"Signs And lying Wonders"

                The title of this post is from 2 Thessalonians 2:9. The ESV reads...."The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders."
                Woody Allen experimented with it....and it became popular with Forrest Gump. Holographs started appearing. ABBA made news with it....Randy Travis did it with the voice. Patty Duke used a split screen way back in the 60s. (I couldn't make up my mind which girl I liked best) They....(the inventors of these various technologies)....can make you believe that you are watching someone say something....a celebrity of some sort....passed on or still with us....but it's right before your eyes....only it is fake....artificially manufactured somehow. 
                Where is all of this going? Are there any limits to where it can go? Pick someone out of history....someone good or bad.....Reagan or Hitler or anyone. Now on the screen before you....or in the holograph in front of you....they appear. Let's make it Ronald Reagan because we are all so very familiar with his voice and his smile and his mannerisms and his personality. Well there he is on that giant television that so many of us have today. (our TV is a 32") And as he speaks to us he is referencing things in the news that may have only happened that morning or the day before. And he even addresses the fact that he knows that he passed away....and he knows that none of us will believe this....(unless we put our hands on his side....which we can't)....and in his so very convincing way....he tells us that we just have to believe him because he cannot prove it?
                Now in the case of Reagan....all of us conservatives loved him. What more could we ask for....honesty and wisdom? So would we be won over again by him on this screen? He might just start to give us a campaign speech of sorts....as good or better than it had ever been....simple guidance on where to go and what to do. No problem there right? He never led us astray before. But what if Lenin would come back from his 'head wound'....or the Nazi Fuhrer....or Einstein? Suppose Albert Einstein not only came back but gave us life changing mathematical equations? Suppose whoever it was gave us an instant cure for cancer or dementia?
               I'm using the hypothetical of computers and artificial intelligence here because we have already lost any defense on this....but this "power" and these 'signs" could conceivably be anything....an alien maybe? Did Sister Lucia really see the Virgin Mary at Fatima? Well we know the answer to that. And we know that no angel from God appeared to Joseph Smith.... but what if it was Billy Graham that came back? 
               Was it really the prophet Samuel that appeared to King Saul through the the woman medium from Endor? Are you sure you know the answer. R. C. Sproul was asked that question and vehemently answered that we do not know if that 'Samuel' was from God or was a demon. The Apostle Paul warned us in Galatians 1:8...."But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed"....and then he repeated himself! Paul also wrote to the Corinthians...."And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light." (2 Corinthians 11:14)
               Roughly forty years ago....when I miraculously came to faith in Christ....only understanding the gospel enough to fall prone before it in thankfulness and awe....I did know enough to recognize that there were false gospels out there....because they were not what happened to me....and the 'christ' of those gospels was not the same Savior that opened my eyes. So I jumped right into Christian apologetics. At least you cannot get into too much trouble defending what the Bible says about who Jesus Christ is....and what He has done for us. I knew this much....and I know it today....the best way to identify what is fake....is to first learn what is genuine!