DEMONOLOGY – THE ANTICHRIST

Dr. W. A. Criswell

Daniel 7:7-8

5-30-73    7:30 p.m.

These last two Wednesday evenings we have been studying the mysterious unseen world of evil.  And the first Wednesday we were studying demons, who are fallen angels [Revelation 12:7-9].  God never created anything evil; evil is always something good that God created that has been debased.  Always that is true.  And these angels were created beautiful; and one-third of them chose to follow Satan, Lucifer, in his rebellion against God [Revelation 12:4].  And they were thus debased.  And to this day they follow Satan as their great leader and presiding prince [Revelation 12:7-9].  Then the next Wednesday night we were studying Satan.  And we avowed, according to the Word of the Lord, that he is a somebody, he is a personality [John 8:44].  Here again to us there is a mystery:  how does a personality exist without a body?  Well, that is no more of a mystery than how a personality, a spirit, can use a body.  But all of us are demonstrations of that mystery.  We have a body that is made out of dust; it is ground, it is earth, it is dirt [Genesis 2:7].  And there is somebody me that lives on the inside of it and uses it.  And in death, every part of me will be there, unless I am mangled or dismembered in a tragic accident; but in death I’ll be lying right there as I was a moment before death, yet a mysterious, indescribable, unfathomable something has happened: the spirit has fled this house, all of which is un-understandable to us.  But God is spirit [John 4:24].  Satan is spirit; but he is a person.  And as we followed through our study of Satan last time, we came to the fact that he is incarnate in the ultimate and final Antichrist [Revelation 12:3, 20:2]; and that leads us to a study of the Antichrist.  And this will conclude these three lectures that we are listening to on demonology.

So we look at, for a moment, we look at the Antichrist—”anti,” against, the opposite of Christ.  He also is a mysterious and terrible person to be revealed in the last time [2 Thessalonians 2:8].  And what I have done in this brief study, I have followed the presentation and the revelation of the Antichrist in the Bible chronologically.  Instead of doing it in subject form, why, I’ve just chosen to follow it in the Bible as it is revealed, because practically all that we know of the Antichrist is found in about four different places; first of all, Daniel.

One of the things that will come to you, it just will, as you study the Bible, you will have an increasing sense—now I just say you just will.  I remember in studying English literature, they were talking about Spenser’s “Faerie Queen.”  That’s the great English poet; and the “Faerie Queen” was Elizabeth I.  And I remember this great literary critic saying that you could tell whether you had the spirit of a poet by whether you liked Spenser’s “Faerie Queen”; that if you had the spirit, the intuitive response of a poet, you just would like that kind of poetry, Spenser’s “Faerie Queen.”  Well, I have the same feeling about this thing that I’m going to say about the study of the Bible.  When you study the Bible, you will increasingly have the sense, the inward intuitive persuasion, that what you’re reading here is also what you’re going to see down the line.  Now you just will.  It has far greater reverberations and adumbrations than just the written text there.  When you study this thing, it’s down the line also.  So many of your types are that way:  when you study the situation—it can be a ceremony, it can be an historical incident, it can be a person, it can be a revelation from God pertaining to that circumstance right there—but as you read it and study it, you will just unconsciously grow into that sensitivity that what I’m looking at here is something else also down the line, down the way.

Well, now I’m going to give you a good illustration of that.  You have a fine illustration of that in the study of Daniel.  In the Book of Daniel, again and again and again there will appear a king, the prophecy of a king.  In Daniel 7:7-8, he is the little horn.  In Daniel 8:8-11 got that same little horn again.  In Daniel 8:23-25, he’s the king of fierce countenance.  Now when you look at that prophecy in its immediate near term fulfillment, you’re talking about, for the most part, a man by the name of Antiochus Epiphanes, who was a little crack-pot Napoleon who strutted up and down the Middle East, and who was as far as the flow of human history is concerned an insignificant peccadillo; he’s a bubble on the surface.  But in the life of the Jewish people in that period of time, he was a tremendous figure.  And Daniel in his prophecy of him used him, by inspiration, to prefigure some other personality that is yet to come; and that personality that is yet to come is this mysterious and terrible person to be revealed in the last time, the Antichrist [2 Thessalonians 2:8].

