A week ago yesterday, the 89 year old radio evangelist Harold Camping was proven to be a false teacher… again.
His prediction that Christians would be raptured on May 21st, 2011 did not come true. Actually, that was a second false prediction, as he initially had claimed September 6, 1994 as being the date of the rapture. He later claimed a mathematical error to be the problem when it did not happen, but in the weeks leading up to May 21st, declared with 100% certainty that his math was now correct, and his interpretation sure.
So, what is he saying now? That Jesus did come, in a “spiritual judgment” upon the world. His first view was that a great earthquake would signal the final judgment, accompanied by the rapture of the saints. Then, in the next five months there would be cataclysmic and horrific events leading up to the final destruction of the earth on October 21, 2011.
Now? “We have to be looking at all of this a little bit more spiritual, but it won’t be spiritual on October 21,” he said. “Because the Bible clearly teaches that then the world is going to be destroyed altogether.”
His view is that Christ’s judgment is finished, that what happens in the next five months does not matter, as God has already decided the fate of men and of the earth. Because of this, his radio station will no longer do any more evangelizing. It will primarily play music until the date of October 21.
It is interesting to consider Camping’s after-the-fact explanation of his erroneous claims. He now says, in effect, it happened and we just didn’t see it. This is exactly the explanation given by the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Charles Russell, who started the denomination claimed that the world would end in 1874. When it didn’t happen, the date was changed to 1914. Other dates predicted by the Jehovah’s Witnesses were 1925, 1941 and 1975.
Witness’ doctrine evolved to teach that 1914 was the date of Jesus’ invisible return to reign on His throne, and that the generation that then existed would still be alive at the end of the world. (Hence, the date of 1975, and then until around 1995 the continued belief). By that time, almost all alive and of age in 1914 had died. Interestingly, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have been much more cautious as of late, stating “Rather than providing a rule for measuring time, the term ‘generation’ as used by Jesus refers principally to contemporary people of a certain historical period, with their identifying characteristics.” (November 1, 1995 issue of Watchtower).
So now the Witnesses are claiming that the end will come in our general period of history, but are too snakebitten by their date setting failures to posit any particular date of the world’s destruction.
As we have mentioned before, all date setters are immediately false teachers. We can demonstrate the falseness of their claims in the failures of their prophecies (cf. Deuteronomy 18:20-22). But, we can even know before their predicted day that they speak falsely, because the Bible reveals that no one can know the time of His coming. “For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:2).
Harold Camping has been discredited, as have the Jehovah’s Witnesses. However, the credulous will continue to believe their error. In response, we must “contend earnestly for the faith” (Jude 3).
