Are You a “Marked Man”?

Are You a “Marked Man”?
John R. Petrilli

The old cowboy western movies had them. So did the cops and robbers episodes of the fifties and sixties. If the sheriff put a bounty on a man, then he was considered a “marked man”. When the police attached a wanted poster onto the post office bulletin board, the individual on that poster was a “marked man”. Marked men are usually categorized as such because of a criminal act they’ve perpetrated. Be it a bank robbery, kidnapping, or other lawless deed, the marked man has a price on his head for good reason. The concept of marking a man to distinguish him from the rest of society is not a modern idea. In fact, the practice is as old as human history. And the theme continues to run all throughout Scripture. Consider these instances where people of all kinds were “marked”, some for good purposes, others for penal ones, and still others for evil designs.


SOMETIMES GOD MARKS A PERSON AS AN ACT OF MERCY. Genesis 4:10-16

All was peaceful and happy on the Adam family farm. That is until one dreadful day when one brother savagely murdered his only brother in a moment of jealous rage. Cain acted out of a sinful heart, and God pronounced his due penalty. Banishment, toilsome labor, and a vagabond lifestyle awaited him. Like a defendant hearing their conviction of murder at the judge’s bench, Cain buckles at the knees, pleading for a sentence reduction, but no reduction would come. Fearing for his life as a convicted criminal, he verbalizes his dread that he’d become public enemy number one with a bounty on his head. To allay those fears, God promises sevenfold vengeance on anyone who takes Cain’s life, and also imprints the outcast with a sign of some kind that will keep bounty hunters away from him. Such action was an act of great mercy toward an individual who deserved the electric chair. Such is the mercy of God toward us sinners who deserve everlasting banishment from God’s presence and eternal death for our sins. The Father “marked” His only Son via nails, a thorny crown, and a cross, so that we could receive the indescribable, unmerited mercy of a loving and forgiving God.


SOMETIMES GOD MARKS A PERSON AS A SEAL OF DIVINE APPROVAL. Ezekiel 9:1-6

The culture of ancient Israel had become rotted to the very core. Idolatry had so consumed the society that even the religious leadership had turned their backs away from God and bowed their hearts and heads to pagan deities. The situation was grave, and called for immediate and decisive action. Ezekiel, a prophet who was among those who had not succumbed to the apostasy, received a vision from God. In the vision Ezekiel witnesses the arming and commissioning of the city guards. Their mission was to wipe out everyone [including men, women and children] who had forsaken the Lord and gone after other gods. But before the house-cleaning took place, another man entered the picture, clothed in linen and equipped with a writing kit. It was his assignment to go before the city guard assassins and mark out those in Israel who were still faithful to the Lord, as evidenced by their profound grief over the nation’s departure from God. That mark would distinguish the loyal Israelites from the disloyal ones. The mark served as God’s divine seal of approval with regard to their spiritual status. Likewise, we live in a culture and a world that is rapidly moving away from God. Many of its laws directly contradict God’s commands, it worships everything but God, and its population revel in sin as if it were something wonderful. Only as we’re marked by Jesus’ blood can we hope to escape the righteous wrath that is coming upon this wayward world. Only through faith in His death and resurrection can we find divine approval.


SOMETIMES GOD MARKS A PERSON TO SET THEM APART FOR A SPECIFIC MISSION.
Revelation 7:2-3

Anyone in America who hasn’t heard about the second coming of Jesus or the tribulation period preceding His return must be living in a cave. The past fifteen years have witnessed a plethora of mainstream movies and books dealing with these subjects, and statistics reveal that millions of viewers and readers are not church-going folks. The seven years of global trouble coming upon this world make Hollywood’s end of the world scenarios look mild by comparison. Jesus said that the catastrophic nature of those days will be unprecedented and unequalled in human history. So much so that people will drop like flies from heart attacks (Luke 21:26). In the midst of all that insanity, God will raise up an army of global evangelists. 144, 000 of them to be exact. They will be recruited from the nation of Israel, as is clear from their ancestries rooted in the twelve tribes of Israel. So there will be a message of hope spread across an out-of-control globe via these evangelists. God never leaves Himself without a witness, even in the most dire of straits. That will be their mission, and their foreheads will bear a seal, a mark that will identify them as God’s holy ambassadors.