Now, you turn to Daniel chapter 9.  And in Daniel’s prophecy of the seventy weeks, you have the heart of the whole prophetic revelation of the end time [Daniel 9:20-27].  Now you have to realize that what I say comes out of my persuasion of how the Bible ought to be interpreted and how prophecy ought to be presented.  But with that little extenuating remark and explanation, there is no opportunity for any one of us to understand prophecy unless we start with the seventy weeks of Daniel [Daniel 9:20-27].  It is enigmatic to us.  It is an impossible jigsaw puzzle, the whole prophetic scheme.  But if you will start with the seventy weeks of Daniel, the whole outline of prophecy will be plain to you; it will fit, it will just, it will be just like these little pieces in a jigsaw puzzle, they’ll just all fall into place.

Now, the last part of the ninth chapter of the Book of Daniel is a description of this ultimate and final Antichrist.  He says here in verse 26 that “after threescore and two weeks” [Daniel 9:26]—he’s already spoken of the first seven weeks [Daniel 9:25], so threescore and two weeks, that’d be sixty-two weeks [Daniel 9:25].  “At the end of sixty-nine weeks,” up here above, you have seven weeks [Daniel 9:25], and here you have threescore and two weeks [Daniel 9:26], “after sixty-nine weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for Himself” [Daniel 9:26].  Do you remember my preaching a sermon on that, “but not for Himself”? [Daniel 9:26]. He died for others; He died for others [Matthew 20:28; John 15:13].  “And the people of the prince that shall come”—that’s the Roman prince Titus—”shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; the end thereof shall be with a flood” [Daniel 9:26].  Now verse 27:  “And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week” [Daniel 9:27]—that is the seventieth week of Daniel, and this is the Antichrist.  Titus, who destroyed the city of Jerusalem in 70 AD, is a type and a picture of that prince who is coming [Daniel 9:26], who will be this final and ultimate and mysterious person who shall preside over the world at the end time.  And this prince that shall come, “will confirm the covenant with many for one week:  and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease” [Daniel 9:27].  That’s where you get that three and one-half years:  it’s one week divided in two, three and one-half years, forty-two months, one thousand, two hundred fifty days.  And you will find that period of time mentioned throughout the Revelation, and mentioned here in the Book of Daniel.  “Time, times and a dividing of time,”  . . . “time, times and half a time,” . . . “three and one-half years,” “forty two months,” “one thousand two hundred fifty days” [Daniel 9:27].  Now all of that comes from that sentence there that I’ve just read:  “He shall confirm the covenant for one week” [Daniel 9:27], that’s the last week, the seventieth week of Daniel, “and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease” [Daniel 9:27].  You see, when you come to that prophecy, the temple in Jerusalem has been rebuilt [Daniel 9:26].  You’re going to see, as we go on with this, several other instances that the temple in Jerusalem is rebuilt, and the Jewish people have reinstituted their sacrificial system [Daniel 9:27].

Well, you can talk about that for volumes written on this; you can just talk about that endlessly.  But this is the Antichrist; the last seven years of this world history is presided over by the Antichrist [Daniel 9:27].  And in the middle of that seven years, the first three and a half years [Daniel 9:27], he’s that prince riding on the white horse in the sixth chapter of the Revelation [Revelation 6:2].  He promises peace and prosperity, the solution to all the problems of the world [1 Thessalonians 5:3]; he’s the great admired and accepted leader of all humanity.  But in the middle of the week he breaks this covenant with the Jewish people [Daniel 9:7].  These Jews have just fallen right in with him.  He breaks the covenant, and that is the last half of that seventieth week, that’s the last three and a half years [Daniel 9:27].  The first three and a half is called the tribulation [Matthew 24:21, 29]; and the last three and a half is called the great tribulation [Revelation 7:14].  Well, this is Daniel.

Now following it through we are coming now to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, and we’re going to read the second chapter of the second Thessalonian letter.  And here again you have a prophecy concerning the Antichrist:

Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him,

That you be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of the Lord is at hand.

There is a mistake in the manuscript that this Textus Receptus used.  “The day of Christ” is another thing.  “The day of the Lord” is what Paul wrote:

Let no man deceive you by any means:  for that Day shall not come, except there come a falling away first.

