Jesus is coming back on May 21st!

So says Harold Camping. Why should you care?

Harold Camping is the president of Family Radio, which has over 100 radio stations across the United States and some other countries. He is not some “flash in the pan” kook. He has been hosting the “Open Forum” call-in show for 3 hours a night for decades where people call in with their Bible questions. He obviously has a large following because these hundred plus radio stations need lots of money to stay in existence.

For some time now he has been teaching that the “rapture” will occur on May 21, 2011, when “true believers” will be caught up to heaven, followed by a time of intense tribulation. Six months later the “end of the world” will come.

He has come to these dates through complex understandings of the exact calendar dates of everything from Adam and Eve, the flood, and the birth and death of Jesus. For example, he says that the creation of the world was 11,013 BC. The date of the flood was exactly 7,000 years before May 21st, 2011. To see some of the mind-numbing complexity, go here. Coincidentally, Camping is not a trained theologian. He is a civil engineer. My observation is that when engineers get a hold of end times prophecy, complicated mathematical interpretations are sure to follow! (Some of you may remember Edgar Whisenant who wrote a booklet called, “88 Reasons Why The Rapture Will Be In 1988.” He was an engineer!)

Camping says that certain numbers in the Bible have meanings. For example:

• 2  Those bringing the gospel
• 3  God’s purpose
• 5  The atonement (judgment and salvation)
• 7  Perfect fulfillment of God’s purpose
• 10  The completeness of whatever is in view
• 12  The fullness of whatever is in view
• 13  The end of the world
• 17  Heaven
• 23 Judgment or God’s wrath
• 37  Judgment or God’s wrath
• 40  Testing
• 43  Judgment or God’s wrath

So, if something was 46 years, for example, that is 2 x 23, so it has something to do with “those bringing the gospel” and “Judgment or God’s wrath.”

Most people write him off immediately because the Bible says that “No man knows the day or the hour” of the coming of Jesus. However, he has biblical explanations for all of the common objections to date-setting. For example, the book of Daniel says that one of the “seals” will be opened in the end times, allowing us to understand things that were hidden before. Many of the controversial doctrines he teaches are because “God is opening our spiritual eyes” to see things the we were not allowed to understand before. He quotes a verse in Ecclesiastes that says “a wise man's heart discerneth both time and judgment.” Moreover, he says that all of those restrictions regarding knowing the exact time of the end were in effect during the “church age,” which he claims ended several years ago. Lastly, he draws analogies to Noah and Jonah, both of whom warned people of God’s impending judgment, and when it would be (Niniveh-40 days, Noah-7 days). Jesus will come as a thief in the night, but the person that is watching (studying the Bible intently) will not be surprised or caught unaware.

Camping is a “true believer,” in that, he totally and absolutely believes this will happen because God has given “many infallible proofs.” These proofs generally come in the form of complicated mathematical coincidences, not by any observable events in the world. However, he sometimes uses external evidence to support his claims. For example, the evidence that they Holy Spirit departed the churches at the end of the church age can be seen by the church’s acceptance of divorce, the gay agenda, the rise of the charismatic emphasis on signs and wonders versus the Bible, and the persecution he and his followers experienced when they began believing and teaching some of his new doctrines.

Having come to his conclusion on the dates he has now gone through the entire Bible in excruciating detail showing how just about every verse supports his conclusion. One of his biblical interpretation principles is based on the verse that said that Jesus spoke in parables and “without a parable he spoke not unto them.” (Matthew 13:34) He claims that Jesus and the Bible are the same (both the Word of God). Therefore, since everything that Jesus said is a parable, everything in the Bible must be a parable. Now it is possible to take every saying, event, and teaching in the Bible and come up with an allegorical or parabolic “hidden” meaning. Unfortunately, once you go that route everything is up for grabs; it’s possible to show or prove anything! I have observed the irony that this results in taking the concrete, historical events in the Bible and finding hidden, spiritual meaning, while taking the parts of the Bible that are obviously parabolic or allegorical and assigning them literal, historical meaning! It’s a maze, to be sure.

Every extreme group develops it’s own nomenclature, or catch-phrases, and Family Radio is no exception. Here are some of them that you will hear Camping and his devotees utter regularly.

• “Super important” - What you say when you’re trying to make a point emphatically.
• “Holy” - Whenever you say God or Bible, make sure you put “Holy” in front of it.
• “True believer” - This is to differentiate between people who think they’re believers but are only deluded, and those that are really saved.
• “Do-it-yourself gospel” - This is what they call any church’s teaching about how to be saved.
• “Cry out to God for mercy” - This is the only thing you can do in hopes of salvation.
• “Listen to the whole Bible” - Anyone who doesn’t believe the doctrines Family Radio teaches are said to not be “listening to the whole Bible.” They are just picking and choosing verses here and there.
• “Compare Scripture with Scripture” - This is usually used to justify an interpretation of Scripture that is different than the norm, by showing how another verse defines a particular word in the first verse.
• “Local congregations” - Churches
• “Opening our spiritual eyes” - What God has been doing over the last few decades, helping Camping understand new doctrines that were previously hidden, unknown, or not understood.
• “Intense desire to obey the whole Bible” - the mark of a “true believer.”
• “Thank you for calling and sharing. And shall we take our next call please. Welcome to Open Forum.” (Sorry, I just had to include this! Those of you who have heard the program will get it.)

Here is an overview of the doctrines currently being taught. For details go here.

