A lethal masquerade...

The identity behind the mask...

In Twinsburg Ohio, there is a festival every year. Twins and triplets and quadruplets attend every year from around the country. There you can see a lot twins, some of who may be almost impossible to tell apart. I am a twin myself, and have had many interesting experiences down through years. When I was in college, my twin brother came to the school where I had been attending for a year. Twins at times look at each other and wonder, “How can someone possibly not know the difference between me and my twin? For example, my brother likes facial hair and I prefer to be clean shaven. How could anyone not be able to tell two fellows apart when one has facial hair and the other does not?

It can be easy if you don't tell your friends you have a twin. Such was the case in college. When my brother came to school, he was clean shaven but got tired of everyone calling him Brent, so he grew some facial hair. Brian and I look so different to me that without my telling my friends that I had a twin, I thought that they should be able to tell that we were two people and not the one person which everyone assumed. Upon seeing Brian, some of my friends, would say, “hey nice, beard Brent!” Poor Brian, he could not win, until the talent show, and then there was no confusion.

When we went to school at the Navajo Indian High school, the same thing happened. We went to different classes and our friends thought we were one person until a media production. When we came onstage at the same time, all the students began to freak out, and later they said, “you did not tell us you had a twin. We though it was one person and you really scared us when you came onstage. It did not help that some of our indian friends were somewhat superstitious. The same thing happened to our younger brother's wife. For three weeks she though we were one person, and our habit of walking up in different clothes ten minutes apart and asking the exact same questions began to scare us. She became a little upset when our younger brother informed her theat He had forgotten to tell her he had two older twin brothers. We were never able to convince her it was an accident.

When Brian and I were very young, my mother used to dress us up in identical clothes for church, and there was only one way Mom and Dad could tell us apart. That was when we opened our mouths. Brian and I never deliberately set out to deceive anyone regarding who was who.

The Bible tells us that there will be two events and entities which will appear to be very similar. It is eternally vital to know the difference between the two and it impacts us as it is not many years away. The signs of the times attest to this. Civil unrest in the world, natural disasters, worldwide political chaos and oppression, earthquakes and a multiplicity of wars all point to a planet whose years are numbered. So what are these two entities? Christ and Satan. What is the question? Will Satan will masquerade as Christ in order to deceive en mass?

It is a topic which I had not studied for myself till now. What we know for sure ought to be that which we have studied for ourselves in God's word. And our prayer should be that people will not take our word for it, but search it out for themselves in the sacred scriptures. While I do not mistrust those whom I have decided to listen to on this topic, I had not yet not searched it out for myself in God's word.

So is Satan going to masquerade as Christ? The scriptures do not tell us directly in a single verse, but a number of verses compared and agreeing on the topic will give us an answer. And this is the aim of contextual and holistic investigation of the holy scriptures. What does the Bible say as a whole on a certain topic? First we will need to observe a number of verses that are connected with the coming of Christ. Then we will observe some facts.

Jesus is coming back. This is the essence christianity. There is a beautiful hymn that harmonizes with this, the greatest hope of the apostles and faithful down through the ages. And so the question is, what does the Bible say? Will Satan masquerade as Christ?

Matthew 24:23~27

23. Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. 24. For there shall arise false christ's, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they should deceive the very elect. 25. Behold, I have told you before. 26. Wherefore if they shall say unto you, behold he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers: believe it not. 27. For as the lightening cometh out of the east, and shines even to the west, so shall also the coming of the sun of man be.

Isaiah 25:9

And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him; we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.

2^nd Thessalonians 1:7,8

7. And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven with His mighty angels, 8. In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

1^st Corinthians 15:51,52

51. Behold I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

Exodus 19:19

And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spoke and God answered him by voice.

^1st Thessalonians 4:15-17

15. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain to the coming of the lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. 16. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Acts 1: 9-11

9. And when He had spoken these things, while they beheld, He was taken up; and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 10. And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; 11. Which also said, You men of Galilee, why stand you gazing you up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you have seen Him go into heaven.

Revelation 1:7

Behold, He comes with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen.

Matthew 24:30,31

And the shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 31. And He shall send His angels with the great sound of the trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

Matthew 27:52,53

51. And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, 53. And came out of the graves after His resurrection, and went into the holy city and appeared to many.

