Why Are Billboards Telling us that Judgement Day is May 21?

While driving to San Antonio a few weeks ago, the wife and I noticed many billboards proclaiming that the end of the world was certain to happen on May 21.  Then, they sprung up in Dallas.  Soon, my friends on Facebook had seen them all over the country; I've read about them in California, New York, and places in between.

Individuals are volunteering great sums of their personal savings to put these signs up in support of the cause, and, in what will end up being a sad part of the story, some families are putting themselves in poverty to pay for these signs.

It's the work of a guy named Harold Camping who has done this sort of thing before.  He previously told us that the world would end in 2006, but we're still here.  His theological approach involves some questionable views that are not shared by many theologians, but are picked up by many church-goers because of the influence of his radio program.  He's the president of Family Radio, and his 24-hour radio broadcasts are heard all over the world.

I've never seen such a movement.  I've been around plenty of "End Times" groups who were very zealous, but not zealous enough to spend their own money on billboards and signs.  Mind you, this isn't some scam where Harold Camping gets a kickback from this stuff (he appears to be a decent guy despite this odd theology), but his words are so powerful that they simply inspire people to spend their own money promoting his ideas.

Of course, it's impossible not to think of the Millerites.  Long ago, a guy named William Miller predicted the world would end, using similar scholarly methods, in 1844.  He used complex time charts (look to the right) like those of Harold Camping and distributed them through newspapers all over the country.  His followers sometimes went so far as to sell their homes and have no possessions as they prepared to see Jesus' return.  Since it didn't happen, Miller sharpened his pencil and came back with a new announcement that he had been off by one year and that they next year would see The End Of The World.  After the second prediction failed he was no longer considered to be an expert on the Apocalypse.

I hope Camping realizes that his ministry is hurting people.  When this thing is over, some people are going to be much poorer and will spend the rest of their lives wishing they hadn't wasted their life's savings on a billboard.

Of course, most people in the world agree with me- but if there is a world-killing earthquake, next week (as Camping says), then no one will read this after the fact to know that I was wrong.  I think I've chosen a pretty safe position in this debate.  Which is all that matters.