We are now in our eighth year of presenting a Prophecy Update.  This is #400 in that series.

We talk a lot about prophecy because one quarter of the Bible is devoted to it.  One in every four verses is either a fulfilled prophecy, or a future one awaiting its fulfillment.

Eighty-percent of the Bible’s prophecies have already come true.  Those that have not come true are all concerned with what we commonly call the end times, or the last days.  They, too, must be fulfilled to the letter.

What do we mean by “Prophecy Update?”  It is our belief that we can identify trends in the world, and news, that would be expected in light of the unfulfilled prophecies.

We’re not saying that the things we report are the fulfillment of prophecies – only that they are what you’d expect to be happening in the light of what we know about the future.

The most famous of all last days prophecies is the Mark of the Beast.  It’s something on you or in you that will allow you to transact all your daily business.  It will be a fool-proof, hack-proof personal identifier.

In the middle of the Tribulation, the technology folks are using will be hijacked by the antichrist.  He will demand you swear allegiance to him, and worship him, or else you will be cut-off from buying and selling anything and everything.

We therefore take notice of advances in, or uses of, technology that might be the precursor for that which the antichrist will one day dominate.

I was sent an interesting article, titled, You’re being secretly tracked with facial recognition, even in church.

Excerpts:

We know that Facebook has a vast facial recognition database so good that it can recognize you when your face is hidden; that the FBI has built a millions-strong criminal facial recognition system; and that Google’s new Photos app is so effective at face recognition that it can identify now-adults in photos from their childhood.

But now facial recognition is starting to pop up in weird and unexpected places: at music festivals (to identify criminals); at stadiums (to weed out “sports troublemakers“) and at churches. Yes, churches.

Moshe Greenshpan, the CEO of… facial recognition software company Face-Six, says there are 30 churches around the world using his Churchix technology.  He launched the service just four months ago and says churches are already using it to scan congregants’ earthly visages to keep track of attendance at events in order to know who wasn’t there so they can check up on them, or who attends most frequently so they can ask those people for donations.
He declined to name any of the churches using the technology citing the controversy around facial recognition.

Greenshpan said the churches just have to upload one high-quality photo of a congregant to start scanning video or photos from gatherings to see if they were there.

[Another company], California-based FaceFirst, tells retailers in an advertising brochure that they can get alerts when “pre-identified shoplifters” or “known litigious individuals” enter their stores.

FaceFirst also says retailers can create a database of “good customers,” so they can greet them by name when they walk through the door.  “Instantly, when a person in your FaceFirst database steps into one of your stores, you are sent an email, text, or SMS alert that includes their picture and all biographical information of the known individual so you can take immediate and appropriate action,” says the Facefirst brochure.

“There are no federal laws that specifically govern the use of facial recognition technology,” wrote Ben Sobel in a Washington Post editorial… In lieu of a law, the Department of Commerce has been trying to establish facial recognition industry standards…

http://fusion.net/story/154199/facial-recognition-no-rules/

We are not using any facial recognition technology here; rest assured.

Is facial recognition going to be the tech that eventually becomes the Mark of the Beast?  Too early to tell.

News like this, however, is exactly what you’d expect from reading Bible prophecy.

We don’t expect, or need, to see anything happen, or to be fulfilled, before Jesus can resurrect and rapture the church.  It is presented in the Bible as imminent.

Are you ready for the rapture?  If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.  Ready or not, Jesus is coming!