The passage deals with the “coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him” (v.1). “Coming”, parousia, is a standard term denoting Christ’s Second Coming at the “first resurrection” (shortly to be noted), as seen from its usage in 1 Cor. 15:23 (“afterward, those who are Christ’s at His coming”), and 1 Thess. 4:15 (“we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep”).
This “coming of the Lord” will be OPEN and VISIBLE TO ALL, just like lightning, as Christ expressly declares: “For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so will the coming (parousia) of the Son of Man be. … [T]he 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” (Matt. 24:27,30).
Concerning this “coming of our Lord Jesus Christ”, Paul – by the Spirit of God – lays down two categorical precursors to it. That day will not come, he says,
“unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition” (2 Thess. 2:3). That is, the Antichrist.
Despite the misguided attempt by some to turn the plain NKJV/KJV meaning of “falling away” (Gk., apostasia, our “apostasy”) into “departure” (ie., departure at the rapture),[8] none of the Greek lexicons I’ve consulted lends any support to such a disingenuous approach. On all 364 times listed in The Strongest Strong’s that the Bible uses the words depart(ure), and related forms, NOT ONCE is apostasia used, making such a view quite impossible to defend. Rather, as the great prayer warrior George Mueller observed of this passage:
“The Scripture declares plainly that the Lord Jesus will not come until the apostasy shall have taken place, and the man of sin … shall have been revealed”.[9]
This is exactly what we have already seen with all the authentic Church Fathers – not to mention it also having been the position of Luther and Calvin, Wycliffe and Tyndale, Bunyan and Spurgeon, Matthew Henry and both the Wesleys. God, says Paul, will “give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed (Gk., from apokalupto, our “apocalypse”, or revelation) from heaven with His mighty angels” (2 Thess. 1:7). This is our true “gathering together unto Him”, when He will be “glorified in His saints and … admired among all those who believe” (v.10).