False Messiahs Big and Small

Charles Manson

According to Jesus Christ, one of the prophetic signs of the end times will be the appearance of false messiahs throughout the world. (Matthew 24:24) Some will be big and some will be small, and some will even possess demonic power that will enable them to perform supernatural feats.

Many people find it impossible to consider Charles Manson a messianic figure, even though he is. To them, Manson was just a lowlife and a con artist and a career criminal who avoided righteousness like the plague. He became incorrigible in his early childhood; a troublemaker from the beginning who couldn't and wouldn't obey the law and respect authority.

But to others, Manson was and remains a messianic figure; a man with a charismatic personality and a genius mind who was sent to earth to prepare the world for a new age of peace and tranquility. He spoke in a language of apocalyptic gibberish that combined reality with fantasy and delusional thoughts. 

Anyone with a solid moral foundation who listened to Manson's ramblings quickly dismissed him as an uneducated kook. But to those who were gullible and weak-minded, Manson told them exactly what they wanted to hear after he sized them up. He became their savior; a knight in brilliant armor who would lead them out of their empty life of material opulence into a new life where the flowers blossomed and the birds sang and the sun always shined and brilliant rainbows dazzled the skies.

That's what false messiahs do. They promise you a plate of caviar and then deliver a bucket of bovine manure. That's what Manson did, and he was very good at it, and he's still very good at it with certain folks. One of those people has written a book that portrays Manson as an innocent victim who was betrayed by the very people he was only trying to help. If the book is being sold as fiction, then that's fine. But it's being sold as fact, and that's bad. I won't name the book because it's undeserving of publicity.  

For those of you who weren't around 46 years ago, Manson was the guy who ordered his cult of mostly young women and a few men to murder eight people in Los Angeles, California during the summer of 1969. 

Why? Ostensibly because Manson, a white supremacist, wanted to start a race war and because he was spurned by a record producer named Terry Melcher.

Manson, you see, considered himself an aspiring musician who was destined to score a big contract with a record company. When Melcher turned him down after an audition, Manson became incensed. Ironically, Melcher was spared while eight other people, including actress Sharon Tate and coffee heiress Abigail Folger, were brutally tortured and murdered.

Certainly, there have been numerous false messiahs throughout the centuries, going back even before the time of Christ. But indeed, we've seen an increasing number of them in recent decades from David Koresh to Jim Jones to Sun Myung Moon to Menachem Schneerson to Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and to Manson.

Except for Manson, all of the others are dead. Manson's locked up in a federal prison in Corcoran, California where he'll remain until he dies. At 81, he's in the winter of his life, so he doesn't have many years left to ply his magic on young, innocent minds. But he still retains his ability to charm fools, from the man who defended him with his book to a young lady who was recently engaged to marry him until Manson broke it off.

Sadly, until the Lord comes back, they'll be more false messiahs. Some will be big like the Antichrist who'll fool the entire world. Others will be small like Manson who'll fool those who can't distinguish their left hand from their right hand. But they'll continue to fool people.

And they'll continue to disappoint people, as well. False messiahs always do that. They inevitably fail to deliver on their promises. Still, that doesn't stop some people from giving up on them. As the book of Proverbs says: "There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death." (Proverbs 14:12)