.
4. Angelic conflict and restraint. Daniel 10:13, 20–21 portrays Michael opposing hostile powers. Revelation 20:1–3 shows an angel restraining Satan, while 12:7–12 connects heavenly conflict with earthly consequences. These passages establish the possibility of angelic agency without identifying Paul’s restrainer or placing all three scenes at the same point in a chronology.
5. Daniel 12:1’s textual forms. The Old Greek and Theodotion texts differ: pareleusetai (“will pass by”) and anastēsetai (“will arise”). Brown–Driver–Briggs, ʿāmad, records both standing/arising and stopping senses, including oil ceasing to flow in 2 Kings 4:6. Context determines which sense applies; lexical possibility alone does not establish Michael’s withdrawal.
6. The Michael proposal. Alan Kurschner’s presentation of Colin R. Nicholl’s argument explains the proposed connection between Michael and Paul’s restraint. Test it against the whole movement of Daniel 12:1–3: guardianship, distress, deliverance, and resurrection. Daniel’s immediate reference is to his people Israel; a wider application requires argument.
7. Timing and assurance. Second Thessalonians 2:1–8, 15–17 supplies the controlling context. The restraint ends, the opponent is revealed, and Christ defeats him; the intervals are not measured. Identifying the agent does not independently settle the gathering’s timing. Paul’s closing emphasis is steadfastness and encouragement, allowing confidence in Christ’s victory alongside uncertainty about the Restrainer.