In every mainline denomination the facts are in and well-known, abortion is as commonplace inside the church as outside. Fornication is as expected between single adults inside the church as outside. Pornography is as rampant inside the church as outside. Divorce as commonplace. Greed as rampant. Gossip as unbridled. Homosexuality as condoned and even encouraged.
Adulters are moving unrepentantly and unchallenged among the assembly. That's apostate behavior. Sometimes the best way to defeat an enemy is to defeat it from within.
Infiltrating the enemy and trying to undermine its effectiveness is a powerful tool. This is actually a tactic that Satan uses to try to undermine the church. Satan doesn't want to destroy religion. He's fine with religion and religious devotion as long as it's empty and devoid of truth.
Welcome to Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. Stephen is about to show you how during the tribulation, Satan will bring the world together under one false destructive religion. Here's Stephen with today's message. Now in light of our study of the antichrist, I found it especially interesting that John will follow up that phrase with a phrase a few verses later where he will say this, I have not written to you, church, because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie is of the truth. So who is the liar but the one who denies Christ, that Jesus is the Christ, that is the Messiah, God in the flesh? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. So John writes about those who've left the church. He writes about those apostates who deny the truth of Christ. He writes about those who say eventually, you know, we never did buy into all that stuff and we're out of here and they deny the Lord with their lies from that point forward.
Even worse, if there's something worse than somebody leaving as an apostate, are those apostates who deny the truth but remain in the church. They provide this fifth column. They're masquerading. They're actually on the enemy's side.
They're in league with him. They're preparing the way for falsehood and deception. They vote in church meetings. They serve on deacon boards. They may even be in the pulpit. They are the fifth column. They are shepherds and those would be the worst of all then, those in leadership who lead the sheep astray. This was Paul's warning to the Ephesian elders when he said to them, be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock.
Why? Because from among your own selves, that is within the assembly, men will arise speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after them. Now the word for perverse, you might think of as some kind of immoral thing.
It isn't. Diastrefo can be translated to simply twist or distort. They say distorted things. They say twisted things. They sound right. They sound true until you think about it five or ten seconds later, but they are actually twisting the truth and distorting its meaning.
As we've said before, they use the same terminology that we use, but they use a different dictionary. I agree with one author who wrote that it doesn't take much effort to see we live in a generation of surging apostasy. Paul wrote to Titus, these are they who've turned away from the truth. That is, they're defiled and unbelieving. They profess to know God, but by their deeds, they deny him. See, these are the ones that Paul is warning the church of in every generation. This fifth column from within, they collaborate with the enemy. They are watering down perhaps the gospel.
Maybe that's their shtick, or they denigrate the mission of the church into nothing more than let's just be inoffensive in our presentation, which means we never present the gospel because the gospel does offend. In fact, we'll just let everybody have the God of their own choice and you get to heaven in whichever way you want to get there. The world will finally, according to what John will reveal to us, finally be unified in one global government, in one global economy, and as we're about to see, in one global religion. It will begin with the acceptance of every God and every religion.
In fact, the inclusive religion will be the state of the art way, and anybody that doesn't believe that would be some exclusive prude who really isn't very tolerant, and who might that be? Well, we gather today in this room. That's who we are.
That's who they are. Everyone will have a God in this day, and every God will be validated. However, halfway through the tribulation, we're going to see the happy days of every God will do, will morph into only one God, and that God will be the antichrist, and you will either worship him or die. Those who, of course, have been raptured won't go through this. Those who've come to faith in Christ after the rapture will have to make that significant decision of whether or not they'll wear the mark of the beast, and we'll get there in our next session.
This is the challenging day which I believe may very well be setting up for the emergence of the antichrist. All we have to do is observe the distinction or the lack of among professing believers. Sin is condoned.
Sin is endorsed. Whatever lifestyle you want to have, whatever behavior you want to act out, whatever doctrine you want to believe, whatever you want to toss out, whatever you think that God may want you to believe in the Bible, all of that, the church doesn't seem to be disturbed. One of our shepherd seminary graduates told me some time ago that he arrived at his new church, beautiful building, congregation waiting for him, first weekend. He got a phone call on Friday night before he was to preach his first sermon at this, now his first church. The phone call was from a man outside the church that was trying to reconcile with his wife who was inside the church, and he was in the midst of writing a letter that he hoped would appeal to her heart, and he wanted the pastor to meet with him. He felt he was close, and he wanted to get the words right, and so he asked if the pastor would meet with him, and he was so excited he told me because my first weekend I'm going to get to be involved in the reconciliation of a marriage. When he met with a man later that night, he realized that it wasn't quite what he thought. In fact, he realized how deeply troubling the situation was.
