BIN LADEN GONE AT LAST!

I certainly wasn't expecting the news we received last night that Usama Bin Laden had been killed. A nagging question for years had been why he had been able to elude any attempts at capture or his life. It is a wonderful day to know that this personification of evil has at last been brought to his end. As news people catalogued the many attacks he masterminded and the thousands of deaths he was responsible for, the thought came to my mind: how can any person be so filled with evil and hatred?

Like so many events which take place, they are not only significant in themselves, but are foretaste of something else to come. As I reflected on UBL, I got to thinking that he has been a shadow of an even more evil person to come, the antichrist who will come to power during the Tribulation period before Jesus Christ returns in power and glory to establish His earthly kingdom. The Apostle John writes telling us that even in his day, the spirit of antichrist was present in the world. He said, "Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world" (1 John 4:3).

Bin Laden was not the antichrist, but he helps us to catch an idea of what kind of evil will be rampant in the time that antichrist comes. Evil will continue to multiply in these days as we approach the end of this age and will come into the fullness of expression when the Tribulation takes place. Osama and his kind remind us to be constantly watchful that we be not deceived by persons who are under the control of Satan and allow themselves to be used by Him to enact his destructive power and terror in the world. Jesus and the Biblical writers are unanimous in reminding us to "Watch out that no one deceives you" (Matthew 24:4).