Chip me, will you?

by Michael G. Mickey

(10-12-06)

Last night after church I was talking with a brother in Christ concerning the vast volume of information that exists today in support of the fact we are rapidly approaching the return of Jesus Christ and how that, practically each and every day now, I see mounting evidence to that effect!

When is Jesus Christ coming exactly? No man knows the answer to that question, but we are conditionally very close - to the extent that everyone who calls themself a Christian needs to be actively watching for the return of Jesus Christ for His Church for we are told, concerning a variety of prophetic signs (many of which are presented on this website weekly), that when these things BEGIN to happen we are to begin looking up, for our redemption draweth nigh (Luke 21:28). Note that we are not to begin looking up when we've endured all these matters to their full extent but when we see them beginning to take shape. That time, brothers and sisters in Christ, is right now!

So, what have I got for you today? Another dandy, let me tell you! RaptureAlert.com reader Dennis Maurer pointed me to an article by the Daily Mail entitled "Young shoppers want to pay with chip in skin", the content of which I want to address in relation to Bible prophecy.

According to the Daily Mail article, we've got a generation of young people, around 8% of 13 to 19-year-olds, who are open to the idea of receiving microchip implants to pay for their purchases in stores. In fact, these young people want to get one so they can have a "high-tech shopping experience." If that isn't indicative of what is to come according to Bible prophecy, I don't know what is!

In spite of the fact we're told in Revelation 13:16-17 that the False Prophet of the prophesied Antichrist is someday going to require, through the one world government and religious system of Antichrist, that both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads and that those who refuse to accept this mark of allegiance to the Antichrist will be unable to buy or sell, we have a generation of young people rising up that are already acceptive, in principle, to the notion of accepting such a system as a part of their daily lives!

If you're a Christian and the hair on your neck isn't standing up, it ought to be upon hearing that! Recently, I was asked by a member of my church to help him research current trends concerning teens and their religious beliefs and experiences, highlighting how seriously the Church needs to take educating them as to what the Word of God teaches before they reach adulthood. Although I have since passed the information and articles I found on the topic on to my brother in Christ, a number that sticks out in my mind, based purely on my memory which is fallible, is that approximately 60% of our youth presently attending church are not expected, based on current trends, to continue to be regular churchgoers as adults. God help us - and I mean that! What that tells us, in my opinion, is the old-time Gospel, the one that teaches children to both love God for His abundant mercy and love and fear Him because of His righteous judgment of all mankind that is to come, is no longer being taught with the authority it needs to be, as a whole at least! This, to be sure, is why we're losing so many young people today!

I remember - and clearly - being a child so young that I was still sleeping in a little boy's bed, going to bed one night after hearing a sermon at my church and pondering the condition of my soul. Already, I knew there was a heaven to gain and a hell to shun and I remember my parents talking to me that night, comforting me as to God's love for me. I just needed them to explain that need to me, which they lovingly did. I was so young that I don't believe my family thought I could even grasp the concept of salvation or the magnitude of what Jesus had done on my behalf on the cross of Calvary when He died for my sins, but I can tell you today that the loving nature in which I was brought up to understand these things, even being told of the horrors of hell itself, was such that I knew from the time of my earliest recollections of my childhood there was only one name under heaven, only One who could save me from the fires of hell --- Jesus Christ! At the age of eight, I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and, although I readily admit that I have sometimes found myself driving in the ditch line of the narrow road to heaven because of sin in my life, I've never once been blinded as to where I'm headed and how I'm going to get there! Why? Because the foundation that my faith in Christ was laid upon was made of solid rock and not sand!

Today, as we see reflected in a news story like the one above, there are a number of problems which exist that we, as the Body of Christ, need to consider and work to rectify.

The first that comes to mind is that many of our young people today are unchurched altogether. Somewhere down the line, many churches have lost their passion for Christ and the pure, politically uncorrect teaching of His Word that:

• challenges us to be more than we ultimately can be because of the weakness of our flesh.
• reminds us of our sinful nature.
• tells us of God's abundant love for us.
• fills us with positive imagery of the wonderful things God has in store for those of us who love Him.
• warns us that those who reject Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior are going to suffer a fate too horrible for us to approach the issue of salvation in any manner less than telling everyone that there is both a heaven to gain through Jesus Christ and a hell to shun!

