Know the season you’re living in.
As believers I think it’s incumbent upon us to know the times we are living in. I believe we’re very close to the rapture of the Church, the Day of the Lord, and the entrance of the Beast upon the world stage. However, there are certain things that would need to happen, and indeed are happening, that would indicate that the time is very short. Please indulge me while I try to highlight some scriptures and compare them with current events. Keep in mind that most of those that dwell upon the earth today won’t have a clue because they’re living like in the days of Noah. In his incarnation, The Lord rebuked the religious leaders saying, … “When evening comes, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ and in the morning, ‘Today it will be stormy, for the sky is red and overcast and, in the morning. You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.” (Matt 16:2-3 NIV) And He told his disciples, “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; (Matthew 24:37-38 NIV)
While the world grows more and more evil and corrupt, they’ll have no idea that a righteous God is about to unleash his righteous judgment upon the earth. They’re too busy living their lives for themselves and caught up with the affairs of this life. That includes many who claim to follow Christ. However, I believe the Lord has certain believers that are able to discern the times similar to sons of Issachar in the Old Testament, found in I Chron 12:32 .
“Of the sons of Issachar, men who knew how to discern the times, to know what Israel should do, their chiefs were two hundred; and all their relatives were at their command”
There are basically four indicators that I’ll review; increased technology, rampant immorality, perverted justice (lawlessness), and increased violence. For Part 1, we’re only going to look at Increased technological advancement and perverted justice. In Part 2, we’ll look at rampant immorality and increased violence.
“Knowledge shall increase” (Dan 12:4) Increased Technology
Those of us who are baby Boomers know what it was like before, PCs, the internet, Smartphones and Smartwatches. Imagine if the old you could go back and tell the young you about the technology we have today, the young you wouldn’t believe it. Yet here we are.
I just got a new Galaxy s4 Smart watch. Not only can I make and receive calls and texts, but the watch also monitors my vital signs, sleep, precise location, and activity. Man, it’s really cool! When I go on a run, on each mile, in my headphones, a voice interrupts the music and tells me my pace, how many miles, and heart rate. Not everyone has a Smartwatch, but almost everyone has a Smartphone. They’re basically little computers we can’t do without. There’s so much good in having these devices. However, there’s a lot of bad too. Good, we can keep in touch with our kids and know where they are all the time. Bad, they can, with a click, access the worst pornography imaginable and our kids could get seduced by strangers with nefarious intentions.
Digital, Crypto currency
Again, not all technology is good, according to the book, What’s Next Al & The Antichrist by Jimmy and Mark Hitchcock (2024):
Global government proposals, ubiquitous surveillance mechanisms, cashless financial transactions, artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality, cryptocurrencies, biohacking, transhumanist aspirations, pandemic response precedents, and much more are setting the stage for the Antichrist’s prophesied authoritarian reign supported by wonders from Hell (Revelation 13:1-15). Today’s explosive expansion of technology is laying the infrastructure for unprecedented government oversight (p. ix).
Let me just add a word about what it would look like to have your purchases surveilled. It’s already happened on a smaller scale. In an article by CBS News, dated February 12, 2024, by Michael Kaplan, “American Express, Visa, Mastercard, move ahead with code to track gun store purchases in California.” Mastercard, Visa and American Express initially agreed to implement a standalone code for firearm sellers, but later paused their work on it after receiving blowback from Second Amendment advocates concerned tracking gun purchases would infringe on the rights of legal gun owners”. For the time being, they were thwarted, but how long will it last?
Just recently, I read an account of a female defector from China. She wrote that the CCP has an advanced biometric surveillance system that automatically tracks each citizen’s exact location, online activity, religious affiliations, political leaning, medical information, social media posts (the ones they’re allowed), and financial activity. More disconcerting, they have an on-going citizen credit score for everyone. If you behave properly, you get good credits, but if you get out of line, you get bad credits. And you do not want to have a bad citizen credit rating in China!
Personal note: In order for us to receive our tax refund after we first moved to Texas from Ohio, the government had to identify us. They sent us to a website that did facial recognition scanning. We had to download facial recognition software. It freaked us out! Via the camera on our phones, we watched as the software made outlines of our faces and our image being transposed on the screen. Right after, that information was automatically uploaded and sent to them. Not joking! This way of identifying ourselves was optional. However, for the sake of getting our refund sooner we opted in. How many disclaimers and agreements did you have to sign before you got to use your favorite apps? Ever read all of what you’d agreed to? Me either. And they know that.
