The Anti-christ IS the "restrainer"?

[Originalist]

Originally Posted by mfblume

Right... Or the holy ghost being the restrainer,.

Okay. I think I see it now. MTD is partially right. Mike Blume is partially right.

Here is a paraphrased version of what I feel the verses are saying concerning the restrainer.....



1 Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters,

2 not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter—asserting that the day of the Lord has already come.

3 Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs (falling away, apostasy) and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction.

4 He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple , proclaiming himself to be God.

5 Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things?

6 And now you know what is holding him (the anti-Christ) back (the falling away that must first come is what is holding him back from taking power), so that he may be revealed at the proper time (right after the falling away).

7 For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one restraining (the coming of Christ) will continue to do so until he is taken out of the midst of the apostasy/falling away (he will be a product of the falling away.)

8 And then the lawless one will be revealed (from the midst of the falling away), whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming.