Is the Rapture Really Happening on May 21?

(Update, May 19, 2011): With Harold Camping's so called Judgment Day of May 21 less than 24 hours away in parts of the world as I write this, he is apparently taking back some of his comments. In an interview for CNN, he is no longer insisting that the Rapture will be a so-called "rolling judgment" hitting each time zone at exactly 6:00pm or 1800 local time, but it could happen anywhere at any hour:

"We cannot say emphatically that it’s 6 pm. There’s a lot of information that looks at the probability of 6 pm in any city in the world–when that great earthquake will occur. It could be that it might be just one great earthquake, but there is enough evidence in the Bible that says it will begin at one point in the world, and it could be at 6 pm—that’s a great possibility. Then as it gets to be May 21 in any other country—there will be a great earthquake there."

Read the entire interview of Camping with CNN's Jay Kernis at the following link, "Harold Camping Prepares for Judgment Day":

http://inthearena.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/17/harold-camping-prepares-for-judgment-day-may-21-2011/?hpt=C2

I will have a postscript on the aftermath of this whole controversy after May 22 in a whole new post separate from this one.

(Original post follows)

If you listen to Christian radio here on the internet, cable, satellite, or good old-fashioned shortwave and AM/FM, in the past few months you may have heard a lot of noise from people claiming that the Rapture, or the Day of Judgment, is happening on May 21, 2011 and the end of the world five months later on October 21.

Those wild predictions are from Harold Camping, co-founder and president of Family Radio, a ministry based in Oakland, California that once preached and defended orthodox and biblical Christian doctrine but in the past 15 years has cut itself off from the rest of Christianity and has made false, heretical claims such as God is no longer working in the churches but Satan is instead, that hell does not exist, that Jesus didn't really die for our sins on the cross, and that the only way to salvation is to cry out to God "Have mercy on me, a sinner!" and hope that maybe God will save you when the Rapture comes. Camping also taught that the Second Coming of Christ was back on September 6, 1994 and that believers could no longer be saved after 1988.

While most Christians recognize all of this as bunch of nonsense, there are thousands of followers of Family Radio who are betting their lives on Camping's May 21 end date and billboards have been placed all around the world to scare people into listening to the ministry. But Jesus Christ clearly said that:

"no one knows the day or hour when these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the Son himself. Only the Father knows." (Matthew 24:36, Mark 13:32)

and He warned His disciples against false teachers:

"Then if anyone tells you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah,’ or ‘There he is,’ don’t believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will rise up and perform signs and wonders so as to deceive, if possible, even God’s chosen ones. Watch out! I have warned you about this ahead of time!" (Mark 23:21-23)

Because his previous date-setting prophecies have failed miserably and he failed to repent of those sins, that alone should be a good reason to not pay any attention to Harold Camping.

Despite those clear and plain admonitions from our Lord Himself, Camping has for whatever reason to go his own way, using an esoteric and mystical way of interpreting the Bible through numerology, mathematics (he uses the old term "arithmetic"), adding so called "deeper spiritual meaning" to verses by taking them out of their original context and creating a new context with a totally unrelated verse, and claiming that "new revelation" can always be gleaned from the Bible and the job is never done. Through these twisted methods of studying scripture he has made the following proclamations:

• The Holy Spirit has been removed from all the churches and Satan is ruling them instead.
• The "Church Age" (whatever that is) has ended, and God is no longer working through the church.
• If you're still in the church, you won't be raptured on May 21 and your soul is in grave danger.
• Hell is not real; it's a man-made doctrine used by the church that is not supported in the Bible.
• Nonbelievers will be "annihilated"--cease to exist--as "the second death" instead of consciously being separated from God forever in Hell as taught in Revelation 20:10-15 (the final judgment) and Luke 16:19-31(the parable of the rich man and Lazarus).
• Jesus didn't really die for our sins on the cross at Calvary; instead He "spiritually died" before the world was created and the crucifixion was merely a "symbol" of what was already done in eternity past.
• Worst of all, Camping doesn't teach that salvation comes through faith in Jesus Christ. Instead, he says we should cry out to God "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner!" (a twisted and false interpretation of Luke 18:13) and hope that maybe God will save you when the Rapture happens on May 21.

Harold Camping turns 90 years old this year, and critics have suggested that old age and senility are the reason for his horrible teachings. But that doesn't hold water. Billy Graham is 92 years old and still has a sharp mind for biblical truth and evangelism despite his frail condition and struggle with Parkinson's disease, and Chuck Smith of the Calvary Chapel churches is still behind the pulpit and teaching the Bible even at the age of 84 and after a recent back surgery. Even if the flesh is weak, the spirit is willing and able in these men. Camping made a conscious decision a long time ago to reject the church and go his own way, claiming that he alone has true teaching and everyone else is wrong. Cult leaders like Jim Jones, David Koresh, Sung Myun Moon (founder of the Unification Church) and Charles Taze Russell (founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses) all made the same claim before him.

Many evangelical churches who hold to the doctrine of the Rapture, in which believers will be "caught up to meet with the Lord in the air" and be taken out of this world before the Antichrist is revealed (and popularized in the "Left Behind" books and movies), have condemned Camping for daring to set an exact date for the event and denying salvation through Christ. We Lutherans do not believe the Rapture and Second Coming of Christ are separate events as evangelicals do, instead teaching it all comes about on Judgment Day. This is a secondary issue that all Christians can debate and discuss over, as I wrote in my last post, but we need not divide or judge over. Proof of that unity in diversity is the almost unanimous and strong stand by all orthodox and conservative Christians against Camping.

Should we abandon the church because there have been some unfortunate trends like the ordaining of gay clergy, denying the deity of Christ, and other things within some liberal denominations who no longer believe the Bible is true? Absolutely not. Instead, we should continue to serve the Lord through His ordained instrument, the church, as flawed as it is because it is led by sinful people saved by the grace of God, and we must be there to welcome Camping's followers back to the church when May 22 comes and they realize they were deceived.

A brief explanation of Harold Camping's false teachings and how to easily defeat them are found at this link to Redeemer Broadcasting of Olivebridge, New York:

Family Radio Alternative (an analysis of Harold Camping's teachings)