Evidently his wife wasn't interested in reconciling with him at all. In fact, she had already moved in and was living with another man who was also attending that same church, and everybody evidently in the church knew about it, a small church. The pastor also came to find out that the man she was involved in was actually a leader in that church.
In fact, he would discover that this man was the chairman of the pastoral search committee that had called him to pastor, and that was his first weekend. I didn't ask him if he changed his text, but in every mainline denomination the facts are in and well known. Whether we want to deny it or not, the facts of the evangelical church are in. It doesn't seem troubled that abortion is as commonplace inside the church as outside. That fornication is as expected between single adults inside the church as outside. That pornography is as rampant inside the church as outside. Divorce as commonplace. Greed as rampant. Gossip as unbridled. Homosexuality as condoned and even encouraged.
Adulters are moving unrepentantly and unchallenged among the assembly. They who profess to know God, deny him with their deeds. That's apostate behavior. There is apostate belief, which is the second, of course, characteristic. The church at large comparing itself to apostate belief would have to admit it is throwing overboard historic biblical pre and post-Reformation doctrine, which is biblical.
It is now considered intolerant and out of date. Doctrine is not overtly denied as much as it is discreetly distorted, twisted ever so slightly at times, redefined. No apostate would ever probably, I don't think, get up in an evangelical church and announce, I deny Jesus Christ from here on out.
No, no. What he will do is deny that Jesus Christ is God incarnate. That the resurrection doesn't have to be literal.
The apostate will not deny that Christ exists, but he will deny that Christ is exclusively God our savior. If ever we needed to be alerted, it is today. This is heavy on my heart. In fact, I wanted to get to the entire paragraph in Revelation 13, but let me just say a few more words, because I'm not done yet.
I think this is so needed today. The closer we move to the end of the church age, the more the plethora of false teachers there will be. Christ warned of it. He said there are going to be many false teachers, many antichrists, many people against Christ. And it will lead to the introduction of the antichrist and the final deceiving prophet, spiritual leader, preacher who will endorse the antichrist.
I'll introduce him to you in a minute. And in a matter of 42 months, the world will be worshiping the antichrist. You say, how in the world could that happen so quickly?
Because there's a fifth column already at work. And the true church is raptured and all that's left are people that think there are many gods anyway. And they're ready for him. Verse 11, where we left off at Revelation chapter 13. Then I saw, it's John's way of saying, I have a new vision. This is a new vision from God. Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth. Now you might notice, if you look up at verse 1, there is a beast mentioned here. The first beast, that's the antichrist.
We've studied that section already. And he came up out of the sea. You look in verse 1, then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea. Probably a reference to the Mediterranean since the antichrist will come from the revived Roman Empire surrounding the Mediterranean Sea. The second beast, now down in verse 11, is called later in Revelation 19, the false prophet or the false preacher. And he, John says, I saw him coming up out of the earth.
Interesting to me. The word translated earth can be simply translated land. In Matthew's gospel, chapter 2, verse 10, we read of the land of Judah. In verse 20 of Matthew chapter 2, we read of the land of Israel. This has led some Bible teachers, evangelical scholars to propose that the false prophet will be Jewish. He's going to come up out of the land.
Now you might say, oh no. And you know, we're not going to go to the wall on this, but you might immediately say there's no way a Jewish man would ever promote a one world religion that would accept Buddhists and Muslims and Christians. Well I happen to have in my study a copy of an interview that somebody sent me last month with a leading rabbi in Israel, a chief rabbi who said, and I quote him, it is my dream to create a united religious nation.
And I couldn't help but think of Revelation chapter 13. He went on to explain that since Abraham is the father of all three major monotheistic religions embraced by the majority of the human population, that's Islam, Judaism, and Christianity, that that connection, the fact that we all go back to Abraham, well let's use Abraham then. Let's not worry about Christ. Let's talk about Abraham and let our connection to Abraham be the foundation for dialogue and a united world religion. That's a Jewish man speaking, a rabbi.
