To be Born Again is to have God separate the soul and spirit and then ABIDE in the born again spirit (1 John 3:9). The Word of God refers to the Body of Christ believers as 'salt of the earth'. Salt restrains bacterial growth and thus disease. Sin is a disease of the soul effecting the spirit. When God is ABIDING in the spirit there can be no sin in that spirit.
The Presence of the SEED (spirit) of God in the Born Agains restrains the lawless one. A Society with Born Agains actively living therein acts as a natural restraint on sin, until the Laodicean attitude overtakes that restrainer influence. The Philidelphian influence acts as a restrainer of sin behaviors.
When GOD removes the Born Agains from the Earth, from all societies of peoples the lawless one is unrestrained and rises to have the power to rule unrestrained by the Presence of The Holy Spirit in peoples who are The Body of Christ. The Body of Christ as a collective Body, when removed from the Earth, un-restrains the rise of antichrist.
When unrestrained, antichrist fools the Jews who take his powerful actions as those of their messiah. At the mid-point in the antiChrist's reign he does something which shocks the Jews into realizing he is not Messiah (the abomination of desolation).. The Body of Christ has been absent from the Earth for at least three and a half years (likely longer, since the Rapture removal of the Body of Christ is not the start of the Tribulation, the treaty with Israel IS).
“The Presence of the SEED (spirit) of God in the Born Agains restrains the lawless one. A Society with Born Agains actively living therein acts as a natural restraint on sin... When GOD removes the Born Agains from the Earth, from all societies of peoples the lawless one is unrestrained and rises to have the power to rule unrestrained by the Presence of The Holy Spirit in peoples who are The Body of Christ. The Body of Christ as a collective Body, when removed from the Earth, un-restrains the rise of antichrist.”
It seems to me that attributing the role of the 2 Thessalonians 2 “restrainer” to the Holy Spirit is forced upon the next rather than being drawn out of it. I always find it helpful to go back to the text under discussion and be sure that I am not superimposing my own presuppositions on it.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 (NKJV)
Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you, not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of Christ had come. Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? And now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in his own time. For 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 the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
Re-reading the text, I am reminded of what specifically is being restrained: the revealing of the antichrist, which must happen at a precise time under God’s control. This event is important specifically because Paul says it is one of two things that must occur prior to the Day of the Lord. The other one is the “falling away” or apostasy.
This begs the question of what event signifies the revealing of antichrist. Over the years, all the way back to the apostolic era, many have speculated as to who the antichrist might be. Revelation gives us a clue connected with his name. But the truth is that we don’t know. Until he is revealed it is all speculative. But I think the passage is not referring to merely some Christians becoming aware that a particular man is or may be the antichrist. It is referring to an event.
A pre-trib rapture would require the revealing or unveiling of antichrist to be prior to or at the exact moment of the start of Daniel’s seventieth week, because this event must take place before the Day of the Lord. And the pretrib position must make these seven years equivalent to or part of the Day of the Lord. So the typical speculation is that the signing of the seven-year treaty protecting Israel will identify the antichrist. However, it is not the treaty but the breaking of it that identifies him. And the text here specifically identifies an event that occurs in the exact middle of Daniels seventieth week.
To me, without overwhelming evidence to the contrary, we should assume that it is the abomination of desolation that reveals the antichrist. But if this is the case, then it presents an extreme difficulty for the pretrib rapture position. There is a general consensus among all pre-millennialists (pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib, and pre-wrath) that the rapture occurs at the arrival of the Day of the Lord. These various positions just have differing views about what constitutes the Day of the Lord. But if antichrist is revealed at the abomination of desolation, and this event must occur before the Day of the Lord, then this also would mean the rapture does not occur until after this event as well.
Books could be and have been written on these issues. I will not presume to resolve all of the related disagreements, but the biggest problem with identifying the “restrainer” as the Holy Spirit is that taking the Holy Spirit out of the world would make it impossible for the massive numbers of people to overcome the strong delusion, be convicted of their sins, repent, and hear, understand, and believe the Gospel, and then endure to the end at a time when the worst trials and tribulations of history are perpetrated against Gods people.
Remember that the Great Commission requires the work of the Holy Spirit, who was prophesied to be coming in the Old Testament. The Gospel must also be preached in the whole world BEFORE the End comes.
Look at this relevant passage about the role of the Holy Spirit (which Peter quotes from on Pentecost):
Joel 2:28-32 (NKJV)
And it shall come to pass afterward
That I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh;
Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
Your old men shall dream dreams,
Your young men shall see visions.
And also on My menservants and on My maidservants
I will pour out My Spirit in those days.
And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth:
Blood and fire and pillars of smoke.
The sun shall be turned into darkness,
And the moon into blood,
Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord.
And it shall come to pass
That whoever calls on the name of the Lord
Shall be saved.
For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be deliverance,
As the Lord has said,
Among the remnant whom the Lord calls.
The outpouring of the Holy Spirit AND the signs and wonders in the heavens (sky) proceed the Day of the Lord. But Christ taught that the heavenly signs follow the Great Tribulation:
Matthew 24:29-31 (NKJV)
Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
I believe we can divide Daniel’s seventieth week into four parts based on the Olivet discourse:
1. time of great deception/false peace
2. beginning of sorrows
3. the Great Tribulation
4. the End/Day of the Lord
The End/Day of the Lord is a time period which is equivalent to the Second Coming, and begins with the rapture and ends with Christ destroying antichrist. But what I am espousing is a pre-wrath view. It asserts that the Church will face antichrist but will NOT experience God’s wrath being poured out on the earth during the Day of the Lord judgments (the trumpet and bowl judgments of Revelation).