Communism - Anti-Christ — Major Ian Thomas

The Bible as God's Revelation of Truth

There is only one revelation of truth that God has given to us, and that is contained in the Bible, this wonderful word, which is an exposition of all the counsels of God from the eternal ages of the past until the eternal ages that are to come.

And prophecy, as it is popularly called, that concerns the return of the Lord Jesus Christ, is simply part of the eternal progress. Whatever truth God brings to us in his word, it is designed to lead us to the person of the Savior and to glorify him.

The Lord Jesus said of the Holy Spirit that he would lead us into all truth, that he would take the things that were his and show them unto us and glorify him. The word of God that fails ultimately to bring us to the person of the Lord Jesus and to a fuller recognition of his sovereignty in our lives is of little value and is likely to grieve his spirit and prostrate the purpose of God in giving us this revelation.

No matter what oriative in which we explore in the word of God, we must inevitably anticipate that the Holy Spirit will confront us with the person of God's Son. I'd like to read to you a few verses from the second chapter of the second epistle to Thessalonians.

The Man of Lawlessness and the Mystery of Rebellion

Thessalonians chapter 2 and verse 1. In the New Testament, relative to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah, and our gathering together to meet him, we beg you, brethren, not to allow your minds to be quickly unsettled or disturbed or kept excited or alarmed, whether it be by some pretended revelation of the Spirit or by word or by letter alleged to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has already arrived and is here.

Let no one deceive or beguile you in any way, for that day will not come except the apostasy come first. That is, unless the predicted great falling away of those who have professed to be Christians has come.

And the man of lawlessness, the man of sin is revealed, who is the son of doom, who opposes and exalts himself so proudly and infinitely against and above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, even to his actually taking his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming that he himself is God.

Do you not recollect that when I was still with you, I told you these things? And now you know what is restraining him from being revealed at this time. It is so that he may be manifested in his own appointed time.

For the mystery of lawlessness, that hidden principle of rebellion against constitutive authority, is already at work in the world, but it is restrained only until he who restrains it is taken out of the way.

And then the lawless one, the Antichrist, will be revealed, and the Lord Jesus will slay him with the breath of his mouth and bring him to an end by his appearing at his coming. The mystery of lawlessness, that hidden principle of rebellion against constitutive authority, is already at work in the world.

When you think of Antichrist, don't just conjure up in your mind ideas about a monster who one day will come. It is perfectly true that the time will come when he, as the man of sin, the man of lawlessness, will be revealed, manifested, and will be identifiable.

But don't imagine that the Antichrist is something that concerns only the future. The Antichrist, when he is manifest, will simply be the final full consummation and incarnation of that mystery of iniquity that is already at work.

That is why you can never relegate the study of prophecy to one department of Christian exploration. For one would never understand the manifestation of the man of sin, the Antichrist, unless one goes right the way back to the beginning and discovers who it is, what are the motivations, how it has all come about, the significance of the Antichrist and his appearing, unless we fully understand what it was that happened when man fell into sin and why it happened.

We have an intelligent grasp for appropriation, but are crowding in upon us with such that the things that are happening are the inevitable. You can never have an intelligent grasp of the great life. When God made man, he made man to be inhabited by God.

It is the fact of God in man that makes man manifest. Unless we fully understand what man is as God intended man to be, we shall never understand the nature of the man of sin and what he is intended to be.

Because, you see, the Antichrist, as the man of lawlessness, as the man of sin, is the final prostitution of human personality to the great life that was first perpetrated by the devil in Adam. When God created man, he gave him a body, given something more than a body, and something more than a soul.

Humanity, the Spirit, and the Image of God

It might surprise you if I were to say to you that had God only given man a body and a soul, man would have been in common with the rest of the animal creation, no more than an animal. But it is not the possession of a soul that makes man man.

That which God created within him as a deliberate act of creation, a spiritual capacity to receive and to enjoy what God is, a spiritual capacity that God gave to man that enables him to receive and enjoy what God is, is called the human spirit.

In the book of Zechariah, Zechariah 12 .1, the burden of the word of the Lord to Israel saith the Lord, which stretches forth the heavens and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him.

The God who created the universe, who stretched forth the heavens, who laid the foundation of the earth, he is the one who by a deliberate act of, formed the spirit of man within him. Verse 27, the spirit of man is described as the candle of the Lord, the lamp of the Lord.

A very beautiful definition, because contrary to popular idea, a lamp doesn't produce light. One always fancies that a lamp produces light, because that is apparently the effect of a lamp. But a lamp doesn't produce light, a lamp simply receives that which working in it and to it produces light, that's why you have an electricity bill.

These lamps, as to other lamps in this building, all these lamps would cease to produce light. They'd go out, but they'd still be lamps. The lamp by virtue of being a lamp doesn't produce light. A lamp by virtue of being a lamp simply has that capacity to receive that, upon which it is totally dependent for the performance of the purpose which it was created.

