Friday, August 27, 2004





Revelation 13:16
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:



Hello everyone.

Today, Bill Koening at worldwatch.org wrote an article about the Mark of the Beast and studies that are being carried out by the United States and the European Union. The Bible is such an fantastic Book and our Lord told us through His Word that this would happen. This plan is on the agenda for the future but I know that we believers will be gone when the Mark is forced on a lost and dying world.

God Bless
Elaine


Impact Segment--U.S., “Former Roman Empire” E.U. Nations ID Experiments Reflect Eerie Shadow Of End Time “Mark Of The Beast” Prophecies


The United States and European Union nations, who were once part of the ancient Roman Empire, are conducting experiments with high-tech identification systems that will make it more convenient to travel and to acquire health care, food purchases and other services. These systems are so technologically advanced that they can be administered to millions of people and make services so convenient that people will not think twice about taking the mark of the beast.


The European Union and its member countries are testing new human identification technologies that can be massively distributed and are the key to open a wide variety of convenient services to those who would accept the IDs. The United States, using the war on terrorism as its reason, is also testing new forms of identification that will make it easier to track people and provide services.


These tests run headfast into the prophecies of Daniel and John in that the former Roman Empire would become the one world government of the anti-Christ who would rise to power and require everyone to worship him by receiving his mark in order to travel, trade, receive medical care and to eat.


In Daniel 2, Daniel interprets a dream of King Nebuchadnezzar about an image of a man that related to various kingdoms in history. The fourth kingdom, the Roman Empire, was strong as iron but broke into pieces. Then later, its pieces, represented by the ten toes of the feet of the image, will come together, “And as the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly fragile.(Daniel 2:42)” This is the kingdom that the anti-Christ will unite against Christ in the tribulation. Revelation 13 speaks of the beast (the anti-Christ) who in verses 16 & 17 “causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.”


The European Union is comprised of the former “kingdoms” of the Roman Empire—Greece, England, France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Austria and Belgium, among others. And an identification system that easily can be administered is a type and shadow of the mark of the beast emanating from these kingdoms. The United States, whose mother country is England, may well be included in this group. Certainly, all these nations are rushing toward some sort of technologically advanced ID system.


There are three factors that make an ID system effective: 1) public acceptance, 2) accuracy and security, and 3) ease of distribution and sign up. Public acceptance comes when it is more convenient to accept the ID than it is to continue doing business the old way. Accuracy and Security are technology related, as is distribution.


Convenience is key to a test program at Reagan National Airport by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) where travelers can stare into an iris scan kiosk and in seconds be on their way to the plane. Others have to wait in the regular, longer security lines. Registration is scheduled to continue for about two weeks, until the TSA gets the 2,000 volunteers it seeks at the airport. Their opinions, and the effectiveness of the equipment in identifying them, will guide the agency in developing a similar nationwide registered traveler program. Moreover, the American Airlines customers who signed up as registered travelers Monday, August 23, 2004 had a few concerns about privacy.


In France, there is growing concern over people with stolen passports crossing borders illegally and participating in terrorist acts. There is an effort to stop that by linking Interpol's 181 member countries to a stolen travel documents database that will let immigration officials at any border post screen incoming passports and ensure that they are not among the thousands of such documents reported stolen each year.

The database, which includes information for 1.7 million stolen passports and other travel documents, is available to all member states, though participation has been sluggish. Two months after the database was ready to receive information in June 2002, only two countries had sent Interpol lists of their stolen passports. Even today, only 49 countries have done so.


Advocates of technologies like radio frequency identification tags say their potentially life-saving benefits far outweigh any Orwellian concerns about privacy. RFID tags sewn into clothing or even embedded under people's skin could curb identity theft, help identify disaster victims and improve medical care, they say. Critics, however, say such technologies would make it easier for government agencies to track a person's every movement and allow widespread invasion of privacy. Abuse could take countless other forms, including corporations surreptitiously identifying shoppers for relentless sales pitches. Critics also speculate about a day when people's possessions will be tagged--allowing nosy subway riders with the right technology to examine the contents of nearby purses and backpacks.


Insider’s Take: It is now no large leap in either technology or acceptance to issue IDs to the populations of nations, paving the way for the anti-Christ to “sensibly” require an ID system for those loyal to him. Even Americans, who are fiercely independent, use a myriad of ID systems from EZ tags on toll roads, to credit card proximity cards at gas stations, to iris scans at airports. The technology and the sensitivity toward personal ID will become so commonplace that most people would never give it a second thought if it were ever required to travel, obtain food, or hospital care. In fact, those are the industries where most of the IDs are currently being accepted—airports, grocery stores and healthcare. Beware!


ARE YOU READY FOR THE RAPTURE?




JOHN3:16