¹⁷ and he decrees that no one will be able to buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name. (Revelation 13:17 NASV)

In Apostle John’s vision of events that would be taking place in the end times, he saw a time coming when people would not be able to buy or sell unless they took the Mark of the Beast.

Over the years, many theories have emerged on what the Mark of the Beast entailed as John saw it being put on a person’s hand or forehead (Revelation 14:9).

Perhaps the most popular theory involves having a computer chip inserted into a person’s hand in order for them to function in society. Certainly, this is already happening as chips are being inserted into people’s hands enabling them to make purchases and to open locked doors simply by waving their hand.

But this chip theory doesn’t fit well with the Mark of the Beast being inserted in a person’s forehead. This has led some to speculate that maybe it reflects the idea that people would be forced to embrace a certain type of thinking.

And recently this has been on display in Britain where several Christians and conservatives have had their bank accounts shut down, simply because bank managers didn’t agree with the individual’s personal opinions.

In our increasingly digital age, not having a bank account would effectively stop a person from being able to buy or sell.

Premier Christianity recently reported on what happened to an Anglican minister, Richard Fothergill who had his bank account at Yorkshire Building Society (YBS) closed down in June 2023 after he questioned YBS’s Pride promotions.

Fothergill who had opened his account at YBS in 2005 had responded to an email he received from the bank asking for feedback.

After noticing a Pride logo in the email, Fothergill asked:

“Is this really the best use of your time and energy to promote a particular worldview. You’re a bank, you deal with money. Why don’t you concentrate all your people’s energy on that rather than pushing a particular cultural agenda?”

Within a week, YBS responded with a letter telling Fothergirll that their relationship was ‘irrevocably broken down’ and said the bank would be closing his account within two weeks.

Core Issues Trust (CIT), a Christian charity based in Northern Ireland, had its bank account closed down in 2020 at Barclays after a successful campaign by LGBT activists. CIT was providing counseling services to those who had unwanted same-sex attractions.

When Barclays shut down CIT”s account in July 2020, with the help of the Christian Legal Centre, CIT sued the bank.

Though Barclays argued that it has the right to close down any account it wants and added that it does not discriminate because of religion or political views, it nevertheless settled with CIT before going to trial by agreeing to pay the charity £21,500. However, it did not reinstate CIT’s account.

Then a similar thing happened to Nigel Farage, a popular, outspoken conservative in Britain who also had his account closed down at Coutts Bank because of his political views.

Fortunately, Farage has a prominent voice in Britain and within days of going public with what happened, two major Bank executives at Coutts and NatWest, which owns Coutts, resigned over their role in the debacle.

Farage added that since he went public, he has been approached by hundreds of people who have had their accounts closed by NatWest.

He also stated that since both his business and personal accounts were canceled, ten other banks have refused to open an account for him.

These disturbing events reveal the chilling willingness on the part of certain financial institutions to punish those holding opinions that are legal, but which the bank executives don’t agree with.

Some would say, it is a sign of the times.

Though the Bible states that this is eventually coming, I also believe it is too early for this to be happening and is part of Satan’s strategy to change the times and seasons (Daniel 7:25).

READ: Why are banks closing the accounts of these Christians? AND Nigel Farage calls for more NatWest resignations – as data privacy watchdog writes to banks