The Restrainer Part I

"And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he may be revealed. 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 . . . " (2 Thessalonians 2: 6-7)

Helen, my 88 year old mother-in-law, has been a member of St. Joe's parish her entire life. Although she still drives a car and can pretty much take care of herself in the same house she moved into when she first married, Harry has been gone for 10 years and health issues the last 2 years have made it difficult for her to drive herself to mass very often. None of her 10 children and spouses or her 95 grandkids and great grandkids attend church at St. Joe's. Jackie and I were the first to leave the Catholic faith, and most of the rest of the family followed later when the time was right for them. The family of Helen's oldest son still attend mass regularly, but they live several states away. Although that son goes to mass and receives the sacraments, he does not believe that Jesus is God.

My wife will take the hour and a half trip to Kalamazoo once a week to spend a Monday or Tuesday night, and half of the next day with Helen. They talk, play rummycube, watch TV and sit by the fire. Every third week Jackie will color Helen's hair, and each week Helen will have waiting for Jackie a list of things for her to do or fix around the house, "cause Jackie can do anything!" A couple of other daughters will also spend a night with their mom, and I'm sure they and some of the other kids each have special projects or things to go out and get for their mother.

Recently Jackie and I were at church and our pastor mentioned that Mother's Day was in a couple of weeks and that everyone should make an effort to bring their mother to that service. This planted a desire in Jackie's heart to take Helen to mass at St. Joe's on Mother's Day, accompanied by as many of Jackie's sisters and brothers that could make it, followed by a traditional pork roast dinner at the house. So this last Mother's Day Jackie and I picked up Helen and then Angie, an 89 year old friend of hers who also would normally not be able to get to mass, and met 5 of Jackie's sisters just inside the door of St. Joe's. Helen was thrilled to show off her kids to a couple of people she knew when we were coming in, and the whole day was delightful.

Mother's Day coincided with the Feast of Pentecost, which remembers the day that the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the first followers of Jesus, who were waiting as the Lord had instructed at a room in Jerusalem, partially fulfilling the prophecy in Joel that was quoted by Peter in his sermon to the large crowd that had gathered outside; "And it shall be in the last days, 'God says, that I will pour forth of My Spirit upon all mankind . . ." Father Mike, who had come to St. Joe's as an assistant priest in 1972, the year Jackie and I were married there, centered his homily on the idea that Jesus had breathed on his disciples, telling them to "Receive the Holy Spirit". This was a good point in that the congregation could better understand that the gift of the Holy Spirit comes from Jesus, who imparts it upon the church. But it was a little misleading in that Jesus did that, not at Pentecost, but when He appeared to the disciples after the resurrection, but before His ascension. The next verse of scripture goes on the say; "If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained". (John 20:22)

Let's understand what was happening here. Jesus had died and had risen from the dead, and salvation was now available to all who would call upon the name of the Lord. The disciples, by faith, believed that Jesus had died for their sins, understanding that through the Holy Spirit. That same Holy Spirit united the spirit of Christ with their spirit so that they now were reborn in Christ. Because they had a reborn spirit they were also now a temple of the Holy Spirit, who was present in their lives even before Jesus breathed on them. Jesus was now imparting a particular gift of the Holy Spirt to the first believers. He was not establishing an institutional structure, where priests would have a chrism to forgive sins, but a universal church, where all believers are impowered by the Spirit to proclaim forgiveness. We see this a little better at the end of Luke, where the resurrected Jesus insturcts the disciples; "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem". Jesus then goes on to say; "And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you, but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high". The clothing with power from on high was to come at Pentecost.

I think Fr. Mike's point was intended to support the Catholic practice of receiving the Holy Spirit through the impartation of the Bishop, the thought being that Pentecost began an institution called The Church, with the bishops and priests and the sacraments they administer being the visible presence of Christ on the earth. This theology affects how the Catholic Church views scriptures that concern the last days, including who or what The Restrainer is and what The Apostasy is. I will talk more about those in my next post.