Even now, the federal government is spending hundreds of millions of our tax dollars to develop this kind of ID technology. To this point, in article titled, Prophetic Observer by Josh Davis (2024), he stated the following:
The border crisis and technological advancements are driving the U.S. toward a national digital ID. One of the digital systems of the federal government is called Login.gov. It seems poised to become the hub for all U.S. government agencies. A pilot program began in May to allow users to upload their selfies as a facial recognition option to increase identity verification and safety. There is another interesting detail to this plan. Not only can people upload a selfie from their smartphone, but over 18,000 locations operated by the U.S. Postal Service will be equipped to help people verify their ID in person. Right now, America has the network and plans in place for a national digital ID. Last year over 49 million people used Login.gov. America’s move to a digital ID is being accomplished through backchannels and bureaucracies (p.2).
Cash is no longer king
I don’t think anyone paying attention these days can’t see that the use of paper money is quickly coming to an end. I don’t know about you, but I rarely use cash or even checks anymore. My new credit card has a “feature” that allows me to just tap the scanner at the point of sale to pay for my items. Most bills can be paid digitally online by moving money from your bank account, or via auto draft. How much more convenient would it be to just have a little microchip, about the size of a grain of rice, inserted in your wrist? Then you just move your wrist across a scanner or bar code. You’d never have to worry about getting your credit card lost or your identity stolen. There’s just that little verse in Revelation that if you do, your soul, is damned forever. But, hey, who reads or believes the Bible today? They’ve already done experiments like this in Europe… on a volunteer basis. They claim it went off without a hitch.
In a recent article from the Olive Tree Ministries: Why We’re Running Out of Time by Jan Markel (2024), it pretty much sums it up, “Life with digital currency (CBDC) will cause life as we know it to dramatically change! It will be the heart of the beast system, but many think it will be implemented sooner” (p.2).
The wise will understand that we are already, to a limited degree, participating within the Beast system.
There is so much instability with most every country’s economy these days that it’s bound to happen sooner than later. You do realize that we’re headed towards a one world government, religion, as well as one world economy, right? So far Marxists, socialists, and the far “woke” left are doing a pretty good job, don’t you think? It’s only by God’s grace, the precious Holy Spirit, and many proud patriots who resist this onslaught, temporarily at least, it’s deferred. Of course, too, there are those pesky little documents unique to our country, namely, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Both of which are currently under siege. On a side note, I’ll let you in on a little secret. The Biden border crisis is no accident! Out of control spending and plummeting us into unrecoverable debt, is no accident! Racial division and identity politics is not by accident! The push for soft on crime policies and the defunding of the police movement, is no accident! As Nikita Khrushchev said in 1956, “We will take America without firing a single shot. We will destroy you from within.”
According to the book What’s Next? AI & The Antichrist by Jimmy Evans and Mark Hitchcock (2024) “The Antichrist will set up a mandatory new economic system involving the worship of himself and totalitarian control, forcing people to take a “mark” without which no one can buy or sell (Revelation 13:14-18). Breakthrough innovations in financial technology and artificial intelligence are paving the way for the introduction of such an identification system. He will present the method as a way to keep order, but he knows it is really an idolatrous system to get the world to further reject God.”(p. vxii).
Artificial Intelligence Friend or Foe?
I don’t mean to ruin the surprise, but I’m going with “foe”. It’s virtually impossible (no pun intended) to escape the far reaching tentacles of AI. It’s ubiquitous. AI can mimic the voice or picture of a famous person so well it’s very difficult to distinguish if it’s real or fake. It happens within social media all the time. Just recently there has been litigation involving such. In an article by The Hollywood Reporter, May 16, 2024, by Winston Cho, titled, Actors Hi AI Startup With Class Action Lawsuit Over Voice Theft. “The lawsuit claims Berkeley-based startup LOVO misappropriated actors’ voices to create its AI voice tool.
As a Talent Consultant with a large regional bank, I run into AI on a regular basis. Our bank wants us to implement AI in our marketing to prospective candidates. For example, when I go to craft a post or direct message to someone on LinkedIn, there’s always an AI pre-generated message that pops up as soon as I start to type in the subject line. I’m sure, too, that potential candidates have AI suggested responses. Moverover, my daughter, who is an elementary school teacher, informed me that she has to take advanced courses in AI and implement this technology into the curriculum while she teaches. Additionally, she just took a required course in writing computer code. So basically, you’ll have computers communicating information back and forth with each other with little input or thinking by humans. Heck, you can write a term paper or a perfectly grammatically correct periodical without knowing very much about English grammar or composition. However, much to my chagrin, it should be fairly obvious that I’m not using AI on this blog 😉
So what could be the next new, technological advancement? Clue: what has man been trying to incessantly do since the fall? If you said, “they’re trying to be like God or become god-like”, you’re 100% right. One attribute a god can display is superhuman power. Another attribute is that a god doesn’t die. Now let’s look at some scripture in the book of Revelation and consider what I’m proposing.
