2 Thessalonians 2:8-17 TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES Strangely, many people are attracted to secrets and cannot seem satisfied until they know what has been hidden. The secret of lawlessness, "the mystery of lawlessness," has been known to God but, for the most part, hidden from men because there has been a certain outward cover of decency and civilized behavior imposed on people by law. After the rapture of the church, people will learn by bitter experience the alternative to Christ being Lord of all. The lawlessness hidden to a degree will break out without restraint. That hidden force from which sin springs will bring lawlessness and violence across this world, motivated by Satan and the "man of sin (lawlessness)" who is under Satan's control. One of the names of the antichrist is "Wicked." There will be a supernatural working of evil in him, empowered by Satan. This man will be "revealed" and will come on the world scene suddenly as an extremely powerful person. The whole world will see him.
The point of Paul's letter, and the same should be about our teaching, is not to give all kinds of information about this evil man or to try to figure out who he is. He is not going to be able to withstand the power and authority of the Lord. He will be exposed for who he is when the Lord Jesus Christ appears, and our Lord will destroy him. He will be rendered entirely useless and cast into the lake of fire. God's purposes are going to come to pass no matter how strong the enemies seem to be. The Lord's people are on the side of the Victor, not the vanquished. The rapture is our anticipation, not what comes after. These may be awful days for the persecuted saints, but our rest comes in glory. We don't have to be occupied with the antichrist. The Lord will deal with him by His power and "the brightness of His coming" when He is revealed from heaven and appears in glory.