Intro: [upbeat music] Welcome to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Spoken Gospel is a ministry that's dedicated to speaking the gospel out of every corner of scripture. In Luke 24, Jesus told his disciples that every part of the Bible was about him. So each week, hosts David and Seth work through a passage of scripture to see how it's all about Jesus and his good news. Let's jump in. [upbeat music]
David: Well, welcome everyone to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Thank you for joining us. Seth, how are you today?
Seth: I'm doing well.
David: Yeah.
Seth: I've just been thinking about antichrist so much-
David: [laughs] Me too
Seth: ... that it's just been... It's one of those topics where it feels like the more you study it, the more you feel it.
David: Oh.
Seth: Do you know what I mean? Like, the more you study just about death, the sadder-
David: Oh
Seth: ... you feel.
David: Yes.
Seth: Like, the more you study about antichrist, the more, like-
David: You feel anti
Seth: ... embattled.
David: Oh, okay. [laughs]
Seth: Like Christ and anti. They're just embattled.
David: Yeah. No, that's true. Yeah.
Seth: But I'm doing well, and as you can probably tell, a- audience, our episode is about antichrist.
David: Antichrist. Yeah. The, which, which Jo- First John and Second John-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... are the only places in the Bible that you can find the word antichrist.
Seth: That's exactly right. Which is-
David: Which is... I'm like, I know this, and I've studied this, but it almost seems, like, wrong because it's such a big deal-
Seth: Yes
David: ... in the Christian psyche-
Seth: Huge deal
David: ... that it's like it can't just be in these two small letters.
Seth: Yeah. I don't think... I preached through First John, I think four years ago.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And leading up to that sermon series, I always assumed antichrist was, like, everywhere-
David: Right
Seth: ... throughout the Bible.
David: Surely Daniel mentioned it, and it's in Revelation, and I bet-
Seth: Right
David: ... Paul talked about it. Maybe Jesus mentioned it.
Seth: Nobody does except here in the book of First John.
David: Yeah, by the name antichrist.
Seth: Second John. By the name, phrasing, antichrist.
David: Right.
Seth: Um, and so that's significant for a couple of reasons.
David: Mm.
Seth: But really, like, the point of this podcast isn't to talk about antichrist, although we will talk about them a lot.
David: We will.
Seth: The point of what John is g- getting at is preaching good news to a community, like, overwhelmed by antichrist-
David: Mm
Seth: ... and antichrist-like teaching.
David: Yeah, and to situate them in Christ.
Seth: Yes.
David: We were praying just before we came on air, and I just thought it was so good that you prayed like, "All right, God. We've been thinking a lot about antichrist, but the point of all this study is not to think about antichrist but to think about Christ." [laughs]
Seth: Yes.
David: And so that's w- hopefully where we get today is-
Seth: Yes
David: ... to, that in studying antichrist, we actually fall more in love with Christ.
Seth: Yes.
David: Okay.
Seth: So the question then-
David: Oh, yes
Seth: ... we have to answer is, like, what is a christ?
David: Oh, yes.
Seth: Like, before we know what an antichrist is, what is a christ, which is the Greek word for the Hebrew word messiah?
David: Yes.
Seth: What is a christ? What is a messiah?
David: Yeah. So yeah, like you said, Ch- Christ comes from the Greek Christos, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word messiah. Um, and so a messiah, uh, means anointed one or promised one or, uh, there's several different translations.
Seth: Yeah.
David: But, like, um, and there are several messiahs-
Seth: Mm
David: ... in the Old Testament.
Seth: Okay.
David: And we meet them, and they are people who are anointed, set apart, endowed by God to bring about the rescue or the salvation of Israel.
Seth: Okay. Yep, I know that from, like, studying the Book of Judges, studying Samuel, st- like, the kings. David was anointed.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So, like, anybody that was anointed, like with oil, would that have been, like, automatically a mes- messiah? Or because, like, the anointed one-
David: Right
Seth: ... or an anointed one-
David: Right
Seth: ... is that, like, a messiah-type figure? Should we be making those connections between anointing with oil and leadership automatically as a mes- messianic? Like-
David: Well, that- that's a good question, actually. I don't know. I, I'd have to look up... I think whenever... Like, does David, whenever he talks about Saul being God's anointed-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... the, is that the word God's messiah?
Seth: Oh, that would be super interesting.
David: Because then it's like he was a false messiah, not in the sense that God didn't choose him initially, but that he failed.
Seth: He failed. He was a failed messiah.
David: Oh, yeah. Okay, right here. So First Samuel, uh, I just did a word search for anointed in First Samuel, and almost every single time the word's mentioned, uh, it's like when Saul was anointed, he was messiahed. [laughs]
Seth: Okay, so it's a verb too apparently.
David: Yeah, yeah.
Seth: Like Googling.
David: "I shall messiah him to be prince over my people."
Seth: Okay.
David: Uh, or when David said, "I shall not raise my hand against the Lord's anointed, against the Lord's messiah." So yes, even Saul was called a messiah.
Seth: And that's because he rescued Israel from their enemies-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... rescued them from people who were trying to attack them.
David: Yeah. The anointing of, of Israel's king is God's selection, his divine selection of an individual out of-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... his people, uh, to lead his people.
Seth: Okay.
David: So it's a, it's a selection of God to rise up an individual to lead his people.
Seth: And-
David: And he did that to Saul.
Seth: It, that's exactly right. And, uh, the reason why I wanna lean into the battle metaphor, 'cause we're gonna talk about false prophets, spirits, testing spirits in a second, but, like, there is, like, a military element to that, like a going out and a conquering element of that.
David: Mm.
Seth: There's people, like, coming against God's people. Like, we have antichrists here coming against God's people-
David: Right
Seth: ... that the true Christ, the true Messiah is supposed to push back-
David: Mm
Seth: ... in order to provide for God's people.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Okay. That's what a messiah is.
David: Yes.
Seth: A messiah is someone who protects, leads, is anointed by God to protect-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... lead, and conquer-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... on behalf of his people.
David: And since, and since John, in his letter, particularly uses, and we'll use here in a little bit, the term anointing to talk about us as Christians-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... let's try as best we can-
Seth: Yes
David: ... to refer to Jesus as the anointed one-
Seth: Yes, yes, yes
David: ... and maybe antichrist as the anti-anointed-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... ones or something like that, just to try to clear up, 'cause like-We're just transliterating the Greek language when we say antichrist, 'cause it's antichristos. So it's not even tr- a translated word.
Seth: Uh.
David: It's just-
Seth: Right
David: ... transliterated like-
Seth: Right, so the-
David: ... in our English letters it would be antichrist, but it doesn't have any meaning.
Seth: Right. So it's-
David: You know, it's not a trans- translated word
Seth: ... it's those against the anointed one, or-
David: Yes
Seth: ... anti the anointed one.
David: Yeah. So let's try that.
Seth: Okay.
David: Okay.
Seth: Great. So we've just set up, like what is a Christ?
David: Uh-huh. What is an anointed one?
Seth: What is an anointed one?
David: Yep.
Seth: We know what that is. In the modern imagination-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... an antichrist-
David: Oh, yeah
Seth: ... is a, at least, maybe modern imagination's too strong a word, but in many, like, traditions within Christianity, my own included-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... the antichrist was a figure coming at the end of times.
David: Right.
Seth: This was Nicolae Carpathia in [laughs]-
David: If you ever read the Left Behind series [laughs]
Seth: ... if you ever read the Left Behind series. Or, like, I mean, I heard George Bush was the antichrist. I heard-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... Obama was the antichrist.
David: Right.
Seth: I heard Saddam Hussein was the antichrist.
David: Right.
Seth: Some normally political figure who exercised world power and to oppress Christians or oth-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... or the poor or somebody. That's kind of, like, the way I've understood it-
David: Right
Seth: ... until I really read 1 John-
David: Mm
Seth: ... and it kinda challenged me, uh, a good deal. So I don't know if you wanna say anything more about, like, the way that we misunderstand.
