SECTION II
CHAPTER 8
INTRODUCTION
“THE ANTICHRIST IS COMING”
The denial that Jesus Christ is "come in the flesh" is, according to John's First Epistle, definitely the manifestation of the "spirit of antichrist." "Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son" (I John 2:22). Specifically, John was contesting the Gnostics who denied the physicality of the Lord Jesus and sought to undermine that "Jesus Christ is come in the flesh." Yet, today, prior to the Lord's Second Advent, that same spirit of Antichrist--who could not defeat Him in His First Coming--seeks to spread a new and foreboding heresy: There is no Antichrist--THE Antichrist will not come!
John sought to dispel that end-times' heresy by his first mentioning of THE Antichrist in I John 2:18: "Little children, it is the last hour; and as you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come, by which we know that it is the last hour." (NKJV)
The world and the kingdoms of this world are at the crossroads of history--failing divine intervention, the incessant wars of so-called liberation, recurrent famine and disease, civil unrest and general commercial exploitation will increase until the people cry out for a great leader who will deliver them all! THE ANTICHRIST IS COMING is NOT a "light read" - it embraces the Blessed Hope for believers, who in the midst of whatever trial or tribulation they encounter--the future is sure: "And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever" (Daniel 2:44). These are the same "kings" spoken of in Revelation 17:10-11: "There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to perdition."
These "kings" and their "kingdoms" - in particular, the seventh and eighth, whose kingdoms are of the Antichrist and the Beast, await the sound of the Seventh Trumpet: "The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!"