It is beyond any question that we have reached the closing days of John's vision in Revelation 13:16 when people will be marked and tracking implants are a reality of the signs of the times. But then what about people who would fear hypodermic injections with needles the diameter of a piece of rice, or would go mad at the sight of a permanent lump under the skin of their foreheads?
We must then add to these problems the mind numbing costs and logistic problems of implanting billions of people with individual transponders by the use of syringes. This brings us back to the practicality of micro-laser brands.
As I have shared, the laser marking of living creatures has been developed since the 1970's. The capability to reduce the size of these brands while expanding the information that can be contained within these flesh-etchings has vastly improved since the 70s as is proven by a June 14, ‘04 Knight Ridder article which headlined "Pinpoint idea to foil thieves."
Notice as we read from this article the one obvious shortcoming of this latest technology, if ever used for marking human beings, is that beyond the use of a super adhesive it can be removed. Then also keep in mind that there is an already existing laser marking procedure which can be readily adapted to utilize this newest technology so that data can be applied directly to a person's flesh.
Quoting we read, "They are the size of a grain of sand, nearly impossible to see and equally difficult to scrape off. With laser technology, they are engraved with lines of text invisible to the naked eye.
They're called DataDots, and the Coral Gables, Fla., Police Department will be the first law enforcement agency in the nation to use the tiny identification devices in a community program to help return stolen property.
"We have a property room full of TVs, VCRs, and we can't give them back because we don't know who to give them to," Sgt. Mike Frevola told members of the Coral Gables' City-Wide Anti-Crime Committee last week, when he announced the program.
Police soon will start applying the dots for free to the cars and other property of city residents, courtesy of the Coral Gables Citizens' Crime Watch, which paid for the pilot.
Here's how it works: The tiny dots, made of a heavy-duty plastic, can be engraved by laser with different types of information: A car's vehicle identification number, a boat's hull identification number or a personal identification number registered to the property owner in a national database.
One thousand dots, suspended in a clear-drying, ultraviolet glue, come inside a container about the size of a 35-mm film canister.
With a swab, police paste the dots all over cars, especially on hot parts like the headlamps of expensive cars. They can do the same with plasma TVs, stereo equipment and other items burglars like to steal because they are hard to trace. Without identification on stolen property, the chances of prosecution are slim.
DataDots can deter crime by changing that equation, police say.
Someone caught with property that can be traced to another owner can be charged with possession of stolen property on the spot.
Police hope that when thieves see "Protected by DataDot Technology" decals pasted on a car or home window, they'll pick an easier, unmarked target.
It's easy for police to check stolen property: All they have to do is shine a UV black light on the item and the dots become visible.
Then, with a 30x magnifying glass or microscope, they can read the information and identify the owner.
"That's the beauty of the product - it doesn't need expensive readers or trained technicians. Anyone with a $10 microscope can read it," said Brent D. McLaws, inventor of DataDots and president and CEO of DataDot Technology USA Inc.
The department has 500 kits to install - 250 for homes and 250 for cars - which cost Crime Watch a discounted $5,000. There's no charge for the service, but police will ask for a donation to the Coral Gables' Crime Watch so they can buy more kits.
McLaws said he came up with the idea in the mid-1990s when gaming chip manufacturers asked him to find a way to differentiate real casino chips from counterfeit ones.
"It had to be easily read by anyone, and it had to be very, very inexpensive," McLaws said. "I came up with the dot concept. They like it and have used it ever since. From there, we proceeded to realize that this had other applications, and we started working with law enforcement."
Consider the frightening world of tomorrow that Jesus revealed to John in the Book of Revelation, when human beings will be marked like cattle.
Instant, nearly invisible to the eye, micro laser engraving is a present reality. It doesn't require expensive readers or trained technicians to retrieve data and most of all the engravings are, "...very, very inexpensive."
A bar code, used to accommodate computer readers fitted with a magnification ability, can also just as easily be engraved on a surface area the size of a grain of sand. If only a bar code is engraved, then the area of flesh needed to be exposed to a laser would be as small or even smaller than that of the list of numeral's being etched on the tiny DataDots.
During the Tribulation we are told in the Book of Revelation 6:8 that people will die in untold numbers from the sword, hunger and by the beasts of the earth. All of these deliverers of death will lead directly to the day when the mandatory branding of people will seem like the only answer for survival to a Christ-rejecting world.