[2 Thessalonians 2:1-3]

Now I read a whole lot of things about that.  The Greek word is apostasia.  “Except there come a falling away first” [2 Thessalonians 2:3].  There are those who believe that that word refers to the rapture, “Except there come the taking away first,” the rapture first.  But for the most part you will find that these scholars will follow this translation here:  “Except there come a falling away first,” the great apostasy, “and,” now here’s the Antichrist, “and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition” [2 Thessalonians 2:3]—he’s called there two things:  “the man of sin” and he’s called “the son of damnation, the son of perdition” [2 Thessalonians 2:3]—”Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God” [2 Thessalonians 2:4].  Now that temple there is the temple of the Jews in Jerusalem.  So in the second chapter of the Book of Thessalonians [2 Thessalonians 2:4], as in the ninth chapter of the Book of Daniel [Daniel 9:26], the temple is built in Jerusalem—right where you go now and look at that Mosque of Omar—some of these days—I don’t know how.  I speculated one time here in the pulpit and that’s just sheer rabbit chasing.  I have no idea, just speculation.  Somebody, next time they go to war over there and saw that, says, “We’re getting ready for military confrontation.”  Bless his heart he couldn’t stay in power if he didn’t say words like that and keep it going.  And someday he’s going to have to do something; that’s where the trouble arises.  Well anyway, in today’s paper, Sadat says, “We getting ready for military confrontation with Israel in the next few weeks.”  Well, just my speculating around here, the next time they go to war over there in Israel, it may be that somebody accidentally on purpose will drop a bomb right on the top of that mosque, or a big artillery shell will just accidentally blow the thing to smithereens.  You just can’t tell.  And if that thing ever gets blown up, don’t you ever persuade yourself that those Arabs are going over there, those Muslims are going over there and be allowed to rebuild it.  That’s out.

However it is, in the ninth chapter of the Book of Daniel [Daniel 9:26] and in the second chapter of the Thessalonian letter, [2 Thessalonians 2:4], and in the eleventh chapter of the Book of the Revelation [Revelation 11:1], the temple is rebuilt; it is there.  And in that temple this man of sin, this son of perdition, of damnation [2 Thessalonians 2:3], is going to present himself as God [2 Thessalonians 2:4].

You know it’s a funny thing how humanity is.  In a conversation today, today, of some men who are in the high echelons of this country, hobnobbing with the presidents of the United States, and these big officials who control the destiny of our country, in a conversation with those men, one of those men who is so intimately conversant with the leadership of America, one of those men said—now he’s just talking along; he’s not making a point, he’s not talking about prophecy least of all, but he’s just talking along—he said—man, things like this just stick in my head; nobody else paying attention to him, he’s just talking along, just flowing along, just chit-chatting, you know, just talking; just like a whole bunch of magpies together just carrying on, no purpose in it at all, you just doing small talk—but he said, “You know, one of the weaknesses of men who are in high office, such as the president of the United States, it isn’t long until they half persuade themselves that they’re God.  They have such tremendous power, they have such billions and billions of dollars at their hands, they have such awesome, almost illimitable power,” but he said just inadvertently, just incidentally, he said, “Those men just get to the place where they think of themselves as God.”  And in a little conversation a little later on, why, he was talking about one of those presidents that he was so conversant with, and he said, “Sometimes the way that president would treat an underling, you know, a man lower down, was just inhuman, just used the vilest language to curse him, just trash under his feet.”  Well, all the Roman Caesars were that way:  they presented themselves as God.  All the great heroes of the ancient world looked upon themselves as God, such as Alexander the Great.  So when you see this, you’re not talking about something strange to human history, though it may be strange to us who are American people.  But when this man gets the power of the whole earth, and the whole world looks to him as its savior, deliverer [1 Thessalonians 5:3], why, even the cherub that covereth [Ezekiel 28:14], Lucifer, the son of the morning [Isaiah 14:12], said, “I will be God” [Isaiah 14:14].  And that’s where sin was born [Ezekiel 28:15].  Well, if Lucifer was that way, an angel was that way, how much more will you find that same spirit in a man?  And this man, this final terrible and mysterious person, the Antichrist [1 John 2:18], he’s going to look upon himself as God; and he’s going to show himself in that temple of Jerusalem as the Almighty [2 Thessalonians 2:4].

“Know ye not that I told you these things?  And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time.  For the mystery of iniquity doth already work” [2 Thessalonians 2:5-7].  This isn’t something that is going to start sometime later on; it’s already started.  “Only He who now letteth will let, only He who now preventeth, prevents, until He be taken out of the way” [2 Thessalonians 2:7].  And most of the people will think that that is a reference to the Holy Spirit.  “And then shall that Wicked” [2 Thessalonians 2:8], now see what he’s called here by Paul?  He’s called “the man of sin,” he’s called “the son of damnation” [2 Thessalonians 2:3], and here he’s called “that Wicked” [2 Thessalonians 2:8].  And you have it in your Bible spelled with a capital “W.”  “That Wicked,” incarnate Satan,

Whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming:

Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,

And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.

