g the Thessalonians had evidently misunderstood,
and this misunderstanding was working mischief among them. They had
false hopes and expectations. Their faith, instead of exciting them to
holy activity in Church and State, had begun to paralyse all their
efforts. "For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that _we_
which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent
them which are asleep; for the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trump of God;
and the dead in Christ shall rise first (that is, before Christ
descends); then _we_ which are alive and remain shall be caught up
together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so
shall _we_ ever be with the Lord" (1 Thess. iv. 15-17). It was the
frequent use of the pronoun "we" that had confused them--_we_ who remain,
_we_ who are alive. The Thessalonians had inferred from this that the
second coming of Christ would take place in their day. Hence, to correct
this impression Paul thus writes in his second epistle. The two verses
preceding the text show us Paul's intent. "Now we beseech you, brethren,
by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together
unto Him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by
spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ
is at hand." Then comes in the text, "Let no man deceive you," &c.

In reasoning on such important subjects as Anti-Christ, resurrection, and
second coming of Christ, we should always be mindful of the Scriptural
order. When we sit down to take dinner, we follow the order that custom
has prescribed, soup, fish, meats, and dessert. Children, however, if
let alone, would reverse this order by beginning with the dessert first.
So with many Christians, they reverse the order of things as laid down in
the Bible. They make Christ to come before Anti-Christ, and Anti-Christ
to come before the Jews and Ten Lost Tribes are gathered together again
and settled after their first estate in Palestine. The Millerites could
neither have deceived themselves nor others had they taken knowledge of
the relation of things. The Jews and Lost Tribes had not been gathered
together then, the temple had not been built in Jerusalem, as described
in the last chapter of Ezekiel, neither had Anti-Christ appeared. But
such was the folly of men then, and not less now than then.