What we can learn from failed predictions of the end of the world

Here are some online sources of information about failed predictions for the end of the world:
These sites give a long list of predictions without examining them in detail.  Good places to get an overview:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/end_wrld.htm
http://www.armageddononline.org/failed_armageddon.php

Here are the details of one prediction about Jesus's second coming in 2011 (Taken from http://www.bible.ca/pre-date-setters.htm):
 

TIMING OF IMPORTANT EVENTS IN HISTORY 11,013 BC—Creation. God created the world and man (Adam and Eve).
4990 BC—The flood of Noah's day (6023 years from creation). All perished in a worldwide flood. Only Noah, his wife, and his 3 sons and their wives survived in the ark.
7 BC—The year Jesus Christ was born (11,006 years from creation).
33 AD—The year Jesus Christ was crucified and the church age began (11,045 years from creation).
1988 AD—The 13,000th year of earth's history. This year ended the church age and began the great tribulation period of 23 years (8400 days).
1994 AD—On September 7th, the first 2300-day period of the great tribulation came to an end and the latter rain began (commencing God's plan to save a great multitude of people outside of the churches).
2011 AD—On May 21st, the rapture will occur at the end of the 8400-day great tribulation. NO ONE will become saved from eternal damnation after Friday, May 21, 2011.
On October 21st, the world will be destroyed by fire.
ONE DAY IS AS 1000 YEARS The child of God has learned from the Bible that the language of Genesis 7 has a twofold meaning: Genesis 7:4 For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.
Historically, as God spoke these words, there were seven days remaining for Noah, his family, and the animals to get into the safety of the ark; but spiritually (and the Bible is a spiritual book), God was speaking to all of the people of the world and was declaring that sinful mankind would have 7000 years to find refuge in the salvation provided by Jesus Christ. How can we know that? We know this is so based on what we read in 2 Peter, chapter 3:
The context of 2 Peter 3 is extremely important! In the first few verses, God refers us to the destruction of the world by the flood during Noah's day. Then we find an interesting admonition that we ought not to be ignorant of one thing, which is, 1 day is as 1000 years, and 1000 years is as 1 day. Immediately following this bit of information is a very vivid description of the end of the present world by fire.
What could God be telling us by identifying 1 day along with 1000 years?
Since we recently have discovered the Biblical calendar of history on the pages of the Bible, we find that the flood of Noah's day occurred in the year 4990 BC. This date is completely accurate (for further information on the Biblical timeline of history, please go to: www.familyradio.com). It was in the year 4990 BC that God revealed to Noah that there would be yet 7 days until the flood of waters would be upon the earth. Now, if we substitute 1000 years for each one of those 7 days, we get 7000 years. And when we project 7000 years into the future from 4990 BC, we find that it falls on the year 2011 AD.
4990 + 2011 = 7001
Note: When counting from an Old Testament date to a New Testament date, always subtract one year because there is no year zero, resulting in:
4990 + 2011 – 1 = 7000 years exactly.
The year 2011 AD will be the 7000th year from the flood of Noah's day. It will be the end of the length of time given to mankind to find grace in God's sight. This means that the time to find refuge in Christ has grown extremely short. We are only a little ways off from the year 2011 AD!
THE RAPTURE: MAY 21st, 2011
We know that the year 2011 is the 7000th year from the flood. We also know that God will destroy this world in that year. But when in 2011 will this occur?
The answer is amazing. Let's take another look at the flood account in the book of Genesis:
Genesis 7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
Faithful to His Word, God did bring the flood 7 days later in the 600th year, on the 17th day of the 2nd month of the calendar aligned with Noah's lifespan. It was on this 17th day of the 2nd month that God shut the door on the ark, securing the safety of its occupants and also sealing the fate of everyone else in the world outside of the ark. They would all now certainly perish in that worldwide catastrophe.
Earlier it was mentioned that the church age came to an end in the year 1988 AD. It so happens that the church age began on the day of Pentecost (May 22nd) in the year 33 AD. Then 1955 years later, the church age came to its conclusion on May 21st, which was the day before Pentecost in 1988.
On May 21st, 1988, God finished using the churches and congregations of the world. The Spirit of God left all churches and Satan, the man of sin, entered into the churches to rule at that point in time. The Bible teaches us that this awful period of judgment upon the churches would last for 23 years. A full 23 years (8400 days exactly) would be from May 21 st, 1988 until May 21st, 2011. This information was discovered in the Bible completely apart from the information regarding the 7000 years from the flood.
Therefore, we see that the full 23-year tribulation period concludes on May 21st, 2011. This date is the exact day that the great tribulation comes to its end, and this is also the most likely landing spot for the 7000 years from the flood of Noah's day.
Keep in mind that God shut the door on the ark on the 17th day of the 2nd month of Noah's calendar. We also find that May 21 st, 2011 is the end of the great tribulation period. There is a strong relationship between the 2nd month and 17th day of Noah's calendar and May 21st, 2011 of our Gregorian calendar. This relationship cannot be readily seen until we discover that there is another calendar to consider, which is the Hebrew (or Biblical) calendar. May 21 st, 2011 happens to be the 17th day of the 2nd month of the Hebrew calendar. By this, God is confirming to us that we have a very correct understanding regarding the 7000-year timeline from the flood. May 21 st, 2011 is the equivalent date to the date when God shut the door on Noah's ark. Through this and much other Biblical information, we find that May 21 st, 2011 will be the day when God takes up into heaven His elect people. May 21st, 2011 will be the day God shuts the door of salvation on the world.
In other words, in having the great tribulation period conclude on a day that identifies with the 17th day of the 2nd month of Noah's calendar, God is without question confirming to us that this is the day He intends to shut forever the door of entry into heaven: The Bible teaches that on May 21st, 2011, only true believers elected by God to receive salvation will be raptured (taken up) out of this world to meet the Lord in the air and forever be with the Lord:
THE END OF THE WORLD: OCTOBER 21st, 2011 By God's grace and tremendous mercy, He is giving us advanced warning as to what He is about to do. May 21st, 2011 will begin this 5-month period of horrible torment for all the inhabitants of the earth. It will be on May 21st that God will raise up all the dead that have ever died from their graves. Earthquakes will ravage the whole world as the earth will no longer conceal its dead (Isaiah 26:21). People who died as saved individuals will experience the resurrection of their bodies and immediately leave this world to forever be with the Lord. Those who died unsaved will be raised up as well, but only to have their lifeless bodies scattered about the face of all the earth. Death will be everywhere.
The Feast of Tabernacles / Ingathering was said to be in the end of the year even though it was observed in the Hebrew 7th month, which is not the end of the year. The reason for this is that the spiritual fulfillment of this particular feast is the end of the world. The date October 21st, 2011 will be the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles and the last day of earth's existence.
On October 21st, 2011, God will completely destroy this creation and all of the people who never experienced the salvation of Jesus Christ along with it. The awful payment for their sinful rebellion against God will be completed by the loss of everlasting life. On October 21st, 2011, all of these poor people will cease to exist from that point forward. How sad that noble man, made in God's image, will die like a beast and perish forever.