David: Yeah, I think, uh, I think we've, I think Christians throughout church history have always looked for an antichrist. Maybe not always would be an overstatement. For a long time, Tertullian did it, one of the early church fathers. Uh, famously Martin Luther, uh, during the Reformation, he taught widely that the pope-
Seth: Oh
David: ... during the corrupt papacy was the antichrist. Uh, even so much so that in the 17th century version of the Westminster Confession, the pope is the antichrist, was actually put-
Seth: In the confession?
David: ... in the confession. It's not there anymore, obviously. Uh, it's been revised out, but it was a widespread idea in ref- Reformed Christiandom.
Seth: And there is a certain sense in that when you have people in power teaching contrary to the message of the true Messiah-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... um, and have political power to back that up. It makes sense you wanna label them something that's the opposite of what you are. [laughs]
David: Right.
Seth: You know? Like-
David: Yes, but I think it's strange that John's not talking about politics. John-
Seth: That's true
David: ... John's not talking about some strong figure, right?
Seth: Uh-huh.
David: This is, we're bringing in other texts and putting them on top of the, the term antichrist-
Seth: Yes
David: ... in order to create kind of an amalgamation of this political figure at the end of time.
Seth: That's probably the most important thing you guys need to take away from, as you start to think about the word antichrist, is to, like, cut away the parts of your mind that want to equate the antichrist with the beast of Revelation 13, or cut away antichrist, at least temporarily, from the man of lawlessness in 1 Thessalonians. Like ag- as we said in the beginning, like 1 John is the only place that antichrists are used or mentioned in the whole Bible, and we've already been given several categories to think about these antichrists within 1 John, and they seem to be people from within the church-
David: Mm
Seth: ... not outside the church.
David: Let me, I, I, I was like, whoa, careful, Seth, for a second, but I agree with you. But let me say it a different way-
Seth: Okay
David: ... that might be helpful maybe to another group of listeners.
Seth: Yep.
David: Um, it's not like cut those ideas off, like the, the antichrist can't be the beast, or the antichrist-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... can't be the man of lawlessness. That's not what we're saying. What we're saying is, first, seek to identify what the, who the antichrist is in John.
Seth: That's right.
David: Let John give you all the information that you need to understand who he is talking about-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... before you start letting, uh, Paul or, uh, Peter talk about who this person is.
Seth: That's right.
David: Uh, because you have to then do a whole bunch of, uh-
Seth: Other work
David: ... of other work-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... of good biblical interpreta- uh, interpretive work to make those connections.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And, and that's good work.
Seth: Uh, yes.
David: But, first, and what we wanna seek to do here, um, is say, what, what was, what was in John's mind and, and hopefully the minds of his readers-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... when they heard antichristos, the, the, the one against or in place of the Lord's anointed.
Seth: Yes.
David: Okay.
Seth: Okay. So we got that in our, in our systems.
David: Yes.
Seth: That's what a Christ is.
David: Yes.
Seth: An anti-anointed one is an antichrist.
David: Yeah. We should talk about, we, we know what anointed is, but what is an anti-anointed?
Seth: Yeah.
David: Yeah. Is it against, is it, is it someone who is against the Lord's anointed one? Is it, you know, like, so, so you have to, like, who is the one being attacked here? Is it Christ himself, the anointed one himself?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Uh, so in a sense was, like, Saul an antichrist to David? [laughs] You know? Like, they were at odds with each other-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... as two anointed ones, in a sense.
Seth: Well, it's a good question. So John kinda answered that question for us in his own context.
David: Great.
Seth: So in verse, um, well, 19 is the first clue we get who, who are these anti-anointed ones.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: They went out from us. And so I think us here is a reference to the apostles.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So, like, in the beginning they talked about we have seen him. We've touched and seen the Messiah. We've touched the, the anointed one.
David: Yes.
Seth: We know who he is. So these false messiahs, these fal- these anti-messiahs, these anti-anointed ones, went out from the apostles, but they were not from us.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So that could mean, like, maybe geographically they were situated in Jerusalem for a period of time, and they went out and traveled and did all this ministry that was anti the teaching-
David: Oh
Seth: ... of the apostles.
David: Sure.
Seth: Which would make sense in 2 John, where he talked about don't accept these itinerant missionaries into your home-
David: Oh, yeah
Seth: ... who are teaching contrary to-
David: Uh-huh
Seth: ... to what we taught.
David: So it could be geographical. It could also be, like, doctrinal fellowship. Like, they were a part of our church, and now they're not.
Seth: Yep.
David: [laughs]
Seth: It could, it could also even be more broad than just the apostles.
David: Uh-huh.
Seth: Just, like, they were part of us as believers in the Messiah.
David: Right.
Seth: And they went out from us. But anyways, they, if the, for if they had been of us, is the next section, they would have continued with us, but they went out, that it might be complained that they are not of us.
David: Right.
Seth: So the first criterion, according to John, of what an antichrist is, is somebody who used to hold to the apostles' teaching-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... and has left the apostles' teaching.
David: Right. Uh, now before we unpack that a little bit more-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... we've just assumed something really huge.
Seth: Okay.
David: Which is they?I thought we were talking about the Antichrist.
Seth: Oh, yeah.
David: And we went from the Antichrist to those antichrists really quickly.
Seth: Okay. You're right. We did do that.
David: Which is important.
Seth: So let's-
David: So verse 18-
Seth: Yep
David: ... is, "Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come." Okay?
Seth: Yep.
David: So he's saying that, okay, so out here, and we're gonna, we're gonna let John's ambiguity for a second just kinda live, live here. So John says, "It's the last hour." You know, this is a common idea in Jesus's view of time, and in therefore in the Apostle's view of time.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: That we are in the last age.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: That, um-
Seth: The next big thing in redemptive history is Jesus coming back.
David: That's right. The next big thing, yeah, is Jesus coming back, um, and these are the last days. And since it's the last days, one of those markers of the last days that Jesus talked about, that, uh, Paul talks about, that- that Peter talks about is, um, there is, uh, at least here, there's an Antichrist-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... that's going to come. He is coming.
Seth: There is a figure of disobedience-
David: Yes
Seth: ... that's coming.
David: Right.
Seth: As we've said before, John's the only one who calls him Antichrist.
David: That's right.
Seth: Paul calls him man of lawlessness, and Jesus says-
David: Jesus, yeah
Seth: ... the abomination of desolation.
David: Desolation. Yeah.
Seth: There is a central figure.
David: Right.
Seth: Yes.
David: And they, and these might be the same.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Um, people disagree about-
Seth: Mm
David: ... whether the Antichrist is the man of lawlessness. Um, that doesn't matter right now.
Seth: Right.
David: What matters is that he's saying, like, you guys have in your imagination about the view of the world that this is the last time, that we're waiting on the return of Jesus and some cataclysmic redemptive event. We're waiting on that. And you know that leading up to that means that the Antichrist is coming. Let's put that aside.
Seth: Yeah.
David: He's like, more importantly...
Seth: Many antichrists have come.
David: Right, and they're in your midst already.
Seth: Do you think that means that these, these disciples of John, this community of disciples, believed, like, were kind of like maybe obsessed with the idea of, like, a big figure coming at the end of time, so much so that they were neglecting the fact that John's concern was, like, there was a whole bunch of, like, deception going on in their church that they weren't acknowledging?
David: Mm.
Seth: Because they were too focused on the big one at the end of time?
David: Man, definitely. Like, that is, that's definitely what we call, like, reading behind the text.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Right? We're trying to get at what could have been going on in John's congregation, uh, but that's, why else bring it up? If, 'cause he's not, he doesn't go on to talk about it. He makes no big deal at all about the Antichrist.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Instead, he doubles down on these many antichrists. And so i- a, a plausible situation is that either, one, they were overly obsessed with it, or two, it just loomed large-
Seth: Right
David: ... in the first century church's imagination.
Seth: The way it does in most of, like-
David: Totally
Seth: ... I mean, me as a teenager, I was all bought in on the Antichrist.
David: Oh, yeah.
Seth: Yeah, I was like, I was like, that was a big deal for me.
David: It was.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so to, to kinda turn that energy and, um, anticipation on its head, you know, and, like, it has all this-
Seth: Yeah, yeah, yeah
David: ... weight. And they're trying to figure out who these false teachers are, who these secessionists are who left their church and are now teaching false things. They're like, I don't know, are they, like, still kind of Christians or Christian-lites, or are they a new age teacher, or are they apostates? And he's, they don't know what category to put them in.
