Unleashing the Beast

T HE B EAST K NOWN AS THE A NTICHRIST / 19

come in the flesh is not of God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now is it in the world (4:3). For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist (2 John 1:7). Because John said, "Even now there are many antichrists"(1 John 2:18), some teach there is not a future person called the Antichrist. They say that the antichrist is only a spirit which has existed from the first church to the present age. I submit to you that antichrist is both a spirit and a future person! The "antichrist spirit" existed in the time of the early church, because some denied the divinity of Christ and His position as the Son of God. Yet, the Bible says that at the end of days, one man will appear who will be a prince of darkness, a son of perdition, who is identified as the Antichrist. In 2 John 1:7, the Greek uses the definite article, ho antichristos meaning "the antichrist." According to John, the spirit of antichrist and the Antichrist deny three things: 1. Both deny, without hesitation, the deity of Jesus Christ (1 John 2:22). 2. Both deny that Jesus Christ is the Son of God (1 John 2:22). 3. Both deny the relationship between the Father and the Son (1 John 2:22).