 
From the book: "We Are Almost There" by Harold Camping and Brian Miller D.S.
Grand Rapids, MI

You can also read more from Harold Camping here, here, here, here,
 and here.  Comments about this prediction.

1.  Harold Camping had already predicted the date of Jesus's second coming would be in 1994.  At that time he had proposed 2011 as a backup date.   Logically, just because he was wrong the first time doesn't mean he is wrong the second time, but it's worth pointing out he has a track record.

2.    His calculation for the date of the creation is bogus.  If you follow the Biblical chronology literally, the date of creation would be far more recent (between 6000-4000 BCE).  And that is how the author of Genesis meant the chronology to be taken.  For example if you take Noah's genealogy as a literal description of parent-child relationships without interruptions or gaps, his last surviving ancestor died the year before the flood.   As a literal description of when ancient events took place the Genesis chronology is dead wrong, but that doesn't give Camping license to monkey with it so he can come up with dates he finds believable or useful for his own end-times calculations.

3.  Camping's date for the flood is bogus.  If we take the Genesis chronology literally and tie it in with later chronological notices in the Bible, the flood took place sometime in the early-mid 3rd millennium BCE (c. 3000- 2300 BCE).  In Camping's favor, there is no evidence that any worldwide (or even regional ancient near eastern) flood took place in this timeperiod, but the simpler explanation is that the flood as described in Genesis just didn't happen.

