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For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist. Watch yourselves, so that you may not lose what we have worked for, but may win a full reward. Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever greets him takes part in his wicked works.
2 John 7-11
If you pay any attention to religious news, you're going to hear something about the "End Times" and "The Antichrist". There are various predictions as to when the end of all things will come, and there are just as many or more predictions about who the Antichrist will be. John, in his three short letters, explains to us who the antichrists are (yes, there are more than one ) and why they are called such.
Firstly, anyone can be an antichrist. This certainly doesn't fit with much of the popular writing about this topic, but this is what the Bible says: "...you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come" (1 John 2.18). John would then go on to define what he meant by saying, "Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son" (1 john 2.22). When you add in the passage above, antichrists are also those who deny the coming of Jesus as the incarnation of God in human flesh (cf John 1.14, which states that the Word became flesh).
Why is all this so important? It's important because if we deny Jesus as the Messiah or that he was God in human form, then we deny the basic tenets of the gospel. If we go beyond the fact that the crucifixion was God sacrificing his own son for our sins, then we remove the power of the cross, the importance of the resurrection and the love of God from the basis of Christianity. If we change something about Jesus, then we change everything about Christianity. It is for this reason that Paul was so worried when the Christians in Corinth began to accept "another Jesus" (2 Corinthians 11.4). Paul would also say that if anyone, even an angel in heaven, change the information in the gospel, then they were to be anathema, that is, utterly cut-off and excommunicated from the community of Christian faith (Galatians 1.8-9). This is serious business!
As it stands, there are many different teachings about the person of Jesus today. There are some who claim that he is really the archangel Michael. There are others who claim that he didn't really come in the flesh, but only appeared to do so. Still some others claim that Jesus is one of many different children that God had and was, therefore, not the Word made flesh. All of these different ideas about Jesus change who he was. They change his relationship to the Father, and they make him out to be a liar when he claimed that he and the father were one (John 10.30).
What does this mean if you don't believe in a different Jesus, but you believe in and obey the Jesus found in the Bible? It means that you have faith in the one, true, living Son of God. You have faith in the one who is called Eternal Father, Wonderful Counselor, Prince of Peace. It means that you have as your savior the Lamb of God, the only begotten Son of God who gave himself as a sacrifice for all the world's sins. It means that you are partakers of the great and precious promises that God has given to mankind through Jesus - it means that you are part of the household of faith, have your citizenship in heaven and are enrolled there as a member of God's kingdom.
As long as we maintain our faith in Jesus and love him enough to obey him, then we have nothing to fear in this life and everything to look forward to in eternity.
Prayer: Father, please help us to remember who Jesus is and why his life, death, resurrection and ascension into heaven are so important to us. Please help us to keep our eyes fixed on him who alone is our hope of eternal life with you in heaven. Amen
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