Seth: Uh-huh.
David: And John's like, let me make it simple for you. They're antichrists.
Seth: Hm. They're anti-anointed ones.
David: They are anti-anointed ones.
Seth: Okay. And-
David: Okay
Seth: ... that-
David: And so there's lots of them
Seth: There's lots, and so that's, that's probably the biggest brain shift for most of people-
David: Definitely
Seth: ... as you read through. I mean, John says it clearly. Many antichrists have come, and he talks about them as historical figures within his own lifetime. They went out from us.
David: Right.
Seth: We were in Jerusalem with the apo- other apostles, and they left us.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: They're real people that existed in a particular time.
David: Right. And the, and the, the, the mind shift here, uh, i- is, is not necessarily, uh, not one, but many antichrists.
Seth: Yes.
David: Uh, but rather maybe better put would be still one and many-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... would be a better, 'cause he doesn't say, "There's not one coming. There's many already."
Seth: Yes.
David: He says, "There is one coming, but there are many already."
Seth: Yeah, yeah.
David: He doesn't exclude one for the sake of the many, and, but, but he then doesn't focus on the one.
Seth: Yeah.
David: He focuses on the many.
Seth: Whoever the Antichrist is-
David: Uh-huh, is really of no concern to John right now
Seth: ... he's more concerned with, like, the small A antichrists-
David: Yes
Seth: ... that are, like, plaguing his community of-
David: Yes
Seth: ... believers who are doubting, overwhelmed, and suffering-
David: Right
Seth: ... under the persecution and hatred-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... that these anti-anointed ones are, do- are
David: Yeah, and then he also doesn't pull any punches in calling... There is no lowercase A antichrist.
Seth: That's right.
David: You know, I, I, I love that designation 'cause it's helpful.
Seth: Right.
David: But it's like they're still antichrist.
Seth: Whatever you, if you think the-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... the big beast that's coming at the end time, that's capital A Antichrist, these are just, these are-
David: These are just as bad
Seth: ... these are just as bad.
David: Which is, like, exactly John's point, is he wants-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... them to know that these false teachers are bad business. Like, it's, it's just not good [laughs] is his whole point in l- probably looping in such a huge cataclysmic figure.
Seth: And again, what's unique about that is I think in my imagination, and I think many people's imagination, the Antichrist, big A-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... is something outside of the church, some big governmental organization-
David: Yes
Seth: ... or a powerful politician or just anybody in power.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: But he ta- so no, no, they went out from us.
David: Right. They were part of the church.
Seth: They were part of the church. They were part of the apostolic community for a period of time, and now they are no longer.
David: Right.
Seth: You know? So it's like that's, that feels significant too. It's like, it's not one. It's many. It's not end of time. It's now. And it's not out there. It's inside our-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... church.
David: Right.
Seth: And that what's feels kind of, like, insidious and dangerous or even just, like...Category breaking
David: Totally. Well, it, but it fits another category in at least the epistles, and even Jesus would talk about this a little bit, was the idea of false teachers being among you, right?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Like, there are these wolves in sheep clothing, you know?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And, uh, and so, like, Paul warned about this. Clearly it's completely devastated the Johannine community.
Seth: Yep.
David: And so, like, it's actually a really big deal, and I'm guessing you're flipping over to chapter four.
Seth: Yeah, so this, this podcast kind of uniquely is gonna bridge 1 John 2 and 1 John 4 because we have here again more references to these false teachers, these anti-anointed ones, but here he calls them false prophets. And he says this in 4:1: "Beloved, do not believe every evil spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world. And by this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus has come in the flesh is from God."
David: Mm.
Seth: Which is exactly what he's about to say-
David: Is the-
Seth: ... marks the teaching-
David: Yes
Seth: ... of the anti-anointed ones. So in John's view, the antichrists are people that were within the apostolic community, have left the apostolic community, and are teaching people that from within the church that Jesus is-
David: Is not the anointed one
Seth: ... is not the anointed one.
David: Right.
Seth: Which feels really narrow.
David: Oh, yeah, really narrow. Yeah, usually when I think Antichrist, it's like, I don't know, maybe he'll sit on a giant gold throne, or maybe he'll fly a rocket ship, you know? [laughs] Like-
Seth: Right, yeah. [laughs]
David: I have no-
Seth: Yes
David: ... I have no idea, you know, uh, whenever I let my adolescent mind run with the idea.
Seth: Yeah, he, here he says it again in verse four, verse three, "And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God."
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: "This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already."
David: Right. Yeah.
Seth: So he's saying, like he's conflating false prophets-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... and antichrists together.
David: Yes.
Seth: They're one and the same figure-
David: Right
Seth: ... in John's mind.
David: So since we've breached this topic, let's go, let's also go back to, to chapter two.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And, and, and, uh, go ahead and read in chapter two, um, the mark of the antichrist, of an an- of a non, an-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... anti-anointed one. [laughs]
Seth: Uh, verse 22: "Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Fa- Son has the Father. But whoever confesses the Son has the Son also."
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So the message of the anti-anointed ones is that Jesus is not the anointed one.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: That's the message of them.
David: Right. Yeah, and so, like, let's camp there for a second.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Is like we've talked a lot in, in this series so far about what was the false teacher's, you know, message. Was it that they, that, "Oh, you actually haven't sinned," you know? And like, "There's other ways to ease your conscience."
Seth: Mm-hmm. Yep.
David: "And we're actually sinless, perfective people." And you know, it's like, but at the heart, the, the sin, the, the, the wrongness of their message was that they denied that Jesus was the Son of God, the anointed one.
Seth: Yeah, and 2, 4:2 he says that Jesus came in the flesh.
David: Oh, yes.
Seth: Is from God.
David: Mm.
Seth: So it's not just that Jesus was the Messiah, but that he came in the flesh, which is actually probably pretty connected ideas. You can't be anointed with oil-
David: Mm
Seth: ... in the Old Testament Samuel sense without being on the Earth.
David: Right. You can't be a, a, a king.
Seth: You can't be an anointed one-
David: Right
Seth: ... without being able to be anointed.
David: Right.
Seth: So like there was a... And Jesus was anointed-
David: He was
Seth: ... at his baptism.
David: Yeah, not by oil, but in water and by the Holy Spirit.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Um, so yeah. So you have to affirm-
David: Mm
Seth: ... that Jesus came in the flesh from God in order to avoid the charge of being an anti-anointed one.
David: Right. And so then it begs, it begs the question, too, in what way were the false teachers anti the anointed one? Not only that maybe they were denying that he came in the flesh. Obviously, that's true. But anti in the Greek, anti is like a, a prefix here. Um, and it can mean not only opposed to or opposite. It can also mean in place of or alongside.
Seth: Okay.
David: And so may- and so it, it's all gonna boil down to the same thing. But it's like they were offering, um, a path, like, of anointing or a path, like they were-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... offering a different type of salvation-
Seth: Yep
David: ... alongside or instead of, in place of Jesus.
Seth: Yes.
David: They were offering an anti-anointing.
Seth: A different anointing.
David: Like a different anointed one.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And maybe it was themselves. Maybe it was their teaching. Maybe it was some system of rules. And you know, it's like another religion. And it reminds me of, like, what Paul said in Galatians, that, like, if an, even an angel comes down and preaches a different gospel, let them be anathema.
Seth: Yeah.
David: You know?
Seth: I think, the, and I think it's also interesting that both here in chapter two and again in chapter four, surrounding those two things is conversations about love.
David: Mm.
Seth: So it also makes me think that there's a certain, like, lovelessness to the teaching of the antichrists, or a lovelessness in their behavior-
David: Mm
Seth: ... that marks them as outside of the anointed one's community.
David: Yeah.
Seth: The anointed one and-
David: Well, I mean, yeah. I mean, take, take, I m- what is the preeminent act of love in 1 John?
Seth: Jesus dying for our sins.
David: Yes. Without that, anything else is loveless.
Seth: Mm.
David: You know, like, that, that is the ultimate mark of love is Jesus, the God of the universe, becoming flesh as the anointed one and dying for our sins as our propitiation, like we talked about-
Seth: Right
David: ... you know, earlier. And it's like anything else compared to that is loveless, is hate.
