The Mark: The Beast Rules the World

by Tyndale House

  "And can you trust a Pakistani? I don't understand those types."

  "Who can you trust these days, Walter? Now listen, I don't know how you stand on pomp and circumstance, but I don't want to make a big deal of this. You'll have an appropriate office you won't have to share with anyone, but I just want to announce your appointment and not get into a lot of ceremony."

  "Perfect," Walter said. "I don't want to take any attention from you, sir."

  David thought Walter sounded disingenuous and almost palpably disappointed. He was right, though, in pandering to Carpathia's ego. No one was going to steal that thunder anyway.

  "Walter," Carpathia said, "how are we coming with the GCMM?"

  Moon sounded surprised. "Sir, the Morale Monitors have been in place for a long time. I get input from them every day, and I know Suhail counts on their intelligence briefings."

  It was clear Carpathia was impatient. "Mr. Moon, surely you caught my drift recently when I spoke of mobilizing a great enforcement throng from every tribe and nation who would-"

  "Of course, Potentate. I am working with Chief Akbar now to-"

  "I don't believe it! You missed it! Walter, I am determined to surround myself with people who understand me intuitively!"

  "I'm sorry, Excellency. I-"

  "For all of Leon's foibles and idiosyncrasies, he is a man who stays with me, anticipating my needs and desires and strategies. Do you kn-"

  "That's the kind of subordinate I want to b-"

  "Don't interrupt me, please!"

  "I apologize."

  "Do you know where Leon is now?"

  "I heard he had flown to the United European Sta-"

  "He is in Vatican City, Walter! He has called together the ten regional potentates and has asked each to bring his most trusted and loyal spiritual leader to join them in that former great bastion of Christianity."

  "I don't underst-"

  "Of course you don't! Think, man! At this very moment I imagine Reverend Fortunato is kneeling in the Sistine Chapel, the sub-potentates and the spiritual leader from each region who will represent Carpathianism throughout the globe laying hands on him and committing him to the great task before him."

  "I should like to have been there, Excellency."

  "You're my chief of security and you didn't even know this! I'm going to make you Supreme Commander, but you have to get in step!"

  "I'll do my best."

  "Leon called me at dawn, telling me with great relish that he had ordered destroyed every Vatican relic, every icon, every piece of artwork that paid homage to the impotent God of the Bible. There were those among the potentates and even among the Carpathianists who suggested that these so-called priceless treasures at least be moved here to the palace to preserve their worth and to remind us of history. History! I don't know when I've been prouder of Leon. Before he returns, the Vatican will be left no vestiges of any sort of tribute to any god but the one my people can see and touch and hear."

  "Amen, Your Holiness. You are risen indeed."

  "Of course, and the whole world was watching! Now when I spoke the other day of a host of enforcers, I wanted you to gather that I meant the very core of my most loyal troops, the GCMM. They are already armed. I want them supported! I want them fully equipped! I want you to marry them with our munitions so their monitoring will have teeth. They should be respected and revered to the point of fear."

  "You want the citizenry afraid, sir?"

  "Walter! No man need fear me who loves and worships me. You know that."

  "I do, sir."

  "If any man, woman, young person, or child has reason to feel guilty when encountering a member of the Global Community Morale Monitoring Force, then yes, I want them shaking in their boots!"

  "I understand, Excellency."

  "Do you, Walter? I really need to know."

  "I absolutely do, sir."

  "I don't care whom you replace yourself with as chief of security. All I want you to know is that I hold you personally responsible for carrying out this wish."

  "Of giving more muscle to the GCMM."

  "The understatement of the century."

  "Any budget for this?"

  "Walter, you report directly to me. I control the globe politically, militarily, spiritually, and economically. I have a bottomless sea of resources. Spare not one Nick in your effort to make the GCMM the most powerful enforcement juggernaut the world has ever seen."

  "Yes, sir!"

  "Have fun with it! Enjoy it! But don't dawdle. I want a full contingent, at least one hundred thousand fully equipped troops, in Israel when I return there in triumph."

  "Sir, that is but days away."

  "Do we not have the personnel?"

  "We do."

  "Do we not have the armaments?"

  "We do. Are you lifting the embargo against showing military-style strength in the form of tanks, fighters, bombers, and other such?"

  "You're catching on, Walter. I want to crush resistance in Israel before it even arises. From whom should I expect opposition?"

  "The Judah-ites and-"

  "You've already told me they are unlikely to show their faces. They take their potshots from behind the trees of the Internet. From whom shall I expect flesh-and-blood opposition within, say, Jerusalem itself? You know my plans."

  "Not totally, sir."

  "You know enough to know who will be outraged."

  "The Orthodox, sir. The devout, religious Jews."

  David heard chairs squeak, and it was obvious Carpathia had stood and Moon followed suit. "Now, Walter. I ask you. How dangerous to me will be the funny-looking men with their beards and their braids and their skullcaps once they have seen one hundred thousand heavily armed troops, there to protect me and those who worship me?"

