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Why is Current Prophecy Teaching About Antichrist Unbiblical – Part 2

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Why is Current Prophecy Teaching About Antichrist Unbiblical – Part 2

“Rome’s answer to the Protestant Reformation was twofold, though actually conflicting and contradictory. Through the Jesuits Ribera, of Salamanca, Spain, and Bellarmine, of Rome, the Papacy put forth her futurist interpretation. Almost simultaneously Alcazar, Spanish Jesuit of Seville, advanced the conflicting preterist interpretation.” (1)

Both of these interpretations were intended to counter the historical interpretation of the Reformers. Although they were actually opposite and conflicting, they were both designed to take the attention away from applying prophecy to the papacy and placing the fulfilment of prophecy either in the past (preterism), stopping short of Papal Rome’s career, or in the distant future (futurism) so that it leaps over papal dominance and squeezes Antichrist into a short period of time, just before the consummation of the ages – therefore often called the ‘gap theory’.

The Reformers’ interpretation of the vision of Babylon and the Beast of Revelation 17 rested clearly on the Roman Church – “the apostate woman, the Roman Church; the city – seven-hilled Rome; the many waters, the many peoples; the Beast, the fourth, or Roman beast of Daniel 7:7; the sixth head, the Caesars and the seventh, the popes”. (2)

“Roman Catholics as well as Protestants agree as to the origin of these interpretations. The Roman Catholic writer G.S. Hitchcock says:
• “The Futurist School, founded by the Jesuit Ribera in 1591, looks for Antichrist, Babylon, and a rebuilt temple in Jerusalem, at the end of the Christian dispensation.
• “The Praeterist School, founded by the Jesuit Alcasar in 1614, explains the Revelation by the Fall of Jerusalem, or by the fall of Pagan Rome in 410 A.D.” (G.S. Hitchcock, The Beasts and the Little Horn, p. 7.)” (3)

Francisco Ribera (1537-1591)
“About 1590 Ribera published a 500-page commentary on the Apocalypse, denying the Protestant application of Antichrist to the Church of Rome. Ribera’s death at fifty-four halted the preparation of further commentaries. Those that were printed passed through several revised editions—at Salamanca about 1590, Lyons and Antwerp in 1593, Douay in 1612, and Antwerp in 1603 and 1623.

“Since its inception his basic thesis has been virtually unchanged. He assigned the first few chapters of the Apocalypse to ancient Rome, in John’s own time; the rest he restricted to a literal three and a half year’s reign of an infidel Antichrist, who would bitterly oppose and blaspheme the saints just before the Second Advent. He taught that antichrist would be a single individual, who would rebuild the temple in Jerusalem, abolish Christian religion, deny Christ, be received by the Jews, pretend to be God, and conquer the world—all in this brief space of three and one half years!

• Places Antichrist’s coming at the close of the seals
• Places trumpets under the seventh seal
• Death of the witness in literal time
• Antichrist’s persecutions last three and one half years
• Judgements upon Rome for ultimate apostasy—in Revelation 17

Ribera admits the woman to be not only pagan Rome but also Rome Christian after a future falling away from the pope. (Francisco Ribera, Sacram Beati Ioannis … Apocalypsin Commentarij, chap. 14, pp. 282, 283).

• Repudiates Augustinian earthly millennium
• Antichrist’s reign counted by literal days
• Babylon is Rome past and future, not present” (4)

Alcazar’s preterist interpretation fell into disrepute and is not therefore relevant for this discussion.

What is the relevance of this information for the Church today?
1. The motive for Ribera’s interpretation of prophecy was not to interpret Scripture accurately but to take the attention away from the Reformers’ identification of the Papacy and the Roman Catholic system as the Antichrist and the Scarlet Women of Revelation 17 and place it on some fictional character far in the future.

2. The Reformers suffered and paid a high price for believing and propagating the truth of salvation by grace through faith alone and for making the Scriptures available to the man in the street.