But you're probably thinking there's no way in the world a Muslim is ever going to follow a Jew. Well I just happened to get this week a journal I subscribed to called the Friends of Israel. And in this month's edition they had a big splash, one page, a picture of the king of Saudi Arabia and then the article, which I couldn't help but believe fit well within this movement which may be setting the stage, who knows, even in our generation for the coming one world religion.
This king of Saudi Arabia, of course he's a devout Muslim and that nation is I guess you could call them the most intolerant nation on the earth, you're either Muslim or you don't breathe, you're dead. Well he had a conference in Spain, he convened. That conference was claimed to be an historic conference. Historic for one thing because it was a conference on religious inclusivism and Muslims normally aren't at those conferences, right?
Well they were here. It was led off by this king who got up and spoke on the need to connect and to be in unity. There at this meeting were Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Zoroastrians, by the way those are not people who follow Zoro in case you were wondering. They are a smaller sect of monotheists who believe in an uncreated god named Mazda. That's right. Those of you that drive a Mazda are in deep trouble.
Just thought you'd like to know. Well 300 religious leaders convened in Spain and this Muslim king got up and said this and I quote, we all believe in one god who sent messengers for the good of humanity in this world and the hereafter. End quote.
In other words, we ought to find common ground in our monotheism and in the name of monotheistic unity, let's just kind of combine and get along. John records here in chapter 13 the rise of a powerful, demonically inspired preacher, prophet who will rise with pseudo-spiritual leadership. Notice John's further vision and he had two horns like a lamb and he spoke as a dragon, a reference to two animals, the metaphor here could be the lamb, a reference to him counterfeiting Christ, the lamb.
I'm not so sure that's it. We know the antichrist will pull that off. He will be the pseudo-lamb, the anti-lamb, the antichrist. I think this is probably language that takes the reader back to Matthew 7 where Jesus Christ alerted his audience saying listen, there are going to be many false teachers who are going to come to you and they're going to be dressed in lamb's wool or lamb's clothing so to speak.
They're going to be dressed in wool. That's part of their disguise. They're dressed as harmless sheep but underneath, he says, they are ravenous wolves and they are going to rip you apart.
Now think of it, this is part of the deception. Nobody's afraid of a lamb. Lambs don't scare people. They're innocent.
They're harmless. They're gentle and throughout scripture, they are ceremonially clean. This man is going to have all the religious boxes checked. He's going to be the perfect gentleman but then note John adds here that he spoke as a dragon. That ties him to the language of Satan.
Throughout this expose, Satan is called the dragon so he looks like a lamb. He's innocent. He's harmless. He's smooth. He's eloquent but when he speaks, he reveals his partnership with the enemy, Satan. He'll work like no fifth column ever worked behind the scenes, ultimately aiding the one who will destroy billions of people who surrender to this false Messiah and I thought, you know, false prophets are like that, aren't they? They often appear meek and mild and harmless and positive and kind.
They are the perfect gentleman. They offer hope and solutions to the problems troubling men and women yet they are the voices of hell whether they realize it or not. In fact, Matthew 7 tells us some are not even going to realize it until they stand before Christ and he says, I really never knew you. When they speak, they speak the words of Satan, the false prophet under his power will come like a lamb speaking false deceptive words of comfort. He's going to promise the suffering tormented human race experiencing the wrath of God that all will be well. One scholar F.F. Bruce called him the minister of propaganda. In reality, he is in partnership with the devil himself.
I want you to underscore not only his partnership but his passion. Look at verse 12. This is the anti-spirits passion. He exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence. Now there are some believe that he is the antichrist. The text clearly indicates he's exercising the authority of the antichrist in the presence of the antichrist.
These are two separate individuals. Others believe that this false prophet is not really a man. He's just an ideology. Maybe he's a false religion of some sort or maybe he's an institution.
The trouble with that is that you don't have institutions. You don't have ideologies cast into hell. Revelation 19 verse 20 reveals the terrifying finality that the beast and this prophet will have.
Let me read you what he says. The beast is seized along with the false prophet who performs signs in his presence and these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone. So this is their end. But for a short space of time the false prophet will act with great passion. He's going to act with this primary objective to accomplish what? Look at verse 12 again. And he makes the earth and those who dwell in it, that is the earth dwellers is a consistent reference to unbelievers. He will make the earth dwellers worship the first beast whose fatal wound was healed. A reference to the antichrist. Simply put then his passion is to preach, to prophesy about a one world religion and why that makes sense. And he will then coalesce the voice of humanity that will ultimately exalt the antichrist and worship him.
