Rapture Stuff, Again

It is time for the annual “Rapture Index” check-up. It currently stands at 181, which remains in the “fasten your seat belts” territory. The all-time high was 189 (on October 10, 2016, and again in 2023). With all the culture war unease, political tribalism, and “wars and rumors of wars” currently in the air, I suspect the proprietor must be sympathetic to Trump, which is why the index is as low as it is. If all the typical punditry signs are showing things getting worse, but you like the guy in charge, you probably cannot bring yourself to push the index higher. That is not supposed to happen on his watch.

And I keep asking, why would you want to “fasten your seat belts” if the rapture was near? Wouldn’t that leave a nasty mark when you get snatched away?

According to churchleaders.com,

Max Lucado opined, “are we witnessing a major turn in the calendar of prophetic history? It certainly seems that the stage is being set for the end of this age,” said author and Pastor Max Lucado in a video posted Sunday, June 22, titled, “Israel, Iran, and End Times.”

Pastor Greg Laurie of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California, had a take similar to Lucado’s in a video Laurie also posted following the United States’ decision to bomb Iran. Laurie titled his video, “Is This the Start of Gog and Magog? U.S.–Iran Tensions & Prophecy.” Gog and Magog are referenced in the Bible in Ezekiel 38-39 and in Revelation 20.

I’ve heard these same predictions all of my life—they have not come to pass yet and will not, because both men are looking for the wrong “signs.” If anyone is interested, I address the “signs of the end” in detail here.

The law of unintended consequences may just come back to bite the pundits. Peter warned us that “knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, `Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation’” (2 Peter 3:3-4). How many times can you cry “wolf” before people tune you out?

We keep hearing from these guys “the rapture is near, look at all the signs which are being fulfilled.” Due to the worries and uncertainty of our times, their followers eat this up. But only because their followers have forgotten, or choose not to remember, how many times these same predictions have been made, and then shamelessly made again the next time something happens in the Middle East.

Yes, the Lord will return, and yes, it will be glorious. But the signs given us in the New Testament (the universal preaching of the gospel, the rise of an Antichrist, the conversion of Israel) have nothing to do with Iran, Russia, or any of the things the pundits keep repeating.

Remember this? Apparently Jesus will return to Dallas (I think this is the 1975 Dallas skyline). This gem was the work of Charles Anderson. I recently found one in my papers—which I never sent. We used to take a few of these with us when we traveled, and then mail them to friends from overseas.

There are countless parodies of this, along with a few other postcards depicting the same thing. Apparently, none of the artists consulted Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15:52. “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.” Nor the words of Revelation 6:14-17 which come to pass at the same time.

“The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”

Not only is this stuff wearisome, it is based upon notions found nowhere in the New Testament. There is no seven-year tribulation predicted. There is no sudden rapture seven years before our Lord’s second advent. There is only the final consummation when time gives way to eternity! When Jesus comes back (and no one can know the day or the hour—Matthew 24:36) it is to raise the dead (the general resurrection—1 Corinthians 15:52), to judge the world (2 Thessalonians 1:6), and usher in the new creation (a new heaven and earth—2 Peter 3:4).

The biblical signs of the end remind us that our redemption draws near (Luke 21:28), and with Paul we cry out, “Maranatha! Lord come!” We also find comfort in our Lord’s promise made to John in Revelation 22:20, “He who testifies to these things says, `Surely I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!”

You can unbuckle your seat belts now . . .