The restrainer

“For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so until He is taken out of the way.” 2 Thessalonians 2:7
2 Thess. 2:1-8 gives us a description of the series of events leading up to the Rapture, followed by the Tribulation and the return of Christ. The ‘lawless one’ (commonly called the Antichrist) is only revealed after the restrainer is removed. I believe this is the Holy Spirit in the sense that He indwells the church. That is, the removal of the restrainer refers to the rapture of the church.
We’ve all heard people complain about Christians ‘forcing their standards on other people’ – by which they mean, they don’t like Christians telling them that something they are doing is wrong and a sin. They want to be free to indulge in their own lusts, use whatever drugs they want, live with whomever they want, raise their children however they want, put whatever they like on a billboard or TV, the list goes on. ‘If only those Christians would just disappear,’ they say. ‘The world would be a much better place without them.’
If only they knew. There will come a day when all the Christians will disappear. And after that, things get really bad. If we think the state of the world is bad now, how much worse will it be after the church is gone. We are seeing a restrained version of evil.
When God promised the land of Canaan to Abraham, He said that there would be a delay of 400 years before it would be fulfilled, because “the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure” (Gen. 15:16). God does not bring judgement prematurely. He waits until the people He is judging have passed the point of no return. The fact that we are still here, shows that God is still waiting; there is still hope for those around us to come to salvation.