The Problem Is That We Are Not Looking For That Strong Delusion!

               I've witnessed and experienced a lot in politics since the 1960s. I'm one of those who can tell you where they were on November 22, 1963. I remember the mechanical numbers changing on the black and white television screen in November of 1960 when that young and handsome John F. Kennedy beat Richard Nixon....and I remember standing in front of the television in Ted's Dairy Store on March 31, 1968 when LBJ announced that he would not run for another term....and I remember that unbelievable comeback when Nixon won in 1968. I remember going to bed before RFK took the microphone at the Ambassador Hotel....and I remember the news of the next morning. Watergate....Jimmy Carter....Reagan....Clinton fooling the evangelicals....Obama....and then that groundswell for Trump in 2016. Yeah....I've seen a lot.
                  This is a difficult post. It's about as controversial as it gets. Here is Revelation 13:18 from the ESV...."This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666."
                  Some of you are thinking...."I don't remember the first part of that verse....that can't possibly literally mean for us to calculate!' Talk to a pastor about this and he will do something that he rarely if ever does....warn! He'll warn you vehemently against thinking too much about that verse....but it is there....and like time-release medication....it is kicking in right about now. 
                  Tune into David Jeremiah and you will get one take on where the Antichrist might come from.....tune into any one of a number of other popular preachers and you will get a number of other theories. There is nothing wrong with this. This is what we are to be doing. There will be legitimate speculations....and there will be the opposite.
                  Barack Obama was a candidate at one time....and may still be. There was his nomination acceptance speech in 2008....at Mile High Stadium in Denver....with a giant white horse on top of the stadium....and a stage that looked like a replica of the Altar of Zeus from Pergamum.....Satan's throne as is referred to in the letter to the church at Pergamum. Were those things a message from God....or a joke from the devil?
                  Gorbachev was a considered a....man of peace.....if there ever was one.....with a weird birthmark on his forehead that someone once described as looking like the Hebrew number 6....with a drop of blood at the bottom. Whoever or whatever this 'man' is....the Antichrist....he or it is with us today. That alone should wake us up!
                  'Kick in the butt' is an idiom that we hear fairly often. You're about to start a new job....a real good job....and then the position is suddenly eliminated. Well that would classify as a kick in the butt would it not? Well here is another....particularly for evangelicals....and very particularly for pastors.....what if it turns out that Donald Trump becomes the Antichrist? To use two popular idioms....that would be....'the mother of all'....'kicks in the butt'.....would it not? All these pastors who ignored all the warnings in God's Word....on people to definitely stay away from....would find out that they paved the way in their churches for.....The Antichrist!
                    Well lets' hope and pray that that is not the case.....but it is a legitimate speculation to at least give the once over. Why do I say this? Nine years of study and over a hundred books on Trump have showed me that this man is empty.....and if a man is empty.....there is the potential to be filled. He has absolutely no compassion or empathy.....in spite of all blabbering that he does on this. His belief that he is the most important person in the world....far beyond mere delusions of grandeur....impossible to experience anything akin to humility....filled with an unquenchable passion for revenge....and incapable of discerning the difference between truth and lies....all this combined with a truly great ability to deceive....yeah....he's probably not that man....I surely hope that he isn't....but he is a legitimate candidate!
                     Here's another verse to consider....Matthew 24:24 from the ESV...."For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect." Did not Trump prophesy...."our best is yet to come"....along with dozens of other statements of what glorious 'wins' were to come....and this constantly for years? Did he not tell us in some way every day of the great wonders that he accomplished? 
                     That rally over the weekend in Wildwood, New Jersey was nothing less than astonishing....80,000 to 100,000 people in that small blue state town....I've been there many times. 
                     Here's another verse....2 Thessalonians 2:11 from the ESV...."Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that that may believe what is false." Folks....we do not know what that strong delusion will be. That's not the problem. The problem is that we are not even looking for that strong delusion!