Today's Rapture Watching and Reading

Given all the media attention to a wacky Oakland preacher's prediction of The Rapture apparently scheduled for today, I thought it only fitting to bring back the king of the End Times genre, Billy Graham's 1972 movie "A Thief in the Night".  I remember seeing this when it first came out and frankly, it scared me half to death.  If it wasn't a Billy Graham film it probably would have been a pretty good Saturday afternoon B-Sci-Fi movie.

For several years preceding 1972 The Rapture was all the rage in evangelical circles.  A lot of people had taken this prophecy very literally:

"Now learn a lesson from the fig tree. When its buds become tender and its leaves begin to sprout, you know without being told that summer is near. Just so, when you see the events I've described beginning to happen, you can know his return is very near, right at the door. I assure you, this generation will not pass from the scene before all these things take place. Heaven and earth will disappear, but my words will remain forever." Matthew 24:32-35

Many took that to mean that within a single generation from the time Israel was reborn the Lord would return again. A generation was calculated at 20 years, so once 1968 rolled around (Israle was reborn on May 14, 1948) the whole Rapture thing hit high gear.

I remember much of the music of the time in Southern Gospel was Rapture-related. The number one song in 1968 was the Oak Ridge Boys "Jesus is Coming Soon". You can watch the Oaks perform that song many years later here. Other songs of the era included "Redemption Draweth Nigh" and "I Wish We'd All Been Ready". There were lots of them.

And in 1970 Hal Lindsey came out with his apocalyptic book The Late Great Planet Earth in which he purported to unlock all the secrets of the End Times.  Looking back from 40 years later it seems he was a little premature in some of his predictions.

Some in the media have taken this latest Rapture hoax as an opportunity to make all Christians look silly.  They don't refer to this one guy in Oakland as a fringe operation, but make blanket pronouncements that "Christians are expecting the Rapture on May 21st".  Bad, biased journalism.

As far as future predictions go, your best advice comes from Matthew 24:36:

"However, 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."

And He's not talking to crazy old radio preachers in Oakland.