3. The Roman Catholic Church spilt the blood of millions of Protestant Christian martyrs during the Inquisition – in the name of the Church!

4. The Protestant Church has now joined hands with the Roman Catholic system in propagating the same lies Rome used to turn the attention of the Christian world away from their apostasy, lies and wickedness with which they control the consciences of millions of devotees.

5. In the name of unity – the large part of the Church of the Lord Jesus has climbed into bed with the great prostitute of Revelation 17:3-6. This what Jesus has warned: “Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues; for her sins are piled up to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes.” Revelation 18:4,5.

(Quotes 1-4 taken from the website http://gospel-herald.com/futurism_history.htm, (captured 01/10/2102), (LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic faith of Our Fathers, The Historical Development of Prophetic Interpretation, Vol. 2, Review and Herald, Washington, D.C., 1948, excerpted, pp. 464-532.)
(Please refer to the article “Who is the Man Doomed to Destruction?” for a brief examination of this interpretation).

Why is Current Prophecy Teaching About Antichrist Unbiblical – Part 1

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Why is Current Prophecy Teaching About  Antichrist Unbiblical – Part 1

Before we can understand what the Bible teaches about the end times, it would be of value to look at a summary of the history of current popular interpretation so that we can understand its origin. How did this way of understanding the events surrounding the second coming of Jesus come about? Has this any bearing on the accuracy of this interpretation?

“The papacy suffered a major setback through the Reformation. The help of the monastic orders was sought, but they were so decadent that they had lost the respect of the people. The Dominicans and Franciscans, peddling relics and indulgences, had become the butt of ridicule and mockery.

At this crisis Loyola and his companions offered their services, to go wherever the pope should designate, as preachers, missionaries, teachers, counsellors, and reformers. A new order was created, authorized in 1540, which infused a new spirit and spread rapidly in Europe. Like a wounded giant, Romanism arose in desperation to recover her lost prestige and shrunken territory.” (1)

This movement grew in power and influence across Europe. Its representatives preached in streets and market places like the Protestants did and thousands flocked to hear them. They became eloquent preachers. They were among the best teachers of the land and became entrenched in the universities of Europe. Even Protestants sent their children to them “because of the scholastic progress they could make.”

There was irreconcilable conflict between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. “The two systems stood forth in absolute and irreconcilable opposition at the Council of Trent, where the council expressly condemned what the Reformation taught.” (2)

“The Council of Trent—beginning in 1545 under Paul III and ending in 1563 under Pius IV—crystallized its actions into decrees that became permanent law of the Catholic Church. Reformation truths were there rejected and stigmatized as pestilential heresy. In one sense Trent became the culmination of the Counter-Reformation. It was Rome’s definitive answer to the Reformation.” (3)

For a time after the Reformation, Catholic leadership, mindful of the Reformer’s views of the papacy as Antichrist, avoided preaching on the books of Daniel and Revelation. They were not ready to take on the Reformers damning interpretation of Antichrist which was undermining the foundation of the papacy and the Catholic Church. The Reformers, with pulpit and pen, were forcefully proclaiming that the papacy was the Antichrist of prophecy. Their influence was so great that Rome had to counter attack or lose the battle.
“From the ranks of the Jesuits two stalwarts arose, determined to lift the stigma from the Papacy by locating Antichrist at some point where he could not be applied to the Roman church. It was clearly a crisis of major proportions.” (4)

(Quotes 1-4 taken from the website http://gospel-herald.com/futurism_history.htm, (captured 01/10/2102), (LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic faith of Our Fathers, The Historical Development of Prophetic Interpretation, Vol. 2, Review and Herald, Washington, D.C., 1948, excerpted, pp. 464-532.)
To be continued…

The Final Nail in Antichrist’s Coffin – Part 1

Apologetics,

ANTICHRIST – THE FINAL NAIL IN ANTICHRIST’S COFFIN – PART ONE

The Apostle John gives us the criterion for the ultimate test for the spirit of antichrist.

“Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can recognise the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.” 1 John 4:1-3 (NIV).

“Many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh, have gone out into the world. Any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist.” 2 John 7 (NIV).

We have to determine what John meant by “has come in the flesh”. In his prologue to the fourth gospel, having placed Jesus squarely in the Godhead as the Word who was with God and was God, John makes this statement: “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14 (NIV).

This is the wonder and the mystery of the gospel, that God Himself, the divine Logos, took on human flesh and became one of us, God with us, Emmanuel. What God would leave the glories and privileges of heaven to enter a fallen world and live among His people as one of them? But Jesus did!

Why did He do it? “Since the children have flesh and blood, He too shared in their humanity so that by His death He might destroy him who holds the power of death — that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” Hebrews 2:14,15 (NIV). The King James Version states it this way — “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same…”

He had to have the same flesh as we have in order to identify with us. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, fused with the natural ovum of Mary, and was nurtured in her womb as a human baby. Scripture makes it clear that this is a mystery: “Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great: He appeared in a body…” 1 Timothy 3:16 (NIV) – (God was manifest in the flesh – KJV).

What does the Bible mean by “flesh” and “same flesh”? Paul said, in Romans 7:18, speaking of his struggle with his sinful nature, “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature (“flesh” – KJV), for I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” He was aware of a power within him that warred against his higher desires and won, which he called his “flesh” or “sinful nature.”

Now the Bible expressly states that Jesus was born with the “same flesh” as we have. He had to in order to be an appropriate sacrifice for sin. Any other nature would have disqualified Him from taking our place in death as a punishment for sin.

“Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are — yet was without sin.” Hebrews 4:14, 15 (NIV). The mystery of godliness is great, that Jesus was both fully God and fully man, sharing our human nature, susceptible to every temptation we face, and yet He was without sin.

“For this reason He had to be made like His brothers in every way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that He might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because He Himself suffered when He was tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.” Hebrews 2:17,18 (NIV). Our faith stands or falls on this truth.

(To be concluded…)

So Who Is Right?

Apologetics,

SO WHO IS RIGHT?

Before I conclude these studies on the Biblical picture of antichrist in relation to the widespread popular teaching found in books, movies and current preaching and teaching, let me do a quick review.

Popular teaching presents the picture like this:

1. There will be a silent and secret rapture of the church during which Jesus will snatch believers away from the earth and the Holy Spirit will be removed with the church. This implies that Jesus’ return will happen in two parts; when He raptures the church and when He returns to the earth with the saints, separated by a period of time.

2. After the rapture, the antichrist will make his appearance in the world, an evil and powerful world leader who will come from outside the church. His appearance will trigger seven years of tribulation during which time people will still become believers in Christ.

3. He will invade the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem after three and half years, stop the daily sacrifice and proclaim himself to be God.

4. At the height of his power, Jesus will return with His saints in power and glory to overthrow the antichrist and set up His millennial reign on earth.

A serious study of Scripture contradicts these teachings on the following points:

1. Antichrist, as presented by both Paul and John, is not a single, evil individual who arises outside the church in the end times but a spirit that was already operating in people from within the church in their day. “Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.” 1 John 2:18 (NIV).

Anyone who manifests the treacherous spirit of Judas, one of Jesus’ trusted followers whom Jesus called ‘the one doomed to destruction,’ (John 17:12b; 2 Thessalonians 2:3b), is operating in the spirit of antichrist. “Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of antichrist…” 1 John 4:3a (NIV). He is not an obvious evil character from outside the church but a less obvious trend in people within the church who occupy positions of leadership and influence.

2. The rapture will not be silent and secret: “For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.” 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17. (NIV). This is a fulfilment of the Feast of Trumpets which heralded the Day of Atonement in which God judged His people.

3. The Roman Empire, not the church or the Holy Spirit, was the restrainer, holding back the power of the Church until Rome fell and the centre of government moved to Constantinople.

