Trending Toward A Cashless Society: 100 Nations Exploring Digital Currencies

The Bible tells us that when the antichrist comes on the scene, he's going to gain a foothold of global power. The beginning strategy of his power grab will be to first gain control over the world economy. It's a lot faster and easier to gain economic control with all the means that are available today than it is to achieve military and political power. 

Once you have that economic control, you control people's lives, and you can then take them over politically and militarily as well.

According to Revelation chapter 13, the antichrist will have iron-fisted control over all buying and selling. Bible prophecy teachers for decades have said that a cashless society will be required. What we see today developing in our world is a cashless society on steroids.

Recently, a new entity was created called the FedNow Service. The FedNow Service is a portal created by the Federal Reserve, which permits financial institutions to exchange funds digitally in real-time.

The government website in early July stated:

The Federal Reserve on Thursday announced that its new system for instant payments, the FedNow Service, is now live. Banks and credit unions of all sizes can sign up and use this tool to instantly transfer money for their customers, any time of the day, on any day of the year.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell said, "Over time, as more banks choose to use this new tool, the benefits to individuals and businesses will include enabling a person to immediately receive a paycheck, or a company to instantly access funds when an invoice is paid."

To start, 35 early-adopting banks and credit unions, as well as the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Bureau of the Fiscal Service, are ready with instant payments capabilities via the FedNow Service. In addition, 16 service providers are ready to support payment processing for banks and credit unions.

CoinDesk published an article recently that reads, "Federal Reserve's 'FedNow' Launch Triggers Fresh Speculation Over Digital Dollar," subheading, "While FedNow is currently not tied to any initiative for a digital U.S. dollar or the crypto space in general, experts warn that the system might end up as a precursor to the infrastructure for a central bank digital currency."

Immediately, the creators of the FedNow said this isn't related to Central Bank digital currency (CBDC), but many experts are warning that's exactly what it is.

The CoinDesk author continued:

The U.S. Federal Reserve denies that its new instant payments service, FedNow, is in any way tied to the digital asset space.

But experts say the new system could lay the groundwork for the infrastructure needed for a potential central bank digital currency (CBDC) in the U.S.

The FedNow project adopts a key goal of the digital asset industry: moving money around easily and quickly, and at any time of day or the week, even if banks are closed. FedNow will operate 24 hours a day.

"This is a payment system, not a digital token or a CBDC, but it is something that can be used to facilitate the creation of a CBDC," said Jim Bianco, president of Bianco Research.

Dave Weisberger, CEO and co-founder of CoinRoutes, said this: "If FedNow does indeed become a programmable CBDC, then it could theoretically be used to block payments for items the government doesn't favor or to cut out people from the financial system who are seen as threatening in some way to governing authorities, aka, political opponents."

"In that situation, things could get dystopian very quickly," Weisberger added. Of course, the "dystopian" government we know from Scripture is the rule and reign of the global empire and economic system of the coming antichrist. 

"Officials at the Fed had been studying the potential for a government-issued digital currency," CoinDesk further stated.

On March 9th, 2022, President Biden signed an executive order that put into motion the machinery and the mechanism to develop a CBDC. In preparation for the G20 Summit, the Bank of International Settlements published a report laying out the Central Bank's efforts to prepare for a CBDC and all its benefits. 

This is moving forward at a dramatic speed. FedNow seems to be the infrastructure or platform that can easily be used when a central bank digital currency is brought online.

At the same time that FedNow was emerging, the World Economic Forum (WEF) published principles of central bank digital currency interoperability. 

At a recent WEF event, economist Eswar Prasad bragged about how CBDC can be used to limit your purchases of whatever bureaucrats happen not to like--that's where this is headed, and they're not even hiding this.

One hundred nations are now exploring CBDC. Twelve central banks have pilot programs for digital currencies, and the EU already has a "digital euro."

The problem with CBDCs is that they are programmable, traceable, expirable, and controllable by the government. For example, if a person goes to a gas station and they have a central bank digital currency, it can be determined how much money they are allowed to spend on gasoline. That's how they will control the environmental agenda that we see taking place.

There's a pilot program in India for CBDC. Reuters reported, "The Reserve Bank of India is targeting one million transactions per day through the central bank digital currency (CBDC) by the end of this year."

China is doubling down on CBDC with the aim of controlling its population even more. There's a revolution for retail payments in the country, whose government is demanding all retail spaces now accept digital currencies. 

The wider goal is the total elimination of all physical forms of currency. 

"In the future, commercial electronic payment tools may fully meet the needs of the digital economy and society and completely replace cash," the Chinese central bank chief said.

The trend toward a cashless society, they say, is inexorable. All of this is a striking foreshadowing of what we read in Revelation 13. It's just another flashing light that the coming of Christ is near.

It's also a very powerful confirmation and validation of the truth of the Bible. Think about John writing those words in Revelation, 2000 years ago, that no one can buy or sell in the world without the mark of the beast. During that time, the described scenario was impossible. 

It was even impossible 50 or 100 years ago, but it's possible with the technology we see today. It's just another validation of the inspiration of God's Word, how trustworthy it is, and how we can believe it for all these prophecies that are yet unfulfilled.

Originally published at Harbingers Daily - reposted with permission.