CAMPBELLTON, New Brunswick, July 21, 2023 – If the comments posted under YouTube videos are anything to go by, a good many Christians these days are basing their witness on end times prophecies. They’ve blown right past preaching the Good News, loving your enemies, and keeping the Ten Commandments and fast-forwarded to pre-Armageddon, where they hope to be among the lucky few who will be raptured before things get too nasty here on Earth.

The only problem with this strategy is that it hasn’t worked out too well for all the other Christians who’ve been doing it over the past 2000 years.

I’m not going to delve into the risk-aversion, reality-avoidance, and borderline sadistic psychopathologies of those who are enraptured by the rapture. Nor am I going to point out that Jesus never recommended that we skip the preaching/loving/Commandments-keeping phases to don a “THE END IS NIGH” sandwich board and think we’ve done our job as his followers. No, far be it for me to mention those things, even in passing. What I will mention is that end times prophecies, like all predictions of future occurrences ranging from God-given all the way down to weather forecasts, rely on the source. If God is the source, well, you can take those prophecies to the bank, but every other source requires a measure or two (or more) of salt.

The Bible has amply documented the straight-from-God prophecies about Armageddon and pre-Armageddon, starting at Genesis and ending at Revelation. We honestly don’t need any more than what God has already given us. If we not only start but stay with that tried-and-trued premise, we’ll be fine. Where things start to go hinky and send people off-course is when self-styled prophets claim to have “a word from God” without anything to back up their claims except their own dubious claims.

YouTube, as I’ve written before, is rife with false prophets preaching that Jesus is coming back soon. Not only that, but they breathlessly tell us that Jesus is coming back to set up his worldly kingdom. So the same people who are certain that Jesus is coming back soon to rapture them to Heaven are just as certain that he’s coming back soon to set up his worldly kingdom. They see no contradiction between these two beliefs.

It would be funny if it weren’t so sad.

I can’t imagine that Jesus, having already endured 33 years here, culminating in an excruciating crucifixion, is going to give up his glorified body and exalted seat at the right hand of God to come back to Earth to set up a worldly kingdom, especially since he stated plainly that his Kingdom is not of this world. If Jesus’ Kingdom is not of this world (and scripture cannot be contradicted) – if Jesus’ Kingdom is not of this world, then how can he set up a kingdom in this world? Wouldn’t that be contradicting scripture?

The so-called millennial (1000-year) kingdom is God’s Kingdom on Earth. It is a spiritual Kingdom that was set up by Jesus during his time on Earth 2000 years ago. This Kingdom is not of this world and is not even on Earth. It is, however, spiritually accessible, via God’s Holy Spirit, to born-again believers who are still on Earth.

Again, the Kingdom is not on Earth but has been made spiritually accessible to us while were still here. This is the so-called millennial kingdom written about in the book of Revelation. It was also written about in Daniel, where the prophet describes a kingdom that will be set up alongside other kingdoms but will be an eternal kingdom ruled over by the “Son of man”. Isaiah also famously talked about the Kingdom (Isaiah 35:8-10), as did all the OT prophets, starting with Enoch.

As much as I’d like to base my entire witness on “Jesus is coming back soon” and hoping to get raptured the heck outta here, I’d be denying scripture if I did. Jesus told us to watch, but he didn’t say to do so while shirking our other duties as his followers. Those virgins didn’t get that oil in their lamps just by wishing it there. They were ready when the bridegroom arrived not because all they did is wait for him, but because they did the other things that enabled them to have the oil, i.e., preaching, loving, and keeping the Commandments.

Waiting is just one of the many tasks Jesus gave us; it’s not the only one. Those who base their witness on signs of the end times are like people who skip to the back of a book and only read the ending. Sure, they’ll find out how it all works out – who lives and who doesn’t – but they miss the point of how the story got there in the first place.

They miss the whole point of the story.