For this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:

That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

[2 Thessalonians 2:8-12]

How in the earth does Satan ever deceive the world?  Well, when we reject the truth, we open our hearts to every kind of deception and lie, and mistruth.  And we just illustrate that world without end; and that’s what’s going to happen at the end time.  Just like how in the earth do all of these armies and peoples get to Armageddon?  They are deceived, and they are brought there in deception [Revelation 16:13-14].  Well, this is Paul’s presentation of the man of sin, the Antichrist [2 Thessalonians 2:3].

Now John speaks of the Antichrist.  Let’s turn to 1 John, 1 John chapter 2, 1 John chapter 2:18.  “Little children, it is the last time:  as ye have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time” [1 John 2:18].  Now verse 22, “Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ?  He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son” [1 John 2:22].  I have always been kind of in sympathy with that expositor who says, “In every generation, Satan has his man, every generation he has his man.”  It may be Napoleon in one generation.  It may be Charlemagne in another generation.  It may be Frederick the Great in another generation.  It may be Hitler in another generation.  But always Satan has his man, these antichrists [1 John 2:18].  And finally, in the final one, at the consummation of the age, he’ll really incarnate himself in that man, when the time comes.

Now we have another reference in 1 John 4:3:  “Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God:  and this is that spirit of Antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.”  The spirit that lies back of this ultimate rebellion against God is already here in the world.

Now, we’re going to the last book, the Revelation; and here you’re going to have the Antichrist spelled out in great detail, in chapter 13, in chapter 13:

I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, ten crowns on his horns, his name, the name, his heads have the name of blasphemy.

And the beast looked like a leopard, feet like a bear, his mouth as a lion:  and the dragon—

[Revelation 13:1-2]

that’s Satan, twelfth chapter of the Revelation [Revelation 12:9], the dragon, the serpent, is Satan—

And the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.

And they worshiped the dragon which gave power unto the beast:  and they worshiped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast?

And there was given him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given to him to continue forty and two months.

[Revelation 13:2, 4-5]

And remember what I told you?  Daniel’s seventieth week is divided into two parts: three and a half years one way, three and a half years the other way; forty-two months, a thousand two hundred fifty days, three and a half years [Daniel 9:27].

And he opened his mouth to blaspheme against God, to blaspheme His name…

And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them—

Kind of a drastic time at the end, isn’t that right?—

to overcome them: and power was given to him over kindreds, and tongues, and nations.

And all that dwell on the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.

[Revelation 13:6-8]

Now isn’t that something?  That’s just hard to believe.  The deception of this man, the whole world, all whose names are not written in the Book of Life, the whole world will accept him as their great god and savior.

In the eleventh verse—and we won’t go into that—”I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon” [Revelation 13:11]; now that’s the false prophet.  The first beast here that arises out of the sea [Revelation 13:1], out of the nations of the world—the sea is always a picture of the nations of the world—rising out of the sea, out of the great turmoil—that’s why he has opportunity to seize the power of the earth:  the whole earth is in turmoil.

You know, listening today, things that people say sometimes just scare the daylights out of me.  They’re just talking along.  Here’s one of them.  One of those men has been in Germany a good deal, and he said, “This young generation of Germans is something else.”  He said, “They are far out.”  And he said, “They have an anti-American spirit that is awful to behold.”  And he gave an illustration.  He said, “I was over there with one of those great corporations, and we were going to amalgamate our corporation in America with that corporation in Germany.  And just as the time came to sign the documents and to put the two great corporations together, the man died.  So the woman, his wife, and her boys, inherited all that property and that part of that great German corporation.  Now,” he says, “We are in the worst mess you ever saw, because,” he said, “those boys are moving heaven and earth against their mother going through with this amalgamation with our corporation in America.”  And he says, “It’s because the young generation of Germans hate America.”  Boy, it just scares the life out of you!