Ephesians 5:14

Wherefore He saith, Awake, thou that sleepest and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.

Mark 13:22

For false christs and false prophets shall rise and shall show great signs and wonders, to seduce, if possible, the very elect.

There have been and will be many people who have claimed to be Christ. When we look in the Bible, we know that there are some things from the true second coming that the impostors and phonies will not be able to duplicate. There are numerous signs and events that will accompany the coming that even Satan cannot and will not be allowed to duplicate. Let's gather facts that describe the true second coming. What are the differences between the true second coming of Christ and that of the great deceiver?

• 2^nd Thessalonians 1:7,8 tells us that Christ will come with the clouds of heaven... His holy angels. They will come forth from Christ to the four winds of heaven to collect his saints. There will be no angels collecting Saints when Satan masquerades as Christ.
• The sound of a great trumpet will accompany the second coming of Christ. Like the trumpet on Mount Sianai, this will be a sound everyone will hear. Every eye shall see Him, and those who pierced him also. This is going to be a worldwide visual and audible second coming.
• 1st Thessalonians 4:15-17 tells us that graves will be opened with the dead (and then the living) being caught up to be with the Lord. Matthew 27:52,53 corroborates in telling us that those who rose at Christ's death on the cross arose with physical incorruptible bodies coming out of the graves. The same will happen when the true Christ comes.
• No false Christ, Satan included will be able to duplicate glorified saints coming out of the graves. If someone claims to be Christ portraying his returning to earth, this will have to be a major accompanying sign according to scripture. If there are not numerous open vacent graves that once held saints, then we could look in our immediate vicinity without going anywhere and ask, “where are the rent rocks? Where are the vacant graves that have been pushed open by occupants who have been glorified?” When Satan masquerades as Christ, no graves will open. The saint's will remain asleep until the true Christ comes and calls them to wake.
• Jesus will come down in like manner as He left, revealed in the clouds of heaven.
• Isaiah 25:9 tells us that there will be a group of people who when the true Christ does come will claim Him as He whom they have waited for. Because they know their Bibles, they have refused to even look at or listen to the false christ . This group has not been deceived by those who claimed to be Christ, who also displayed miraculous signs following their lies. They will not go to see the false Christ's weather he be reported to be in the desert or in the secret place. They will remember Jesus's warning in sacred scripture and will faithfully pay no heed to the false reports. This is the group who will say, “this is the Lord.” There is a strong hint here that this group has already witnessed reports that Jesus has returned, and had rejected the reports because of what they knew from the Bible.
• There will be numerous reports of Christ's return to earth in various places. Using the Bible, we will not to give into fatal curiosity, but ignore the lethal temptation to see for our selves.
• When it is Jesus himself coming in the clouds of Glory, all the tribes of earth will mourn. Why is this? They will not be mourning when Satan and the other false christs come.
  When they give into the temptation to go where Jesus is reported to be and are taken in by Satan's grand ruse, and then they see Christ, the true Christ coming, they will realize too late that they have been duped. Their agony stems from the fact that their fates are sadly sealed.
• “For as the lightening cometh out of the east, and shines even to the west, so shall also the coming of the sun of man be.” This will not be a visit, but a mission. When Jesus the true Christ comes, he does not take the time to perform signs and wonders as the false Christ's and false prophets do. He comes on an errand to collect His saints living and dead and to consign sinners to the first death. He also comes to doom Satan to his thousand year prison sentence on a dead planet full of dead sinners, bored stiff with no one alive to tempt or annoy.
• Satan masquerading as Christ will want to take time to say many of the same things that Christ said when He was on earth. Yet Satan always twists the truth as he always twists scripture to frame his lies, much as he did in his temptations to Christ in the wilderness when he deliberately misread the scriptures.
• 2^nd Thessalonians 1:7,8 lets us know that 1, those who obey the gospel commission, and 2, who know God, and remember the words of Christ which are embeded in their memory, will not be deceived.
  Those who choose to listen to the false Christ and to go out to see him against the solemn warnings of Christ will be deceived.
  With universal censure and scorn, they will be looked upon by the deceived world as pathetic idiots and morons by the vast majority who have been deceived against the warnings of Christ...the vast majority who have not studied Scripture and do not know God. The whole world will be deceived by this, the greatest delusion of the enemy of souls. All the tribes of the earth mourn when Jesus, the true Christ comes, letting us know that Satan had tragically succeeded in deceiving everyone. They mourn because they realize they have been deceived to their deaths.
• We will know from scripture without having to go anywhere or listen to anyone that the reported false christs, including, and especially Satan are phonies because we have studied the genuine shown us in the Bible.