He will literally function as one who seeks to glorify the son of perdition. You see the false trinity in here? You see the anti trinity represented in these three, the dragon, the antichrist and the false prophet.
Listen to these contrasting descriptions were given in the Bible. The Holy Spirit exalts Jesus Christ. John 15. The anti spirit or the false prophet exalts the antichrist. The Holy Spirit reveals divine revelation, gives us, illumines divine revelation. John 16, 13. The anti spirit is an instrument of satanic revelation. The Holy Spirit seals the believer to God forever. 1 John 3. The anti spirit will also seal their followers forever.
Bringing about their doom. The Holy Spirit builds up the body of Christ. John 7, 37. The anti spirit will build up those who follow after antichrist. The Holy Spirit enlightens mankind with God's truth.
John 14, 17. The anti spirit will deceive mankind with Satan's lie. So just as Satan will counterfeit God the father, the antichrist will counterfeit God the son, the false prophet will counterfeit the Holy Spirit.
You have this anti counterfeit trinity. Satan, the first person, acts as God the father, so to speak, in having this plan and scheme. The second person, the son of perdition, which carries out, as it were, his father's scheme, and the third person, the anti spirit, who seeks to glorify the son of perdition, bringing worship, sealing those followers forever. And listen, the anti trinity is going to sound a lot like the deceivers of every generation, and they are in our generation, and I've quoted from some of them already. Rob Bell, another emergent church leader, interviewed in a supposed evangelical magazine, and that interview, Bell said, listen to this, and I quote him, the church has preached horrible messages about being left behind and that this place is going to burn. These are toxic messages that are against the teaching of scripture.
I wondered how long it had been since he read 2 Peter 3 about the earth being burned and those apart from Christ being doomed. But he said this, these messages are against the teaching of scripture, which states, we are connected to God. We are connected to the earth.
We are connected to each other. Your relationship with God is tied into your relationship with the soil. And then he says, go back to Genesis.
So I did. In Genesis, we discover the original sin so that man is no longer connected to God, but in deep trouble. We saw mankind's spiritual death through disobedience.
Connection is broken. But we saw God's initiative as he took the lives of two innocent animals and robed Adam and Eve with their skins, thus picturing blood atonement and the fulfillment of the coming final sacrifice for us, the seed of the woman promised in Genesis, the suffering Messiah who will crush the serpent's head in final victory. That's what you find in Genesis. Go back to Genesis and you have the introduction of Satan and sin and atonement and grace and the promise of a coming Messiah.
Listen, your relationship to God today, my friend, if you have one, is not tied to the soil. It is tied to a savior and he's your only hope. And anybody who tells you otherwise is a false teacher who speaks the dragon's language of lies. The fifth column, unbelievers within the church who promote unity at the expense of truth, who cast their vote to make the church more tolerant of those who disbelieve the scriptures. What they're clamoring after, according to Revelation, as we will even see further in another study, it will be trivial, it will be superficial, it will be self-promoting, it will be flawed, and most importantly, it will be temporary.
It'll last 42 months and then lead straight to the gates of hell forever. But an assembly committed to the truth of God's word, the truth of God's person revealed in the scriptures can be that body of people that enjoy the unity of heart and the unity of purpose and the unity of true passion and love not only in this assembly but between assemblies of like faith who also believe in the singular atoning work of Jesus Christ and this infallible book and the record of scripture which gives to us even the end of the age. This lesson is an important reminder, isn't it?
There is absolute truth, God's truth, and it's found in God's word. I'm glad you've joined us today here on Wisdom for the Heart. If you haven't already done this, please install the Wisdom International app to your smartphone. When you do that, you can take the complete archive of Stephen's Bible teaching ministry wherever you go. You can follow along in our Bible reading plan, listen to each day's broadcast, or access any of the previous lessons. You can also sign up to receive a trial of our monthly magazine, Heart to Heart. All that and more is available on that app, and you'll find it in both the iTunes and the Google Play stores. Be sure and install the Wisdom International app today, and join us for our next Bible lesson right here on Wisdom for the Heart.