Too many punches are being pulled today to prevent upsetting the delicate sensitivities of the lost and it's rendering the church of the end times near useless in reaching our youth! The Church of the end times' loss of passion has led many Christians to stop inviting people to come to church and fellowship with them which is a fundamental part of keeping the pews filled on Sunday mornings! Church, we need to reinvigorate ourselves in these end times and get young people into the doors of our churches that we might teach them the full counsel of God. We should be working to get their parents there too as a large number of our unchurched youth are such because no one has reached out to their parents!

Secondly, Bible prophecy is no longer being instilled in the minds of our young people well enough that they even recognize that the mark of beast described in Revelation 13:16-17 may well be a technology like the one they presently hope to have placed inside themselves to have a "high-tech shopping experience." I don't think there's any excuse for that whatsoever! We need to be reaching out, especially right now!

Thirdly, if a large percentage of our youth do know the mark of the beast could be something similar in description and function to an implantable microchip, the fear of God is no longer being taught to the extent it should be as acceptance of the mark of the beast, when any such technology becomes what is described in Revelation 13, will constitute a one-way ticket to an eternal burning hell from which there will be no escape or hope of rescue, as seen in Revelation 14:11:

And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.

Lastly, we need to be leading people of every age, not just young people, to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. That we can all have a part in! Every single one of us knows of someone who needs to come to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. One of the things I do is drive around with a HUGE advertisement for RaptureAlert.com in the back window of my vehicle. Often, when I'm sitting at a red light, I'll see someone jot down the website's address and know they're curious enough to go to the site to see why the back of my vehicle says Jesus Christ is coming soon. Another thing I do is advertise my faith to all my skeptical friends and acquaintances by calling myself a "Bible thumper", a "Jesus Freak", a "Holy Roller" and, occasionally, a "Bed Bug" - that last one being because some people in the southern U.S. use the phrase "crazy as a bed bug" to describe people like me who believe Jesus Christ is coming soon. Not only do I call myself those things with a big smile on my face, I tell people it's perfectly okay for them to say to my face what they say behind my back concerning my Christian faith as those particular things don't insult me at all unless, of course, my faith and the practice there-of as manifested through this website is maliciously used against me in a manner harmful to my or my family's well-being and security which has happened, which probably comes as no surprise to many of those who read my site.

Mark 13:32-33: But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father. Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is.

While no man can accurately tell you, according to the Word of God, when the Tribulation Period is going to begin, through Bible prophecy we are given far more than a snapshot of what the time of Christ's return will look like that we might know the season of His return - a season I believe we may very well be living in based on years of research I've conducted and documented on a number of fronts, all of which I've deliberately marked with relevant news stories from the world around us to show even the most skeptical that the Word of God is not a fairy tale but a true depiction of what has been and is yet to come!

When people start saying "Chip me, will you?", it's time for those of us who know what the Bible predicts will eventually come to pass, as revealed in Revelation 13:16-17, to begin looking up for the return of Jesus Christ! When people openly begin wanting to make purchases with the swipe of their hand, doesn't that tell us something concerning the lateness of the hour we're living in? I believe so, especially when we compare this latest development with probably thousands of others I have stored in my site's archives dating back to January 1, 2005 when I realized that I needed to keep my old commentaries for far longer than I did when RaptureAlert.com was born in 2003.

If you're reading this and you're a skeptic, feel free to ignore me when I suggest we are living in the end times based solely on what I've said today, a week ago or a month ago, but I don't suggest you disregard me completely. Rather, I ask you to go to my site's archived commentaries page and pick a point sometime between 1-1-05 and now and start reading. What I'm confident of is this: You'll see more evidence that we're living in the end times prophesied in the Bible than you, as a skeptic, will be able to handle, leading you to question that you are correct, whether you admit it or not, when you state that we are not living in the end times!

People have been convicted of murder on less evidence than I've compiled on this website! In fact, lots less! And there is even more going on pointing toward prophetic fulfillment than I'm documenting here - way, way more than I, as a man of limited resources, can make known! But I'm trying. I'm really trying!