  "Not very, Excellency."

  "Not very indeed, Walter. Good day to you."

  David guessed Walter still had time to make their appointment. His goal was to schmooze Walter, flatter Mr. Wong, and somehow get rid of them so he could plot with Chang how to get out of there with the other four believers. He sat, earphones in place, ready to shut down his computer. But then he heard Carpathia humming, then singing, as if he were writing a song, trying a line, improving it, starting over. David listened, transfixed.

  Finally perfecting it, to a military-sounding tune Carpathia softly sang:

  Hail Carpathia, our lord and risen king; Hail Carpathia, rules o'er everything. We'll worship him until we die; He's our beloved Nicolae. Hail Carpathia, our lord and risen king.

  Just before midnight in Chicago only Rayford and Tsion were awake. All were excited about the expected return of Buck and Albie and their next new member, Ming Toy. Chloe and Leah asked to be awakened as soon as the chopper arrived.

  Tsion had been working all day on a new, though brief, message. "I'm about to transmit it," he told Rayford. "But I'd appreciate your looking at it. It's an interesting study, but it's not for the beginners. We have hundreds of thousands of new believers joining our ranks every day, but I have to think also about moving the more mature ones from milk to meat. Perhaps the day will come when someone like Chaim can take over the teaching of the newest."

  Rayford eagerly accepted Tsion's hard copy, always feeling privileged when he was among the first to get a glance at something a billion people would benefit from.

  Dear ones in Christ:

  From your letters to the message board, I sense some questions about certain passages and doctrines, one of which I address today. I am most encouraged that you are reading, studying, curious, and that you so plainly want to learn and grow as believers in Messiah. If you have placed your trust in Christ alone for salvation by grace through faith, you are a true tribulation saint.

  While we all rejoice in our new positions before God-we went from old to new, from death to life, from darkness to light-no doubt all are sobered by the reality that we are living on borrowed time, now more than ever.

  I have gathered from many that one of
your loftiest goals is to survive until the Glorious Appearing. I share that longing but wish to gently remind you that that is not our all in all. The apostle Paul said that to live is Christ but that to die is gain. While it would be thrilling beyond words to see the triumphant Lord Christ return to the earth and set up his thousand-year reign, I believe I could learn to deal with it if I were called to heaven in advance and saw it from that perspective instead.

  Beloved, our top priority now is not even thwarting the evils of Antichrist, though I engage in that effort every day. I want to confound him, revile him, enrage him, frustrate him, and get in the way of his plans every way I know how. His primary goal is ascendancy for himself, worship of himself, and the death and destruction of any who might otherwise become tribulation saints.

  So, as worthy and noble a goal as it is to go on the offensive against the evil one, I believe we can do that most effectively by focusing on persuading the undecided to come to faith. Knowing that every day could be our last, that we could be found out and dragged to a mark application center, there to make our decision to die for the sake of Christ, we must be more urgent about our task than ever.

  Many have written in fear, confessing that they do not believe they have the courage or the character to choose death over life when threatened with the guillotine. As a fellow pilgrim in this journey of faith, let me admit that I do not understand this either. In my flesh I am weak. I want to live. I am afraid of death but even more of dying. The very thought of having my head severed from my body repulses me as much as it does anyone. In my worst nightmare I see myself standing before the GC operatives a weakling, a quivering mass who can do nothing but plead for his life. I envision myself breaking God's heart by denying my Lord. Oh, what an awful picture!

  In my most hated imagination I fail at the hour of testing and accept the mark of loyalty that we all know is the cursed mark of the beast, all because I so cherish my own life.

  Is that your fear today, friend? Are you all right as long as you are in hiding and somehow able to survive? But have you a foreboding about that day when you will be forced to publicly declare your faith or deny your Savior?

  I have good news for you that I have already admitted is difficult to understand, even for me, who has been called to shepherd you and exposit the Word of God for you. The Bible tells us that once one is either sealed by God as a believer or accepts the mark of loyalty to Antichrist, this is a once-and-for-all choice. In other words, if you have decided for Christ and the seal of God is evident on your forehead, you cannot change your mind!

  That tells me that somehow, when we face the ultimate test, God miraculously overcomes our evil, selfish flesh and gives us the grace and courage to make the right decision in spite of ourselves. My interpretation of this is that we will be unable to deny Jesus, unable to even choose the mark that would temporarily save our lives.

  Isn't that a blessed thought? I could no more do this in my flesh than I could swim the Pacific. I have heard stories of believers from the past who were asked at gunpoint to denounce their faith, and yet they stood firm, dying for it. I never envisioned myself with that kind of fortitude.

  Even since writing to you last, I have heard the story of one who was among the first to face this test. We have no eyewitness account, no one to tell us how the scene unfolded. Yet we know that of all the people herded through the mark application process at this specific venue (which I naturally have to keep confidential), only one man rejected the mark. Knowing the consequences, he chose to die rather than to deny Jesus Christ.

