Friday, August 21, 2009

Antichrist End Of The World Foolishness

There are many Christians who have determined that the end of the world will involve a great leader who is almost god-like and who will pervert and corrupt many people before Jesus Himself will deliver us.  This figure has been dubbed the Antichrist and is the subject of much speculation and entertainment pulp.  The Left Behind books were very popular among Christians and some secular critics alike.  They feed on this notion that there will be a single man who has some kind of supernatural power to overcome the minds of non-believers.

I personally think that the notion of a single figure having power equal or like that of the Christ on Earth is ridiculous.  While I understand that there references in the Bible, they are often vague and never, ever refer to a single person.  Often times, they are symbolic references to man’s own corruption.

I used to believe in that, but then I began to think for myself.  I spent that last year reading through the entire Bible and never once did I come across anything that specifically referred to a man (or woman) who is to come and be like the antithesis of Jesus on Earth.

Yes, you can interpret the prophecies many different ways and there are many different perspectives on Biblical prophecies.  It is a fool’s game, however, to say that the Bible means this or that when it comes to the vague prophecies, unless they have come true.  I myself could entirely wrong about the nature of the Antichrist and it could very well be a real person who has come, is here, or is coming.

Speaking of the end of the world, I have trouble believing that we are in the end times.  We may be in the end times of the United States of America, which is unfortunate, but not necessarily the end of the world.  Human beings have always been intellectually gifted and just as moronic since the beginning.  While the social norms and cultures may change over time and in different regions, the capacity for human understanding and intellectual thought has always been the same.

Because of this, I believe that the times are always the same.  There has always been sin and just because the older days seemed to be better, that is not always true.  It is kind of like the critics of industrialization who criticize industry for its apparent destruction of the environment sitting in their assembly-line produced recliners within their air conditioned homes.  There is nothing new under the sun.  The technologies and customs may change, but the patterns of human behavior hardly ever do.

The signs of the end as Jesus described to his disciples before the end were a pretty common occurrence if you go anywhere that has been stricken by war and famine.  Remember too that when the prophets discussed the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians, it was much of the same thing.  In fact, there were worse things mentioned, like the cannibalizing children, much in the same way that some Chinese did under Mao’s famine in the 1960s.

I believe that there is no Antichrist and that those references are symbols of human evil.  I believe that the end will come like a thief in the night, where we will not know until when it happens.  Then everyone will know that Jesus is Lord and everyone will worship Him, whether they want to or not.

Until that happens, I will encourage every Christian to not worry or fret over the end times.  Instead we should live our lives in God’s Will and not focus on trying to interpret things and apply them to events that God Himself did not reveal to His own Son.