The book of Revelation is considered apocalyptic literature. Meaning, the style is symbolistice and allegorical in nature. Let’s take a look at the scripture below.
“One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast. People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?”
Rev 13:3-4 NIV
Could the Beast be an AI supercomputer that could produce a life-like hologram of sorts? Rather yet, could the Beast be a human-robot hybrid? Sounds crazy? Consider this. In an article published by CNBC on April 8, 2022 by Megan Sauer, “Elon Musk says humans could eventually download their brains into robots-and Grimes thinks Jeff Bezos would do it.” “Elon Musk says a lot of seemingly fantastical things. For example: The billionaire Tesla and SpaceX CEO seems to believe that humans will eventually be able to live forever, by downloading their brains into robots….One of Musk’s current startup ventures, Neualink, is working to develop ‘brain machine interfaces’ that in Musk’s own words-could one day allow people to ‘store your own memories as backup and restore the memories.’
Could the humanistic aspirations of mankind be building a neo-Tower of Babble? Hmm…
Perverted justice (lawlessness)
Another sign of the times before the Day of The Lord, and a prelude to the Beast is rampant lawlessness and injustice. Justice is supposed to be impartial. God told the Israelites in Lev 19:15 “You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor.” ESV Our judicial system is extrapolated from the 10 commandments. In the courtroom of The Supreme Court, Moses is displayed holding the 10 commandments. However today, it’s plain to see that justice has been perverted and subverted.
I don’t know any objective honest person who cannot see that we now have a two-tiered justice system. For example, we now know for a fact that Hilary Clinton deleted at least 33,000 emails. She used “bleach Pit” to wipe her servers, and smashed Blackberries with a hammer, AFTER the DOJ ordered her to turn them over. However, they were able to find 110 emails that had classified information. Additionally, she even had her own personal server sending and receiving these classified emails in an unsecure location. Check this out! After a “thorough” investigation, Attorney General, James Comey, said in a statement, “Although there is evidence of potential violations of statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.” Wow! Really? I guess they couldn’t find any of those “reasonable prosecutors” when they raided Trump’s personal residence in Florida with armed FBI agents. He was accused of having classified documents in a locked room at Mar-a-Largo. However, they must have, once again, found a “reasonable prosecutor” because they didn’t charge Biden or Pence for doing essentially the same thing. Funny how that works.
It is also a fact that the Clinton campaign paid for the now debunked Russian Dossier. Not to mention that in 2016 the FBI spied on the Trump campaign. Further, they used a FISA warrant (4 times) to spy on Trump even after he was in the White House. Additionally, they told us that the Hunter Biden laptop was “Russian disinformation”, all while the FBI knew it was real! But they didn’t admit it until just after the 2020 election. Then in New York, we had all these bogus, trumped up (no pun intended) charges that resulted in convicting Trump of a 34 count felony in what has been rightly called, a “Kangaroo court” with a highly partisan Democratic judge. All the while, mind you, the Biden crime family gets away with having made millions from foreign countries trading influence for money (quid pro quo). Some of which are our adversaries. And no matter how much evidence comes to light from James Comer and the House committee on Oversight, it gets buried and/or stonewalled by the FBI and DOJ. What good is having evidence if the “Justice” Department won’t execute justice?
What’s with the propensity towards soft on crime today? No bail laws? We have George Soros funded AGs that let criminals back out on the street with not even so much as a slap on the wrist only to commit worse felonies! Perpetrators are treated like victims, and victims are treated like perpetrators. Parents get arrested for speaking out at school board meetings because they have concerns about boys in girl’s restrooms and porn in the school library. Yet, pro-Hamas protesters can riot and deface federal monuments with impunity.
However, the Bible warns, “Woe (judgment is coming) to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” Is 5:20 AMP
How many scenes have we seen of young people looting department stores, drug stores, mini marts? Practically none have been apprehended, and if they were, they’re released back out into the streets. And how about all the heinous crimes by numerous illegal immigrates, raping, beating, and murdering US citizens? Justice is truly inverted, is it not? The scripture below could be a headline today!
Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands afar off; For truth is fallen in the street, And equity cannot enter. Is 59:14 NKJV
We should all be able to discern the times that we are living in. And I truly believe that our increased technological advancement and our perverted justice system are just two signs indicating a prelude to the coming of the Beast. But take heart, we who believe are not looking for the beast, we’re looking for the best! Our Lord and Savior’s glorious appearance!
“For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.” 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 NIV
Amen! Amen! Amen!
Up next, Part 2. Rampant immorality and increased violence indicate that the world is on the precipice of judgment.