Is the Restrainer Removed

That's Carter Conlon from the historic Times Square Church in New York City. Our prayer is leading us to a true relationship with God.

That's what it's all about. God, put your Spirit upon me again in a new way that I've never known. Give me the courage to fight for this generation.

That's Carter Conlon from Times Square Church in New York City. We're glad you're with us today on A Call to the Nation. In 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, the Bible tells us for the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. He who now restrains will do so only until he is taken out of the way. Let's join Carter Conlon now as he begins his message titled, Is the Restrainer Removed?

Is the Restrainer Removed? And it's from 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 beginning at verse 7. Now Paul is writing about a time of lawlessness in the world, a season of lawlessness.

It's always been at work, but it's going to culminate in the last days in an unspeakable lawlessness. Now we've seen it periodically throughout history. We saw it in Rwanda, for example, in Africa when lawlessness broke out and neighbors started killing neighbor indiscriminately and some even, sad to say, thought they were doing it in the name of God. We've seen it in World War II.

We've seen it in various places. When the restraint against lawlessness is removed, it is in the heart of all of humanity to do evil, even your life and my life. The only thing that restrains us is the power of God's Holy Spirit. The truth of God's Word, the redemption that we have through God's Son is the only thing that restrains us from doing that which our sin nature would like to do. Paul says in chapter 2, verse 7, the mystery of lawlessness is already at work.

Only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with his breath of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of his coming. Now I want to read you from the Full Life Study Bible commentary just to comment on this particular passage of scripture, particularly verse 7 when it says this mystery of lawlessness is already at work. The mystery of iniquity or spirit of rebellion operates behind the scenes throughout the course of human history, preparing the way for the rebellion and the man of lawlessness, also known as the Antichrist. It is an insidious process that entraps unbelievers and prepares many within the church to turn from true faith and to accept the lie emboldened in the apostate church. It involves a spirit or movement against true biblical faith and divine law. It seeks freedom from moral restraint and it takes pleasure in sin. Though this spirit existed already in Paul's day, it will increase on an accelerated scale and it be especially prevalent in the world and in religion at the end of the age, not only in the world, but in a religion that is part of this fallen condition in the world at the end of the age.

Paul the Apostle calls it a perilous time in 2 Timothy chapter 3, a time when people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents. That means they despise all authority. They want no authority over them.

They want their own, no boundaries, no borders. They will be blasphemers against God, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, head strong, haughty, lovers of pleasure, more than lovers of God. And on top of all this, they have a form of godliness, but deny its power from such people turned away. For this sort are those who creep into households and take captive, gullible women loaded down with sins and led away by various lusts, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Just as Jambress resisted Moses, these also resist the truth. Men of corrupt minds disapprove concerning the faith, but they will progress no farther, for their folly will be manifested to all as there also was. And so here we have a situation evolving, Paul says, in the last days when there will be corruption in the name of God, corruption in the house of God. There will be a generation arise who don't esteem the word of God. They have their own thoughts, they have their own ways of perceiving truth, and they will bring this into the house of God.

They will make a boast of their study, but their study will never bring them to the place where God would have them to be or to become the people that God would have them to become. You know, when we look at this passage of Scripture and it says that these things will happen on the earth, this mystery of lawlessness will continue to work until that which holds it back will be taken out of the way. Now, when you study this and you look at some of the commentaries, some believe it's one angel, some believe it's four angels, some believe it's the rapture of the Christian church when the people of God are physically taken from this earth. My personal viewpoint on this verse of Scripture is the restrainer is the presence of God's Holy Spirit within his church on the earth. It is you and I that God uses to hold back this darkness that would swallow our entire society.

It would swallow up goodness, it would swallow up our families, it would swallow up civility, it would destroy our society. And when the work of God's Holy Spirit inside of a people is taken out of the way. Now, how does that happen in the Christian church? How is it possible that this restraining power of God's Holy Spirit can actually be taken out of the way allowing evil to progress? You see, it's important to understand this because you and I are the only ones that have the power to stand against this lawlessness.

We are the only ones who can push it back actually. The Bible tells us that when we pray we can command mountains to be cast into the sea and they will obey us. There are incredible promises that God gives to his people of things that he will do in unison with us when we walk with him in truth, in righteousness, and with faith at the center core of our hearts.