Seth: Or any other type of love motive- mo- love motivated by something other than the self-
David: Right
Seth: ... sacrificial love of Jesus-
David: Yes
Seth: ... fails to be truly loving.
David: Right. And so it's just like, that is an antichrist type of love-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... is a love that's unmotivated by Jesus's love for us first. Because it might be legalistic, it might be self-seeking, it might be lustful, it might be, you know, it might be-
Seth: Yep
David: ... all kinds of things, but it's not the anointed one's love.
Seth: So we've said a couple different things. What does it mean to be anti the anointed one?
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: So one, it means to deny that the anointed one-
David: Is Jesus
Seth: ... is Jesus, and that he came in the flesh.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: Another thing is to be, to preach a different gospel other than Jesus-
David: Right
Seth: ... coming in the flesh.
David: To try to replace the gospel.
Seth: We've noticed that in the context, there seems to be a lack of lovelessness, but here's something also interesting.
David: Mm.
Seth: Uh, verse four, "Little children," uh, 4:4, "Little children, you are from God, and you have overcome them, for He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world." And he's referring to the antichrists.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: The, the anti anointed ones. And what's interesting about that, it's, it's almost a direct quote of John's Gospel chapter 16, where Jesus is talking to his disciples, one of whom was the author of this letter-
David: Mm
Seth: ... I believe at least.
David: Right.
Seth: I think, I think John the Apostle-
David: Same
Seth: ... wrote this letter. So Jesus at one point told John that he should expect persecution.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: That there would be religious leaders, there'd be kings, there'd be authorities that would persecute him for following his message.
David: Right.
Seth: And let me just read to you the way that it reads in, um, John 16. It says, "I've told you all this stuff about the people who persecute you so that you wouldn't pass away, or that you would not fall away. They will push you out of the synagogue. The time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they're offering a service to God."
David: Mm.
Seth: "They will do such things 'cause they have not known the Father or me," which is just what he said. You know, these people do not know the Father or the Son.
David: That's right.
Seth: "I've told you this, so that when the time comes, you'll remember that I warned you about them, but I have told you these things so that you may have peace. In the world you will have trouble. But take heart, I've overcome the world."
David: Mm. And he says, "You've overcome the world." He's linking this-
Seth: So like, I think John even as, like, one of the disciples of Jesus is noticing the increasing persecution about people who deny the message of Jesus against himself and his community.
David: Mm.
Seth: And he's saying, "You know what Jesus told me-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... when he, he was talking to me about this stuff? Take heart."
David: Right.
Seth: "You've overcome the world."
David: Yeah.
Seth: So part of the, what it means to be an antichrist m- is to be anti the anointed ones of God, the followers of the Christ-
David: Absolutely
Seth: ... is what, is what I'm trying to say.
David: Yes, absolutely.
Seth: So.
David: And that's, that's confirmed by the fact that in the next chapter, like, John, like, identifies the believers, his little children, as those who have been anointed not by the devil, which is animating the world-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... but by the Holy Spirit. They-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... are Christs.
Seth: They have been christened.
David: Now, please-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... no one, I don't want any angry letters. I'm not saying [laughs] that we are Jesus or Messiah in that way, okay? But we-
Seth: But we have been-
David: But he-
Seth: ... Messiah'd by the Messiah.
David: We've been Messiah'd by the Messiah.
Seth: Yeah.
David: We've been anointed by the anointed one. We are co-heirs. We are brothers, uh, of, of Jesus and sons of God. Like...
Seth: So we're getting to the good news.
David: Yes.
Seth: This is the good news of this passage 'cause we said at the beginning, this passage isn't ultimately about antichrists.
David: [laughs] Right.
Seth: It's about the good news in a world of antichrists.
David: Right.
Seth: So l- l- let me ask a que- this question.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Why is a world of antichrists so alarming?
David: Oh, yeah.
Seth: Like, why is that bad news? 'Cause I think sometimes it's like, well, they just believe differently than I do.
David: Mm.
Seth: It doesn't feel threatening all the time, and sometimes I'm also tempted to see pe- oh, people are attacking our religious liberty.
David: Mm.
Seth: People are attacking our freedom of speech. Therefore, Barack Obama is the antichrist.
David: Right.
Seth: And I'm like, I think you're doing some good biblical work there in saying that, okay, people who oppose the message of Jesus, um, are antichrists.
David: Mm.
Seth: And there's a threatening, persecuting quality towards them. How do... Like, what is... And I don't wanna, like-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... get into who is... Like-
David: Right, yes
Seth: ... we've already talked about that. What I wanna say is, like, what is it... Why is it bad news that we're in a world of antichrists? What does that feel like? Why do we need to overcome? Obviously, Jesus, people are being thrown out of their synagogues-
David: Mm
Seth: ... which would've been their places of worship, which would've been where their families went to, to synagogue. You know, like-
David: Yeah. No, I mean, it's, yeah, it's like it, it, it would be probably the same answer I would give to what, why is it bad news to live in a world without the gospel?
Seth: Mm.
David: Because what's left for us, right? We just have our oppressor, Satan.
Seth: Mm.
David: Like, we just have everything that's not Jesus. We only have bad news. Like, we only have-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... things that stand against us, wanna hold us down. Like w- in the pivotal points throughout Israel's history, like, they had a lot of bad news, you know? Like, you think about the time of the judges, and everything was chaotic. You think about, um, multiple times in the kings when they were worshiping false idols, and there was drought or all kinds of stuff, right? And then God would raise up a Messiah, and it was good news that there was a Messiah because he would bring them out of that darkness. And so the reason why it's bad news to be in a world filled with anti anointed ones is because they are stifling and trying to suppress and keep us from-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... our own, our anointed one, our Messiah, our Jesus. Like-
Seth: And that can both look like authoritarianism.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: Like, it can look like some form of government, like, oppressing us, but I think probably the way we, at least in the West, in America, where freedom of religion is a thing, and our Supreme Court is affirming freedom of religion wherever it can, it probably doesn't, it's not in, like, oppression in that sense, but it's in people that we trust, admire, respect, and are smarter than us telling us that Jesus isn't real.
David: Yeah, I would say even, like, a, like, to be really Johannine here-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... to be like John, we need to look, the first place we must look for antichrist is within our own church walls.
Seth: Yes, or people who used to be in our church walls.
David: Right. That's right.
Seth: So, and I mean, I, I don't wanna name, like, ex-evangelicals as an enemy-
David: Right
Seth: ... but there is something to be said about a movement that defines itself by walking away from the teachings of-
David: The ch- the historical church
Seth: The historical church. Sometimes it's like, no, I'm ta- I'm, I'm walking away from the impoverished church, the church that's not true to the-
David: That's right
Seth: ... apostolic essentials.
David: Or this really harmful church where you've been abused or berated or belittled. Like-
Seth: Right
David: ... we wanna see you if you're in that camp.
Seth: Right.
David: Yes.
Seth: So we're not, we're not talking it to that crowd. What we're talking about is a group of people who are willing to leave the apostolic church, and then willing to teach others and say that Jesus is not the Christ.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: He's not necessary for salvation to conquer your enemies. Something other than that-
David: Right
Seth: ... is-
David: There's some other path.
Seth: There's some other path.
David: There's some other... path of self-actualization or of free sex or of psychological awareness or of the common good, quote, unquote. You know, like some other-
Seth: Or-
David: ... form
Seth: ... or even like Jesus is a good moral teacher-
David: Uh-huh
Seth: ... but he's no savior. Like-
David: Pattern your life off of him, you know, if you want to.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Yeah, there's lots of people who are opposing the message of Jesus died for your sins.
Seth: And what that feels like... I mean, I've, like, I've pastored teenagers for a long time.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And so I think what that feels like is just it feels overwhelming. There's lots of people out there who are smarter than us-
David: Mm
Seth: ... more educated than us. I'm gonna sit in their... I'm gonna sit in one of their classrooms one day and learn from them as a professor.
David: Right.
Seth: They're gonna tell me I can't trust the Bible, that Christianity was made up by a whole bunch of whi- uh, well, uh, not white guys.