• End Times
• May 21, 1988 - The end of the Church Age, where the Holy Spirit departed from the churches, and Satan became their ruler. Start of the Great Tribulation. Virtually no one gets saved from now until the next event in the timeline, which is...
• September 7, 1994 - The end of “Silence in Heaven.” Now it’s time for a great multitude of people to become believers, a great harvest.
• May 21, 2011 - A great worldwide earthquake, and all true believers raptured away to heaven. The beginning of 5 months of severe judgment on the unbelieving. No possibility of being saved anymore.
• October 21, 2011 - The universe as we know it will be destroyed, and a new heaven and new earth will be created.
• Annihilationism: This is the doctrine that in the final judgment unbelievers will be destroyed in hell, not left alive to suffer torment eternally.
• Extreme Calvinism: This is the doctrine that there is nothing we can do in and of ourselves to be saved, including having faith. Faith is seen as a “work.” The only thing we can do is “cry out ot God for mercy” and maybe he will save us. In fact, one of his booklets is called, “I hope God will save me.” (To me, this strains the definition of “good news!”)
• End of the church age: This is the doctrine that in 1988 the Holy Spirit left the churches. Many of the verses in the Bible no longer apply, as they were only meant for the “church age.”
• Leaving the local congregations: This is the doctrine that states that since the Holy Spirit has left the churches and Satan is now in charge of them, all true believers will leave their congregations. God deals with people directly now, not through the church.
• Jesus’ crucifixion was only a demonstration: This is the doctrine that states that since the Bible teaches that Christ was slain “before the foundation of the world,” his crucifixion and death in 33 AD was only a “demonstration” of what he had already previously done.
• Assurance of salvation: How do you know you are one of the saved, elect, a true believer? Because you have “an intense desire to be obedient to the whole Bible.”

I have been listening to Family Radio off and on for the last few years, mainly because of my curiosity about what he and others will do on May 22nd, 2011, the day after the rapture will have supposed to taken place.

Other groups with large followings have set dates for the end of the world, for example, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, and the Worldwide Church of God. When the predictions fail sometimes the organization survives and sometimes it doesn’t. Those that do survive typically handle the failure in one of two ways: 1) They claim their math was wrong, or the calendar they used was faulty, so they reset the date. 2) They reinterpret what was supposed to have happened on that day in spritual/invisible terms, such that it could not be verified objectively. For example, “Christ did return on that day. He returned as the true leader of our church.” You get the point.

I have speculated what Camping will do on May 22nd. My guess is he will do #2. He is so convinced of this date through so many complicated proofs that it “can’t be wrong.” So, when the rapture doesn’t happen on May 21, I am sure he will say that the date was right, but our understanding of what would happen on that date was wrong, and he will go back to the Bible to find more “truth.” For example, he might say something like, “Christ did return for his true believers, but he did not take us up into a literal heaven like we were expecting - he took us ‘spiritually’ to heaven. We need to continue to live on this earth in order to continue to teach and preach the Word of God.” One of the reasons that leads me to believe he could take this kind of approach is that he claims that the “church age” ended several years ago, and that we have been in the great tribulation for many years now, neither of which have very good tangible evidence. External reality seems to matter little. Whatever is his current interpretation of the Bible is all that matters. Reality needs to conform to that.

However, there is a slim possibility that he could reset the date. The reason for this is that he formerly predicted 1994 as the end. People met in an ampitheater in California to await the end. When it didn’t happen, he went back to the Bible and refigured. I’m not sure it will happen again though, since he is so utterly convinced that he is right this time. The first time he published a book called “1994?” He thought it might be the end, but he didn’t teach it as undeniable truth.

The third possibility is that he will claim that God changed his mind because of people’s repentance. I base this on the fact that Camping refers often to the story of Jonah who preached judgment day to the city of Nineveh, and because of their repentance God changed his mind and spared the city. It’s tougher for me to believe he will take this stance because there is not wholesale repentance going on in the world now like there was in the story of Nineveh. But who knows. Anything’s possible.

The other thing to consider, of course, is what his followers will do on May 22nd. I am sure that many of them will be bitterly disillusioned. I’m not sure how one’s faith recovers after something like that. I am sure there will be some who will cling to Mr. Camping regardless, because they are so totally enamored with his Bible knowledge and sincerity that they regard him as a prophet, even though he is careful to claim that he is not one. He is just someone who has “carefully studied the whole Bible for many years and come to conclusions that anyone would come to who did the same.” He bills himself as a teacher, not a prophet. He claims no special revelation from God, and is suspicious of anyone who does.

What is my personal take on all this?

First, I respect and admire anyone who takes the Bible and his faith as seriously as Camping does.

Second, it seems odd to me that the way God would choose to reveal the exact date of the rapture and end of the world would be through an extremely intricate and complicated system of the timeline of history that only an engineer could possibly understand. Is this how he revealed the future to anyone else ever? No. He did it through prophets, not teachers.

Third, the whole date-setting phenomenon has been going on since the first century. This is not new. For an exhaustive list of these predictions go here. This is another in a very long list.

I think this failure will be life-altering for many of Camping’s followers, especially for those who have changed their whole lives (and bank accounts) based on this belief. In my opinion, the type of person that typically calls in to his talk show is generally uneducated, simple, suggestible, and fear-prone. They are “sheep,” if you will. It is sad, and in my heart I have wished to be available to help them in the aftermath, but have not known how to communicate that to them.

To leave your comment, or to read others', click on the word "comments" below.


If you'd like to drink the kool-aid you can follow this blog on facebook, email, google connect, or a blog reader. All those options are in the left corner. It would make me a happy boy...

Also, if you liked this article, please do me a favor and share it on Facebook or Twitter by clicking on the t or f in the row right underneath this sentence. Thanks!