Now, first of all, the restrainer is taken out of the way when the Word of God is no longer the guide of the thoughts and actions of God's people. This is what Paul says is going to happen in the last days. There will be people who are studying this book, but they choose what to believe and choose what not to believe. They'll make excuses, for example, not to forgive those that have wronged them. They'll make excuses not to be under proper godly authority. They will make excuses for everything. They'll pick and choose what they want to believe. They're always learning, but the restraining power of God will not be working through them. As a matter of fact, they will be so assimilated into their society that they will look remarkably like it. They will think like it.

They will speak like it. Their speech does not restrain evil. Their behavior does not restrain evil. Their presence does not restrain evil.

As a matter of fact, they become actually partakers of it, according to the Apostle Paul, and cover it all up with Christian talk and learning and such like. Now Psalm 19, 105, the psalmist says, Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. But when I came to Christ, I submitted my thoughts to the Word of God. You remember, he says himself, your thoughts are not my thoughts. My thoughts are higher than your thoughts.

My ways are higher than your ways. So I submitted willfully my thoughts to the Word of God. If I thought something was right, and God said it was wrong that it became wrong.

It's really that simple. That's how the restraining power of God begins to work through somebody's life is when you and I are a people of the Word of God. The Word of God becomes our guide.

The Word of God, we don't try to push away certain parts of the Word of God and embrace other parts that we like and push away the hard parts, or agree with the parts that make us that kind of conform our worldview, and then push away those parts that don't know the Word of God actually becomes the source of our thinking. That's why we become new creations in Christ Jesus, the old things are passed away, and all things become new. The promise of God in the Old Testament to those who belong to God is a new heart, a new mind, and a new spirit. We become brand new in Christ Jesus. And by virtue of that, we become part of this force of God on the earth that restrains this lawlessness that would literally destroy our societies, our cities, our homes, our marriages, our families, our children, our grandchildren. We become that voice through whom God can speak. We become that life through whom God can be made manifest everywhere we walk, every room we go into, every conversation we enter. We become that restrainer as it is, putting forth the thoughts of God, the presence of God, the anointing of God walks with us and goes into every room. And we become of those who can open prison doors and set captives free and help to heal those that have been bruised in heart. It's through our lives that those who are poor in their own resources come to understand there's this treasure of heaven available to them through Jesus Christ, through his word, through the power of God's indwelling Holy Spirit. This is who we are on the earth.

This is our purpose on the earth. I remember several years ago being in Nigeria, in Joss, Nigeria, in the middle of a civil war. And God sends his little crew in from Times Square Church to do a three-night evangelistic service. And we saw a civil war in which 6,000 people had been recently killed. We saw a civil war actually come to an end by the presence and power of God. The restrainer had come and pushed back that form of darkness that was causing people to kill each other and burn each other's homes and places of worship. And suddenly there was forgiveness on both sides.

It was truly amazing. The governor of Nigeria wasn't there when this particular crusade happened. And he was so moved, so moved by what had happened when he came back that there was peace in a war-torn area of Nigeria that he flew with an entourage to New York City, came to my office and looked me in the eye and said, would you put your hands on me that I could too become a follower of Jesus Christ? He didn't understand it was by faith. I had to explain it to him.

He thought it was imparted. But whatever it was that he saw, it had so restrained evil that he wanted that presence of God in his life. This is the purpose of the church. This is what ministry is all about.

This is what you and I are called to do. Psalm 119 again, verse 111, the psalmist says, I've hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. In other words, it doesn't say I've hidden it in my head.

I've hidden it in my heart. I made the transition from reading it and memorizing it to embracing it, to say this is my value system. This is the course of my life. This is what I'm going to do. This is where I'm going to go.

This is what I'm going to be. And by grace, this is what God is going to accomplish through my life. Thy word have I hid in my heart. You see, when we don't esteem the word of God, when we don't let the word of God govern our thinking and govern our lives, we are literally taken out of the way. We become a religious noise in an ever degenerating society.

We become a powerless soldier trying to stop an army and all we have is a cardboard sword in our hand. We have no power. There's no anointing.

