UCLA, Jews and the Mark of the Beast

Imagine that your son or daughter is going to an American university like Harvard, Yale, or UCLA. Your child is a committed believer, but when they seek to go to a certain area on campus, there is a checkpoint. Your son or daughter is asked to deny their faith in Jesus. If they do so, not only can they pass, but they will be given a wristband so they can get through other checkpoints. If they don’t denounce their faith, they will be barred from certain parts of the campus that they are paying tens of thousands of dollars to attend.

Now let’s make matters worse. The institution's leadership in democratic, free America is siding with the persecutors.

True Story for Jewish Students

Shockingly this is the present situation for Jewish students at UCLA and a judge ruled against the institution yesterday after several Jewish students sued the university. First, let me explain the situation:

“The complaint alleges the protesters created a ‘Jew Exclusion Zone’ where in order to pass ‘a person had to make a statement pledging their allegiance to the activists’ view.’ Those who complied with the protesters’ view were issued wristbands to allow them to pass through, the complaint says, which effectively barred Jewish students who supported Israel and denied them access to the heart of campus.” (NBC News)

University leaders are simply out of touch with the values of America. Even my friends on the left think this is disgusting. In an effort to ensure free speech for a few (many of whom are not even students in the university!), they have violated the freedom of religion principle in the First Amendment. At least that is what Judge Mark C. Scarsi wrote in his opinion yesterday.

“In the year 2024, in the United States of America, in the State of California, in the City of Los Angeles, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith.”

In case he was not clear, he re-stated it with emphasis:

“This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith.” He went on to say that this is a violation of the first amendment. The fact that he even had to rule on it is such a sad commentary—of course it’s a violation of the First Amendment!

The ruling said that if Jewish students could not avail themselves of “programs, activities, and campus areas,” they would normally be able to use, “UCLA must stop providing those ordinarily available programs, activities, and campus areas to any students.”

Interestingly, the ruling said that religious beliefs for Jewish people included how they felt about the state of Israel. Meaning, that a secular Jew, who is a Zionist, who loves the nation of Israel, and is denied access, has had his or her religious freedoms violated.

Something that I have not been able to ascertain is how students who were not Jewish but would not comply with the fascist demands of the anti-Israel activists were treated. Were there any believers who stood with the Jewish people on the campus? I’m assuming there were—as well as well-intentioned people who knew that this was wrong. Unfortunately, on most university campuses, people become followers, not leaders. When they do take up a cause, it is the Cause célèbre—not something counterculture to the campus.

The Times of Israel reported that a spokesperson for UCLA criticized the ruling to the Los Angeles Times, saying it would “improperly hamstring our ability to respond to events on the ground.” They added that the school is “considering all options moving forward”; the university had previously indicated it could appeal.

Prophetic warning

I’m pretty sure that most of our readers would agree that UCLA's behavior is outrageous. But eventually, this will become worldwide. The Bible is very clear that the nations will turn against Israel in the End Times. Throughout history, evil regimes have demanded loyalty pledges at the risk of great harm in order to keep people in line. If you were part of the Roman Empire, once a year, you had to pledge loyalty to Caesar, and even confess, “Caesar is God.” Nebuchadnezzar had a similar pledge, and we know how that ended.

But these are merely types and shadows of the antichrist. The Bible says that he will survive a fatal wound to the head (Rev. 13:4), which will give him the audacity to claim to be God (2 Thes. 2:4). Amazed that he came back from the dead (fatal means deadly, lethal), the world will worship him (Rev. 13:5). Eventually people will have to pledge their loyalty through some type of mark on their hand or forehead. That is why I was pretty confident that the COVID-19 vaccine (whether you were for or against it) was not the mark of the beast. There was no loyalty pledge connected to it.

But make no mistake, the day is going to come when we will have to pledge our loyalty to the antichrist and against the nation of Israel and the Jewish people. Revelation and Zechariah are very clear that the goal of the antichrist will be to destroy the nation of Israel. Fortunately, Jesus comes back and sets up his millennial government and judges the antichrist and his hoards (Zech 14:4, 16, Rev. 19). What is happening today is just practice, so we will be ready in the future.