May 21, 2011: A Day the Rapture Will Not Occur

You may have seen the billboards along the sides of the road: May 21, 2011: Save the Date! One religious group claims that you can know the day that Jesus will return, and it is coming very soon. Like many false religious claims, the "We Can Know" movement sounds good, because it contains about 99% truth; unfortunately, it has about 1% poison to it as well. The truth is, we won't know the day of the Lord's return. As a result, if you want to predict a date that you can guarantee that the Rapture will not occur, it will definitely not occur on May 21, 2011 (although it could happen on May 20th or May 22nd, so don't start partying like it's 2012 just yet).

What is the Rapture?

The final years on Earth, as predicted in the Bible, will begin with the Rapture. The Rapture is when Jesus comes back to the clouds and takes all the Christians, living and dead, to Heaven to be with him. After the Rapture, there will be a seven year period on Earth called the Tribulation. This is when the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Antichrist will appear; whoever is left behind will not have a good time. The Bible says that the Rapture will come like a thief in the night, although the We Can Know group believes that it will occur on May 21st.

A Convincing Theory

If you take a look at the "We Can Know" web site, you'll see quite a few convincing Bible verses explaining how you can know when the Lord's return is imminent. It points out Bible verses like Mark 13:35-37 and John 8:12, which admonish Christians to watch for the Lord's return. If you look through the web site, you can read their mathematical calculations which tell you why they believe that the date is May 21st. They base it on the date of Noah's flood and upon the date of Christ's crucifixion. If you aren't familiar with the entire Bible, you just might begin to think that they are correct.

Proof that the Lord Will Not Return on May 21, 2011

The biggest problem with the We Can Know group is that they omit one key verse from their analysis: Matthew 24:36. In that verse, Jesus says (of his return) "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only." If only the Heavenly Father knows the day, that means that Jesus doesn't even know the day of his return! If Jesus doesn't know the date of His return, do you think that a few mortals with a convincing theory know the truth? I don't think so.

What We Can Know

The We Can Know group seems convincing because there are some true things to what they are saying. Although we can't know the exact date of the Rapture, we can watch for the signs and know when it is going to happen soon. We can become familiar with prophetic books like Daniel and Revelation and look for the figurative planets to align. We know that when the Jewish people return to Israel, that the Lord's return is near. When Iran, Russia, and Turkey are teaming up (which they are), we can know that the Gog and Magog alliance is being formed. When China is forming alliances with countries that are unfriendly to Israel, and is capable of producing a 200 million man army, we can know that the massive army predicted in Revelation could literally come true. It is true that some people thought that the Lord could return 100 years ago, but there has never been a time in world history that all of the human-led events in the last book of the Bible could be fulfilled without supernatural help. Additionally, all the unrest and economic turmoil in the world could easily lead to the people clamoring for some charismatic leader (such as the Antichrist) to come help them. We can know when the Lord's return is near, although we cannot know the exact day.

God will not be proven a liar. When the Bible says that nobody will know the exact date, it's true. Although the rapture could happen before May 21st, if you wake up on that morning and the Christians haven't gone into Heaven yet, you can be pretty sure that you'll make it through the rest of the day without the Rapture's occurrence.

Sources:

Bible.

We Can Know web site.