4. The influence of antichrist arose after the restrainer was removed and in the wake of a massive falling away during which the churches moved away from the simplicity and power of the early church with it devotion to Christ and faithfulness to the teachings of the apostles and became more and more ritualistic and dominated by the church of Rome.

5. The Roman church, led by a succession of corrupt popes, became self-exalting, usurping the authority of God in His own temple, the church. It became a man-led and man-centred kingdom (Daniel 7:19-21), making great claims for itself. It was powerful and made war on the saints, (between the 6th and 18th century, the Roman Catholic Church has murdered 150 million in the name of the church!).

6. According to historians, it was the church, not the barbarians who came down from the north, that cause the Dark Ages. It was the church that stifled learning, reasoning, scientific discovery and philosophy. The Bible was taken away from the people, illiteracy was encouraged and even the priests could not read the Bible.

The church, which had been an organism of life and blessing to the world, had become a monster. The Reformers of the 16th century stood up against Rome and called the people back to the Bible.

(To be continued…)

Antichrist Revealed

Apologetics, , ,

ANTICHRIST REVEALED

“Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? And now you know what is holding him back so that he may be revealed at the proper time. For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so until he is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of His mouth and destroy by the splendour of His coming.” 2 Thessalonians 2:5-8 (NIV).

So far we have established from the examination of Scripture, that antichrist is a spirit operating in people which denies both the deity and humanity of Jesus. It was already at work in the time of Paul and John. It was at work in people who had fallen away from the truth and were leading others astray.
The beast, of which Daniel and John wrote, is a kingdom, not a person, which opposes the church and persecutes the saints. Antichrist, meaning a succession of people who lead and represent the beast, sets himself up in the ‘temple’ of God, the church, and claims to be God. The full of force of antichrist’s power would be held back by the Roman government until its fall after which the beast and the antichrist would be let loose upon the world.

In spite of the depravity and debauchery of society in the time of the apostles, the early church was devoted to Jesus and the gospel spread rapidly across the Roman Empire. By the time the last of the apostles had died, around 100AD, there were Christian churches across the entire Roman world. Believers honoured God’s Word above tradition, they held to Jesus as the only way to the Father and the only Mediator between God and man. They were obedient to the truth and willingly suffered for their faith.

During the first three centuries of the church, the saints were mercilessly persecuted by emperor after emperor, starting with Nero during the lifetime of the apostles, because of their refusal to participate in the cult of Caesar worship. An early Christian theologian, Tertullian, in his “Apologeticus” chapter 50, claimed that ‘the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church’.

After the death of the apostles and their immediate successors, things began to change. Constantine the Great, (who ruled Rome from 302 – 337AD), made Christianity the dominant religion of the Empire. Instead of being persecuted, Christians were favoured but, with the change a flood of pagan practices came into the church and were ‘Christianised’ to make them acceptable to the church; idolatry became ‘honouring’ the saints, and pagan festivals like Christmas (Roman Saturnalia, a harvest festival that marked the winter solstice—the return of the sun) and Easter (honouring the resurrection of Tammuz who was brought back from the underworld by his wife/mother, Ishtar), were brought into the church calendar.
“The Church made a sacred day of Sunday … largely because it was the weekly festival of the sun; for it was a definite Christian policy to take over the pagan festivals endeared to the people by tradition, and to give them a Christian significance. – Source: Arthur Weigall, The Paganism in Our Christianity, p. 145. Copyright 1928 by G. p. Putnam’s Sons, New York.” http://www.essene.com/Church/Sunday.htm.

As the Apostle Paul had predicted, there was a gradual but massive ‘falling away’ from the simplicity of the apostolic gospel message. False theories, unbiblical practices and manmade traditions replaced the simple truth that Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins and the only mediator between God and man.
By the 1500s people were confessing their sins to priests, praying to Mary, bowing to saints and buying forgiveness in the form of ‘indulgences’. Although Christian apologists would have us believe that the period of history called the ‘Dark Ages’ was caused by the ‘heathen barbaric hordes’ that overran the Roman Empire from the north, honest historians such a Gibbons have discovered that this era was brought on by “the corruption of a counterfeit Christianity” (The Truth About the Dark Ages – http://www.hermes-press.com/DAtruth.htm.