God has shown us how to recognize the false Christ's without hearing a word they say. Indeed, Christ has warned us not to even listen to them or go to see them.

When currency examiners study to be able to know false bills from a true one, they never study false bills. They study only the real one so closely that they can spot a phony on sight. God has shown us in Bible that we can comprehend a false Christ without seeing them or having to hear a word they say. And this is done by examining very closely the what God has shown us concerning what His true coming will be like according to the Bible as opposed to other imitators. We must pay no heed to the false, but study the genuine with prayerful vigor. “All the tribes of the earth shall mourn.” All the tribes of the earth, a somber testament to Satan's success in masquerading as Christ, shall see too late that they have been deceived to their deaths.

The enemy of souls has succeeded on a grand scale. But if we are students of the word, we do not have to be deceived into sin. It was the prime purpose of Satan to get Jesus to sin when he was on earth, and Satan failed. Every attempt failed, and we can look at Jesus to know how to throw a wrench in the arch deceiver's well oiled engine of trickery.

But what was the power? It was in the word's “It is written!” In the wilderness, when Satan tempted Christ, every answer was, “It is written, it is written, it is written.” So Satan said, “I can play that game too.” Of course Satan never plays by the rules. In Matthew 4:6, Satan took Jesus and set Him on a pinnacle of the temple which was a tall building, and said “If thou be the son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give His angels charge concerning thee: (?) and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.” But in this excerpt from Psalms 91, Satan leaves out a very important sentence as Jesus well knew. A sentence that would remind Jesus of His mission which He never forgot. Here is Psalms 91:11&12 undefiled.

11. “ For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all they ways. 12. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.” Jesus used a power available to all of us to defeat the arch deceiver. He used scripture.

How can we know that Satan will be the one to masquerade as christ? Surely there will and have been many humans twisted enough to imagine that they are christ, and this is true. Yet what kind of person could pull off the following?

“All the tribes of the earth shall mourn.” All the tribes of the earth; a somber testament to Satan's success in masquerading as Christ, shall see too late that they have been deceived to their deaths, and will wish they had studied scripture closer and held to conviction over impulse. There is no person in history who could pull this deception off. “They shall show great signs and wonders, to seduce, if possible even the very elect.” There will be miracles attending Satan and other false christs. He will heal people of cancer, heal people of sickness, and in every way imaginable will imitate Christ, in speech, action, deportment, but there will be a fatal flaw, which if we had not been warned by Christ in scripture, we would fall for.

Satan, when he masquerades as christ will deceive all the tribes of the earth, and they will mourn to know they deceived when they see the genuine coming of Christ. Satan has had 6000 years to study and deceive humans, and he knows his evil art well.

We are not to venture on the enemies ground and go to listen to him even with the Bible as a shield, or humor false reports. Jesus has told us not to for good reason.

The principle here is choosing to trust knowledge God has given us in the Bible over impulse. If we do, we will know that a false christ is false without ever having to see or hear it, and we will stay right where we are, which should be as far away from false christ's as possible. People who do not know the Bible, will think we are ridiculous ingrates. We will most likely be hated and perhaps hunted and it could well be a dangerous time for us, but as we stick to our Bible based convictions, God will be with us. A popular phrase nowadays is that seeing is believing, but we do not need to see or hear in order to obey the words of Christ. So will Satan masquerade as Christ? This is not a 100% yes, but it is very likely. But most importantly, if we prayerfully store the words of Christ in our hearts, and remember and obey them, and ignore the urging curiosity of impulse, God will preserve us from the strong delusion that will take the world captive. Let us know the word of God so well that by the grace of God, we are not deceived. And we will be among that group who says, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him; we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” In the meantime, the best thing we can do is prayerfully study the Bible for ourselves, and so by doing, we will build up a holy consecrated arsenal against Satan's lies, and it will be contained in the words, “it is written.” We will have followed the example of Jesus, and like Him will become more than conquerers through Him who loves us and gave Himself for us.