John talks today about what he calls "the spirit of antichrist" and he tells us how to recognize false teaching so that we won't fall for lies. He will later speak of the actual person known as the Antichrist when he writes the book of Revelation. But today he tells us that the spirit of antichrist is already in the world. This is because, even in the first century AD, heresies and false teachings had arisen that taught things that were in direct opposition to the true message of the gospel. As soon as there was a gospel message, Satan was at work trying to pervert it. The devil was unable to stop the advent of Christ. The devil couldn't hold Christ in the grave. So now he's working as hard as he can to prevent as many souls as possible from coming to salvation in Christ. Satan hates God, but there's nothing he can really do to hurt God except by hurting the human beings God values so much that He gave the very best He had (His Son) to rescue them.
John begins by warning us not to value the things of the world more than we value the Lord. This is a form of idolatry. If Satan can't entice us to worship him, he considers it the next best thing to cause us to worship anything or anyone but God. When John warns us about loving the world, he's not saying there's anything wrong with being grateful for our lives on earth, or with enjoying the beauty of God's creation, or with caring about our fellow man. He's using the term "the world" to mean the things that are on the outside---outside of God's will and outside of God's grace. "Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them." (1 John 2:15)
John is talking about a spirit of rebellion. If we don't place more value on our relationship with the Lord than we place on temporary things, we can't say we truly love Him. If we don't live our lives with eternity in mind, we are allowing ourselves to be led by the flesh and not by the Holy Spirit. "For everything in the world---the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life---comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever." (1 John 2:16-17) King Solomon spoke of man's tendency to follow after worldly things, saying, "Death and Destruction are never satisfied, and neither are human eyes." (Proverbs 27:30) Solomon knew what he was talking about. He may well have been the wealthiest man who ever lived. In today's dollars, he would be at or very near the top of the Forbes 500 list. He spoke in the book of Ecclesiastes about how he had used his wealth to live a life of debauchery and excess. He said, "I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure." (Ecclesiastes 2:10) Did any of this satisfy the soul that was created for fellowship with God? No, and that's why we find Solomon so clinically depressed in the book of Ecclesiastes that he no longer wants to live. This is where following anything or anyone but God leads us: to discouragement, to depression, and eventually to destruction.
While he is on the subject of personal rebellion against God, John points out that there is a spirit of rebellion at work in the world. This spirit comes straight from the wicked one, who would love to lead every human being to destruction. The rebellion we feel in our hearts on a personal level is part of a far bigger picture. We have to be constantly on guard against anything that tries to seduce our hearts from total commitment to the Lord. We need to be wise to those around us (false teachers) whom Satan is using to entice us to leave our first love (Christ). (See Revelation 2:4 for an example of an entire church that has become so worldly that it has left its first love.)
"Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour." (1 John 2:18) We have been living in the last days ever since Christ ascended to the Father. Nothing remains to be fulfilled before Christ takes the church out of the world, so Satan is working as hard as he can to prevent as many people as possible from coming to salvation in Christ. While it's true that Satan will embody a man who will be known as the Antichrist during the seven years of the Great Tribulation, the spirit of antichrist has been in the world ever since the Lord Jesus fulfilled God's plan of salvation. You know and I know that Christ could call believers out at any moment. The devil knows this too, and this is why he's trying so hard to pervert the gospel of Christ. If he can introduce false doctrine to the world, he can prevent some souls from ever hearing or accepting the truth. He will introduce doctrine that appeals to the carnal side of man. He will bring in false teaching that allows man to keep back a part of himself from God. False teaching appeals to the spirit of rebellion in man, so that man does not bow the knee, the heart, or the soul to God.
Some of the false teachers whom Satan is using were originally attending the true church. They heard the gospel message, but something in them didn't accept it. Something in them didn't want to submit fully to the Lord, so they left the church and are now teaching a perverted gospel. They are teaching doctrine that is worldly and that allows man to live according to his own sinful desires. "They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us." (1 John 2:19) These false teachers were active in the church for a time, but their hearts were never really right with the Lord. If they had truly belonged to Christ, they would never have cut themselves off from the body of Christ (the church). These are the type of people the author of Hebrews spoke of when he said, "The message they heard was of no value to them, since they did not share the faith of those who comprehended it." (Hebrews 4:2b) Those who left the church heard the same message that everyone else heard, but they didn't allow the message to transform them. It's not that they didn't understand what they heard; it's that they didn't accept what they heard. They didn't accept it because it didn't say what they wanted it to say. They didn't accept it because it didn't give them permission to live how they wanted to live.
If we know what to look for, we will be able to recognize false doctrine and false teachers right off the bat. Knowing what to look for means knowing the truth so we can recognize lies. As we said yesterday, the only way to combat lies is with the truth, so it's of vital importance that we study the word of God daily. John's readers are the type of people who study the word of God daily, so he has confidence that they will recognize lies when they hear them. "But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth." (1 John 2:20-21)
Any doctrine which denies Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ is a lie. Any doctrine which contradicts anything Jesus said is a lie. Jesus told us who He is. Jesus told us that salvation is only through Him. Any teaching which contradicts these things is a lie and is prompted by the spirit of antichrist and is coming straight from the evil one. "Who is the liar? It is whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a person is the antichrist---denying the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also." (1 John 2:22-23) If we don't accept that Jesus is who He says He is, we are denying the very word of Almighty God who testified that Jesus is His Son. (Matthew 3:17, Matthew 17:5, Mark 9:7, Luke 3:22, Luke 9:35) We are rebelling against God when we refuse to accept what He said about the Lord Jesus. But if we accept the Son, we are by extension accepting the Father also, for we can't have the Son without the Father. As the Lord Jesus Himself said, "If you knew Me, you would know My Father also," (John 8:19) and, "If you really know Me, you will know My Father as well. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him." (John 14:7) We know the Father because we see Him in the Son, for the Son is "the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of His being". (Hebrews 1:3)
We know everything we need to know about God by studying the life, the works, and the words of His Son. This is why we need to know the word of God. We need to study what God the Father has said and what God the Son has said. Then we won't become confused when we hear false doctrine. We won't accept any teaching that perverts the gospel of Christ.
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