The Rapture that Never Happened

The attached billboard says it all. After being plastered on thousands of other billboards around the world eerily proclaiming Judgment Day on May 21, 2011, the doomsday prophecy of Harold Camping, the president and general manager of Oakland-based Family Radio, failed to come true.

Camping claimed that based on information gleaned directly from the Bible, on May 21 there would be cataclysmic earthquakes, dead bodies coming alive from graves flung open, and 200 million people disappearing skyward into heaven to escape five more months of catastrophe culminating in the end of the world on October 21, 2011.

After spending an estimated $100 million to warn the world of its pending doom, its failure, indeed, was awkward.

The day after, Camping appeared at the front door of his residence and told reporters "It has been a really tough weekend." Ya think?

"I'm looking for answers," he added, referring to frequent prayer and consultations with friends, "but now I have nothing else to say. I'll be back to work Monday and will say more then."

But people hoping that Camping would admit that he was wrong and ask forgiveness were sorely disappointed when during a press conference at Family Radio headquarters Monday night, he claimed that May 21 was a "spiritual" Judgment Day rather than a literal one, and he was initially "flabbergasted" that nothing was destroyed because he was focused on a literal judgment. Instead, God has now judged the world "spiritually" and will bring about the end of the world on October 21:

"We've always said May 21 was the day, but we didn't understand altogether the spiritual meaning. The fact is there is only one kind of people who will ascend into heaven ... if God has saved them they're going to be caught up."

God completed his judgment and salvation plan on Saturday, so there is no point in warning people about it anymore. Thus, Family Radio will instead play Christian music and programming until the real end on October 21.

As he continued to explain himself before an army of reporters and cameras, his bizarre theology came out of the closet with these rambling remarks:

• God's judgment really began back on May 21, 1988, when He left the church and let Satan take them over. Churches don't really believe the Bible is the literal Word of God because in teaching from it pastors always say "Paul says", "Moses says" or "Peter says" instead of "God says."
• There is no such thing as conscious eternal damnation for the lost, and thus no hell. In His grace and mercy, God spared the world five months of destruction and judgment because that would have brought eternal damnation on the earth. (Camping believes in the unbiblical doctrine of annihilation--that the lost will cease to exist rather than suffer eternally in hell.)
• God's period of judgment was from May 21, 1988 to the same date in 2011.
• September 7, 1994, the last time Camping predicted the end of the world, was actually the beginning of salvation for those who left the church and cried out to God for mercy.
• He declined to offer hope or assistance for the thousands of followers who blew away their life savings buying billboards and going on RV caravans to spread the May 21 message. He said that we're in a recession, and lots of people lost their homes "but they survived. People cope, people cope." Also, the great losses from the recent economic crash was much less than what "the average Family Radio listener" experienced.

With all due respect, these are the confusing and contradicting words of a unrepentant, rambling idiot.

Meanwhile, lawsuits against Family Radio may be coming. An attorney in Media, Pennsylvania is actively offering his services to devastated Camping followers who want to sue the pants off him for losses and damages incurred from his misleading information.

So what happens now? Camping has again been proven to be a false prophet and bona-fide cult leader, but the damage has been done to Christianity in general.

Well, I've made the following observations.

• The Rapture is a legitimate secondary doctrinal issue we can disagree on, but which Camping has twisted and brought into disrepute.The Rapture is an endtimes doctrine held by many evangelical and conservative churches in which believers will be literally caught up from the earth to meet the Lord in heaven before a seven-year-event called the Great Tribulation, followed by Christ's second coming to the earth to set up a literal 1,000-year reign of righteousness from Jerusalem. There are variations to this doctrine, such as "pre-trib", "mid-trib" and "post-trib" Raptures, but no exact or approximate date is ever given or assumed for when the Rapture will happen. While I no longer hold such endtime beliefs as a Lutheran, I still have fellowship and partner with fellow believers who sincerely believe this secondary doctrine and it boils my blood when nutcases like Harold Camping butcher and distort it so that it makes all evangelicals look bad.
• Camping's followers need compassion and mercy in their seeking recovery from his influence. On the message boards at Crosswalk.com a pastor met about 25-30 Family Radio listeners who fell for Camping's rubbish because they grew up in strict fundamentalist churches with authoritarian leadership that told them what to believe and why. These poor folks were never taught how to read the Bible for themselves and check what was being taught. Psychologically they have been conditioned to accept anything Camping says because of his assumed authority, just like how cult members are conditioned and brainwashed. And like anyone else coming out of a cult knowing they were duped, a judgmental "See, I told you so!" approach will not work. A gentle, compassionate and genuinely caring approach has proven to be far more effective. When I left an authoritarian, legalistic independent church in 2000, the unconditional love showed to me by the Immanuel First congregation helped me heal from that influence.
• We ourselves need to be on guard against false teachings, lest we end up just like the Family Radio followers. It's very easy for us who sit under solid biblical teaching to make fun of and dismiss the Family Radio masses as a bunch of brainwashed nutcases who blindly believe what they are taught. But have we ever been persuaded that a certain preacher or Bible teacher is trustworthy because they are bold hellraisers who condemn hot-button issues like gay marriage, abortion, moral relativism and the liberal agenda? John Hagee is such a hellraiser who has gained a large following because of his bellicose and blunt personality, but he is also a Word of Faith preacher who believes the Jews already are saved under a separate covenant with God, that positive confession can heal all diseases, and that persecution of the Jews throughout history (including the Holocaust) was because of their disobedience to God. Like with Harold Camping, we must never let the charisma of a pastor cloud our spirit of discernment. After all, God gave us brains to use.

So much more can be said of what we can learn from this whole debacle, but this will suffice.

In closing, I am humbled that at least two frightened listeners of Family Radio were convinced to switch it off completely and instead tune in to better Christian alternatives and return to the church through my corresponding with them on Crosswalk.com. Never did I ever think that I would help set a lover of God free from a dangerous cult, but I have always been passionate about apologetics, which is part of evangelism and the Great Commission. In addition to the 25-30 others now being counseled by the aforementioned pastor, I hope that this evangelism to former Camping followers is replicated nationwide and worldwide. If even one person comes out of the darkness back into the light, it will be worth it all.