The rapture and dates

I am a "Johnny come lately" on the subject of what happened last week.

Jesus was supposed to return last Saturday, May 21, 2011.

I didn't even know about the prediction (I guess I have been too busy doing God's work :)).

Saturday afternoon I called "Apple support" about something with my cell phone.  While we were talking, the subject of the "end of the world" came up.  The person I was talking to asked me (in knowing I was a pastor), "what do you think about the end of the world coming?"

I replied, "I don't mean to sound cliche, but if the world does end, I know where I am going."

He went on to inform me of Harold Camping's prediction that the world was going to end that day with the return of Jesus Christ.

Great witnessing conversation starter.  We agreed to continue our conversation on email.

The minister (Camping) who was predicting it had predicted this same exact thing in 1994. Now in 2011, he was back with a new wave of billboards and devoted followers handing out flyers warning about the rapture date.

You didn’t think it was going to happen. You knew it wasn’t going to happen on that date and probably quoted the same verse I did, Matthew 24:36 “No one knows about that day or hour. Not even the angels in heaven know. The son does not know. Only the father knows.”

Predicting the second coming for Jesus dates to the first days of Christianity, when believers said he would return in their lifetimes. Since then there have been a series of failed predictions. One of the most famous, known as the Great Disappointment, happened in 1843, after William Miller and his followers sold their homes and waited out in a field for Jesus to come back.

Former NASA engineer Edgar C. Whisenant sold millions of copies of his book "88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will be in 1988."

Richard Landes, director of the Center for Millennial Studies at Boston University, said predictions of the end of the world provide relief from the pressures of daily life for some. That's why they continue to be so popular.

"Whatever the mess that your life is in, it makes everything nice and simple," he said.

Well, as far as I know, we are all still here.  At least I am.  When I get a rapture scare, I always look to see if Debbie is still around.  If she is, I know that I am safe. 

Come, Lord Jesus, come!