Kiss Your Privacy Good-bye!

Last week Congress passed the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act, which ordered the FAA into a new high-tech era in which satellites will be used to direct air traffic. No big deal, right? After all, it's about time the nation switched from radar over to GPS technology. It will save both time and fuel and allow planes to operate more efficiently, even in bad weather. Fewer planes will be diverted--who could argue with that?

No one, if the bill ended there. But it doesn't.

It requires the FAA to open U.S. skies to unmanned drones.

Widely used in Afghanistan, the drones come in very handy spotting unsuspecting Taliban operatives and using them for target practice. And granted, they've also been used effectively on the U.S. border with Mexico by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency. And sure, advocates believe drones will be a huge boon to disaster relief operations, fire fighting and locating missing hikers.

Fine and dandy. But why did Congress okay 30,000 of them (by 2020) to fly over urban areas?

Steve Aftergood, head of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, said, "There are serious policy questions on the horizon about privacy and surveillance, by both government agencies and commercial entities." Ya think?

This bill, drafted under the radar (no pun intended) has some troubling implications, especially in the wake of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It doesn't take much imagination to see our country careening down a disturbingly slippery slope right into the jaws of the Beast, mentioned throughout the Scriptures, but especially in the books of Daniel and Revelation. This kind of power and control over the masses could not possibly happen overnight, but pass a few more bills like these and who knows?

The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution says: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." Will 30,000 drones hovering over our heads trample our 4th Amendment rights? Will they add to our security or destroy it? These are questions we all need to be asking. And while we're at it, we might as well kiss our privacy goodbye.

A wise man once said: "The message of the Cross, the Good News that Jesus died to pay for our sins, sounds absurd to those filled with self. But for those willing to humble themselves, it becomes the power that is able to snatch them from death and impart eternal life." "Live no longer as the ungodly do, for they are hopelessly confused. Their closed minds are full of darkness; they are far away from the life of God because they have shut their minds and hardened their hearts against Him (Ephesians 4:17-18).

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