If I had a dollar for every time the world was supposed to have ended in my lifetime alone, I could probably fill my gas tank. Most recently, the eclipse was supposed to mark “the end.” In Graham Hancock’s 1995 book Fingerprints of the Gods, he puts great stock in the Mayan prophecy concerning the world’s end (supposedly Dec 23, 2012, conveniently revised to “no later than 2040” in Magicians of the Gods, 2015). Y2K was supposed to be a disaster. 

Just since I was born (1993), here are a few of the times the world was supposed to end (from Wikipedia, sorry): 

1. David Berg claimed that the earth would end in 1993. 
2. 05.02.1994 — Neal Chase’s claim that New York City would be struck by a nuclear bomb, followed shortly by the second coming. 
3. 09.06, 09.29, 10.2.1994 — Harold Camping’s three consecutive failed predictions that the rapture would occur on these dates. 
4. 10.23.1997 — The date, according to 17th century bishop James Ussher, that the world was supposed to end. 
5. 03.31.1998 — Hon-Ming Chen claimed that God would come to earth in a flying saucer at 10:00 AM. 
6. 08.18.1999 — World was supposed to end on this day, according to the psychic The Amazing Criswell. 
7. 09.11.1999 — Earth was supposed to burn on this date, according to Philip Berg. 
8. At least a dozen different public figures claimed the earth would end in the year 2000 (Jerry Falwell, Tim LaHaye, Jerry B. Jenkins, James Harmston, Ruth Montgomery, Edgar Cayce, Sun Myung Moon, Ed Dobson, Lester Sumrall, and others). 
9. Some 22 other predictions between 2000 and 2024 claimed that the end of earth was imminent. 

Does earth have an expiration date? Of course! But it makes us (understandably) look ridiculous when we fall for the doomsday-predictors’ nonsense. To comfort the churches at Thessalonica, Paul made it clear that we can’t miss the second coming. A few things have to take place first: 

1. Lawlessness runs the entire world (2.3)
2. The majority of Christians all around the world abandon God (II Thess 2.3). 
3. Religion is discarded (2.4). 

We aren’t there yet. The church is still doing great things all over the world! The world is chaotic, but nowhere near as bad as it could be. Rather than discarding religion, we’re now seeing people pursue it, fed up with hedonism and its best friend nihilism. This may change in our lifetime, it may not. 

I’m writing this in light of what’s happened over the last few days in the Middle East. Already we’re seeing people claim that “Armageddon” is coming because Iran attacked Israel. The point is this: we simply don’t know when Jesus will return. Of all people, we’re the ones who are supposed to be least concerned about it! Rather than portraying an image of gullibility, let’s showcase Jesus’s love to our fellow people. If he returns, great! If not, we have much better things to do than share, post, re-post, or otherwise buy into doomsday speculations.