So the World’s Ending? Again? This Time on April 23rd

By Al Perrotta Published on April 22, 2018

In case you hadn’t heard, the world’s coming to an end. Again. This time the dire prediction comes courtesy of a numerologist named David Meade. Apparently you toss a bit of Revelation, a dash of Isaiah, and some astronomical happenings — and toss out Jesus Christ saying “no one knows the day nor the hour” — and bada bing.  April 23rd is it. Doomsday. Rapture. As in the Lord will say, “That’s a wrap, folks.”

Sure, tell me now, after I’ve spent the weekend doing my taxes. On the plus side, it is a Monday.

So with one foot in eternity and tongue firmly planted in cheek, I have some last minute thoughts before this “mortal coil” packs it in.

Random (Tweetable) Thoughts on Doomsday

If Doomsday did arrive Stormy Daniels would still be CNN’s top story.

Figures. History happens for thousands of years only to end days before our book is published. (The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration, out May 21. If there is a May 21.)

Will the Pearly Gates have walls, or will people just be able to sneak in?

Jesus said “no one, but the Father knows the day nor the hour.” He also said “Love your neighbor,” and lots of people ignore that one too.

We may not be in the End Times, but judging from all the moronic things in the news we’re certainly in the Rear End Times.

What’s the point of predicting Doomsday? Even if you’re right nobody will be around to hear you say, “I told you so.”

April 23rd is William Shakespeare’s birthday. He wrote: “Come, let us take a muster speedily:
Doomsday is near; die all, die merrily.” (Henry IV, Part I, Act IV, scene 1, line 133) And somewhere a high schooler is saying, “Thank God. Now I don’t have to study for Tuesday’s English lit test. And that makes me very merry.”

This David Meade is no Shakespeare. But he is another Harold Camping.

Doomed Doomsday Predictions

Remember Pastor Harold Camping?  He was so positive the world was ending May 21, 2011 at 6 p.m. he spent millions on billboards warning people of the pending Rapture. 

The world did not end on May 21st, 2011 — best I can tell from Google. Dear Pastor Camping decided he had done some miscalculating. The Rapture would be five months later, on October 21. Checked Wikipedia, and again, no Rapture. 

By October 21, Camping was using words like “probably” and “maybe.” And after nothing happened, Camping retired. It was later reported that Camping had told an interviewer on October 16 that God hadn’t given anyone the power to know exactly when the Rapture would come. Why hadn’t he read that passage before he made his prediction and spent millions who knows? But his earnestness was actually endearing. 

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The world was also supposed to end at the turn of the millennium. Remember the Y2K panic? 

Fox News lists a whole series of gloom-and-doom predictions from our recent past. Each had less impact than the break-up of the Spice Girls.

The World Won’t End. It’ll Begin Anew

Since it’s a pretty fair bet we’ll be dodging Doomsday Monday, what’s that mean for Tuesday?

It means that as much as we may have mucked up the works since the Garden, we get another shot at it. We can reach across the ocean to make peace. We can reach across the aisle and find compromise. We can reach across and hold the hand of a loved one. (Lamentations 3:23)

Like Paul, we can be “forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead.” (Philipeans 3:13) The mercies of the Lord are “new every morning.” And so are the opportunities to express his mercy to others.

Sure, it’s easy to mock the Campings and the Meades, express shock at the success of the Left Behind novel series. We can even be cynical at the fortunes made with End of Times books, movies and ministries. But then again, we read the very last lines of the Bible (Revelation 22:20):

The one who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.”

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!

The anticipation is invigorating, rejuvinating, exhilerating. The danger is having it become intoxicating, debilitating. To leave undone the task of spreading his Kingdom on this earth.

For the past month, and continuing for at least the next month, our publisher James Robison has been hosting and taping a gathering at our studios every Monday night focused on this very point. How do we make a Kingdom Impact?

Practical ways we can put aside Doomsdays to help create bloom days.

We expect to be posting highlights from these meetings and sharing ways to get involved and take part. I hope you’ll join us.

The world is not ending just yet. Our task is to reach those who feel their world is.

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