Insight for Living

Bill Meyer: When injustice goes unpunished, it's easy to wonder if God is even paying attention. But God sees everything, and He will have the last word. Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll explores 2nd Thessalonians chapter 1 to show us why suffering is never a divine oversight. The same God who promises relief to the afflicted also promises justice for those who afflict them. It's a sobering passage of scripture and a hopeful one too. Chuck titled his message, "When God Gets the Last Word." It's from his teaching series called Steadfast Christianity.

Chuck Swindoll: These people, according to verse four, were holding up in their faith and perseverance in the midst of their persecutions and afflictions. Verse five: "This is a plain indication of God's righteous judgment, so that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering." Two things kind of bubble to the surface when I read verse five.

The first is this: what you are going through is not a divine oversight. You will notice it is a plain indication that God's judgment that He has planned is right. The second thing I notice from verse five is that what I am going through is the initiation into the kingdom of God. See the way he puts it? "So that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God for which indeed you are suffering."

While thinking about verse five, I thought there are three things that occur to us when we suffer: we mature, we are crushed, and we are awakened. Now suddenly the ball bounces to the other court in verse six. "After all, it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you." Look at the shift in the scene. He talked to us in verse five. We're in this court. Now the ball is sent across the net to the other side in verse six in this interchange.

And God is saying, "But don't forget turnabout's fair play." Not only is that a good children's rule, that's a good divine rule. That's what verse six is talking about. It's when God will have the last word. One day, when things are turned around, He will repay. You see how he puts it? "It is only just for God to repay with affliction."

In my notes I have written Romans 12:19. This is the answer. You know what Romans 12:19 says? It says, "Don't take revenge. Vengeance is mine. I will repay," says the Lord. Don't get even, don't try to get back. Leave vengeance with God. Let Him do it. After all, He's just.

And you know, we are so enamored of the system of our day, where criminals get out of it by some little nuance of the law or the blindness or prejudice of some judge or the oversight of some jury. We think they're going to get away with it. Don't worry about that. God is just according to verse six. He knows it all. He knows motive. He knows timing.

He knows reasons. He knows results. He knows origin of thought. He knows fully what you have gone through and what you're waiting to have happen. He knows all of that. He'll handle it. Our need is to let Him work. Think of all the energy we expend trying to do God's part. And we don't know motive. We don't know timing. We don't know origin. We don't know result. We don't know fully the story. We only know from our prejudiced viewpoint what happened.

So spend your energy walking with Him and leave the revenge to Him. Relax. It says in verse six, "He will repay." Our problem is that He takes so long getting around to it. But wait, He's going to do it. Isn't He long-suffering? Isn't He patient? If you want an example of that, think about your life.

Aren't you glad He didn't zap you the moment you got out of line? We'd all have scars and burn marks and bruises on us from heaven. Zip, zip, zap! I mean, we wouldn't be able to get out of the house. But He patiently, graciously, wisely waits. But when the doors are closed and when the books are opened, He waits no longer.

Now suddenly, when you get caught up in that thought, the ball comes back to the other court. Look at verse seven. At the same time He is repaying those who gave us affliction, verse seven says He will also give relief to you who are afflicted. Isn't that wonderful? The affliction will not last forever. He's going to give relief to us as well. When? When the Lord Jesus shall be apocalypsis. There's a very interesting term.

This same root word is the title of the last book of the Bible: Revelation. It means unveiling. It means disclosing. It means the revealing. The book of Revelation is a vast curtain that the Spirit of God draws open for the careful student of the book to look into and to read as far as God's ultimate judgment is concerned to be carried out at the revealing of the Lord Jesus.

That's the term used here. So when will relief come? When will there be justice meted out? When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven. Now watch, three prepositional phrases: from heaven, with His angels, in flaming fire. Students of prophecy love passages like that. I come to a section like this and I think, "Boy, that would be so juicy to get into the details of that." And it would be.

But we're trying to get through the book of Second Thessalonians, not get into the book of Revelation. But whenever this time occurs, the Lord Jesus will come from heaven, will be with angels according to verse seven, with mighty angels of His and in flaming fire. Fire most often speaks of purifying or of judgment in scripture. So there will be judgment on His mind. Not only justice meted out against the lost, the goats, but justice delivered to the saved, to the sheep, to His people who have walked with Him through awful, awful times.

Now about the time you get caught up in the thought and the joy of that moment, the ball goes back to the other court. Verse eight and nine provide us with some of the most awful thoughts in all the New Testament—awful in the sense of human response. What will this revealing be like? What will be included in His coming? Well, I count three things, if you will count them with me.

Verse eight, there will be the dealing out of retribution to those who do not know God. Even, it could be rendered, even to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. Now we're talking serious stuff. Not only will He relieve those who have been afflicted in life, but now will be the time that the books are closed and He gets the last word.

Observe first the dealing out of retribution. One version says inflicting vengeance. Another dealing out chastisement. Another punishing, allotting full justice. Bob Thomas from the local Talbot Seminary in Expositor's Bible Commentary helps us with this word retribution. The word stems from vengeance. It's the same as that for right, verse five, and just, verse six. It has no overtones of selfish vindictiveness or revenge but proceeds from the justice of God to accomplish appropriate punishment for criminal offenses.