Here we are going all out to help Germany against Russia, and these people who are supposed to be people that we have literally resurrected from the dead, they are going to be apparently our bitterest enemies.  And the concomitant of all that is more and more and more and more America is being isolated, isolated, isolated.  We aren’t looked upon any more as the great deliverer and savior of the world.  Argentina, in today’s paper, putting their arms around Fidel Castro, “Man, we’re buddy-buddies marching together to a new paradise.”  Chile is already gone Marxist.  I don’t know, except that the Book says that at the end time the whole world is in turmoil and confusion [Matthew 24:4-31].  Out of the restless nations, symbolized by the troubled sea [Revelation 13:1], arises this ultimate and final Antichrist [Revelation 13:1].  That’s where he comes from; that’s how he comes to power: there is no hope, there is no way, there is no solution, and when men get hopeless they grasp at anything.  If a drowning man can reach a straw, he’ll seize it.  When the world faces a hopeless situation—you know just one little old part of that, I just wonder what in the earth is going to happen to the world when the oil producing Arabs own everything that we have?  How in the earth are you going to run this world without oil?  The whole planet is geared to oil.  That’s what runs the wheels, that’s what greases the axels, that’s what puts power in those combustible engines.  And every day, every day, more and more and more of the wealth of the world is in the hands of those Arab [oil] producing states.  And pretty soon they’re going to have a gun, just right at your head.  If the Arab states this minute were to shut down their oil supply to Europe, Europe would be absolutely paralyzed; it couldn’t budge, it couldn’t move, it would be dead, the continent would be decadent.

Well, I’m just using these little old things that you read about in the paper, things that are happening.  All of them move, all of them point to a world of tremendous turmoil, a seething, indescribable mass of hopelessness and despair.  And don’t you read China out of this thing.  I was told today that a secret emissary from Russia came to the president of the United States and said, “If you will go with us, we will destroy the Chinese capability of nuclear warfare.  We’ll go over there into China and bomb out their industrial complexes.  And the president of the United States refused to do it, “Because,” he said, “I am afraid that if we have a nuclear confrontation over there in China, that it will engulf us in the Western Hemisphere, that we couldn’t contain it just over there.”  So that’s going on right now.  The turmoil, the mixing of all of these ambitions and national aspirations, it’s just a seething mass.  And the fall of the United States from its preeminent place of world power, we are learning we can’t police the world.  We’re going busted trying to do what we’ve already done.  Our dollars are going down and down, and they’re going to keep on going down.  If you want to buy anything, you better buy it, because that dollar is going to be worth less and less and less and less and less, until finally that dollar is not going to buy anything at all.  How much did the dollar erode this last few months?  Nine percent, eleven percent, it is something like that.  Why, you just take it eleven percent in ten years, it doesn’t even pay for the printing of it.  It is a terrible thing!

Well, I’m just pointing out to you that the world moves in that direction; and it is out of that seething mass, called a sea, of hopelessness and despair that this man arises [Revelation 13:1].  And he’s Satan’s man.  Satan incarnates himself in him.  The dragon gives him the power [Revelation 13:2] that Jesus refused at the temptation [Matthew 4:8-10].  Satan is the prince of this world [John 12:31], he’s the god of this world [2 Corinthians 4:4]; Jesus says so [John 12:31], and Paul said so [2 Corinthians 4:4].  Now we studied that last Wednesday night.  And Satan gives to this man, who presents himself as the great deliverer of the human race, Satan presents to him all of his power and the glory of the kingdoms of the world [Revelation 13:2].  And for three and a half years, he is the man of peace; he’s the great man of destiny [1 Thessalonians 5:3].  But in the middle of that seventieth week, in the middle of that seven years, after three and a half years, breaking the covenant with the Jewish people [Daniel 9:27], is the signal for the awesome time of the great tribulation [Revelation 7:14].

Now you have him again in the fourteenth chapter of the Book of the Revelation, verses 9 to 11.

And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand,

The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.

[Revelation 14:9-10]

Now, you have his doom, the end of the three and a half years, in Revelation 19, in Revelation 19, verses 19, 20, “And I saw the beast,” Revelation 19, verses 19, 20,

And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against Him that sat on the horse, and against His army.

And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshiped his image.  These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.

[Revelation 19:19-20]

There is nobody in hell yet, nobody.  Hell is prepared for the devil and his angels [Matthew 25:41].  And the first two persons that are cast into hell are the beast, the Antichrist, and the false prophet [Revelation 19:20].  Now those are the first two people that are cast into hell; and they are cast into hell at the end of Daniel’s seventieth week, at the end of the great tribulation [Revelation 7:14].  Then after a thousand years, the devil is cast into hell, and his angels, and those who choose to cast life and lot with him [Revelation 20:10-15].  Believe me that’s a poor bargain, because God says without equivocation that those who place their lives at the disposal of Satan will someday inherit Satan’s condemnation [Revelation 20:10-15].  Oh!

