We reserve a few minutes Sunday morning to suggest news, or trends, that seem to be predicted by a literal, futurist reading of the Bible.

We are careful to use recognized, reliable sources for news. There is a lot of sensationalism surrounding unfulfilled Bible prophecy, and we don’t want to add to it.

We’re not saying the things we report are the definite fulfillment of prophecy – only that they are the things you’d expect by holding a Bible in one hand, and a newspaper in the other.

Bible futurists have long understood that, in the Last Days and going into the Great Tribulation, there would be a global system of personal identification. It involves what the apostle John described as a “mark” on the hand, or on the forehead.

It sounds a lot like biometrics, which is defined as, “physical or behavioral human characteristics that can be used to digitally identify a person to grant access to systems, devices, or data.”

Three-and-one-half years into the Tribulation, the man Revelation calls the Beast will demand everyone swear allegiance to him. Since everyone is identified and linked to the system, refusal will mean being cut-off from participating in society. A person won’t even be able to buy or sell anything.

COVID19 is not a one of the pestilence we read about in the Bible. Those occur during the Great Tribulation.

If it has a sinister, Satanic, spiritual purpose, it is that it is pushing the world population towards a global, digital biometric system. It is the kind of system futurists have been predicting since the apostle John wrote the Revelation.

Listen to this quote:

Apple and Google turned heads a few days ago when they announced a joint effort to bolster this public health service – a task known as contact tracing – by building software into smartphones that relies on Bluetooth technology to track users’ proximity to one another. Facebook is participating in a similar effort led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Other countries are using electronic bracelets to track users’ movements or even automated systems that classify citizens’ health status to determine whether they should be isolated or allowed entry to public places.

Quote:

The Kingdom of Bahrain is keeping track of its active cases of COVID-19 via electronic bracelets.
Launched earlier this week, the wristbands – which are compatible with the country’s coronavirus contact tracing app, called “BeAware” – have been designed to alert a governmental monitoring station of any suspicious activity. Affected individuals wearing the electronic bracelet must be connected to the app at all times via Bluetooth, with GPS enabled to track movement, ensuring that they do not leave their location. Those self-isolating will be asked to set their location, most likely their place of residence, and made to remain in that location until cleared.
Meanwhile, Ministry of Health officials may randomly send picture requests to which self-isolating individuals must respond with a photo that clearly shows their face and bracelet. An alert is also sent to the monitoring station if the wearer moves further than 15 meters away from their phone. 

https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/europe/bahrain-launches-electronic-bracelets-keep-track-active-covid-19-cases

Here is what our friends in China are doing:

As China encourages people to return to work despite the coronavirus outbreak, it has begun a bold mass experiment in using data to regulate citizens’ lives — by requiring them to use software on their smartphones that dictates whether they should be quarantined or allowed into subways, malls and other public spaces.

People in China sign up through Ant’s popular wallet app, Alipay, and are assigned a color code – green, yellow or red – that indicates their health status. The system is already in use in 200 cities and is being rolled out nationwide, Ant says.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/01/business/china-coronavirus-surveillance.html

A Human Rights advocate said, “The coronavirus outbreak is proving to be one of those landmarks in the history of the spread of mass surveillance in China.”

We could return to normal, as if COVID19 never happened. OR, the so-called ‘new normal’ may be the precursor to the dreaded Mark of the Beast mid-way through the seven year Great Tribulation.

Biometric technologies are not the Mark of the Beast. But they are, perhaps, the underlying mechanism that will be in place when the Beast demands to be worshipped.

We believe the resurrection and rapture of the church is imminent. It could happen any moment; nothing needs to happen before it. It will happen before the Tribulation.

Jesus will come, in the clouds, and raise the dead believers of the Church Age. He will transform the bodies of living believers to glorified, resurrection bodies. We will join Him in Heaven while the earth endures one final seven-year campaign of severe evangelism.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, Get ready; Stay ready; Keep looking up.

Ready or not, Jesus is coming!