David: [laughs]
Seth: But a whole bunch of, like, you know-
David: Rich
Seth: ... rich men-
David: Rich men, yeah
Seth: ... at some point in, uh, the Council of Nicaea.
David: Right.
Seth: And it's not worth following because Jesus, if he existed, most certainly didn't rise from the dead.
David: Right.
Seth: And most certainly isn't the Son of God come down from heaven. And that's just gonna feel overwhelming and hard-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... to remain faithful in that circumstance.
David: Yeah, definitely. And that's bad news.
Seth: And that's bad news.
David: Yeah.
Seth: So when-
David: It's bad news not only because it's taking away, they are eroding your faith in Jesus that you-
Seth: Mm
David: ... currently have. It's, it's building a kingdom, an empire that is opposed to the empire that the, the, the kingdom that the Messiah, the anointed king, is trying to build.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Right?
Seth: Yeah.
David: Where he is the ruler, you know. And it's like, and we become inundated by all those voices in our culture that say that people don't rise from the dead. [laughs] Like, Jesus' sacrifice for sin was just not necessary. You know, on-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... and on and on it goes. And it becomes increasingly difficult to grab the gospel.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: You know?
Seth: Yeah. John's audience here isn't... is people who are worried about wor- they're, they're worried.
David: Yeah.
Seth: They're hearing all these false teachers. They may or may not be obsessed with some future antichrist figure. They're looking for some sort of explanatory detail that helps them in the middle of their-
David: Mm
Seth: ... persecution, in the middle of their suffering, in the middle of the overwhelming feeling that every intellectual is out to get them. And then John comes in with good news-
David: Mm
Seth: ... which we haven't even talked about yet, but here we go. [gentle music]
David: Okay, so you teased some good news. I want, I wanna hear it because-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... I'm sick of the antichrists, which I think we'll talk more about antichrists in our current day, and the antichrist later in the episode.
Seth: Yeah.
David: But right now, let's do some really good news.
Seth: Yeah, so John is recognizing however these people are feeling.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And here's the first piece of good news we get is in 1 John 2:20. "But you have been anointed by the Holy One." You have been Messiah-ed by-
David: Mm
Seth: ... the Holy One.
David: Yeah.
Seth: "And you have all knowledge. I write to you not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it and because no lie is of the truth."
David: Mm.
Seth: So you have these people who know what's right. Most of us believe Jesus is God. We believe that Jesus came to the earth, and we're being questioned about that. We're-
David: Right
Seth: ... we can't answer all the questions being asked of us. And the good news there is like, okay, your inclusion in God's people isn't based on your ability to have all the answers to the skeptics and the anti-anointed ones out there.
David: Mm.
Seth: But it's the fact that you've been anointed by the Anointed One.
David: Mm.
Seth: The anti-anointed ones can do nothing against the anointed's anointed ones.
David: Right. Yes.
Seth: Like, you are in God.
David: Yeah.
Seth: He's baptized you.
David: Right.
Seth: You're a part of his people.
David: I mean, it's amazing. I mean, so look at, look, look at this from a couple different ways just to drive home the point o- of what, what John is doing here, because it gets a little lost on us-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... just with the language issue, right? So we talked about how, like, Israel's kings were, you know, some of them were Messiahs, right? They were anointed, and they got Messiah-ed, right?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: They got anointed. In the same way, he's talking about Christ and antichrist, right? Uh, the anointed and the anti-anointed. And then he says, "Okay, so you are Christs because you have been Christ-ed." [laughs]
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: You've, uh, so Christos-
Seth: Christened
David: ... right?
Seth: Yeah.
David: Christos, you know-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... is the Christ. But then the, you, as the anointed, are the Chrismod.
Seth: Mm.
David: So it's not Christos, it's Chrismod.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's like you've been Chrismod, you've been Christened, you've been Christ-ed.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And it's just like, it's... I, I almost want you to be a little bit offended by this-
Seth: Uh huh
David: ... idea that you've probably thought a little bit too, you've probably thought too little of yourself as a Christian in the sense of what Jesus has wrought in you. You know? That-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... he has made you like him. You... A- and again, I don't want any angry letters.
Seth: No.
David: I'm not putting on the same plane.
Seth: No, you're not.
David: But you are a Christ.
Seth: Uh-huh.
David: You've been Christ-ed.
Seth: You are a new creation.
David: It sounds wrong when I say it, so I, like, but-
Seth: No, it's not. It's not because you've been anointed.
David: Yes.
Seth: He says it.
David: Yes.
Seth: You've been Christed.
David: You, you've been Christed. [laughs]
Seth: You've been anointed by... And, like, again, the figure, idea of a Messiah-
David: Uh-huh
Seth: ... for us to have been Messiah-ed, historically were always people
David: Mm-hmm. Oh, oh, right. It's not wrong for a human being to be Messiah'd. In fact, Jesus had to become human, we said this-
Seth: Did
David: ... in order to be Christ'd. [laughs]
Seth: Right.
David: His words.
Seth: In order to be the Messiah, you have to be a human.
David: Right.
Seth: And Jesus as the one-
David: Ah, that's so good
Seth: ... who comes down is anointed in him, in his baptism, and then goes out and defeats the anti-anointed ones.
David: Uh-huh.
Seth: The ano- the anti-anointed ones threw everything they had on the cross at Jesus, right?
David: That's right. Yep.
Seth: They killed him.
David: Right.
Seth: You can't do much better than killing somebody if you're a anti-anointed-
David: Right
Seth: ... anti the anointed one.
David: Right.
Seth: And then Jesus, as the true anointed one, rose from the dead, proving he's more powerful than the anti-anointed ones.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And then that Messiah, that anointed one, has Messiah'd you as well.
David: Right. And he's done it in the exact same way that he got Messiah'd. [laughs]
Seth: Yeah.
David: Right? Because like we said, Jesus wasn't anointed with oil. Right? And I know I'm, I'm probably skipping, I think, to point five of yours or something like that-
Seth: Yes, yes, yes
David: ... that you have. But, uh, he, he wasn't anointed with oil, he was anointed with the Holy Spirit. At his baptism, the Holy Spirit came on him.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Right? And that was the moment of his anointing. And that, John says here, is the exact same way we've been anointed. Not with oil, we've been anointed with the same Holy Spirit that Jesus has been anointed with. So, one, we have the same precondition as a ter- uh, in terms of, like, a state, um, that, that is needed to be an anointed one. We are humans, just like Jesus was. [laughs]
Seth: Yes.
David: Just like every other Messiah was in Israel's history.
Seth: Yeah.
David: We're humans, check. Number two, we've been anointed the same way Jesus was by the Holy Spirit. So, like, we've been made little Christs.
Seth: Mm.
David: Christians.
Seth: Yes.
David: That's what we call ourselves.
Seth: Yeah, like Christ.
David: We're little Christs. We're Christians.
Seth: Yeah. Yeah.
David: We're Chri- Chri- the Christ'd.
Seth: Right.
David: We are the anoint- I mean, that's what Christians mean, is we're the anointed ones.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: We are the Messiahs.
Seth: That's what my name means, too, Seth.
David: Seth, that's right.
Seth: Anyway.
David: Anyway.
Seth: Fun, fun-
David: Just a little flex
Seth: ... throw that, throw that in, yeah.
David: [laughs]
Seth: My parents called me the anointed one. No big deal.
David: I mean, I'm King David, let's be real. [laughs]
Seth: Well, I mean, we can duke it out later. [laughs]
David: [laughs] Anyway, so yes, so we have the Holy Spirit-
Seth: Yes
David: ... that we have the anointing-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... inside of us.
Seth: And in the same way, and so why this is encouraging, it goes to 4:4 again. "Little children, you are from God." You have been Messiah'd. "You are a new messiah by the anointing of God and you have overcome them, for He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world."
David: Mm.
Seth: The same way that Jesus conquered over the anti-Messiahs as the true Messiah is gonna be your story of resurrection victory as well.
David: Yeah.
Seth: They're gonna come at you with everything they have. They're gonna kill you. At, at their, at their worst, they can kill you.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And do you know what happens when anti-Messiahs kill Messiahs?
David: We win.