There's no authority. There's nothing in us because we have chosen not to yield to the thought of God that is so clearly revealed for us in his word. We're also taken out of the way when we cease to pray. A prayerless church is a powerless church.

A prayerless church is a church that is making a declaration. We don't need the presence of God. We're not yielded to you, Lord. We don't want your will. We don't want your way.

We don't want your word. We want heaven and we want to live life our way on the earth. And when God's people cease to pray, the promises of 2 Chronicles 7, 14 just simply fall through their fingers and into the sand. Remember, he said, if my people are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face. In other words, our prayer is leading us to a true relationship with God.

That's what it's all about. God, put your spirit upon me again in a new way that I've never known. Give me the courage to fight for this generation. Help me, God, not to surrender the little children in our homes, our societies, our streets to the godless agendas in our schools and in our society that wants to swallow them in confusion. Help me, Lord, to stand. Give me the courage, my God, if it costs me for the sake of others.

Help me not to draw back. You see, living for the benefit of others is more than just a slogan on a wall at this school. It is the actual pathway that leads to you and I being vessels in the hand of God to push back this power of hell that wants to swallow this generation. He says, if you'll seek my face and turn from your wicked ways, seek the face of God. And when he says something is good, declare it to be good. And when he says it is evil, declare it to be evil.

Don't compromise with it. Do it the way God says. If you will seek my face, if you'll humble yourself, pray, seek my face and turn from your wicked ways. Turn from the things that you would want to actually put the word of God in subjection to. Don't let your thoughts override the thoughts of God. Submit your thoughts to the ways of God. Now, of course, in 2 Chronicles 7.14, the promise of God, if we will do this, he says, I will hear, I'll forgive your sin and I'll be healing into your land. You see, when we're willing to do these things, we become the restrainer again. The power of God begins to operate in us and the supernatural comes back to the fore again.

I don't know about you, but I don't want to just talk about what happened in Acts, in the book of Acts. I want to live that. I heard it said in this sanctuary and among the students in this Bible school that somebody prayed sometime, I just heard it secondhand that you said, we want to be the people the next generation talks about or writes about.

That's an admirable, admirable goal. But to be that people, you've got to go for the whole thing. You got to go the whole way with God. You got to cast aside your fears and cast aside your thoughts about what your life should be.

Embrace God's plan for your life. And then you watch what God will begin to do in your life. Isaiah chapter 59 verse 19 says, so shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him. When the enemy comes in our society and our cities like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard.

It doesn't mean that the Spirit of God is going to put up a flagpole on the hill somewhere. You are the standard. You are the one. You are the gathering place of truth. You are that center where God is willing to demonstrate his power. The Spirit of the Lord will raise up a standard.

It is the church of Jesus Christ that through whom God will push back the darkness in our generation and the Redeemer will come to Zion and to those who turn from transgression and Jacob says the Lord. As for me, says the Lord, this is my covenant with them. My spirit was upon you and my words which I put in your mouth shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants. Descendants says the Lord from this time and for evermore. What an incredible promise.

He says to those who will go with God and say, God, raise me up to make a difference in my generation, to those who turn from transgression, to those who seek God and say, God, I want your ways to become my ways. I want your words to be my words. I want your thoughts to be my thoughts. I want your pathway to be my pathway. I don't want one ounce of my own energy, my own thought, my own reasonings.

I don't want any of this left in my life. I want you to be the consuming fire of my life. I want you to take me where I can't go. I want you to make me into what I could never hope to be in my own strength.

I want you to give me what I could never possess. I want you to be glorified through my life. Oh God, even if it means the loss of my freedom at the end of my days, I don't care as long as you are glorified and evil is pushed back and freedom comes to others who are destined for an eternal hell if there's no divine intervention in their life. This is my covenant, he says, and I made it to his people Israel, but it applies to us today. My spirit who is upon you and my words that I put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants descendants says the Lord from this time forevermore. And what it means is when you and I turn to God with all of our heart, God promises the spirit that I put upon you and the words that I put into your mouth will be in the mouths of your children will be in the mouths of your grandchildren.

There will be an inheritance because you chose to rise up and become the restrainer in your home. You let the spirit of God come upon you and God began to push back through you the evil that wants to devour your children and your grandchildren. You see, you're called to be more than just depressed.