Brings us right into the courtroom, doesn't it? But you see, we have become jaded by the courtroom of today. If you're like me, you hear of a person that goes to trial and you think, "I wonder how he'll get off this time. I wonder how somebody will get him out of this one." And often, unfortunately, it's true. The guilty is set free. But mark it down, this is no man, this is no woman, this is no human opinion judging. This is God, who will deal out retribution to those who are immoral.

No, not necessarily. To those who didn't pay their bills. No. To those who mistreated their families. No, that's not the basis. List anything else but unbelief and you miss it. To those who do not know God, to those who have never obeyed the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The first He will do is judge on the basis of faith in the Lord Jesus. If it's absent, thumbs down. Second, verse nine, these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction.

Oh, wait, don't misunderstand. It doesn't mean annihilation, because he says eternal destruction. If your barn is caught in a tornado, it is destroyed, suddenly annihilated. If you are fighting in a war and the enemy comes toward you with full weaponry and blows your company away, you are destroyed instantly. But neither a barn nor a group of people in fight are involved in an eternal destruction. That keeps you from thinking that it occurs in a moment of time and the people involved are gone forever.

No, as a matter of fact, they are here forever under the judgment of destruction. Several years ago, we sighed and ached and wept as we watched one newscast after another that showed the awful scene of our space shuttle as it blew up in the air. We lost seven precious lives who were instantly destroyed, not eternally. This is eternal destruction. Again, you can't think like a human thinks. You have to think like God thinks.

This is after there is no more time on earth. This is before there is eternity. This is in between when the last judgment occurs and God steps into space and He brings before Him these individuals who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of the Lord Jesus. And He causes these who were lost to pay the penalty of everlasting, unending destruction. I noticed thirdly that there is ultimate alienation from God, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power.

I don't know of a more horrible scene and it's been written about rather vividly by Donald Barnhouse. I quote: "The adjective everlasting, or here rendered eternal, which describes our life with Christ in heaven also describes the never-ending expulsion of the lost from His presence. Outer darkness is the way our Lord Jesus Christ described it. A sort of solitary confinement forever. All alone with your thoughts and memories and unable to do anything to change the scene. That is hell. That is hell."

Several years ago, Hollywood put together a film which depicted the half-crazed leaders of several military outfits as they were involved in skirmishes and war over in Vietnam. There was a weird kind of military leader who lost it all and wound up hiding out in the jungle and one of the plots of the story was to get to this man and hopefully to kill him lest he raise up a whole group of troops that would form a counterattack against the force of good. And then there was another half-crazed leader who dropped napalm bombs on villages so as to clear out the area so his troops and he might water-ski along the river. They called it Apocalypse Now. Strange, strange drama from the mind of man.

This isn't some imaginary scene led by some half-crazed leader. God is in charge. And this isn't some script dreamed up by some scriptwriter who lives in Burbank or Southern California and has put together an interesting thought that would hold the attention of a group of people. This is God's book and this is awful. This is true. This is apocalypse then. And there will be no chance for change, no prayer that will be heard to reverse life. No begging for relief will be acknowledged. This is maximum pain suffered at an infinite distance from the living God forever and ever.

My friend, if you don't know the Lord Jesus Christ, today is the day to take care of that. Today. It is passages like this that make funeral services for the lost so unbearable for me, so difficult for pastors. You're looking at the remains of the lost, the body, but what you cannot see is the horror of the soul and spirit. And someday in the future, that body will be raised, changed so as to endure throughout eternity, joined to a soul and spirit that will spend eternity without Christ in hell. You can't fathom it. I can't fathom it. I can't describe it more vividly, nor will I try. I leave it to the Spirit of God to convince you.

I spoke on this sometime earlier and I had a young man stop and say, "Where do I go? Who do I talk to? I need to get out of that horrible destiny that's mine." But it isn't all bad. If a person is in Christ, verse ten says, when the Lord Jesus comes, He will also be glorified in the saints on that day and to be marveled at among all who believed, for our testimony to you was believed.

Here's a body of people who were suffering, going through the throes of difficulty, affliction. They can't explain it, they can't get out of it, but their hope is, "Someday I'll be glorified with Him." And look at how we will respond. It says in verse ten, we will marvel at Him. What a grand, grand moment. We will marvel at Him. And will it be because we were good, we were moral, we paid our bills, we took care of our family? No, has nothing to do with it. It will be because we have believed. That's the way the verse concludes. "All who have believed, for our testimony to you was believed."

I can't think of anything worse than to find my destiny in hell and look back and realize I turned off a gift that simply required my faith and trust. Leave the character direction and building up to God; you simply turn your life over to Him. Now the solution is a wonderful solution. If you are a Christian, there's hope in here to hang on to. You notice how it concludes? This will be your moment. As painful as life is at this moment, your hope is it's not going to last forever. There'll be a day when the roles will reverse and your joy will be the presence of the Lord, glorified with saints, marveling at what He has prepared for you. That is your hope and that's mine.

