We have described unto you the head of the antichristian state; we come now to the subjects, especially the zealous abettors and promoters of this kingdom.
They are described:—(1.), By the means how they are drawn into this apostasy and defection. (2.) By their doom or misery; they are in a state of perdition: in them that perish. (3.) By their sin, which is the cause and reason of this doom: because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.
1. The means: ‘With all deceivableness of unrighteousness.' That Antichrist shall be a deceiver, and that he deceiveth by lying miracles, we have seen already, and is foretold: Rev. xiii. 14, ‘And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast,' &c.; but the deceived are not altogether guiltless, for the fraud would soon be discovered by a holy and pure soul.
His great engine is either the baits of lust and sin, which work on none but those that have pleasure in unrighteousness, ver. 12: the generality of wicked and carnal Christians are easily drawn from God's pure worship, and true godliness; either by worldly means, as by the offers of preferment, riches, dignities, or else terrors of the flesh.
Now, none catch at these worldly baits but whose eyes the god of this world hath blinded, 2 Cor. iv. 4.
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