SOMETIMES GOD’S MARK IS HIJACKED FOR EVIL PURPOSES. Revelation 13:16-17

Hitler, Stalin, Amin. The list of notorious names of those who ransacked their world in a mad dash for ultimate power and control seems endless. The twentieth century has experienced the vast majority of such crazed, murderous demagogues. But put all these crazies together, and you still don’t have the equal of the last day’s world leader known as the “Beast”. This guy will outdo them all by a long shot. While some of those mentioned were doubtlessly possessed by demons, the Beast will be inhabited by Satan himself. After seeing what kind of havoc one demon-possessed leader can wreak, it’s unimaginable and unfathomable what kind of devastation a Satan-possessed leader will bring. But he will come onto the world scene, and he will be granted unprecedented power over, not a nation, but the entire world. To consolidate and coordinate the exercise of that power, the Beast (also known as the Antichrist) will design a system whereby he can track the whereabouts and commercial transactions of everybody on the planet! To accomplish that feat he will make use of an imprinting mechanism of some kind which will place the Beast’s name and/or number on people’s foreheads or hands. This marking will include everyone, regardless of economic status, social standing, or religious affiliation. Now this is one mark that will separate the proverbial men from the boys spiritually speaking. The true believers will be willing to forfeit life-sustaining support if necessary, and will refuse to take this devil’s mark, even if it means martyrdom. It will be “version number 300” in the enemy’s ongoing game to mimic God in his doomed search for planetary supremacy. And like every other version preceding it, it will be infected with a terminal virus that numbers its days of usefulness.


GOD ENDORSES A TRADEMARK UPON HIS FOLLOWERS THAT INVITES OUTSIDERS TO COME IN. John 13:34-35

While Jesus didn’t etch any symbols onto the foreheads of His disciples, He did say that there would be a way for people to identify them as such. For them [and us] it would be the love they had for one another that would set them apart from the rest of the world. While on earth Christ perfectly and consistently modeled what that would look like in every day life. It’s the washing hands of a servant, the forgiving heart of the humble, the believing disposition of a child, and the loyalty of a forever friend. Jesus’ brand of love far surpasses anything the world can manufacture. Its power is found in its source, and that is divine. God’s love transcends the earthly confines of blood relations or romantic escapades. It’s an all-giving, sold out, self-sacrificing, self-effacing care for others. That was [and is] to be the trademark, the hallmark of our relationships within the household of God. When we relate on THAT level, the world will stand up and take notice. For it is that kind of love that all people are so desperately searching for through addictive behaviors, in a bottle, a drug, a fanatical hobby, or a human relationship. Love without limits, love that is unconditional, real and binding.
By THAT kind of love the outside world will be irresistibly beckoned to come inside to taste and see the goodness of God for themselves. And having tasted, they will become regular guests at His table. Are you visibly showing your credentials as Christ’s ambassador to the watching world around you?


GOD MARKS HIS CHILDREN TO SECURE THEIR FUTURE AND INSURE THEIR INHERITANCE. Ephesians 1:13

This brings us to the original thing that prompted this entire article. As I was reading through my devotions in Ephesians chapter one, I noticed that God had done something quite extraordinary for me. As His child through faith in Jesus Christ, I have been “marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit”. It suddenly hit me that I was, indeed, a “marked man”! According to Spirit-inspired Paul, my spiritual future and heavenly inheritance has been safely secured. By virtue of the indwelling Holy Spirit, I’ve been insured against any default or other circumstance that could jeopardize my salvation. In ancient times a governmental seal was to be treated with absolute respect. No one except the authority who placed the seal was authorized to tamper with that seal in any way, shape, or form. To do so invited a death sentence. Such is the seal of the Holy Spirit. It is non-transferrable, non-negotiable, and non-penetrable. No one can break this seal, for its God who has omnipotently set it. How assuring it is to know that I’m in “good hands”, not with an insurance agency, but in the Hands of the One Who loved me and gave Himself for me! I’m a “marked man”! Are you?