The Lovable Antichrist

It happens in churches, at prayer meetings, in home groups, at conferences, and anywhere else there is a person “leading” a group of believers down the wrong path. The antichrist is a lying image of satan and yet is perceived as Christ-like through his language, use of scriptures, and perhaps even working of miracles. A loveable antichrist sounds good and looks good, but is carefully and skillfully getting you to deny the lordship of Christ. But how? How will someone ever be able to convince a believer – the elect – to deny Christ? Here’s how some of them work. A compassionate antichrist will look tenderly into your eyes, lay hands on you, maybe even anoint you with oil. However, instead of relying totally on the Spirit of God to heal, they’ll usually tell you that you’d better get to a doctor. They’ll often say, “I’ll pray for you. We know God can heal you but He’ll meet you at your point of faith.” A statement like that instills a seed of doubt in your mind and causes your budding faith to diminish. If someone prays for you in accordance with the Word, why on earth would they tell you to see a doctor or get surgery? A rationalizing antichrist will convince you that tragedy such as sickness really comes from God. They want you to believe that you’re sick so something good can come from it because God wants you to learn something. Part of that’s true – the Word promises that all things work together for good to those who love the Lord. But the untrue part of it is the implication that God sent the tragedy to you. Why would God send tragedy and then make something good out of it? That just does not line up with scripture. It breaks my heart to hear ministers tell people that they should be thankful for the hardships and tragedies that befall them because “God allowed it for a reason.” That’s just not true! Just read John 10:10! It’s the enemy that comes to steal, kill and destroy. Jesus came that we could have life and that we could have it more abundantly! Now I know that bad things happen all the time, but don’t blame God for that! We’ll explain this more fully in Chapter 3. We’ll give you a fuller revelation of how the antichrist gains access to our lives by convincing us that all the bad things are God’s will. That’s just cunning deception pure and simple! A slick antichrist doesn’t want more for you, he wants more from you! If you’re in a battle and the world is coming down on you; if you’re fighting the same fight over and over, you’re vulnerable if you don’t know what the Word teaches. An antichrist will try to convince you that you’ve got to “do something” or that you’re “not doing something” before God will intervene in your situation. The antichrist will never tell you that what Jesus did is enough! A controlling antichrist will declare that theirs is a “spirit-filled, spirit-led church” but they don’t allow the gifts of the spirit to be manifest. They tell us that raising holy hands, or speaking in tongues, or words of prophecy are disruptive; but in reality, they just don’t want to deviate from their agenda; they just don’t want God to show up! How sad that there is such manipulation and deception in the very places where Jesus should be honored. How do you think our Lord would react if He heard some of these perverted “gospels”?