You don’t have to go there; you choose to go there.  You don’t have to follow Satan; you choose to follow Satan.  It is our choice.  And first the beast and the false prophet, the Antichrist and the head of the world religion [Revelation 19:20]—we’re going to have a world religion—we’re playing around with this ecumenical movement here in America, these denominations, that’s nothing, that’s nothing at all.  One of these days you’re going to have an attempt at a world religion; going to be furthered by that Antichrist.  There never has been a great ruler in the past that hasn’t tried to cement his kingdom and his empire together with a common religion.  They all try to do it.  That’s the most powerful common bond that you could have, is to have all these people worshiping in some kind of a common denominator.  Well, that’s the false prophet, and in that deception you’re going to have the people following the Antichrist, and you’re going to have people following that false prophet [Revelation 13:1-18].  And the false prophet is going to just do everything he can, a sycophant exalting the Antichrist [Revelation 13:12].  And those two are going to be cast into hell [Revelation 19:20].  Then after a thousand years, Satan’s going to be cast there, his angels are going to be cast there, and all whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life, they’re going to be cast into eternal hell [Revelation 20:10-15].  Ooh, that scares you to death!

When I was a little boy, you know, you don’t hear many sermons about hell, but when I was a little boy I heard them.  They preached on hell often.  I’d just feel the fire.  Oh!  You don’t hear it today, but you know what somebody said?  “Long time ago, when we had hell in the pulpit, we didn’t have it out there on the streets.  Now we don’t have hell in the pulpit, but you got it out there in the streets.”  Umm!

Now, you know I meant to spend a good long time tonight in underscoring our Bible.  We’re going to have three minutes at least to underscore the Bible.  I have a contrast here between Christ and Antichrist, so just let me read it real fast.

• Christ came from above, John 6:38; Antichrist comes from the pit, Revelation 11:7.
• Christ came in His Father’s name, John 5:43b; Antichrist comes in his own name, John 5:43.
• Christ humbled Himself, Philippians 2:8; Antichrist exalts himself, 2 Thessalonians 2:4.
• Christ was despised, Isaiah 53:3; Antichrist is admired, Revelation 13:3-4.
• Christ will be exalted, Philippians 2:9; Antichrist will be cast down to hell, Revelation 19:20.
• Christ came to do His Father’s will, John 6:38; Antichrist comes to do his own will, Daniel 11:36.
• Christ came to save, Luke 19:10; Antichrist comes to destroy, Daniel 8:24.
• Christ is the true vine, [John 15:1]; Antichrist is the vine of the earth to be destroyed, Revelation 14:18.
• Christ is the truth, John 14:6; Antichrist is the lie, 2 Thessalonians 2:11.
• Christ is the Holy One, Mark 1:24; Antichrist is the lawless one, 2 Thessalonians 2:8.
• Christ is the Man of sorrows, Isaiah 53:3; Antichrist is the man of sin, 2 Thessalonians 2:3.
• Christ is the Son of God, Luke 1:35; Antichrist is the son of perdition, 2 Thessalonians 2:3.
• Christ is the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh, 1 Timothy 3:16; Antichrist is the mystery of iniquity, and will be Satan manifest in the flesh, [2 Thessalonians 2:7-8].

Don’t you think that’s all right?  It’s a good summary.  All this is going to be written out for you, placed in your hands, so you can have it and keep it.

Well, we got two and a half minutes; so we’re doing good.  Let’s turn to the Book of Numbers, Book of Numbers.  We left off with Leviticus the last time.  The Book of Numbers, all right, underscore where it gets its name, Numbers chapter 1, verse 2.  Underscore that little thing there:  “Take ye the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel, after their families, by the house of their fathers, with the number of their names, every male by their polls” [Numbers 1:2]; and so forth.  That’s where you get the name Numbers, the Book of Numbers; it comes from the numbering of the children of Israel.

Now, turn to chapter 6.  And before you turn to it, I know many of you will recognize it.  This is absolutely the most beautiful benediction in the earth.  “The Lord bless thee, and keep thee,” this is Numbers 6:24-26.

The Lord bless thee, and keep thee:

The Lord make His face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee:

The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.

This is the way that Aaron the high priest and his sons were taught to bless the children of Israel.  Isn’t that a beautiful thing?

Whether you’ve got your Bible or not, you who have your Bible read it out loud; and let’s say it as a benediction.  Now verse 24 through 26, now reading it out loud together:

The Lord bless thee, and keep thee:

The Lord make His face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee:

The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.

Isn’t that a beautiful thing?  Oh, the Bible is just like illimitable treasures, you just hold those pearls and rubies and diamonds in your hands, and look at them, they’re just incomparable.