You're called to be more than just a drug addict or an alcoholic or maybe somebody that's got a sickness or sore in your body, whatever your situation is, whatever you're asking for, you see, you're called to be more than that. You're called to be the restrainer in your home. The restrainer. And quite often, as we saw in our offering video, it was the town drunk that's become the restrainer in his town when the Holy Spirit got a hold of him and he went back.

Even a secular mayor recognized the presence of God and entrusted the mayoralty to him for one month, knowing that this man had the wisdom of God, the power of God and the ability of God to keep everything in order while he recovered from his illness. The restrainer. The restrainer.

The restrainer. You see, you're called to be more than what you think you are. It's you that God is calling to stand up and make a difference. The enemy has come into your home like a flood, but you are the standard that God is going to raise against it. You are the standard that's going to push back the darkness in the minds of your children, in the minds of your grandchildren, in the minds of your extended family.

You are the restrainer that is going to push back or hold back and push back the evil that would destroy your family. And once you begin to know the power of God, then you start looking outside the confines of even just your own home. And you begin to realize that God, what you did in my home, you can do for my street. And then after you move down your street, you begin to realize what you did on my street, you can do in my community. Then you begin to realize what you did in my community, you can do in my state.

And you begin to realize what you did in my state, you can do in my country. God, again, is looking for the restrainer. And so the question comes back in the beginning. Have you been taken out of the way? Have you lost your purpose? Have you forgotten who you are? Have you never even considered who you are? Have you ever considered the mercy of God?

As Pastor Ryan said today, nobody out there has done anything worse than killing the Son of God. So you have the right. Don't let the devil tell you you don't have the right. You have the right to call out to God.

You have the right to receive the salvation that he stretched his arms out on a cross 2,000 years ago to freely give you. Just admit you're a sinner. Believe that Jesus Christ took your place on that cross to pay the debt for your sin that you have committed and confess him.

Confess him with your mouth. Scripture tells us with the heart you believe in, with the mouth confession is made and your salvation in Christ is secured then. The Holy Spirit comes and takes up his residence, his dwelling place inside your physical body.

He guides you into the Word of God. You're given a new mind, a new heart, a new life, a new purpose, a new direction. And it's all about other people.

Because that's what the cross is all about. It's not about you and me being happy. It's good if we are, thank God. But you know, our value system changes. It's not about just being disease free and debt free and all the rest of that.

It's really about the freedom of others. You know, if we live our lives for ourselves, we end up learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth. And Paul said in the last days, the very first sign of this apostate church is that they're lovers of themselves.

Then you'd go right down to the bottom of the description says they're always studying the Bible basically and never coming anywhere near where that knowledge should have taken them. To be yielded for the sake of others, for the sake of Christ, to be used by God to push back evil. You see, there is no other hope for America but the Church of Jesus Christ. We can elect people into public office and they can, in measure, hold back some of the darkness. But this is a spiritual battle. It's not a political one.

It never was. It's a spiritual struggle America is in for its very soul. The only restrainer is the Church of Jesus Christ. Let it begin in your home. Stand up for heaven's sake, stand up. For your children's sake, stand up. For your marriage's sake, for your community's sake, for your sake, for God's sake, stand up.

Stand up and just say enough of living in mediocrity and enough of just being beaten up every day and every week and every month and every year and focusing on my own self. Enough of this, I am getting up and I'm going to start going with God. And you become the restrainer. Don't be taken out of the way and let the devil ransack your house.

Jesus said, if the Goodman had known what hour the thief was going to come, he would have secured, he would have prepared his house or her house. Sir, I don't care if you're a drunk, I don't care. You have an invitation to come to Christ. You have an invitation to stand up and be a new man.

Ma'am, if you're drug addicted, I don't care if you're drug addicted. You have an invitation to be free. You have an invitation to stand up and take charge in your house and push the devil out of your house. The restrainer had come.

The restrainer had come. There's power in the name of Jesus. There's power, wonder working power in the name of Jesus. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. You've been listening to Carter Conlon from Time Square Church in New York City. For more information and resources to help you in your walk in Christ, log on to tsc.nyc. That's tsc.nyc. And be sure to be with us next week for A Call to the Nation with Carter Conlon.