That headline is not true. Dan Cathy of Chick Fil A has not (to my knowledge) taken the Mark of the Beast. Yet he has done something that suggests he might be willing to take it if faced with that choice, in the same way that answering a poll is an indication of how a person will vote in an election. As the Bible says in Luke 16:10, “He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much; and he who is unrighteous in a very little thing is unrighteous also in much.”
Dan Cathy was given a great opportunity by God to show faithfulness to His truth by standing for authentic marriage. He became a great hero to Bible-believing Christians by refusing to back down when the homo-fascists demanded he retract pro-family statements in 2012. The mayors of Boston, Chicago and Philadelphia even pledged to deny Chick Fil A business permits in their cities (coincidentally the very penalty listed in Rev 13:17: “they could not buy or sell without the mark”), but the overwhelming nationwide wave of support that Chick Fil A received was one of the most encouraging events of the past decade.
This week, Dan Cathy took it all back by saying His stand for God was a business mistake. (After all, one cannot serve both God and Mammon: Matthew 6:24)
Nobody knows better than I do the price that one pays for standing up to the LGBT bullies. They are not only vindictive and relentless, they are also very creative in their methods of harassment. And there is an entire army of them ready to pounce on anyone who crosses them. I am absolutely certain that they tried their best to make Dan Cathy’s life a constant, living hell since 2012.
Just think of the nastiness of high-profile elections in the final weeks of a campaign when the mud-slinging is the fiercest and the dirty tricks are the most cruel and invasive. Now multiply that by ten, take away the throngs of energized supporters rallying behind the candidate being attacked (so he has to face it alone), and stretch it out over months or even years. Throw in a few honey-tongued “hostage negotiators” pretending friendliness and concern (in this case Shane Windmeyer of “Campus Pride), promising that all the pain will go away if you just compromise the truth. If you can imagine that you can get a glimpse of what it’s like to be targeted by the “gays.” The greater your threat to their agenda, the worse it gets.
It’s really hard to stand up to that kind of pressure, and I have sympathy for Mr. Cathy, but it’s nowhere close to the amount of pressure that Christians will face in the days of persecution that lie ahead of us. Persecution like many of our brothers and sisters in Moslem countries, for example, are already facing.
True, defending the plain truth that God limits sexuality to the confines of authentic marriage, and specially condemns homosexuality from Genesis to Revelation, is not the same as defending the deity of Christ and your allegiance to Him. One’s salvation does not hinge upon the perfection of one’s doctrine. But it is still very important to God.
I am convinced that God is using the homosexual issue as a test of believers all over the world. It’s like the “stress test” the central bankers are using to forecast which banks would fail in the event of an economic collapse. Except in this case God is testing us for what we will do in the coming moral and spiritual collapse. The Bible hasn’t changed, only the culture has changed, and believers are being “stress tested” to see whether they stand with Him or with the world on the things He says are true but which the world is pressing very hard to declare false.
God’s rebuke to Jeremiah when he complained about the power of the wicked should be ringing in our ears about now: “If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, Then how can you compete with horses? If you fall down in a land of peace, How will you do in the thicket of the Jordan?” (Jeremiah 12:1-5)
The good thing about a stress test is that it gives people an opportunity to change their ways (repent) before the final exam or the big crash. God doesn’t care about Chick Fil A’s profit margins if they come at the expense of Dan Cathy’s willingness to stand up for the truth under pressure. What would it profit Mr. Cathy to gain the whole world (or a few more restaurants on college campuses), if his compromise of Biblical truth today makes him less able to resist the real Mark of the Beast tomorrow?
I’m not saying that Dan Cathy isn’t saved, but he has certainly failed the stress test, and failed the Bible-believing Christian remnant everywhere, by surrendering to the “gay” bullies. How long before we see Chick Fil A running “gay”-friendly commercials as penance for Cathy‘s “homophobia?”
Where is courage in Christendom? Where is the loyalty to Christ that once placed love for Hid Word above every other thing, including life itself? Why have we become so afraid of the opinions of men who hate God and His truth?
There are varying theological views about what the Mark of the Beast is, or will be, and which ones among us will face that choice of taking or rejecting it. Nevertheless, it stands as a symbol to all Christians everywhere as the choice for or against Christ when the sword is on your neck and to choose Christ means to die saved, or live condemned to hell. The stress test of pressure from “gay” bullies is not life or death, but it is an indicator of whether you have the faith and courage to choose Him over the things of this world. In my mind’s eye I used to see the Mark of the Beast as a black dot on the back of the hand. Now it looks more like a Chick Fil A sandwich. I’ll never buy another one, and I hope you won’t either.