Seth: We win.
David: Yeah. [laughs]
Seth: That's right.
David: There's resurrection. [laughs]
Seth: And I, and that's probably closer to the, the context than, like, some, like, gov- Facebook or whatever. It's like-
David: Right, yeah
Seth: ... that's not... It's like these people are gonna kill Christians.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And he's saying, well, when anti-Messiahs, anti-anointed ones try to kill anointed ones, we rise from the dead.
David: That's right.
Seth: We've overcome the evil one.
David: Yeah, and it's interesting that he's talking about the evil one here-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... both before and after this. He's talking about the devil.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: You know, and it, it's, it's interesting to kinda go back to-
Seth: Oh, there's no mention of the evil one here, sorry. Vir- "He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world."
David: Right.
Seth: But yes.
David: Yeah, I mean, that's a-
Seth: Yes
David: ... reference to Satan.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And then in chapter three, right after this, there's several more mentions of the devil.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And so it's interesting, it, like, it talks about how he's been lying from the beginning, you know?
Seth: Mm.
David: And it's like, and what's a mark of the Antichrist? They're a liar.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And it's just interesting to go back to the-
Seth: We know the truth. Yeah
David: ... to the, or even to go back to the Garden of Eden, though, and to be like-
Seth: Oh
David: ... this is the battle that's happened from the beginning, the anointed versus the anti-anointed, right? Eve's line was anointed. It was chosen that the Messiah would come from her line, and then the anti-anointed one was pitting them against each other, right?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Why else would, would John, in the next chapter, pick up on their children, Cain and Abel?
Seth: Oh.
David: And he pits them against each other and says, "This has been happening. This battle of Christ versus Antichrist has been happening from the beginning."
Seth: Mm.
David: It is the story of God's people. God has always been rising up anointed Messiahs to lead and save his people, and the anti-Messiahs have been trying to kill them, and they've been against them. That has happened again and again and again throughout Israel's history, and it culminates on the cross-
Seth: Mm
David: ... when the Antichrists killed the Christ.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And we won.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so what l- what's left? We're still in the battle. The battle's still going on. We are surrounded by anti-anointed ones, people who are against us as the anointed ones. And what do we do? No matter what, no matter what they do to us, we will overcome, not because we're proud and braggadocios, but by humbly loving one another like Jesus loved them, by dying for them.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Because even when we die, we win.
Seth: Which goes, which m- makes a little bit more sense of verse 25, "And this is the promise he made to us, eternal life." Like, like, he's, he's pulling on this thread even here. I, I kept, like, trying to make this a different point-
David: Mm
Seth: ... but it's the same point he's been ma- he just made. Like, if you've been anointed, if you've been Messiah'd like our Messiah, Jesus-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... your destination is the same.
David: Right.
Seth: If he abides in you, "If what you have heard from the beginning abides in you, you too will abide in the Son and in the Father," and this is what it mean, what happens when you abide in the Son and the Father, eternal life.
David: Yeah.
Seth: You can't be overcome by the evil one, by he who is in the world, by anti-anointed ones, because that battle's already been won.
David: That's right, and the darkness is fading away, and the light is dawning. That's what John's been saying multiple times. Another thing we said earlier that just sounded like really good news was in the o- in the past, in the Old Testament, when someone was anointed, right? When...
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Let's take King Saul, for example. I think it's a great image. King Saul was a Messiah. He was anointed. Oil went on his head and marked him as God's anointed, but it didn't change his heartRight? In fact, he got oppressed by lying spirits [laughs] right, uh, and was, and failed as God's anointed but what happens with the Holy Spirit being our anointing oil is it doesn't go on our head and roll off our backs and leave us unchanged. Instead, it enters into us, and the Holy Spirit changes our hearts and makes us live like anointed ones, makes us live like good messiahs, makes us live like Christ, makes us be Christians, you know?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Like, that's good news, is that when we are marked as God's anointed, we start to become like him, and which he's gonna talk about in J-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... in 1 John 3, uh, is-
Seth: And he's already talked about it-
David: Yes, right
Seth: ... about being, like, loving and-
David: That's right
Seth: ... saying no to the world and like-
David: How do you know you are saved? How do you know that your faith is genuine? If you love your brother, if you obey his commands, because why? Because you've been marked. You've been anointed, not by oil, which rolls off your back, but by the Holy Spirit, which penetrates your soul.
Seth: Yes.
David: That's so cool.
Seth: That's so cool. So why, what's good news in a world full of antichrists? That you have been made like Christ.
David: Yeah.
Seth: You have been messiahed.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And you are p- not only, like, overcoming like Jesus overcame, you'll push back that darkness as Jesus pushed it back, too.
David: Right, yeah. What's, what's good news in a world full of those who are opposed to the anointed one-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... and wanna tell you, "Don't believe in him. It's not true. It's not worth it." The, the, the answer, the good news isn't, well, here's a response to all of their critiques.
Seth: Mm.
David: No, the good news is that forget those critiques, you're anointed.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: It's like, how can, how can they disprove the anointed one when there's millions of anointed ones? It's happened.
Seth: Yeah.
David: The Holy Spirit is on all of us. There's, how can they be against the Messiah when there's millions of messiahs? [laughs]
Seth: Uh, I rem- I'm thinking about, "And the world is passing a le- way"
David: Uh-huh
Seth: ... which we, we read last week, and thinking about if part of what it means to be a messiah or to be messiahed by the Messiah is eternal life, necessarily those who do not have eternal life will pass away.
David: Right.
Seth: Over time, those of eternal life will grow in numbers and in strength. The population of heaven and the new heavens is always increasing.
David: Right.
Seth: And the population of those who are anti-God's people is always decreasing.
David: Right. They don't have eternal life.
Seth: God's kingdom is-
David: Right
Seth: ... always winning.
David: Right.
Seth: The Messiah, the Messiah's kingdom is always advancing.
David: Yeah, that's really good. Uh, anything else before we move on to antichrists again?
Seth: Uh, yes.
David: Okay.
Seth: So one of the other things-
David: I thought we had, I thought we had more
Seth: ... uh, that, another piece of good news-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... that John gives people who feel embattled by those who are anti the Messiah, anti-Jesus, is that you've been anointed by the Holy One, and verse 20 of ver- of chapter two, you have all knowledge.
David: Mm.
Seth: I write to you not because you do not know the truth but because you know it and because no lie is of the truth.
David: Mm.
Seth: And I think this connects also to chapter four where it talks about testing the spirits to see where they are from God. You have, in order to, to test the spirits, to weigh the spirits-
David: Right
Seth: ... to not believe in the false spirits is to know the, the true spirits. And I think why this is good news is what Jesus said to John-
David: Mm
Seth: ... in the upper room, in the same place he told him that you'll overcome the world. What did he tell him the Holy Spirit would do? He would teach him everything.
David: Right.
Seth: He would teach him everything that he commanded him and that he would-
David: Mm
Seth: ... not forget it. He, and who, what, what, what, and what does he call the Holy Spirit in 1 John 14, or John 14? He says, "And I'm gonna ask the Father, and he's gonna give you an, an advocate to help you and be with you forever, the spirit of truth."
David: Ah.
Seth: So like-
David: You have all truth because you have been anointed with the Spirit, 'cause he's the spirit of all truth.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yeah, that's good.
Seth: And so what's gonna help you know, what's gonna help you, like, figure out what's true and what's not? The Holy Spirit that I've placed inside you and been praying f- and-
David: That's right
Seth: ... Jesus himself is praying.
David: So like whenever there's a false teacher, test it by what standard? By the word of God-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... and by the Spirit within you.
Seth: That's right.
David: Okay, that's pretty awesome.
Seth: Right.
David: Well, and, like, truth, too, in 1 John is also shorthand for Jesus and the gospel, and to be a liar is to be against Jesus and his gospel. And so it's like you have all truth. Why? Because you have the gospel. What else do you need?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: You, you have Jesus is just another way to put it, too.
Seth: Yes.
David: Uh, also, just like a ran- random thing.
Seth: Yeah.