  My heart is broken for his loved ones. What an awful mental image to season one's bereavement! And yet how thrilling to know that God was faithful! He was there at the darkest hour. And this beloved saint is one of the martyrs under the altar of God, his robe snow white.

  As Antichrist and the false prophet spread their message of lies and hatred and false doctrine around the world, forcing millions to worship Satan himself by threatening to behead those who refuse, it would bode well for us if we would memorize a verse from John's Revelation. In chapter 20 and verse 4, he writes as part of his God-given vision:

  "Then I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years."

  Your loved ones who have been called to what the world would call an ignoble and gory end shall return with Christ at his Glorious Appearing! They shall live and reign with him for a thousand years! Glory be to God the Father and his Son, Jesus the Christ!

  And as for you and me, my friend: might we be among those? Oh, the privilege!

  Revelation 14:12-13: "Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, 'Write: "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on."' 'Yes,' says the Spirit, 'that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.' "

  And what of those who enjoy for a season the favor of the ruler of this world? What of those who avoid the guillotine and seem to prosper? As rousing as the Scriptures can be for those who are washed in the blood of the Lamb, look how fearful it can be for those who choose their own way. In Revelation 14:9-11, John quotes an angel, "saying with a loud voice, 'If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out full strength into the cup of His indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name.' "

  You don't have to be a Bible scholar to understand that.

  Now, precious brothers and sisters, let me try to make plain some passages that have resulted in questions from many of you. In Psalm 69:28, the psalmist pleads with the Lord concerning his enemies: "Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous."

  Exodus 32:33 says, "And the Lord said to Moses, 'Whoever has sinned against Me, I will blot him out of My book.' "

  These references naturally have caused some to fear that they can lose their salvation. But my contention is that the book referred to in those is the book of God the Father, into which are written the names of every person he created.

  The New Testament refers to the Book of Life of the Lamb, and we know that the Lamb is Jesus, for he is the one John the Baptist was referring to (John 1:29) when he said, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!"

  Jesus the Christ came into the world to save sinners, and thus the Book of Life of the Lamb is the one in which are entered the names of those who have received his gift of eternal life.

  The most important difference between these two books is that it is clear a person can have his name blotted out of the Book of the Living. But in Revelation 3:5, Jesus himself promises, "He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels."

  The overcomers he is referring to are those clothed in the white garments of Christ himself, guaranteeing that their names cannot be blotted out of the Book of Life of the Lamb.

  To me the Book of the Living is a picture of the mercy of God. It is as if in loving anticipation of our salvation, he writes every person's name in that book. If one dies without trusting Christ for salvation, his name is blotted out, because he is no longer among the living. But those who have trusted Christ have been written in the Lamb's Book of Life, so that when they die physically, they remain alive spiritually and are never blotted out.

  Rayford had to admit to himself that he had also worried about his own response if he were to face the guillo
tine. He wanted to be true and faithful to the one who died for him, and he wanted to see his family again. But if he failed and proved a coward, he had wondered whether he would lose his standing before God.

  "Tsion," he said, "I wouldn't change a word. This will uplift and comfort millions. It sure helped me."

  TWENTY

  David couldn't sit still. How was he going to pull this off? Maybe he should act uninterested in Chang as an employee. Would anybody fall for that? He stood and paced, straightening his tie and buttoning his uniform jacket.

  When Moon, Mr. Wong, and Chang finally arrived, David was disconcerted at Chang's appearance. A slight, fair-skinned seventeen-year-old, he wore khakis, a plain shirt, a light jacket zipped to the neck, and a red baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. He was clearly angry, his eyes darting everywhere but at David.

  Moon and Mr. Wong were giddy, laughing, talking loudly. "Ever see a boy so afraid?" Mr. Wong said. "Can't say I have!"

  Tiffany ushered them in, and David shook hands, first with Walter, then Mr. Wong, who said, "Hat off for meeting, Chang."

  For the first time since he had seen them interact at the Carpathia funeral, David saw Chang ignore his father. The elder reddened and lost his smile, then faked one, pumping David's hand. "Made hat come off for picture!"

  Moon laughed at the memory of it, whatever it was.

  David thrust his hand toward Chang, who ignored it. He stood looking down. His father nearly exploded. "Shake hands with boss, Chang!"

  The boy lazily reached out, but he did not grip when David did, and it was like shaking a fish. David thought he saw a tear slide next to the boy's mouth. Maybe this was for the best. If David were to try to bust him out of the place in a few days, it would be better if they didn't act civil to each other.

  Walter Moon said, "He is risen."

  Mr. Wong and David responded, "He is risen indeed." David was startled to hear Chang mutter, "Christ is risen indeed."

  Chang may have considered that godly courage, but David saw it as teenage recklessness. No one else seemed to have heard it.