What shall be the sign?

In our Lord's Olivet discourse, Jesus' disciples asked the crucial question "What will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of age?" In His answer our Lord unfolded several significant 'signs' that will characterize life on earth just before His return. I believe some of these signs already have been fulfilled and that the time of the end could well be soon. Here are the two first two warnings Jesus gave.

1."Take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many."
2."You will hear of wars and rumors of wars."

Let us consider both of these warnings.

The end times will be filled with deception as the Lord prophesied. He warned his disciples at least six times in His Olivet discourse against false teachers and deceivers:

1. Take heed that no one deceives you(24:4)
2.For many will come in My name, saying,' I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.(24:5)
3.Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.(24:11)
4.Then if anyone says to you,'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe it.(24:23
5.For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect (24:24)
6.Therefore if they say to you,'Look, He is in the desert!' do not go out; or 'Look, He is in the inner rooms!' do not believe it.(24:26)

Of course, there have always been false teachers, for that is Satan's way of distorting the truths of God. Jesus called him a deceiver and a liar, declaring that he had been a liar from the very beginning. That is why we have so many cults, religions, and other -isms that claim a Christian basis for their beliefs. If Satan cannot get people to disbelieve or rebel against God, he will get them hooked on some false doctrine to lead them astray. There is nothing new about that.

Yet who can deny that everywhere we look today, we find deception growing stronger and more prevalent? Dr. M.R. DeHaan, a popular Bible teacher in the fifties and sixties, wrote:

Never before in all history have there been such divisions in Christendom. There are today over 350 denominations, sects and cults in Protestantism in America alone. All of these claim that they are right and that others are necessarily wrong.

Matthew 10:28 "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell."

It is very regrettable to lose one's soul. Some false teachers whom use drugs as an inducement to open their disciples minds to new thought are today leading thousands of young people astray. Deception is proliferating in this century.As Time magazine reporter described this problem late in 1997:

These are the waning years of the 20th century, and out on the margins of spiritual life there's a strange phosphorescence. As predicted, the approach of the year 2000 is coaxing all the crazed out of the woodwork. They bring with them a twitchy hybrid of spirituality and pop obsession, part Christian, part Asian mystic, part Gnostic, part X Files...we have seen the Beast of the Apocalypse. It's Bambi in a tunic.

We expect deception to increase the closer we come to the next millennium--particularly if these really are the last days the prophets spoke so much about.

2 Thessalonians 2:9-10 "The coming of the lawless one(antichrist) is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.

The greatest deception the world will ever face is the seven-year Tribulation, when the contest between God and Satan for the souls of men will reach its greatest heights. Satan will go all out with deceiving spirits and signs and lying wonders potent enought almost to deceive even 'the very elect'. Although that period has not yet come, it is highly probably that false teachers and deceivers committed to Satan are already in the world.