The End of the World

Then End of the World

I assume Harold Camping is quite pissed right now. It’s deservedly so. He thought the world was going to end today. He thought the rapture was going to be back in May. We are all still here. So, today/tomorrow, he’s going to have to come up with an excuse as to why the world is not destroyed. (I’ve got several theories, including that it’s all bullshit, but I’ll leave that out)

So, why is the world here? I think the best story for comparison is that of Jonah. You probably know the Jonah and the Whale story, but do you know the back story. Do you know how it applies to Harold Camping and the End of the World?

Jonah was told by God to go to Nineveh, to tell them that God was going to destroy them.

Jonah 1:2 Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me.

But Jonah didn’t want to go to Nineveh, so he took a ship to Tarshish. This angered God, so he sent a storm at the boat. The mariners were angry with Jonah because it was his god that caused the storm, so they threw him overboard. Jonah was then eaten by a fish. After three days, the fish puked Jonah up on the land.

God told Jonah to go to Nineveh again, and tell the people they were going to be destroyed. So this time, Jonah went.

Jonah 3:4 And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.

5 So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.

So the people actually repented.

10 And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.

God didn’t destroy Nineveh that day. So everyone rejoiced, including Jonah…

It goes Jonah 3:10 to Jonah 4:1. Here is Jonah 4:1

Jonah 4:1 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.

Jonah was pissed that the place wasn’t destroyed. God then gives Jonah a show, with a worm and a gourd, and tells him some advice.

And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?

God says, Hey, there was a lot of people in there to be saved. Don’t be mad that I spared them… today.

Harold Camping believes the world is going to end today. He has made lots of people believe the world is going to end today. He will come up with an excuse for why the world didn’t end today. He’ll claim his calculations are off. He’ll claim that he missed a piece. He’ll claim that the math was wrong… (He won’t claim the 930 years of Adam’s life, AS thing as I’ve mentioned in other places, but that’s a different story). The thing he won’t mention is that maybe, God didn’t destroy the world, because it repented.

Are we living in the modern version of Nineveh? Did we repent? Did you repent?

Is Camping going to act like Jonah in 4:1 and be pissed that the earth wasn’t destroyed, like he was told/figured/calculated it to be? Probably. The best thing that Camping can do is to say that the earth repented, and God spared us, just like he did Nineveh. Then never make a stupid prediction again.

Christians seem to really look forward to the end of the world. It’s rather discomforting.