The End is Not Yet, but Could Be

Six p.m. last Saturday came and went without the world ending. It could have ended, but not because of the predictions of a California radio preacher. The Bible is clear that “of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only” (Matthew 24:36). So it could have ended Saturday. It could end today. Then again, it may not end in your lifetime. Predictions of the end are not new. Before the Bible was even fully recorded, the Thessalonians confronted Paul with a rumor that the day of the Lord was at hand, and they had missed the rapture. Since then, there have been over 240 end-of-the-world predictions. In 1555, the most famous doomsday prophet, Nostradamus wrote in his book, “The Prophecies”, “The year 1999, seventh month, From the sky will come a great King of Terror” and would thus end the world. In 1806 the “Christian Science Monitor” reported, the “Prophet Hen of Leeds,” a domesticated fowl in England, began laying eggs that bore the message “Christ is coming” leading locals to believe the end of the world was at hand. Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson told followers: “I guarantee you by the end of 1982 there is going to be a judgment on the world.” The book “88 Reasons Why the Rapture is in 1988” proposed that the rapture would occur during a three-day window from Sept 11 to13. I remember Seminary students asking me if they came to class on those days and I had been raptured, what should they do? I told them to check with the Dean’s Office. Harold Camping, the proponent of last Saturdays’ end of the world theory, had already miscalculated once, predicting that the world would end in Sept., 1994. Nor will these predictions end. Several scientists and speculators have observed numerous astronomical alignments hinting at the planet’s demise, based on the view that the calendar of the ancient Mayan civilization ends on Dec. 21, 2012. So when will the world end? I don’t know. I’ve not been assigned to the Time & Place Committee, but rather to the Preparation Committee. “Therefore . . . be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect” (Matthew 24:44). The end is not yet, but it could be.