Who is the Antichrist?

Question 10046.

The Antichrist is a coming world ruler who will oppose God, deceive the nations, persecute the saints, and set himself up as an object of worship during the tribulation. When people ask me who he is, they usually want a name, and that is exactly the one thing I cannot and will not give them. What Scripture does supply is a rich and detailed portrait of his character, his career and his end, and that portrait is what I want to set before you, because knowing what this man will do matters far more than guessing who he might turn out to be.

The very title tells you a great deal about his nature. The prefix anti means both against and in place of, and this figure is both at once. He stands against the true Christ, and he offers himself as a counterfeit substitute for Him, a false messiah for a world that has already rejected the real one. He is the devil’s masterpiece, the ripe fruit and climax of every proud rebel who has ever grasped at the worship due to God alone. To understand him is to understand where human rebellion finally leads.

The many names of the Antichrist

Scripture rarely uses that actual word for this end-time figure, though John’s letters do supply the term. The Greek antichristos appears in 1 John, where the apostle says many such deceivers have already come into the world, yet points beyond them all to a final and greater one still to appear. The end-time ruler is more often described under a whole range of other titles. Paul calls him the man of lawlessness and the son of destruction in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4. Daniel calls him the little horn and the prince who is to come. John in Revelation calls him simply the beast rising out of the sea.

Put those separate portraits together and a single figure clearly emerges from them. This end-time deceiver is the little horn of Daniel, the man of lawlessness of Paul, and the beast of Revelation, one and the same person seen from several different angles by several different prophets. This is exactly why I read prophecy with Scripture interpreting Scripture, letting Daniel and Paul and John fill out and confirm one another, rather than reading each writer in isolation and missing the unity of the whole picture God has given us.

Where the Antichrist comes from

Daniel’s visions tie this ruler firmly to the final form of the fourth great empire, the one that succeeded Babylon, Persia and Greece in turn, namely Rome. The little horn arises out of a revived Roman framework, which leads me to expect a Roman or broadly Western background rather than any of the various national guesses people have made and abandoned over the centuries. He emerges onto the stage of history as a political saviour, a man of dazzling ability and charm who appears to solve the very crises of a frightened and desperate world just when hope seems lost.

His rise is made possible by the removal of the restrainer. In 2 Thessalonians 2:6-8 Paul says the man of lawlessness cannot be revealed until what now restrains is taken out of the way. I understand that restraint to be the Holy Spirit working through the Church, which means this ruler cannot step onto the stage until the Church is caught up at the rapture. Only then is the way finally clear for the beast to appear, a link I develop closely in my study of pretribulationism and the order of end-time events.

The career of the man of lawlessness

This coming ruler opens his career as a peacemaker, not a warlord. Daniel 9:27 says he confirms a covenant with the many for seven years, and that treaty with Israel is what starts the tribulation clock ticking. For the first half of the period he brings a false and fragile peace, and by it he gains the trust of a grateful world. Then, at the midpoint, everything changes in a moment. He breaks his covenant, enters the temple in Jerusalem, stops the sacrifices, and demands to be worshipped as God, committing the very act Jesus called the abomination of desolation.

From that turning point the beast rules a global system for forty-two months, aided at every step by the false prophet who enforces his worship and administers his mark. Revelation 13 shows him given authority over every tribe and people and nation, blaspheming God openly and making war on the saints of the tribulation. I follow the mechanics of his fearful reign in my studies of the false prophet and the mark of the beast, which together complete the picture of his brief and bloody empire.

The downfall of the Antichrist

However mighty this ruler appears for a season, his fall is utterly certain and it is swift. Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 2:8 that the Lord Jesus will kill him with the breath of His mouth and bring him to nothing by the appearance of His coming. No long war is needed, no close-run battle. The returning Christ simply speaks, and the great rebel is undone in an instant. Revelation 19 shows the beast and the false prophet thrown alive into the lake of fire at the Second Coming, their empire collapsing the moment the King appears in the sky.

I find deep comfort in that swift end, and I think you should too. This ruler looks entirely unstoppable for three and a half years, and then Jesus appears and it is over before it began. Evil always overreaches itself, always struts across the stage as though it will last for ever, and always crumbles into dust the moment the Lord stands up. The whole career of the man of lawlessness is one loud, unforgettable reminder that the mightiest human rebellion is no match at all for a single word from the King.

Why I will not try to name him

Every generation seems to produce someone utterly confident that he has at last identified the Antichrist, and every such identification without exception has been proved wrong by history. I refuse to play that foolish game, and not out of any timidity. Scripture ties the unveiling of this ruler to the removal of the Church and the start of the tribulation, so if the Church is still here on the earth, then the true figure has not yet been revealed to anyone. Naming him now is guesswork dressed up as prophecy, and it discredits the gospel every time the guess fails.

There is a real pastoral danger in the naming game as well. It distracts believers from watching for Christ and sets them anxiously watching for the beast instead. My whole hope is fixed on the appearing of my Saviour, not on decoding the identity of my enemy. When this ruler does finally step forward, those left behind will have the clear scriptural marks to recognise him by. My task now, before the rapture, is simply to be ready for the One who is coming first, with my eyes turned upward and not fearfully over my shoulder.

What the spirit of antichrist means today

John reminds us that the spirit of the Antichrist is already at work in the world, long before the man himself ever appears on the stage of history. Every teaching that denies the Father and the Son, every ideology that exalts man into the empty throne of God, carries the fingerprints of the Antichrist even now. So while the final Antichrist is still future and unrevealed, the spirit that will animate him is a present reality all around us, and the same discernment that will one day expose him is the discernment the church needs today.

This keeps the whole doctrine from collapsing into mere spectacle. I do not study the Antichrist to feed a taste for the sensational or to frighten anyone, but to sharpen my love for the truth and my loyalty to the real Christ. The best possible preparation for the day of the Antichrist is a heart so thoroughly captured by Jesus now that no counterfeit, however dazzling, could ever turn its head. Guard your love for the truth, and you have already guarded yourself against the lie of the Antichrist.

So, now what?

The coming rise of this deceiver is a solemn warning that the world is heading toward a reckoning, and that no political saviour, however brilliant and charming, can rescue it in the end. Only Jesus can. If you have been quietly trusting in some person or party or programme to put the world right, the beast is a sobering picture of exactly where that misplaced trust finally leads. Turn instead to the true Christ, the one who saves rather than deceives, and do it while the door still stands open.

And if you are already His, do not lose a moment’s sleep over the beast or his coming empire. Lift your eyes to the Lamb who conquers him with a word. The same voice that will destroy the man of lawlessness in an instant is the voice that holds you safe today and every day. Watch for your Saviour, walk in the light, and leave the deceiver to the breath of the Lord’s mouth. Whom are you truly watching for this morning?

Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction.

2 Thessalonians 2:3 (ESV)