If you're not a Christian, here is the awful truth that you cannot escape, that you must deal with now. This is your solution: to believe in the Lord Jesus, to put that off no longer. Years before I preached, I sang. I was involved in an evangelistic group of young men who traveled around the state of Texas and a little bit in Oklahoma and some in Louisiana and the Southwest, presenting the gospel and singing it and preaching it to the youth of our day. Some great memories connect with that time in my life.

Perhaps it was there like at no other time that I realized the value of giving oneself to public ministry and God used that in my life later on. One of the men who were a part of our group used to ask me to sing a song at the close of the meeting in which he had presented the gospel. He had a special message he presented on the horrors of hell. And I will save you from my singing this, though I know that greatly disappoints some of you. I am not going to sing it. I'm afraid that would take away from the message of this old song written by Bert Shaddock many years ago and you who are my age and older will remember it, but the rest of you probably have never heard it.

The lyrics go: I dreamed that the great judgment morning had dawned and the trumpet had blown. I dreamed that the nations had gathered to judgment before the white throne. From the throne came a bright shining angel and stood on the land and the sea and swore with his hand raised to heaven that time was no longer to be. The rich man was there, but his money had melted and vanished away. A pauper he stood in the judgment; his debts were too heavy to pay. The great man was there, but his greatness when death came was left far behind. The angel that opened the records, not a trace of his greatness could find.

The moral man came to the judgment, but his self-righteous rags would not do. The men who had crucified Jesus had passed off as moral men, too. The soul that had put off salvation, "Not tonight, I'll get saved by and by. No time now to think of religion." At last, they'd all found time to die. And oh, what a weeping and wailing as the lost were told of their fate. They cried for the rocks and the mountains, they prayed, but their prayer was too late.

I want us to bow our heads. I want us not to move about in this worship center. Spirit of God is speaking to you today. Some of you are under a terrible time of affliction. Injustice has occurred to you and the scars of mistreatment still mark your life. You've got bad memories. If the truth were known, you spend too much time and energy thinking about revenge. My Christian friend, that's what the cross was all about. At that moment you delivered that revenge over to Him. You transferred to Him your revenge and you received in place His peace. It's yours. Let Him get even. Your need today is simply to forgive and not let that be a noose around your neck or an albatross that sees you to your grave.

But more importantly, there are those of you hearing this right now who've never before this moment been so serious about your eternal destiny. That's God working in your life. If you don't know for sure that Christ lives within you, here's a prayer. Just in your own mind, pray this with me: Dear Father, I am lost. I am a sinner. I don't know You and I've never obeyed the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I know that if I were to die, this would be my future, the penalty of eternal destruction. And so today, I do believe in Christ. I acknowledge Him as my Lord. I give Him my life. I come fully in repentance to the cross of Christ for my eternal salvation. I trust Him only as my Savior.

Let's pray. Forgive us, our Father, for the days and maybe even months we've wasted trying to understand Your timing rather than simply trusting You in the crevice and valleys. Forgive us for blaming You for racing over head as though You ignored and overlooked us when all the while You had our maturing at heart. Forgive us for the wasted years of unbelief running from You rather than toward You. Thank You that today we turn around and we come to You. In Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Bill Meyer: If you prayed this prayer just now and meant it, something eternal happened in your heart. And if you're a believer who's been carrying the weight of bitterness and unresolved pain, God's word is clear that He hasn't forgotten. He hasn't overlooked you, and He will have the last word. Either way, you don't have to leave here the same. We'd love to help you take your next step. Reach out to us here at Insight for Living because we have resources and people ready to come alongside you wherever you are in your journey.

For starters, we'll point you to the spiral-bound Bible study workbook for Second Thessalonians. This Searching the Scriptures Bible study workbook is a resource for you to jot down your personal thoughts and observations. Think of it as your personal guide for working through Paul's letter in the same way that Chuck prepares to preach it. To purchase the Bible study workbook for Steadfast Christianity, call 800-772-8888 or go to insight.org/offer. If you've relied on Chuck's teaching and grown stronger in your walk with God because of it, perhaps today is the day you'll reach out with your financial support of Insight for Living. Your gift will be channeled into reaching men and women around the world with the truth of God's word, so they can fully experience a relationship with God just as you have.

When you give a donation today, we'd love to send you a classic book written by our teacher. This one's about leadership and it's called Hand Me Another Brick. In the refreshing style you've come to expect from Chuck, Hand Me Another Brick tells the amazing story about Nehemiah, a builder who reconstructed the wall around Jerusalem. It's a masterclass in leadership. To request a copy of Hand Me Another Brick, call 800-772-8888 or go to insight.org/donate. You can also address a letter to Insight for Living, Post Office Box 5000, Frisco, Texas 75034.

Are you worried about a loved one? I'm Bill Meyer. Join us when Chuck Swindoll explains why petitioning God is essential. Tuesday on Insight for Living. The preceding message, "When God Gets the Last Word," was copyrighted in 1986, 1991, 2002, and 2024 and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2024 by Charles R. Swindoll Incorporated. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.