David: I don't wanna open up a can of worms, but it's just cool to be like, if we are Messiah kings in a sense, right, uh, part of the job of the Messiah kings, uh, based on Deuteronomy, was to know all truth, was to study the law, to know good from evil, right, to test the spirits. Like, that was part of the Deuteron- Deuteronomic king's job-
Seth: Yes
David: ... was to be a good Messiah. It was to know good from evil, to test the spirits.
Seth: And to, just to double down that point, we mentioned this in our prep for this, but, like, Moses is called a prophet.
David: Right.
Seth: Abraham is called a prophet, and Abraham, apart from maybe Adam, is the first person God promises to make a people out of.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: And one of the commands that Moses taught us was to discern true from false prophets.
David: Right.
Seth: True from false people speaking of salvation. And so I think it's interesting that we talked about the battle between antichrist and Christ goes back to the garden.
David: Mm.
Seth: God's people have always been defined by the ability to discern between true and false-
David: Yes
Seth: ... prophecy.
David: True.
Seth: True and false revelations of who God is and what he's up to in the world.
David: Mm.
Seth: So it's like don't be discouraged that you have so many people claiming that Jesus isn't the Christ. This is actually the battle that God's people have been engaged in from the beginning.
David: It's proof positive that the battle exists.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yes.
Seth: You're not crazy.
David: Yeah. [laughs]
Seth: God's on the move.
David: You're in the biblical story. [laughs]
Seth: You are in the biblical story.
David: Yeah, that's really good.
Seth: And I think the final piece, uh, so, you know, same-
David: That's all truth, yeah.
Seth: It's all truth.
David: Yep.
Seth: Uh, and then here is the last piece, which is kinda confusing, so I wanna make sure we mention it.
David: Okay.
Seth: But, um, little children, you are from God and have over- overcome them. We've talked about that, verse five.They, the antichrists-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... are from the world, and therefore they speak from the world-
David: Mm
Seth: ... and the world listens to them. How do you know somebody who's anti the Messiah is an anti-Messiah? Well, because they're repeating the narratives of the world.
David: Right.
Seth: And they're gonna speak like the world speaks, and who's gonna listen to them but everybody else in the world that are giving into the desi- the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh-
David: Right
Seth: ... and the pride of life. But we are from God, so you ha- so and who's we again?
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: The apostles.
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: We the apostles are from God. We have touched and seen and felt and saw and heard Jesus. Whoever knows God listens to us, and whoever is not from God does not listen to us, and by this we know the spirit of truth from the spirit of error. What's one other piece of good news for people who are overwhelmed by the anti- the antichrist message against us-
David: Mm
Seth: ... is that we're connected to the eyewitness testimony of somebody that saw Jesus r- speak-
David: Mm
Seth: ... teach, heal, and rise from the dead.
David: Right.
Seth: Like w- like why is that good news? Because we have a historical reality that I saw-
David: [laughs] Right
Seth: ... and it's real.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Don't be... We've overcome the world, and if you don't, can't buy that yet, remember I saw Jesus's dead body.
David: Right.
Seth: And then I saw his living body. [laughs]
David: I love it. It's like really good news that we have an inner witness in the Holy Spirit. That's really good news.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Because without it we wouldn't believe the outer witness, right? But it's, sometimes it's also really good news that we don't just have an inner witness, but we also have objective reality to deal with where it's like there is an empty tomb.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: There are non-Christian historical reports of Jesus rising from the dead. The world has to deal with those, but as Christians, we get to be comforted by those.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Eyewitness testimony, people connected to the historical Jesus.
Seth: Yeah.
David: That's good. That's good news.
Seth: It is good news.
David: Yeah.
Seth: And I, I think, I forget who s- somebody said it, but they said, talked about how Christianity is the world's only falsifiable religion.
David: That's right. It's the only falsifiable religion.
Seth: Every other religion in the world, um, relies on the private thoughts-
David: Right
Seth: ... of one of their spiritual leaders.
David: Yep.
Seth: God spoke to them in a dream, in a vision.
David: You'll never be able to prove that God didn't show up on Mount Sinai in the Exodus story.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: That's not falsifiable.
Seth: Right.
David: Right? But it could be falsifiable to find Jesus's body.
Seth: Yeah.
David: If you found Jesus's body, Christianity's fake.
Seth: Yes.
David: But you can't.
Seth: You can't.
David: He is risen. [laughs] Like-
Seth: And that's good news.
David: That's good news. Yeah.
Seth: That's good news.
David: Okay. All right. Two last things as we close down, and I think we might do a special episode on identifying false teachers or something so we-
Seth: Maybe we already have.
David: Maybe we already have done it, but I do wanna bring it up here where it's like, okay, kind of like a now what.
Seth: Mm.
David: We, we've kind of... We've, we've laid out how maybe John's audience saw the antichrists, but really how the main point is not the antichrists. The main point is cl- like clinging to the Christ and that we are the anointed ones. You know, and all of that that we've talked about. But I think people might, li-listening might still be like, "Okay, but two questions. One, how, how do I or should I identify these plural antichrists in my life? And two, what about the, capital A, Antichrist? Do I still need to be worried about him, or what's going on there?" I think those are, like, the, the last two kind of dangling things.
Seth: Well, how do we know who are the plural antichrists?
David: Mm-hmm.
Seth: Well, who has went out from the church and is denying the apostolic teaching of the apostles?
David: Yep.
Seth: Who is denying that Jesus is in Christ, is the Christ, and who are refu- who is refusing to love their brothers?
David: Mm.
Seth: And who does the world listen to? Like, we've been given a ton of, like, things that we've already talked about.
David: Right.
Seth: They're denying that Jesus is the Christ. They've left the church and denying its teaching, and they don't love people very well, and they, um... What'd I just... The last thing.
David: Yeah, yeah. [laughs] So then if it, if they're somewhat easy to identify-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... uh, what do we do with them? What, what would John say we do with them?
Seth: Well, what's interesting, he doesn't tell us to rise up and kill them or-
David: No. [laughs]
Seth: ... to legislate against them.
David: Or to write Facebook posts about them.
Seth: No. He tells us to remember that we have overcome the world.
David: Mm.
Seth: Like, that's the message. Like, you've been anointed by somebody more powerful than those people out there, and you will overcome them.
David: Yeah, there is, like, a, a kind of a defensive posture I feel like in the Church we take against those that we label as antichrists.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Or those who are just opposed to the Church.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And it's like, "Oh, they're big and strong, and we're weak and have to submit, and, you know, we need to rise up and lash out."
Seth: Mm.
David: And it's like, no, you're in the winning position.
Seth: Uh-huh.
David: They are passing away. They're fading fast and falling. You are rising up and succeeding. The light is dawning. The darkness is already passing away, so continue to rise. Like, continue to-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... remember who you are as God's anointed one. Like, lean into that calling, not necessarily-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... go trample the halls of the antichrists, you know.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Uh, not to say we shouldn't defend our faith and all that kind of stuff, but we don't need a victim mentality.
Seth: Right. That's exactly right.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Yeah. Christians are on the side of the winning team.
David: That's right.
Seth: We're not victims.
David: We are never victims. [laughs]
Seth: Yeah.
David: Uh, we are always victors. [laughs]
Seth: Uh, at least in this sense, yes.
David: Yes.
Seth: Yes.
David: Uh, I mean, al- I mean, yeah, always.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Even, even in death we have victory.
Seth: Mm.
David: Uh, so anyway, uh, okay then, um, just I, I said off air during the break that I was like, there's one last thing I have to personally circle back around to just because I think we've left who is the capital A Antichrist kind of unsaid.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And even some of the ways we've talked about it have kinda just played into the hand of how most people probably think about the Antichrist-
Seth: Yes
David: ... as this end times ma- mega figure who maybe he's political, but he has a lot of power, and he's coming at the end time, and then Jesus will show up and conquer him.
Seth: Yes.
David: It's like this-... picture a lot of us have.
Seth: Uh-huh.
David: And, um, I don't necessarily want to get into all the logistics of that because, one, that might not be who John is talking about here. Because you would have to, and I th- and I'll, you know, I'll show my cards. I- Seth is undecided.
Seth: I am undecided.
