So now we all know that Harold Camping did not accurately predict Jesus’ return… but perhaps more importantly, did Jesus predict Harold Camping? But then, why should anyone care?
“Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many.” (Matt 24:11) That was easy! We can surely agree that Jesus predicted false prophets, and Mr. Camping wasn’t the first. Interestingly, Jesus’ prophecy regarding false prophets is in the context of the lead-up to the day of His own coming. It is fascinating, then, that Harold Camping’s false prophecy leans toward confirming Jesus’ true prophecy!
But then again, many atheists of our day prophesied the embarrassment of Harold Camping as well… planning parties, creating whimsical mockeries using “left-behind” clothes in photos, making the most of entrepreneurial opportunities created by false prophesy, etc.
So why should we care? Well that depends on your standpoint. So choose a world-view and read on…
Believers in Jesus
If you believe that Jesus meant what He said, then the remainder of Matthew 24 would be useful to you. In reading it, you will find that Jesus’ commands are to beware of deception, to not be afraid, (by implication) to maintain carefully your love of God and endurance, to be ready, and to be doing the work of the Master when He returns. Did you skip over this list? If you are a believer in Jesus, Harold Camping’s false prophecy is a real indication that perhaps you should make sure you re-read this list and be actively doing what He says! Let’s not worry so much about when and how and whether we are pre-mid-post-mil-trib-wrath-istic or otherwise, and let’s just do what Jesus said to be doing when we begin to see the signs of His coming!
Atheists
Why should an atheist care? Well, interestingly, the whole of the secular atheism establishment is strengthening the faith of the faithful atheists, bolstered by the foolishness of those who believed foolishly in that which was not true.
This also is very consistent with what Jesus predicted in Matthew 24: “The love of many will grow cold.”
Perhaps even more incredible is how these events (which Jesus said “MUST happen”) are setting you, my dear atheist, for your own failed prophecies. But I should explain.
In Revelation 19:19, there is an amazingly crazy statement. It says that the rulers of the earth all get together with their armies to fight against Jesus and his heavenly army. At first glance, it would seem preposterous that anybody would be so stupid as to intentionally go out to fight against God, and indeed it is preposterous. But this strongly suggests to us that there needs to be some very powerful strengthening of the faith of these anti-God-ites who decide to fight against the All-Powerful One.
In the light of this, we see that the whole Harold Camping prophecy, huge monies spent advertising his failed predictions, and even the media craze and popular hype of this predictable failure… all these are truly necessary for a faith-building exercise for those who desire to believe in not-God. This has truly been spectacularly effective, although I suspect we will need even more faith-building before we can get everybody so convinced that we all head out with our AK-47s, tanks, and nuclear warheads to fight against God.
So expect some additional hype in the months to come… the Mayan Calendar of 2012 thing should help a bunch too. Mockery helps a ton. Figure out a good angle so you can make some money on the next one.
And one other thing, start to feel justified in your hatred for believers. Jesus predicted this as well, so we can be expecting increasing militancy in your circle of friends and fellow not-God believers.
So, I guess if you want to get to my point, it is simply this, that if you want to continue in your faith, you will have ample opportunity to bolster your faith through mockery, leading to hatred. But in the end, your faith-inspired (check previous blogs that demonstrate this) prophecy of not-God will meet up with unfortunate evidence to the contrary. So my counsel is to beware, although such counsel is probably pretty hard to hear, right?
Harold Camping Disciples (or Ex-disciples)
Just because Mr. Camping blew it does not mean God did. Your issue is the same as his: if you know the Book but don’t hear the voice of the Author, you will be deceived. Shove the shame off. Kill off the condemnation. So you were duped… like most everybody else in one way or another! You proved faithful, but unfortunately you were faithful to foolishness – find God and be faithful to the Father Himself instead of what somebody says Father meant when He said something some time. Press in and find out what Father is saying to you today. He’s not mad at you, and He did not disappear as May 21st ticked away. Just be happy that the deception has been dealt with and move forward toward God – not some religious futility promoted by someone who claims to know the Bible.
The Bible or religion never was going to save you anyway. That’s God’s job.
Everybody Else
Well, if you are in between or just aren’t sure whether you believe anything or not, then let me say this: don’t get swept up in the mockery. I know that it is very tempting. Fooled people are easy to laugh at! But in the middle of the mockery is the powerful deception that nothing is true… that lie that says that God Himself was wrong because a bunch of people supposedly speaking for Him were very, publicly, outrageously wrong. And it would be very tempting to gloat a little bit about how you were less wrong because you weren’t even nervous on May 21st. Tempting, but dangerous. A better approach? Do the God experiment, and ask Him if He would show Himself to you… then listen with an open heart. Because if Jesus predicted Harold Camping, then we may be at the beginning of the end 
.