Two More Scholars Line Up Against Don Preston's False View Of 2 Thessalonians 2:2

      William S. Cline, who held two masters — one in Theolgical Studies in the N.T. — and was only his doctoral dissertation away from his doctorate in the same field prior to his death, wrote the study for 2 Thessalonians published for the Spiritual Sword Lectureship of 1976. The editors of the book were Garland Elkins and Thomas B. Warren, the latter also especially capable and accomplished in the study of the ancient Greek language. Bro. Cline, btw, studied Greek under Harvey Floyd and Lawrence Barclay, both acknowledged scholars in the field. Relative to 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3, he noted: "…in this chapter Paul corrects the misapprehension that the Lord was about to come at once…His [Paul’s] teaching had been interpreted, and a report had been spread to the effect that ‘the day of the Lord’ was ‘just at hand’ [the ASV reading, HDD]. To correct the error and to calm the disorder, Paul writes to explain that before the Lord returns there will first be an apostasy from the faith and the appearance of the 'man of sin.'" ("The Living Message of Second Thessalonians," The Living Messages of the Books of the New Testament, p. 211). He clearly took the construction as referring to the idea of imminence rather than something already completed in the past.

      Dr. John C. Stevens, late president and chancellor of ACU, also took the same position in his lecture in the 1962 lecturehsip book published by Ft. Worth Christian College and edited by Claude A. Guild. Stevens wrote: "One of the problems the Thessalonian Christians had was their anxiety about when the Lord should come again. They thought his coming was imminent and this created an emergency basis for their lives which made for an unnatural situation" ("Second Thessalonians," Messages of the Books of the New Testament, p. 201).