1 Thessalonians 2:16
Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost. Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.
Jewish persecutors hindered the apostles by word and action from preaching the gospel to the Gentiles so they might be saved, and by that obstruction kept filling up their sins until wrath came upon them to the uttermost. Their guilt reached its limit when they rejected Jesus despite His mission and miracles and then persecuted His disciples despite the evidence of His resurrection and the descent of the Holy Spirit, completing their transgression so that God cut them off, forsook the sanctuary, and left it desolate. Wrath to the uttermost means the fullest wrath that can fall on people in this life, fulfilled in the calamities that destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish nation when multitudes perished by famine, sword, and fire. God in long-suffering mercy does not overthrow a people until their iniquity is full and no more good can be hoped from them, when the cup of guilt is full and mercy has ceased to plead. That destruction did not settle their final account, for they will still rise to see Christ in glory and answer in the judgment, which warns all once acknowledged as God's people that rejecting greater light brings greater guilt and more dreadful wrath.
Words and Opposition
The term rendered as forbidding denotes preventing or hindering a person by word or action, and elsewhere the same original word is translated as forbid, not suffer or not allow, keep from, and withstand. Jewish persecutors forbade the apostles to speak the gospel to the Gentiles in order that the Gentiles might be saved, and by obstructing that saving work they kept adding to and filling up their sins until wrath came upon them to the uttermost. This forbidding of preaching to the Gentiles, whom the preaching could lead to salvation, was the cause of the apostle's sufferings, without which he could have preached peacefully.
Their opposition included killing the Lord Jesus and persecuting and murdering His witnesses, together with persistent hostility toward others. It reached its fullness when they not only rejected the message of mercy themselves but tried to stop the faithful from preaching salvation to the Gentiles, thereby filling up their sins so that the threatened wrath came upon them completely. Their iniquity reached its limit after they rejected Jesus despite His mission and miracles and then persecuted His disciples despite the evidence of His resurrection and the descent of the Holy Spirit, making it fitting for God's wrath to come upon them. Yet the very opposition described in the chapter became one of the ways the cause of Christ and salvation was advanced.
Sin Filled, Wrath Poured
By hindering the message of salvation from reaching the Gentiles the opposers kept filling up their sins, and Israel's rejection of the Messiah completed its transgression and brought the cutting off of the people, the forsaking of the sanctuary, and its being left desolate. After the rejection of Jesus' teachings, his crucifixion, and the persecution of the church, its leaders hastened to fill up the measure of iniquity until wrath brought their final overthrow. That course reached its fullness when they not only rejected the message of mercy themselves but tried to stop the faithful from preaching salvation to the Gentiles, so that their sins were filled up and the threatened wrath came upon them completely. Persistent apostasy can in this way reach a point at which God withdraws restraining grace and judgment follows, leaving no remedy.
In long-suffering mercy God does not overthrow nations or peoples until their iniquity is full and there is no more hope of good from them. Grecia was no exception to this rule, and the Roman power stood up in the latter time of the Grecian kingdom when the transgressors were come to the full. Guilt can reach its full measure and bring final wrath, when the cup of guilt is full, the number of the good is complete, and mercy has ceased pleading. Then the end of time has come, though people do not recognize it.
Wrath to the uttermost means the fullest extent of wrath that can be inflicted on people in this life. The verse looks ahead to calamities that would dispossess the Jews of their land and destroy them as a nation. It was fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem, when hundreds of thousands perished by famine, sword, and fire and many were tortured on crosses.
That wrath fulfilled in the calamities that destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish nation did not settle their final account. Those who suffered it will still rise and see Christ in the royal glory of his return, when he comes to judge the world and reign forever. They will still meet the Lord and answer for their sins in the day of judgment. The resurrection and judgment bring the righteous their full deliverance and glory but bring those who reject the gospel wrath and ruin to the uttermost. This contrast explains why humanity cannot be portrayed as longing for the resurrection as a time of release, while inanimate creation can be pictured as eagerly awaiting that time because it will share in the renewal and freedom accompanying the righteous' deliverance.
Doctrine and Warning
The verse gives testimony concerning the Romish apostasy, which did not arise all at once but began developing imperceptibly in apostolic times and would reach its predicted fullness later. That gradual development is connected with the rise of the Man of Sin. The verse also points to the caution that Christ should not be expected before the prophesied events have taken place, and those events remove the reason for delaying expectation of his coming.
The verse is applied to Jews who cling to the Old Covenant and do not believe in Christ: they perish unless they repent and are brought to God by faith just as Gentiles must be. The law cannot restore them or give them life, and salvation and the promised inheritance come through faith in Christ. The Jewish nation's rejection brought wrath upon it to the uttermost, not a promise of national restoration. The mass of the nation was under the law and its curse, while the gospel was to be preached to Jews and Gentiles alike and salvation depended on believing, not on descent from Israel.
Those once acknowledged as God's people face wrath to the uttermost when they reject the evidence that prophecy concerning Christ's Second Advent is being fulfilled, a judgment compared with the destruction of the Jewish nation, where greater light brings greater guilt. Wrath to the uttermost comes upon those who have been God's acknowledged people when they deny Christ by denying the evidence God gives when history testifies to the truth of prophecy. Guilt and revealed damnation are measured by light, so the Christian church, having had greater light than the Jewish church, bears greater guilt and faces more dreadful damnation. Professing Adventists have no exemption if they acknowledge prophetic fulfillment to a point and then deny the events that most manifestly fulfill what Jesus predicted in time, order, and manner.