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By Michael J. Brooks

I showered and dressed on a recent Saturday and drove to nearby Hoover for a Christian fest event. However, the parking lot was sparse when I arrived a few minutes before the scheduled hour. The nice reception lady searched the calendar and told me the event was the following Saturday.

I suppose in my eagerness to attend I neglected the important detail of verifying the date.

But I’m not the only one who’s been dressed and ready and missed an appointment. History is replete with those who’ve predicted a date certain for the return of Christ and failed in their calculation.

Broadcaster Hugh Hewitt recently interviewed Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the USA. Hewitt mentioned Oren’s book, “2048–The Rejuvenated State.” This volume relates the nation of Israel’s goals for her 100th birthday. This made me curious, and I did the math: Israel celebrated her 76th birthday last spring.

How can this be?

A Bible teacher in the 70s wrote a best-seller about eschatology–the theology of the end times. He wrote, “… within forty years or so of 1948 [the birth of Israel], all these things could take place. Many scholars who have studied Bible prophecy all their lives believe that this is so.”

But 1988 came and went without a rapture. In fact, President Reagan walked arm in arm with Mikhael Gorbachev in Red Square that year, easing the cold war.

False predictions and hopes fueled an issue in the first-century Thessalonian church. Some of the members understood Paul to teach the soon return of Christ. They gave up their jobs and sat idly by waiting for this event, all the while becoming dependent on other church members to take care of them. 

Paul wrote a second letter to the church as a theological corrective and included his famous dictum: “If anyone isn’t willing to work, he should not eat” (2 Thessalonians 3:10).

Whereas it’s fine to study biblical prophecy, we must avoid date-setting. Everyone thus far who’s made a prediction about the end of the age has been wrong. Apparently, God’s timetable is different from theirs, and many Bible teachers proved to be false prophets.

Jesus himself told about the proper response to his promised return: “Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his master has put in charge of his household, to give them food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom the master finds doing his job when he comes” (Matthew 24: 45-46).

We may take our last breath, or we may live to see his kingdom come. But whatever the case, our task is to remain faithful in God’s work until the hour he calls us home.

“Reflections” is a weekly faith column written by Michael J. Brooks, pastor of the Siluria Baptist Church, Alabaster, Alabama. The church’s website is siluriabaptist.com.