Violent crimes of every nature, from murderous street gangs to international terrorism will explode across the earth's population calling for global demands that positive identification and total control of the movement of people be attained. The disruption of food production caused by relentless warfare will bring unprecedented starvation to the continents. Looting and hoarding of provisions will bring an outcry from the nations for the marking of people to guarantee equal food rationing and distribution.
Then there will be the horrifying results of a world overrun by beasts. This reference to beasts extends far beyond the common thought of creatures like lions and bears, but goes on to include plague infected rodents, disease carrying insects such as flies and mosquitos and then into the microscopic world of beasts called bacteria and viruses.
New or restored versions of incurable, highly infectious diseases continue to appear all over the globe. Back in August of 2001, a report titled, "Impending Catastrophe Revisited" tabulated data from South Africa's death certificate. The staggering fact that was discovered was that, "nearly half of all adult deaths in South Africa [at that time were] attributable to AIDS."
The AIDS virus destroys the immune system so that an infected person is in danger of being killed by what normally would be considered a harmless germ by a healthy individual. At the same time new drug resistant strains of bacteria are infecting more and more people all over the planet in 2004 and are producing incurable hybrids of once treatable illnesses.
The need for controlled disbursement of precious medicines and foolproof quarantine of infected individuals will increase the growing cry to mark people.
Even before the destruction of the coming prophesied global wars, an Oct. 22, "04 Colorado Springs Gazette article reported on the reality of the scarcity of resources the people of earth will soon experience.
Quoting from this article which headlined, "Planet being overwhelmed by consumption - Group's report paints dire picture" we read, "Humanity's reliance on fossil fuels, the spread of cities, the destruction of natural habitats for farmland and overexploitation of the oceans are destroying Earth's ability to sustain life, the environmental group WWF warned in a report Thursday...Humans consume 20 percent more natural resources than the Earth can produce, the report said.
"We are spending nature's capital faster than it can regenerate," WWF chief Claude Martin said in releasing the 40-page study. "We are running up an ecological debt which we won't be able to pay off unless governments restore the balance between our consumption of natural resources and the Earth's ability to renew them"...Use of fossil fuels such as coal, gas and oil increased by almost 700 percent between 1961 and 2001, the study said.
Burning fossil fuels - in power plants and automobiles, for example - releases carbon dioxide, which experts say contributes to global warming. The planet is unable to keep pace and absorb the emissions, WWF said.
Populations of land, freshwater and marine species fell on average by 40 percent between 1970 and 2000. The report cites urbanization, forest clearance, pollution, over fishing and the introduction by humans of nonnative animals...The study, WWF's fifth since 1998, examined the "ecological footprint" of the planet's entire population.
Most of a person's footprint is caused by the space needed to absorb the waste from energy consumption, including carbon dioxide. WWF also measured the total area of cities, roads and other infrastructure and the space required to produce food and fiber - for clothing, for example.
"We don't just live on local resources," so the footprint is not confined to the country where consumers live, said Mathis Wacknagel, head of the Global Footprint Network, which includes WWF...The world's 6.1 billion people leave a collective footprint of 33.36 billion acres, 5.44 acres per person. To allow the Earth to regenerate, the average should be no more than 4.45 acres, WWF said.
The impact of an average North American is double that of a European, but seven times that of the average Asian or African.
Residents of the United Arab Emirates, who use air conditioning extensively, leave a 24.46-acre footprint, two-thirds caused by fossil fuel use. The average U.S. resident leaves a 23.47-acre footprint, also largely from fuel."
God's Word never fails. The Lord showed the Apostle John in the Book of Revelation the horrible final days of a perishing world where people will be controlled by a literal etching they will be receiving on their right hand or forehand.
The present age is facing a time of unparalleled hopelessness as nations now declare it is not "if" nuclear weapons will be used in the near future, but only "when" and; identification etchings are not only in abundance, but the flesh of animals and people are even now receiving them.
Today is the day to put your trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. The Lord can come to remove His Church to heaven at any moment (see I Thess. 4:15-18) and with a simple prayer of faith in the Living Son of God you can be at peace with forgiveness for your sins and assurance of everlasting life.