I know this is a topic that has been discussed endlessly among Christians but if you will endure one more thread I have been searching this for a while now.
What first caught my attention and got my mind to seek a deeper understanding was the scripture in
1 Kings 10:14
14 Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was six hundred threescore and six talents of gold.
If we look back at the law for kings in Deuteronomy 17, It prohibits the king from multiplying horses and chariots, wives, and wealth. This is exactly what Solomon is doing in 1 Kings 10-11. Chapter ten begins by commending his great wisdom, but then steps through his decline - that is, he begins violating the rules for kings by multiplying gold (666 talents a year), multiplying horses and chariots, and finally multiplying wives who turn his heart away from following Yahweh. He sets up centers of false worship for all the foreign gods of his wives. So, the number 666 is associated with Solomon in his fall, his abuse of power, and his turning away from true worship of Yahweh.
In Revelation, Jesus sets up worship interactions under the symbol of business transactions - buying and selling.
I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see.
This is picked up in chapter 13 with reference to worship in the false temple - the image set up by the beast which must be worshiped on pain of death. Everyone must worship the image, but no one may do so without the mark. The buying and selling referred to here is of the same kind established by Jesus in chapter 3. It is worship - spiritual transactions.
Now go to Nebuchadnezzar....
Daniel 3:1 1
King Nebuchadnezzar made a golden statue sixty cubits high and six cubits wide, and he set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon.
King Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold, whose height was sixty cubits and its breadth six cubits... And the herald proclaimed aloud, “You are commanded, O peoples, nations, and languages, that when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, you are to fall down and worship the golden image that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace.”
Nebuchadnezzar is acting as a beast (and later, even more so) and sets up an image to be worshiped. Again, we have six and sixty associated with worship of a false image on pain of death.
All of this comes together in the name and number of the man - 666. This sums up man in his fallen state. The number carries with it the fallen glory of Solomon, his degraded wisdom, his failure to follow the word of God, his abuse of power, and his allowing himself to be turned aside to the worship of impotent gods.
Now let's move to the NT:
1 Timothy 6:10 King James Version (KJV)
10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
There are more scriptures but here is my point...
wealth was the downfall of Solomon, Nebuchadnezzar, and according to 1 Timothy caused many to err from the faith when they coveted it.
Money is an idol to so many people.
So now to today's economy....if the U.S. economy collapses the whole world economy collapses....
Digital money is now being sold and bought as a world currency....(bitcoins for one)
Is it possible that the mark of the Beast will be this world currency in the form of digital money?
any thoughts?
