Analysis. A few days ago, IFA reprinted an article by WFTV9, Orlando, Fla., about Florida Gov. DeSantis’ signing legislation that bans the use of Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) in that state. It turns out that the Biden administration is furtively pushing ahead with plans for a future in which Americans don’t hold or control their own money.

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According to an article published on Fox News a month ago, the administration released a sweeping executive order directing numerous federal agencies to crack down on digital assets, including popular cryptocurrencies, and to study the potential development of a CBDC. The article goes on to explain that CBDC is not the same as the current digital version of paper money you use to transact online, but rather an entirely new form of currency.

An in-depth paper published by the Federal Reserve Bank in January of last year reports: “A CBDC could potentially offer a range of benefits. For example, it could provide households and businesses a convenient, electronic form of central bank money, with the safety and liquidity that would entail; give entrepreneurs a platform on which to create new financial products and services; support faster and cheaper payments (including cross-border payments); and expand consumer access to the financial system. A CBDC could also pose certain risks and would raise a variety of important policy questions, including how it might affect financial-sector market structure, the cost and availability of credit, the safety and stability of the financial system, and the efficacy of monetary policy.”

The Fed invited public comments in response to a list of questions posed to financial institutions, consumer groups, academia, and trade and merchant groups, and then published those on its website. For the most part, the idea for creation of a CBDC got positive reactions, with the exception of issues of privacy.

The latter is what we should be concerned about. The survey groups are concerned that systems will be hacked and that data will get stolen. The Fox article points in a different direction: Under the current proposals from the Fed and the Biden administration, the article says, CBDC would be traceable, programmable, and designed to promote left-wing social goals like “inclusion” and “equity.” A government agency could easily trace every transaction and with a few clicks in a computer system impose rules to limit spending on certain items. For instance, if the government were to determine that Americans are spending too much money on gasoline, it could prevent you from using CBDC at gas stations.

Along with having no privacy in your financial transactions, you would also have no ownership of your money. Under our current monetary system, your ability to withdraw cash from a bank account and the privacy laws that forbid banks from sharing your financial data still guarantee you a certain amount of control. However, if CBDC becomes a reality, major banks and the Fed would own all your money. It has yet to be determined whether CBDC would be held in a two-tier system (the Federal Reserve Bank and some private banks), or a single-tier system (the Federal Reserve Bank only). Either way, you can’t withdraw or download it, the currency holders own it, and the data will be fed to the government for oversight. According to CBDC designers, the latter is necessary to limit criminal activity, thus making the digital currency system safer. But this is yet another example of the citizens being asked — or forced — to give up their privacy and control to the government for the sake of “safety.”

The Fox article rightly concludes: “If a programmable CBDC is rolled out in the near future, you won’t own money and you’ll have very little privacy, if any at all. That’s great news for those who advocate for bigger government and want more power for large financial institutions, but it could prove to be a catastrophic loss of freedom for the rest of us.”

Does that remind you of anything? In a previous article, I mentioned the frog-in-the-kettle approach that Satan uses to pave the way for an Antichrist whom the whole world will be forced to worship (see Revelation 13). Let me repeat my explanation here: When you put a frog into a kettle full of hot water, he jumps right back out, because he feels the heat and knows it will kill him. But when you put that same frog into a pot of cold water and only slowly increase the heat, he’ll stay there till he dies, because he gradually gets used to the rising heat without realizing it will kill him. In that same way, we have become almost entirely dependent on digital money transactions and are quite used to it now: It’s fast, it’s convenient, it’s easy. What people don’t realize is that this has created a technological ecosystem that can give a government complete knowledge of and total control over our money. Suppose laws are passed to facilitate creation of a digital currency that the government controls; in that case, we will have taken a giant leap forward to the scenario described in Revelation 13:16–17: Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.

Already, the technology exists to have computer chips implanted in one’s arm for making payments or gaining entrance into a building. In Sweden this has already become a widespread practice. All of the information so stored is trackable and controllable, and combined with digital currency, would disallow you to buy or sell in any other way — ceding complete control to tech companies and bulk-data storage centers that permanently file your cell phone and app-use history, and to the governments that collude with or control those entities.

For now, alarm bells about CBDC and such control-ceding technology as AI are going off among defenders of personal freedom like DeSantis. These defenders are urging and employing caution and restraint. But all that would be needed is for another global or national security crisis to arise, and those freedoms would be taken away, a little at a time.

The world at large does not know where all this is going. People may occasionally strain against the tightening of the ropes as challenges to individual freedoms surface here and there, but ultimately, they will nevertheless be quite glad to yield those up in the name of “safety and security.” Christians, on the other hand, do know what is happening, because the Holy Spirit helps us understand what the Bible teaches about the last days and our need to be vigilant.

There are three aspects to praying about all this:

1. Consider Abraham’s plea for Sodom and Gomorrah. We are not going to be able to stop this. God will not stop it, because the Bible has already prophesied that it will happen, and all of it will serve His purposes for the last days. But we can plead and pray. I think God wants us to, so that it can never be said that no one tried to resist it once Satan’s true intentions are revealed.
2. Pray for more and more hearts to be opened to the gospel. We’re seeing increasingly less common sense, logic, and wisdom all around us. The only way eyes will be opened to what is really happening is for people to be born again and filled with the Holy Spirit, becoming spiritual people who understand spiritual things (see 1 Corinthians 2:14–16).
3. Pray for discernment among the people of God. Prayerlessness and biblical ignorance have led to blindness, confusion, and fear among God’s people. Many are easily led astray by trends in the world that appear helpful, but they’re unable to discern Satan’s frog-in-the-kettle scheme. Then, when they end up faced with a difficult choice, they won’t have the courage or insight to choose the right thing.

The good news is that nothing happens outside God’s control. When we stay close to the Father, He will take our hand and walk us through anything. So let us pray that many inside and outside the Church will draw near to Him, seek Him, and learn to listen to Him, so that they will do the right thing when the final trap slams shut.

Let’s pray hard about all this and encourage one another by sharing prayers below.

Remco Brommet is a pastor, spiritual-growth teacher, and prayer leader with over 40 years of experience in Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the U.S. He was born and raised in the Netherlands and pastored his first church in Amsterdam. He moved to the U.S. in 1986. Remco and his wife, Jennifer, live north of Atlanta. When not writing books, he blogs at www.deeperlifeblog.com and assists his wife as a content developer and prayer coordinator for True Identity Ministries. Jennifer and Remco are passionate about bringing people into a deeper relationship with Christ. Photo Credit: Canva.