Deceptions before the dawn

The first word and the last

Jesus began His sermon on the end with a warning, repeated it in the middle, and came back to it near the close. If frequency is a guide to importance, the thing Jesus was most concerned about was not that His people would miss the signs but that they would be deceived.

And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many.

“Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many” (Matthew 24:11). And then the warning we have already met, which is the most specific of all:

“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.

Three things in that warning deserve attention. First, the deception is about the coming of Christ: people will claim He is here, in a particular place. Second, it will be backed by “great signs and wonders”: miracles, not mere arguments. Third, it will be good enough “to deceive, if possible, even the elect”. This is not a deception that only fools will fall for. It is aimed at the most sincere, and Jesus says the only defence is that “I have told you beforehand”.

Power, signs and lying wonders

Paul describes the same climax in his timetable of the end:

The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

The lawless one has a “coming” too, the word is again parousia, and it is a counterfeit of Christ’s: “with all power, signs, and lying wonders”. Those who fall for it are those who “did not receive the love of the truth”. Notice what the safeguard is. Not cleverness, not suspicion, not even sincerity, but love of the truth: a settled willingness to be told by Scripture what is so, and to prefer that to what we wish were so. Paul says elsewhere that the enemy’s agents will look like the real thing: “Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness” (2 Corinthians 11:14-15).

Why the manner of His coming is the safeguard

Put the warnings together with what the earlier chapters established and the protection becomes clear. If Christ’s coming will be like lightning from one horizon to the other, with clouds, a trumpet and every eye seeing Him, then anything that is local, that someone has to announce, that happens in a desert or an inner room or a city or a stadium, is not it, no matter how impressive its miracles. Jesus has told us beforehand. A believer who knows the manner of His coming can say to the most dazzling claim, “When He comes, I will not need you to tell me,” and walk away.

That is why the question of a secret or spiritual coming is not academic. Every teaching that allows Christ to come in a way that is not seen by every eye opens a door through which a counterfeit can walk. A people who expect Him on the clouds cannot be fooled by anyone who arrives on the ground.

The test of every voice

The Bible gives one test for any claim to speak for God, and it was given long before the New Testament:

To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.

Not the size of the miracle, not the sincerity of the speaker, not the feeling in the room, but the Word. Luke praised a congregation for exactly this: the Bereans “received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so” (Acts 17:11). They checked Paul. We may check anyone. And we must, because Jesus said the last deceptions would be good enough to fool the elect if the elect were not checking.

Deception from inside

It would be comfortable to imagine that the great deception comes only from obvious enemies. Jesus did not allow that comfort. “Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’” (Matthew 7:22-23). Miracles in His name are no guarantee. Paul’s list of the last days ended with people “having a form of godliness but denying its power” (2 Timothy 3:5). The final test is not whether something is religious but whether it is true to the Word and whether it produces obedience to it. “He who endures to the end shall be saved” (Matthew 24:13), and endurance means holding to what has been written when everything around you says otherwise.

Told beforehand

Jesus ended His warning with four words that are the sum of this chapter: “See, I have told you beforehand.” He has not left His people to work out the end by instinct. He has described the counterfeit and He has described the real thing, and the difference between them is the difference between a claim and a sky full of glory. The one who knows that difference is safe, not because they are clever, but because they believed what He said before it was needed.