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139 Sleeps to go...


Just got some good news today meaning that I, my family and my church can start to make provisional plans up to June 2014... However, I no sooner had got that message than I looked at a blog over at Biblical World, and discovered that all such planning may well be in vain. Now, I know that, in the words of Rabbie Burns,
The best-laid schemes o' mice an 'men
Gang aft agley,
No-one knows exactly what the future holds... Well I say that, but apparently someone does... Family Radio Worldwide and their friends on the WeCanKnow website... and because of what they know, there's not much point in making long term plans (unless of course they are plans for our eternal well-being) because according to billboards they have been erecting around Nashville, and material on their websites, the rapture/armageddon/the second coming is going to happen on May 21st 2011...
AAAARRRGHHHHH!!!!!!
Do these people not read the Bible, including the passage for the lectionary on Sunday (which I spoke about on Radio Ulster), beginning:
No-one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
Matthew 24:36 (ANIV)

Here we are in the season of Advent, preparing for the coming of Christ... not just a remembrance of his first coming, but his promised second coming. Now we could debate until the cows come home (or until Jesus comes again) what exactly is mean by that... But there is no debating the words of Jesus above... He didn't know when, so why should we expect God the Father to let us in on the secret?
Plenty of people are quick to tell me, when they look at the state of the world that "it can't be long now!" And in response I've often quoted the words of Tony Campolo when he was challenged about the timing of the second coming:

"I don't know when Jesus is coming back. I'm not on the planning committee. I'm on the welcoming committee..."
ps. I home that Family Radio Worldwide and WeCanKnow have the integrity to pull the plug on May 22nd... Or perhaps they won't be around to do so...
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