That of course is why the Holy Spirit likens himself to the whole scripture, as what electricity is to these lamps, what oil is to oil lamps, is the Holy Spirit to the human spirit. And it is only what God is in man, indwelling him in the human spirit that God has given to him, that makes man, man.

If you turn with me to the book of Genesis, it says chapter one and verse six, that to every beast of the earth, and to every flower of the earth, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is light, I have given every green herb for meat, and it was all these forms of creative life, the beasts of the earth, the flowers of the earth, and to everything that God said, I have given vegetable life.

It said God has been provided for animal life. But it's interesting to note that the expression used there, according to that is life, living souls. Exactly the same word that is used for the soul of man.

Exactly the same expression that is used, for instance, in the seventh verse of the second chapter of Genesis, where it says the Lord God formed man at the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.

And the living soul there is exactly the same word that is used to describe every beast of the earth, every flower of the earth, and everything that creepeth upon the earth. The soul is not in itself that which distinguishes us from the animal creation.

Your soul is simply your motivating mechanism. That means whereby you function as an animal. As opposed to a vegetable. You won't enlarge upon this, for it isn't my purpose so to do. But a tree, for instance, doesn't get irritated with its neighbors.

It doesn't fall in love with the young bush over the wall. That's one of the disadvantages of being a vegetable. What differentiates animal life from vegetable life is that animal life has a motivating mechanism.

A mental and an emotional, and a to calculate, to react, and to decide. And in varying degrees of development, all forms of animal life are capable of those functions. So that your body and your soul is in fact the animal part of you.

That which distinguishes you from animal is your spiritual capacity to receive and to enjoy what God is. The lamp that God built into you as man, as opposed to any other form of created life. And when God created man, he came and he occupied by his divine spirit the human spirit.

And man became man by virtue of what God was in man. That was the only thing that distinguished him from any other form of created life. He instructed his mind. He knew God. He didn't just know about God.

He partook of the divine nature. He was twice alive. Physically like an animal and spiritually like God. God is love and all that God is was imparted to his emotional capacity. His affections were flooded with the very nature of the God who made him.

So that his will was exercised under the influence of a God-taught mind and God-controlled emotion. So that all the God who made him, who lives within him, and to express himself through him was the vehicle, the human vehicle of the divine life.

Human Dominion and Dependence Upon God

Without being mindful of him, thou hast created him to have dominion over all the works of thine hand. By virtue of his manhood was to exercise a divine authority. It was an authority that he was to exercise only by virtue of his moral relationship to the God who made him.

A moral relationship which we may describe as a faith-love relationship. For God is love and only love can requite love. And you cannot demand or compel love. I can't go to somebody and say I demand your friendship.

That's impossible. I can woo their friend but I cannot demand it. Inherent in the capacity to love is the capacity to choose. And that is why God gave to man a moral capacity to choose. So that he could reciprocate to God the love that God expressed to him.

And man's love to God was to be expressed by a recognition of and a submission to his total dependence. God would express his love to man would express his love to God by an attitude of total dependence upon God.

By virtue of whose presence alone within man, by the Holy Spirit within the human spirit, man was man. For it is God in man that makes man man. The moment man loses God he ceases to be man as God intended man to be.

He is less than human. He is substance. We shall see that Calvary goes far deeper than just trying to get you to heaven and to save you from the punitive consequence of your sins. We discovered the cross of Jesus Christ was designed to restore man from sub-humanity to full humanity.

To restore man to his manhood. Man falls from house to work against constituted authority which is already at work in the world and is restrained only until he who restrains. The first sign of the morning said in mine heart I will ascend in the heavens.

I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the most high.

This was a satanic vote. This was the spirit of constituted authority. God's sovereignty in Adam. It is abundantly clear by virtue of what God was in man. If you had not that you would be animals. Therefore in the day that you lose me you lose life.

The quality of life that makes you man. And when a person loses life he dies. For when life goes out if you repudiate your love for me and your dependence upon me. If you repudiate your need of me. If you lose him you lose life.

If you lose him you lose everything by virtue of what God is in you. Self-sufficient. If only you have the moral courage to step out of this theocratic tyranny. If only you are prepared to shake off the shackles of this.

You will discover that you can lose God and lose nothing. What you are. Without the need for being spiritual. And his love too. Until you are overwhelmingly convinced that two and two make five. And now in your mind there is absolutely no shadow of a doubt that two and two make five.

I promise you that if I could persuade you that two and two make five I could present to you a system of mathematics which would come into that system. This is a deep one. The occasion was the dedication of the New York building of Joseph E. Seagram.

He happened to come from Russia. The New York Journal American is publishing the contributions to the Seagram Symposium by seven of the greatest thinkers of this generation. Man now said to Julian Huxley is realizing that he is the latest dominant type in evolution.

He is responsible for the progress and fulfillment of the evolutionary process on this planet. In the coming century his first job will be to think collectively in terms of a continuing human species as a whole.

A vast program of research on human possibilities and methods for realizing them more fully. Already the progress of biochemistry and psychology is revealing new possibilities physical and mental health and educational research undoubtedly will show the way toward adequate utilization of the variety of inborn human capacities.