The Feast of Pentecost as celebrated by the Western Church always comes 50 days after Easter, the timing having little to do with the actual anniversary of Christ's resurrection, which I believe to be accurate should be celebrated on a Sunday nearest to the Jewish feast of First Fruits. Jesus last supper and death came during the Jewish Feast of Passover. He was in the grave during the Jewish feast of Unleavened Bread, and He rose from the dead on the Feast of First Fruits, thus fulfilling the prophetic purposes of the first 3 of the 7 major Jewish feasts.

The pouring out of the Holy Spirit came on the 4th of 7 major Jewish feasts, coming 50 days after the Feast of First Fruits, and is called Pentecost after a Greek word that means 50 days later. Scripture has instructions for determining the timing of the Jewish feasts, and real Pentecost occurs this year beginning Sunday evening on June 8. This date interestingly enough also coincides with the 41st anniversary of the Six Day War of 1967, where the Jewish nation, after thousands of years, regained complete control of Jerusalem, including the temple area, as well as the Gaza, West Bank and Golan Heights areas. Jewish soldiers had placed a Israeli flag on top of the Dome of the Rock Mosque and had army personal stationed on the Temple Mount area, but the Israeli general Moshe Dyan, rejecting the gift of God, ordered them removed. I believe this began a 40 year period of testing for the Jewish nation, which will end on the 8th or 9th of June.

The first 3 Jewish feasts come in the early Spring, with Pentecost 50 days later, and the last 3 Jewish feasts occur in the fall. Some have suggested ways in which Jesus has already fulfilled the last 3 feasts, but I believe that there are still prophetic events ahead for them, on the actual feast days. Pentecost is an interesting feast in that as the 4th feast, coming between the 1st three and the last three. it follows the 1 - 4 -7 pattern of the lampstand in the tabernacle, a pattern found throughout scripture. The design of the lampstand was given to Moses by God on MT Sinai, and the main lamp in the center, or the 4th stand, holds the oil (a symbol of the Holy Spirit) which feeds the other 6 lamps.

Students of prophecy for years have been saying that they believed that the Rapture of the Church would occur on the 5th feast, which is the Feast of Trumphets. This was because there had already been a prophetic fulfillment of Pentecost, and that scripture equates a trumpet sound with the Rapture, and the next feast in line is called Trumpets. I have always had a feeling that the types found in Pentecost, and certain things that happened in the Old Testament on the Feast of Pentecost, would indicate to me that there might be a dual prophetic purpose for that 4th, and central feast. And there are trumpet blasts connected with the other feasts. Now it seems that a lot of prophecy students are coming to the same conclusion. This doesn't make it right, but there seem to be new insights concerning prophetic patterns coming out every day. Perhaps this will finally be the year, or maybe something else major will happen soon, but the world is changing fast.

One thing that has been suggested, and which I find very interesting, is that there may be a gap of some days between "and the dead in Christ shall rise first", and "Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord". (1 Thess. 4: 16-17) The thought is that just as some graves of the Old Testament saints opened up in Jerusalem after Jesus died on the cross, which was accompanied by an earthquake, with some Old Testament saints seen walking around, so will there be worldwide earthquakes, with graves opened and a resurrection of the dead in Christ, with some seen walking around. It has been suggested that this could happen 10 days before Pentecost, on the anniversary of the Ascension of Christ, or even prior to that, with the Rapture on the anniversary of the Ascension and Pentecost being the complection of the last days outpouring of the Holy Spirit as spoken of by the prophet Joel.

The coming of Jesus as a thief in the night refers to His second coming and not to the Rapture, so I have always thought that it would make sense to have some obvious sign for the Church just before the Rapture, and perphaps earthquakes with graves being opened might happen. There might also be worldwide earthquakes at the time of the Rapture, adding to the confusion and anxiety of the left behind world. The time could be soon. Pray for your family and friends that they may know The One who died for them so they can become part of His eternal family.