David: I'm, I'm, I'm like 70/30, uh, that the antichrist talking about here is connected to the man of lawlessness in Thessalonians, the abomination of desolation that Jesus talks about in Matthew and Mark, and the beast in Revelation. Um, I do think that the abominate- abomination of desolation, the man of lawlessness, and the beast are one in the same person.
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: Um, and then maybe the antichrist could be included in that.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Uh, but maybe the antichrist is a unknown category that we just-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... that was known to the Johannine community of the first century, but we just don't have a category for anymore.
Seth: It was, maybe it was, like, an epithet, like a-
David: Yeah
Seth: ... historical epithet.
David: Right.
Seth: That guy, he's the antichrist.
David: Right.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Um, but regardless, I do wanna bring up this, let's call it the beast or-
Seth: Uh-huh
David: ... the man of lawlessness or the abomination of desolation, this end times figure that we have in our head that has reductionistically now been called, in shorthand, the antichrist. Um, a, a, a few things. Uh, uh, or maybe, maybe just one basic thing-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... is, uh, it's my opinion and the opinion of a lot of biblical scholars, uh, especially conservative biblical scholars-
Seth: Yeah
David: ... Evangelical biblical scholars, um, a- and particularly non-dispensational ones, if you know that term.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Uh, that this figure has already arrived on the, h- on history's scene, that the New Testament writers were not talking about some person that was gonna come 2,000 years later, looking forward to Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin or someone like that, uh, or Nicolae Carpathia, you know.
Seth: Yeah.
David: They were looking to their immediate future, which is why so many times, pretty much every time, when this figure is mentioned, even here in John with the antichrist, this idea of immediacy is also mentioned. The last hour, the day is coming, the time is near.
Seth: Yeah, yeah.
David: Jesus, Jesus seemed to si- think that there was gonna be an imminence-
Seth: Right
David: ... to the abomination of desolation setting up in the temple.
Seth: Referring to last days as just, like, any time before the last thing that Jesus does when he returns.
David: That's right.
Seth: But perhaps maybe we should take Jesus a little more literally when he says last days, that he means, like, it's quickly coming.
David: It's really soon.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And even said that some of the ge- some of this generation is still going to be alive when it happens.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Well, obviously, if it's Jesus coming at the end of time, uh, they're all dead, [laughs] you know?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And so, um, m- many, a vast, vast many of biblical scholars, myself included, not that I'm a biblical scholar, but that I agree with them-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... is that this figure is the Roman Emperor Nero, who died in AD 68. Uh, he be- he came to power as Caesar at the age of 17, reigned for, I think, f- 14, 15 years, and, um, and then committed suicide, uh-
Seth: Wow
David: ... at the age of 31, so whatever that, that reign time is.
Seth: That's odd.
David: Uh, and he was a psychopath, an absolute sociopath. He, um, he persecuted Christians. He burned huge parts of Rome down and then blamed the Christians.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And there's, like, historical records about this.
Seth: Right.
David: Um, I, I even recently heard that, a historical record about Nero, that he would set up these gruesome theaters, kinda like the Colosseum, where he would tie men and women to posts naked. Then he himself, the emperor, would dress up in beast's clothes, like skins of animals, and maul their genitals.
Seth: That's crazy.
David: I mean, he was a psychopath.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Absolutely a crazy person. Um, and, and it's because of his failing as a Roman emperor-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... that, uh, that so many things happened, um, and that people hated the, the, the Christians. And since Christians were born out of Judaism-
Seth: Mm-hmm
David: ... they hated the Jews.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so then two years after his death in AD 70, the temple was destroyed.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And so, um, that, and that for the Jewish person and for Christians who grew out of the Jewish religion, that would be the end of the world.
Seth: Yeah.
David: The destruction of the temple is the end of the world.
Seth: And think about how everything that we've said about antichrists, plural, still applies to that situation.
David: That's right.
Seth: It's like, if that's the case, then the good news is the same.
David: Mm.
Seth: You have been anointed by somebody who's stronger than death, and the worst Nero can do is kill you.
David: Right.
Seth: He can torture you on the way down.
David: Right.
Seth: But you have overcome the evil one.
David: Even that kind of evil.
Seth: Like-
David: Even that great and powerful evil
Seth: ... he's not gonna win.
David: That regime is passing away.
Seth: Yes.
David: Yeah.
Seth: It's, it's good news regardless, and even if you're sitting here listening, thinking, "Well, no, I'm still holding out for a big, bad figure at the end of time"
David: Fine.
Seth: Man, like, I, I, and I can get there with you, too, but it's like the antichrist is not the thing to focus on-
David: Right
Seth: ... in the story of the Bible.
David: No.
Seth: The story of the, the Bible tells us that the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Christ, wins.
David: Yes.
Seth: He overcomes the evil one.
David: Right.
Seth: He makes us messiahs along with him to destroy the works-
David: Mm
Seth: ... of the evil one. He deputizes us, fills us with His Holy Spirit, to push back that type of darkness.
David: Mm.
Seth: It's like we're not, like, who, whoever the antichrists are-
David: Mm-hmm
Seth: ... whether they're the ex-Evangelicals, Nero, or-
David: Something in the future
Seth: ... something in the future, we win.
David: We win.
Seth: We win.
David: Yeah.
Seth: Like, that's the good news.
David: Right.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Absolutely. Yeah, and the bad news is still the same, that there are anti-anointed ones-
Seth: Yes
David: ... all around us, but the good news stands that we win.
Seth: Yeah.
David: And that we win because of Christ, because of the Anointed One, because He's anointed us. Uh, so yeah, I just wanted to make sure we closed the book on, but what about the antichrist, and what about the antichrists?
Seth: Mm-hmm.
David: And it's like, that's not the main point for John.
Seth: Yeah.
David: The main point is what we've said.
Seth: And again, like, he even refers, this is the spirit of the antichrist.
David: Uh-huh.
Seth: There is a spiritual, eternal reality that we pushed all the way back to the Garden of Eden.
David: That's right.
Seth: That is at work in the world.
David: Yep.
Seth: And that spiritual reality of those that are anti the anointed one of God will come to an end.
David: Right.
Seth: That's the story of the Bible, that the, the seed of the snake, the seed of the anti-anointed one is always crushed by Jesus.
David: Yeah, and his anointed ones.
Seth: On the cross.
David: Yep.
Seth: Right now as we live, and then when he finally returns.
David: Yeah.
Seth: The snake loses.
David: Yeah. That's, that's good news. That's really good news. Well, whoo. Okay, for those of you still listening, [laughs] thank you for sticking with us through this episode. Uh, give us grace on a couple of items here that are just hot topics.
Seth: Yep.
David: One, who's the Antichrist? Just, it's just what I've studied, my opinion. If you disagree, that's fine. I love you, and it's, and-
Seth: The important thing is Jesus wins.
David: Jesus wins is the important thing.
Seth: Yeah.
David: Number two is, I just wanna reiterate, like, I don't want anyone walk away, walking away from this offended by me pointing out that anointed ones is Christ, and, like, saying, like, we're little Christs or anything like that. I'm not meaning any kind of sacrilege or putting ourselves on any kind of plane with Jesus. I've, I've written about us being little gods and stuff in the garden before-
Seth: Oh
David: ... and gotten some nasty emails. [laughs]
Seth: Yeah. [laughs]
David: And so I don't want nasty emails. We're not God.
Seth: Yeah.
David: We're not Jesus. We are being made in his image. We're co-heirs. These are, this is all biblical language.
Seth: Yeah.
David: So just two last things for those who have stuck through to the end.
Seth: David's conscience has been appeased. [laughs]
David: [laughs] But seriously, guys-
Seth: It's not often that I hear David hedging his words.
David: [laughs]
Seth: So this is a big moment for me.
David: It's a big moment.
Seth: For our audience.
David: [laughs]
Seth: This is, this is big. David has been tempered by nasty emails in the past.
David: It's true, I have been. So, but thank you all so much for listening. We hope this has been helpful, and we'll see you next week as we continue in 1 John. [outro music]
Outro: Thank you for listening to the Spoken Gospel podcast. Spoken Gospel creates short films, devotionals, and podcasts like this one. Everything we make is free because of generous supporters like you. To see our resources, visit spokengospel.com or subscribe to our YouTube channel. Thanks for listening. See you next week. [outro music]
