Summary: Written/ Published in Sept. ’24: Scripture speaks of three distinct powers of evil afflicting the nation of Israel in the end times – a Caesar as head of a revived Roman empire, an Antichrist as a deceiving religious and civil king in Judah, and the Assyrian from the north of Israel.  This is the second in a series of articles identifying these future evil forces in prophecy. 

 

Everyone knows there is an Antichrist coming into the world.  Many believe there will be a one-world government of which he will be its leader.  But do these beliefs agree with Scripture?  Unfortunately, there are many interesting and popular ideas held by masses of people which have no legitimate support from God’s word.  This is one of them.  There will not be a world-wide government by man in the future tribulation.  God will bring about a global government in the final dispensation of time, the future millennium (Eph 1:10).  But this awaits the return of Jesus Christ to this world.  He will come in power and great glory (Matt. 24:29-30).  He will judge the Gentile nations (Matt. 25:31-32).  He will rule over the world for one thousand years (Ps. 2:9, Rev. 2:27, 12:5, 19:15, 20:4, 6).

The biggest world power by men in the future tribulation time will be the revived Roman empire formed by a conglomeration of ten countries (ten horns) from Europe.  When the little horn, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, rises up among the ten and plucks out three, then this beast will have its Caesar as its head (Dan. 7:7-8, 11, 23-25, Rev. 13:1-8, 17:3, 8-13).  But this empire does not span the whole world, and this emperor is not the Antichrist.

By definition, the Antichrist will be a false Messiah.  Many Christians, including most of our teachers, fail to understand the proper character connected to the name/label “Messiah.”  Jesus Christ, in this title and role, was always a specific promise in Old Testament prophecy to the nation of Israel.  As such, Messiah never was a promise to the Gentile nations, and they were never instructed specifically to look/seek for Him.  The same is true concerning the New Testament believer/church.  The Old Testament doesn’t contain any revelations about the following topics: Christianity, the Christian believer, the church, the general body of Christendom, or the Christian dispensation.  How can we properly apply this Old Testament promise of Messiah to topics that were hidden from the prophets and their prophecies?  It is only manipulation if we do.

Messiah has two main ideas associated with it from the prophetic promises: He will be the son of David; He will reign as King over Israel.  In this, Solomon serves as a remarkable type.  But let us realize how Jewish everything is here.  Solomon was a Jew of the tribe of Judah, and as the son of David he ruled over a united Israel.  This is the essence of the promise of Messiah.

When Israel was in the process of rejecting Jesus, their true Messiah, He made this statement:

 

John 5:43 (NKJV)

“I have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive me; if another comes in his own name, him you will receive.”

 

Jesus is speaking of the end times when the nation of Israel will embrace the Antichrist as their long waited-for Messiah.  For Israel to receive him it will help that he will be a Jew.  The apostle John speaks of the religious beliefs of the Antichrist.

 

1 John 2:22 (NKJV)

“Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ?  He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son.”

1 John 4:3 (NKJV)

“…and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God.  And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.”

 

Although the ‘spirit’ of Antichrist has been in the world since the time of the apostle, the person of the Antichrist is yet to come.  But from these two verses we can know his core beliefs – he is anti- Christian.  There is a complete and profound rejection of Jesus Christ, especially as the Messiah of Israel.  Yet these negatives against Jesus Christ and the fundamentals of the Christian faith are the general beliefs of the nation of Israel.  We can see how the Antichrist will be acceptable to them.

 

Daniel 11:36-39 (NKJV)

“Then the king shall do according to his own will: he shall exalt and magnify himself above every god, shall speak blasphemies against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the wrath has been accomplished; for what has been determined shall be done.  ³⁷He shall regard neither the God of his fathers nor the desire of women, nor regard any god; for he shall magnify himself above them all.  ³⁸But in their place he shall honor a god of fortresses; and a god which his fathers did not know he shall honor with gold and silver, with precious stones and pleasant things.  ³⁹Thus he shall act against the strongest fortresses with a foreign god, which he shall acknowledge, and advance its glory; and he shall cause them to rule over the many, and divide the land for gain.”

