Because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie. 2 Thessalonians 2:10,11
A man one time saw what he thought was an unusual sight: he saw a lad walking along a country lane in England, and he was being followed by a pig. The man was more accustomed to seeing such a boy being followed by a dog, and he wondered why the pig was obediently trotting along directly behind the lad. So he asked the lad how he got the pig to follow him along the road. ‘It’s easy,’ the boy replied. ‘I do it with a bag of beans. Every few steps, I drop a bean, and the pig gobbles up the bean. And he keeps following me because he knows that there will be another bean coming.’ ‘Where are you taking the pig?’ asked the man. ‘To the slaughterhouse.’ Oh, that pig was being deceived! He was about to be a victim of a strong delusion because he believed a lie. That pig was like the people in our text who were headed for damnation because God allowed them to be deceived by the lies of the antichrist. And he was like many people today who allow themselves to be deceived because they refuse to hear the truth.
The context of our text is the great tribulation and the rule of the antichrist. This evil man will speak great lies, and people will believe his lies. If he were to speak those lies today, the antichrist would not be as successful, because the Holy Spirit is present in the world, as He indwells Christians, who are able to discern the lies. But our text declares that in the tribulation, those who have heard the truth and have rejected it will be given a strong delusion. The term ‘strong delusion’ is taken from the Greek words energeia planēs, which can be directly translated ‘working wandering’. Because of their rejection, these people will experience the power of God in causing them to wander from what would ordinarily make sense to them. This is a terrible price to pay for their rejection of the truth. We see small examples of it today when some people who hear the Gospel and turn away from it are led into the lies of the cults. We wonder how they can possibly not discern the obvious error of those systems. But they have been deceived by false delusions. Let us take a warning from this.
Despite the comfort of knowing that we will never fall under the deception of the antichrist’s lies, we need to make sure that we do not reject any of the truth of the Word of God. Some of us have seen Christians who have resisted the truth concerning such doctrines as baptism, the unequal yoke, and living righteously. Often, these folks become caught up in destructive lifestyles, destructive companionships, and false doctrines. God’s Word is true, and His Holy Spirit would teach it to us. If we will receive it and obey it, we will not suffer the harm that comes from rejecting it.
The devil’s minions are all around us, telling their lies. May God preserve us from believing any of them. – Jim MacIntosh