As a result the idea of the welfare state will be superseded by the future will be in the possibility of the human species and the power of human knowledge to realize them more effectively. And God in New York City constituted authority incarnate on earth in the form of a man the one who is the final consummation of the life.

Antichrist, Deception, and World Dominion

Antichrist is through the activity and working of two verse nine and will be attended by pretended miracles and signs and delusive marvels unlimited seduction to evil and with all wicked deception for those who have gone to perdition perishing because they did not welcome the truth and believed.

God sends upon them a misleading influence a working of error and a strong delusion to make them believe what is condemned who did not believe who refused to adhere to trust in and rely on the truth gave his own might and power seemed to have a deadly wound.

The beast was given the power of speech uttering boastful and blasphemous words and he was given freedom to exert his authority and to exercise his will during 42 months and he opened his mouth to speak slander against God blaspheming his name and his abode vilifying those who live in heaven.

He was further permitted to wage war on God's holy people the saints and to overcome and power was given him to extend his authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation. The world will deserve what it gets because church going atheistic america and church going atheistic england church going atheistic nations of the west have within their own hearts considerable ends to protect the light it has been evolving all down the centuries in terms of human society something like half the world's population is at the moment captured by the philosophy of the antichrist dialectic material man is man by virtue of what man is lose God's comfort in the fact that Stalin was debunked.

Pat yourself on the back else congratulatory I told you so when Khrushchev goes to jail in three months time if he does or is banished to Siberia like Molotov and the rest don't nudge your neighbor and say there you are.

It's awkward when they ought to be common. He can't. He can't afford to allow people to become Molotovish. He can't afford for people to become christianized and not common. That's why he hates high carnality in the early church.

Denominationalism and the Loss of Spiritual Power

What was it that brought about the deviation from the truth. The personality power. I'm of Cephas. I'm of Luther. I'm of Calvin I'm of Darby. I'm of Trinley. I'm of Mennon. I'm of Jesus Christ. The organizational strength the loyalty strength of every movement of every denomination of every christian organization is ultimately the weakness the truth between Calvin and Luther and Darby and Mennon.

And how do we. He's not going to allow his he says the moment Stalin begins to attract people to Stalin attract people to Khrushchev. I'll debunk him to the purity of the lie and use his name and finish incarnation in the name of Christ.

Total Dependence on the Indwelling Christ

And to them do not need God. They are not dependent upon you and say that has nothing to do with you simply one who you've received Jesus Christ as your savior. You have become re-inhabited by God since you were regenerate and the Holy Ghost came to occupy your human spirit.

And then you are a very dangerous humanity inhabited by Jesus Christ. It is all too likely so far as the devil is concerned that the very deity of Christ will be demonstrated in terms of your human personality.

He can't now avoid. That you take except in total dependence upon Jesus Christ is a repudiation of your need of him. Is an affirmation of the consent in that you take the responsibility that you assume in church management every time you teach a Sunday school class every time a pastor gets up into the pulpit and preaches other than in an attitude of upon Jesus Christ is a step that you are prepared to take.

Looking in his face and saying you add nothing to me for this death. Every decision that you make and I don't care in what area of life it may come in your domestic in your church or in your business life.

Every decision that you are prepared to make other than in an attitude of total dependence upon Jesus Christ is a decision that you are prepared to make. Looking in his face saying Jesus Christ although you've come to live in me you add nothing absolutely nothing to me for this decision.

The Inverted Life and the Futility of Human Religion

And there's only one person activity. Christian activity is exploitable other than in terms of God. Make the slightest difference to the average mission of society. It wouldn't make the slightest difference to where you where you raise your family church of God is conducted.

It wouldn't make the slightest difference if God were to die tonight. Satan has succeeded in perpetrating the inverted life. Receive. God challenges your highest and loftiest motivation. He capitalizes upon your sincerity upon your compassion upon your sentiments.

He comes and preaches. Do do do for God. Sacrifice for God. Work for God because there's a devil so long as you're busy for God. Pattern tracks to the pulpit. Christ doesn't have the right to be himself and do his own work through you his own way in his own time.

The Church's Need for the Power of the Holy Spirit

Sense of communism in Christian America is right in the heart of the flesh the indwelling spirit of the risen Christ. And sick of the Christian church tired of its futility tired of seeing what can be accomplished in terms of dollars and what is expected of seeing what can be accomplished in terms of human personality human promotion human do something that isn't until you and I have the power of society gone 1900 years ago he not only died for it but he took up with him and put it in the grave and left.

Because that's all we were ever fit is in the part of our cleansed redeemed humanity might present into him acceptable unto God today might be the hilarious good and acceptable in the redeemed humanity of forgiveness from the dead members of the body of the Lord.

Self-deception pity or self-press. See that what we are faced to identify ourselves with thee in death genuinely give consent to thy verdict upon that he has his agency with it which we pray thee from the hypocrisy the debt offering his agents we might bring forth.