 

This is the only passage in Daniel that speaks of the Antichrist.  “Divide the land for gain” refers to the Promised Land.  “The many” speaks of the unbelieving Jewish nation (unbelieving in Jesus as their promised Messiah).  The terms “God of gods” and “God of his fathers” are descriptions of Jehovah.  “The desire of women” refers to the Messiah of Israel.  The Antichrist’s great enemy is “the king of the north” (Dan.11:40-45; this is the Assyrian, the subject of the final article in this series).  The Antichrist is called the willful king because he defies and blasphemes Jehovah and acts according to his own will.  Now lets look at the book of Revelation speaking of the Antichrist:

 

Rev. 13:11-18 (NKJV)

Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. 

¹²And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. 

¹³He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. 

¹⁴And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. 

¹⁵He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. 

¹⁶And he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads,

¹⁷and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark, the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 

¹⁸Here is wisdom.  Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man; His number is 666.

 

Like all beasts in Scripture, the second beast is a worldly power.  This does not mean that it controls all the nations making up the world, but it is a power in the world of some significant stature.  As political/civil powers, all beasts do their own will instead of God’s will.  The first beast of Revelation thirteen (Rev. 13:1) is the fourth beast of Daniel seven (Dan. 7:7).  In the previous article we established this as a revived form in some measure of the ancient Roman empire.  It has a similarity to the three previous beasts in Daniel seven in that they all came up from the sea (Dan. 7:2-3, Rev. 13:1).  The sea is a prophetic symbol for the Gentile nations.

In contrast to this, the second beast of Revelation thirteen comes up out of the earth.  This refers to the Jewish nation/people.  The symbols associated with this beast continue a connection with Israel.  Although he speaks like a dragon, he has two horns like a lamb – influence and power mimicking Israel’s Messiah/King.  He has deceiving religious powers by which he leads the people of the earth (mainly the Jews) into idolatry.  The prediction by Jesus of Israel’s condition in the last days confirms this sad truth (Matt. 12:43-45) – the idolatry of the Jews before Jesus returns will be catastrophic, the worst of its long history.

And clearly, the second beast is subservient to the first – “And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast…”  Why might this be?  I’m thinking it’s because in himself he is not as large or as powerful as the first beast and needs this alliance for protection from his enemies (like the Assyrian, the king of the north).  The second beast is the Antichrist.  Later in the Revelation, still in close association with the first beast, he is known as the false prophet (Rev. 16:13, 19:20).

 

Matt. 24:5,11, 23, 24 (NKJV)

“For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many…then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many…then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it.  For false christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders, so as to deceive, if possible, even the elect.

 

This is from a section of the Lord’s prophecy which is decidedly Jewish (instruction to an end-time Jewish remnant; Matt. 24:4-44).  The Jews are still waiting for their promised Messiah/King.  These references have no application to Christians or Christianity.  But they certainly apply to the unbelieving “many” of Israel.  During the tribulation time there will be a great religious deception of most of the living Jews.  As John said, the spirit of Antichrist has been in the world for some time now.  But this does not negate the truth that the person of the Antichrist is coming in the flesh.  He will epitomize these deceptive characteristics referred to in the passage above – a false Messiah and false prophet among the Jews.

Another passage of Scripture which speaks of the Antichrist is 2 Thess. 2:1-12.  For most of Christendom and many of our ministers/teachers this passage presents much difficulty in gaining its proper understanding.  It would require a separate article in order to address all the issues and misunderstandings people have created concerning it.  I will only point out from it what confirms the deceptive characteristics of the Antichrist already mentioned in this article.

 

1. The man of sin, the son of perdition (v. 3) and the lawless one (v. 8) are all labels referring to the future Antichrist.
2. The Antichrist will have religious power given to him by Satan (v. 9). He will deceive with all power, signs, and lying wonders.  This falls in line with the description of the second beast in Revelation thirteen (Rev. 13:13-15).  It mimics the power of God in the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ (Acts. 10:38).

 

The return of Jesus Christ to this world will bring in the judgment and destruction of the Antichrist (v. 8) – “…the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming.” 

 

Rev. 19:20 (NKJV)

“Then the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who worked signs in his presence…These two were cast alive into the lake of fire burning with brimstone.”

 

Again, the beast is the Caesar, the head of the revived Roman empire, while the false prophet associated with him is the Antichrist, the false Messiah/King of Israel.  One thousand years after this Satan joins with them as receiving his part in this eternal judgment (Rev. 20:10) – “And the devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are.  And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.”