4.  We know neither the exact date of Jesus's birth or death.

5.  2 Peter 2:8 does NOT mean that where a Bible text says "day" we are free to interpret it as "1000 years."    The author of 2 Peter is not talking about Bible interpretation.  Camping himself is very selective about where he is willing to interpret "day" as "1000 years."  He thinks it's OK in Genesis 7:4 but not in Genesis 1:3, etc.  If he allowed that, creation would have taken 7000 years, not 7 days, and his entire chronology would be messed up!   So, how does he tell when "day" can be interpreted as "1000 years" correctly?  When it fits his scheme. 

6.  The idea that the "Great Tribulation" will last 23 years is also bogus.  Camping comes with this amount of time by analogy with a 7-day period of "tribulation" experienced by the patriarch Jacob and the 70-year Babylonian exile.  He says that God would use the number 7 combined with something else, such as 1000 or 12 or 100 or, voila, 7x12x1000 = 8400 days = 23 years!  OK, so is that timeframe mentioned anywhere in the Bible?  Nope.  Is a coded version of that timeframe mentioned anywhere in the Bible?  (e.g. 23 hours or 23 days)?  Nope.  Are there smaller timeframes referring to periods of "Great Tribulation" that add up to 23 hours, days or years?  Nope.  

These considerations make the rest of Camping's arguments worthless.   You can bank on this: if life on May 22, 2011 is significantly different from life on May 20, 2011, it will not be because God brought Judgment Day on May 21st!

This kind of dismantling can be done with other Bible-based predictions of the end of the world occurring any time soon. The authors of the books of the Bible did not conceive of history lasting into the 21st century.  We were simply not on their radar.  If we are going to reinterpret their words we need to accept the fact that we are likely to be going against their own intentions.  And that means we can't use their words as an "authority" to defend our interpretations against our critics.

Instead, we need to pay closer attention to facts on the ground.  What is really going on in our world today?  What is likely to happen as a result?  What could be done to make things turn out differently?    Then we can compare our results with the Biblical pictures of the future as described by Biblical authors and see how they compare.  I think this approach is less likely to lead to foolish errors and more likely to be useful.

Follow-up to My Grandchild's Life Discussion

Here are some other people's attempts at predictions of what the world will be like around 2050 AD.  Take them with a healthy dose of doubt!

http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1890927,00.html
http://www.newsoffuture.com/year_2050/
http://ca.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100523031129AALQ772
http://www.gaj-it.com/5127/technology-and-gadget-predictions-for-2050/
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090502092019.htm
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/0401-01.htm

Follow-up to My Grandparent's Life discussion

What, you missed the first meeting?  All is not lost.  Here are some online resources that will give you some idea of what we talked about.

http://www.examiner.com/historic-living-in-chicago/life-the-early-1900s
http://www.kyrene.org/schools/brisas/sunda/decade/1900.htm#daily%20life
http://www.mchumor.com/holyrollers/holyrollers_corvallis.html
http://www.squareamerica.com/search/?tag=1900s

Second Meeting: My Grandchild's Life Questionnaire

Predicting the future is no easy task. See this article for some examples of what people in the year 1900 thought life would be like by year 2000. As difficult as this task is, there are real benefits to imagining what life might/could be like in the future. With that in mind, try to answer the questions below about the daily life of your yet-to-be-born grandchild.

1.In what decade will your grandchild grow up? (for example, 2040's)
2.What kind of a house will your grandchild live in? In what ways might it be different from the house you live in?
3.What kind of foods might your granchild eat? How would those foods be made or grown?
4.How would your grandchild's family get around? What kinds of transportation might be available?
5.How might your grandchild's family be different from the family you grew up in?
6.How might your grandchild's school life be different from yours?

First Meeting: My Grandparent's Life Questionnaire

The purpose of this exercise is to help you understand in what ways life used to be different and why people used to do things they way they did. A natural source for this information is your own grandparents. Try to get in touch with them sometime before the next Sunday School class and get their answers to the following questions.

1.In what decade did you grow up? (for example, 1940's)

2.What did your parents do for a living?

3.What kind of a house did you live in? Was it in a city, town, village, or out in the country? How did your family keep it warm in the winter and cool in the summer?

4.What did you usually eat for breakfast, who made it, and how? Why did you get breakfast this way?

5.How did you get to school? Why did you travel this way?

6.What kinds of things did you do after school? Why did you do those things?

7.What kinds of things did you do on summer vacation? If you traveled, where did you go, how did you get there, and why did you travel that way?