You need to understand the time and audience of Paul's letters. In this case, was Paul writing to us, to the 19 centuries of Christians all over the world? Was he writing to the last generation of Christians, or was he writing to the Church of the Thessalonians? Let's see:
"To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ..."
It looks like Paul was writing to them. Most believe he wrote his first letter towards the end of 52 AD. Start back with Paul's first letter, first chapter. What is the context?
[SUP]10 [/SUP]and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.
Jesus was to deliver them (the Church of Thessaloniki) from the "wrath to come." What wrath? God's wrath, right? Who was God mad at in 52 AD? We get a hint in 1 Thes 2:
"[SUP]14 [/SUP]For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus. For you also suffered the same things from your own countrymen, just as they did from the Judeans, [SUP]15 [/SUP]who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us..."
Does it appear that God was angry with those who killed Jesus, the same who killed their prophets and who persecuted the saved Jewish Christians in Judea? Was John the Baptist one of those prophets they killed? What did John the Baptist have to say about God's wrath to come and who was this wrath aimed at? Check out Mat 3:
[SUP]7 [/SUP]But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
Wrath to come when, 2000+ years later or to them in their generation? Thus Paul was writing about the wrath to come in less than 18 years from when he wrote it.