Examples of official church policy reveal how far the church had moved from its roots. “The fourth Council of Carthage in 398AC prohibited everybody, including ‘Christian’ bishops, from studying pagan (non-Christian) books – on penalty of death… Illiteracy became official Christian policy… The Roman Emperor Theodosius II In 448 AD, ordered all non-Christian books to be burned…In the new Christian tyranny all scientific thought which contradicted the Bible was suppressed…knowledge which did not serve the purposes of the church was suppressed…within a few generations most priests could not even read.”. http://www.hermes-press.com/DAtruth.htm.
Into this thoroughly corrupted and pagan ‘church’ of the 16th century, the Reformers came with their rediscovery of the simple gospel of faith in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins. These men sought honestly to study and understand the Scriptures, including the falling away, the man of lawlessness in the temple, the world-wide power of the corrupt church and the war being waged against the saints – the Anabaptists, the Waldenses and other groups that stayed true to the gospel of Jesus. During this period, up to 150 million believers were murdered by officials of the church.

Their unanimous conclusion is reflected in the following quotes:
 Martin Luther was the first to speak publicly. On August 20, 1520 he declared, “We are of the conviction that the papacy is the seat of the true and real antichrist.”

 John Calvin (1509 -1564) declared: “Daniel and Paul had predicted that the Antichrist would sit in the temple of God. The head of that cursed and abominable kingdom, we affirm to be the pope.”

 John Knox (1505 -1572) concluded that the papacy was “the very antichrist, the son of perdition, of whom Paul speaks.”

 Thomas Cranmer (1489 -1556) wrote “Whereof it follows Rome to be the seat of the antichrist, and the pope to be the very antichrist himself, I could prove the same by many other scriptures, old writers and strong reasons.”

 Roger Williams (1603-1683) spoke of the pope as “the pretended Vicar of Christ on earth, who sits as God over the temple of God, exalting himself not only above all that is called God, but over the souls and consciences of all his vassals, yea over the Spirit of Christ, over the Holy Spirit, yea, and God himself…speaking against the God of heaven, thinking to change times and laws, but he is the son of perdition.”

 Westminster Confession of Faith – “There is no other head of the church but the Lord Jesus Christ.” Nor can the pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof; but is that Antichrist, that man of sin and son of perdition that exalteth himself in the church against Christ and all that is called God.”

 John Wesley (-1791) “He is in an emphatic sense, the man of sin. And he is too properly styled the son of perdition, as he has caused the death of numberless multitudes, both of his opposes and followers…He is that…that exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped…claiming the highest power, and highest honour…claiming the prerogatives that belong to God alone.”

These were sincere and godly men who based their conclusion on the prophecies of the Bible – Daniel, Paul and John – and who had tasted of the cruelty and evil of a thoroughly corrupt papacy and church.
At this point I must add that this is not intended to be an attack on the Roman Catholic Church and the papacy but rather a resume’ of church history and a summary of the conclusions that the Reformers who were victims of the corrupt papacy and church, came to in their study of history, prophecy and Scripture. The issue here is not people but a system, a kingdom, and leaders who believe and propagate the counterfeit gospel handed down from their forebears.

Satan is the great deceiver. His intention is to lead people astray into every kind of false belief and away from a true and sincere faith in Jesus Christ as the only Saviour. We become a part of the counterfeit church insofar as we deceive or are deceived by believing or propagating anything that is contrary to the true, simple and Biblical gospel.

Those who hate us for exposing the truth can kill the body but they can never kill the truth or extinguish the light that comes from the pure word of God.

“All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the Word of the Lord stands forever.” 1 Peter 1:24,25 (NIV).
(To be continued…)