Heart Tracks - The Antichrist Spirit

"Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour." I John 2:18...."Antichrist is something that assumes the place of Christ. They can seem so much alike." T. Austin-Sparks

Ever since I came to Christ in 1979, there have been varying degrees of conversation about the Antichrist; when he will appear, where will he have come from? Both I John and Revelation speak of him, and everything points to him being a person filled with the spirit of the devil and being everything Christ is not, and against everything Christ is. However, what most miss is that while this actual personage and spirit may be yet to come, the antichrist spirit has already come, has been in the world since the fall, and has been coming against the people of God forever. Though that spirit is total evil, it doesn't often look that way. It can in fact deceive us into thinking that the lure it puts before us is from Christ Himself. If we lack spiritual discernment, we'll be deceived every time.

Something that needs to happen for the believer is be able to discern where every desire, leading, and behavior has its root. In short, what spirit do they feed? Does it come from Him, or that which is not Him at all? The Pharisees who first persecuted and then killed Jesus thought they did the work of God. The apostle Paul, once a Pharisee himself, persecuted and participated in the murder of those who followed Christ. He too thought he was doing the work of God. His zeal to work for the Father had taken the place of a desire to know Him. Jesus often said to the ones who opposed Him, "If you knew My Father, you would know Me." In Scripture, God says, "My people perish for lack of knowledge." Knowledge of Him. That Scripture remains powerfully true today.

Perhaps you're reading this and thinking, "Well, I'm not persecuting Him, or doing anything like that," but is that really so? Sparks says that an antichrist is anything that takes the place of Christ in our hearts and life. What things, people, professions, ambitions, goals....ministries may have taken His place in ours? There may be much good in every one of them, but if the laying hold of any of them is at the center of our hearts, they have taken His place, and they are an antichrist to us. I have had antichrists in my life; attitudes, relationships with others, behaviors, and yes, even the ministry He called me to. In all of them, like Paul, I thought I was following His desire for me. I was deceived. It took examining where the center of those things was rooted to see that they were not rooted in Him. What things in your life aren't either? Who and what are the antichrists for you?

Antichrist is here. Where is his spirit here for each of us? He can indeed seem very much like Christ. Only His Holy Spirit discernment can expose the difference. Do you and I have such discernment?

Blessings,
Pastor O