The Kingdom of Antichrist

Prophetic scriptures speak of a coming Antichrist. In Daniel 9, it is the "prince who is to come" who will make a global treaty at the end of time but break will it after three and a half years. In 2 Thessalonians 2, he is the "man of sin", the "son of perdition" who will sit in the Jewish temple and declare himself God. This chapter also tells us that this world leader will be "consumed in the brightness of the Lord's Coming." Both Revelation and Daniel speak of a symbolic beast who will micromanage the entire global system through his ten-section government. He will go out to resist the Glorious Appearing of Jesus Christ but will be destroyed. When Jesus came the first time, His appearance was heralded by hundreds of distinct prophecies. You have all heard the statistics; for one man to fulfill just 48 prophecies would require odds of 1 in 10 to the 157th power: literally astronomical. Likewise, the Lord gave us hundreds of prophecies telling us about His second coming. Many of these scriptures speak distinctly about the government of the Antichrist; its attributes, symbols, and ideals. It is doubtful that we will be able to tell who the Antichrist actually is before he signs a specific seven-year treaty with Israel, but I am certain that we will be able to know the identity of his government. In the popular Left Behind series, the Antichrist takes over the United Nations and transforms it into his own "Global Community" centered out of a rebuilt Babylon. Many books, fiction and nonfiction, have been written on this subject. Daniel 2 makes the first direct reference to the final global kingdom. The king of Babylon is given a prophetic dream that is interpreted by the prophet Daniel. The young man tells the king that the statute he saw in the dream represents the worldly global governments, starting with a head of gold, Babylon, a silver chest representing Media/Persia, and stomach and thighs of bronze that herald Greece under Alexander the Great. The legs of iron came next; Daniel told the king that this worldwide empire would break in pieces, crushing the known world. This was fulfilled by the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire that threw Europe into the Dark Ages. The last kingdom is the toes of the statue; ten toes of iron mixed with clay. The iron, the prophet says, is part of the iron of Rome, and though the clay will try to adhere to the iron, it will not mix. This is the final government that will be crushed by the Second Coming of Christ; a government of 10 sections in two parts. Revelation says that the headquarters of the Antichrist will be centered in "Mystery Babylon; the city of seven hills." The city of Rome, especially the Vatican, has been known for over 2000 years as "the city of seven hills". Revelation was written by a Roman exile John, which explains why he had to use symbolic language to allow his letters to go through. In the last days of the Holy Roman Empire, it was divided into two sections, the Roman Empire of Northwest Europe and the Byzantine Empire of Southern Europe and parts of the Middle East. This is shown at right. Currently, the European Union is finallizing the inclusion of Turkey and surrounding areas into their union. The current layout of this empire is shown at left (countries currently lobbying for inclusion are shown in red and those already in are shown in yellow). Daniel said, "As you saw iron mixed with ceramic clay, they will mingle with the seed of men; but they will not adhere to one another, just as iron does not mix with clay." The motto of the European Union, taken straight from their site, is "United in Diversity." The European Union meets in a portable building, shown at the right. Looks deceptively like the unfinished Tower of Babel, does it not? That is the image they are trying to present. They call it "The Tower of Euro­babel." I will have more on the European Union/Revived Holy Roman Empire later. In Him, D3