Several dozen times in the Old Testament, God let’s us know He’s a jealous God. In Exodus 34:14, it even says, “for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.”

In the Bible, proper names and titles are capitalized.

What God’s saying by His jealous nature is He demands the complete allegiance and devotion of His children, because to allow anything less would be to let them go into falsehood.

As the Bible says, “There is no other God but Him,” and Satan is the Great Counterfeiter.

In II Cor. 11: 13-15, the Apostle Paul specifically warns about “false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.”

Paul reasons, “And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.
Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.”

It’s like he’s saying, "It shouldn't surprise you and it's no big secret what Satan's doing. It's pretty obvious he's always done this everybody's known about it."

Satan is also the great imitator of Jesus Christ and he appears as an angel of light in order to deceive.

As my pastor, Richard Jordan, explains it, “I John 1 says ‘God is light,’ and, you see, Satan doesn't come in his real character as the ‘prince of darkness.’ He comes imitating the Lord Jesus Christ. He comes in trying to be like Jesus Christ.”

In Hebrews 1:8, Jesus Christ is identified as God. Paul refers to Satan as “the god of this world.” He’s the pretender to the throne.

“It's fascinating that Satan wants not just to be an angel like Christ, and an angel of light like Christ is, but he' trying to appear as Christ,” says Jordan.

In Acts 4:26, which reads, “The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ,” it’s important to notice the “his Christ,” revealing there's more than one Christ!

Satan, as we know from Ezekiel 28, was created perfect and was “the anointed cherub.” If you look at Psalm 2, it says, "They take counsel against the Lord and his anointed."

The term "Christ" means "anointed one."

Just as Jesus Christ desires worshippers (who will “worship him in spirit and in truth,” as John 4:24 says), Satan desires to be worshipped.

In Matt. 4:8-9, when Satan seeks to tempt Jesus Christ, it says he took “him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;

“And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.”

Satan's saying, "Treat me and value me just like you do God."

In Isaiah 9:6, we’re told about Jesus Christ, "his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.”

In John 12:31, Satan is called the “prince of this world.” In Ephesians 2, he is the “prince of the power of the air.”

Jesus Christ is referred to in Revelation 5:5 as “the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David.”

Peter warns us in I Peter 5:8, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.”

If Jesus Christ’s going to be a lion, Satan’s going to be a lion. (Editor’s Note: Isn’t it interesting to think about this in terms of the lion character, Aslan--who supposedly is a Christ figure—in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia book, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”? And notice how the name Aslan shares the same letters as Satan, off by only one!)

All during the ministry of the Jesus Christ, we read about Him performing signs and wonders. He was a miracle worker to prove that God had sent Him.

In II Thess. 2:9, when Paul’s describing the Antichrist, he says, “whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders.”

Similarly, Rev. 16:14 tells of the “spirits of devils, working miracles.”

“It looks like, seems like, must be--it IS a miracle--but it didn't come from God," sums up my pastor. “Who's working them? Spirits of devils. Well, why would they do that? Because Satan’s purpose is to counterfeit Jesus Christ, the truth, and try and make it so people will follow him.”

The first 10 verses in Chapter 13 of Revelation talk about the Antichrist.

In Rev. 19:20, it says, “And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.”

“You notice there's a mark?” says Jordan. “Just as Jesus Christ sends angels out to put a mark in the forehead of the 144,000, or those in the tribulation who belong to Him, Satan marks the people who belong to him.”

From Revelation, we learn Satan descends into hell, into the bottomless pit, and then comes back out. When Jesus Christ died, He went down into the heart of the earth into hell and came back out. “It's a weird kind of thing going on here,” says Jordan.

In Cor. 10:4, Paul writes, “…for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.” All through the Bible, such as when Moses struck the rock, Jesus Christ is represented by a rock.

In Deut. 32:4, when it says, “He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he,” this is a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus Christ before He became a man.

Jesus Christ has the title of Rock and it's with a capital “R.” So notice how Deut. 32:29-33, in talking about the tribulation period, reads, “O that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end!

“How should one chase a thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight, except their Rock had sold them, and the LORD had shut them up?

“For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.

“For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah: their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter:

“Their wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps.”

“Moses is standing over there at the beginning of the nation Israel’s history and saying, ‘I wish they'd get this and consider what's going to happen to them in the end,’ ” explains Jordan. “It's called the ‘last days.’ That's a term Jacob coined in Genesis 49. It's called the ‘latter days,’ ‘end times.’ He's talking about the tribulation and says, ‘Except their Rock had sold them.’

“How did Israel get into this abandoned, scattered position except THEIR rock let it happen to them. It’s there in the verse with a little "r," and it ‘is not as OUR Rock.’ It says, ‘for THEIR vine is of the vine of Sodom. Remember reading in John 15 where Jesus said, ‘I'm the true vine’?

“Here's the counterfeit system that has a rock which isn't God's Rock. They’ve got a vine which isn't God's vine. Revelation 14 calls it ‘the vine of the earth.’ ”

Continuing in this same chapter of Deuteronomy, it says, “For the LORD shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that their power is gone, and there is none shut up, or left.

“And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they trusted,

“Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings? let them rise up and help you, and be your protection.”

The drink offerings, the rock, the vine, the sacrifices, etc., are all part of Baal worship and that’s exactly what will become the official religion of the Antichrist in the ‘last days’!

There’s a false messiah and a false nation counterfeiting the real one!

In John 10:11, Jesus Christ says, "I am the good shepherd." I Peter 5 calls Him the "chief Shepherd."

In describing the Antichrist, Zechariah 11:15 refers to the "foolish shepherd." Verse 11:17 says of him, "Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock!”

“Do you know of a statue of an image associated with the Antichrist in the ‘last days’?” asks Jordan. “Sure you do. That's where people fall down and worship the image of the beast. The ‘idol shepherd’ is the Antichrist. He’s going to show up as the messiah and want to sit on the throne.”

In Matt 25:31, we’re told that with Jesus Christ’s return, “then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory.” From Isaiah 14:13, we know that when Lucifer first hatched his scheme of rebellion, he vowed, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God."

“So just like Jesus Christ has a throne, Satan’s got a throne and, by the way, who sits on a throne?” explains Jordan. “A king does. From Job 41:1 (“Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook?”), we know Satan, also, is a king.

“Who is leviathan? He's not a hippopotamus, and he's not an elephant, and he's not a dinosaur. Who is he? Isaiah 27:1 says, ‘In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.’

“When I'm reading Psalm 41, I'm reading a description of Satan in his most ferocious, fierce form, but look what God tells Job about him in Job 41:34: ‘He beholdeth all high things: he is a king over all the children of pride.’ ”