Jesus is Coming Late 1 - When Is The Rapture?

Jesus is Coming Late – You’ll be Surprised Who Gets a Slapped Behind

The author of this story would like to thank Dave McKay for writing the book Survivors and Harold Camping for predicting the end of the world wrongly at least 3 times. I have never read the Left Behind series of books and don’t want to.

This story is transcribed from the pile of tiny notebooks in my bedroom that I bought from Poundland, which accounts for the really short chapters. But I kept the original chapter headings because they add something to the story.

Chapter 1 A Slapped Behind

“We are End TV, and we are broadcasting until the end of the world, when the rock hits. We are going to gather on Plymouth beach, look at the sign of the Son of Man in the sky, and broadcast the rapture live on TV. The producer and the cameraman are humanists. We had to employ them under UK equality laws. They will be left behind, and continue to provide you with live coverage of all that’s happening around the world after we’re gone.”

Thousands of Christians gathered on Plymouth beach, watching the huge asteroid as it streaked through the atmosphere, clearly visible in the daytime sky. They saw it descend over the horizon. Then something funny happened to the sea.
“What are all those fish doing on the sand?” asked one of the Christians. “The tide’s gone miles out. You’d better get up to the hills. This is a tsunami.”
“Don’t you believe in a pre-tribulation rapture?” asked an old lady.
“We expect to be carried up to Heaven on a flowery bed of ease,” said her husband.
“Well, it’s very obvious that we haven’t been gathered from the four winds, from one end of Heaven to the other. We’re not with Jesus in the clouds, we’re down here and there’s a huge tsunami coming in the next ten minutes. I think we’d better run as fast as we can.”
“I live by faith, not by fears,” said the husband.
“I’m sure God wouldn’t be offended if we climbed up that hill,” said a young lady. “We’ve probably got time. If we are going to be raptured today, I’m sure we wouldn’t miss out on anything by climbing up the hill.”
“Yes,” said a young man. “Let’s run up the hill, it’s only sensible. I’d like to be one of those who do not taste death.”

It was actually BBC News 24 who reported the event.
“Thousands of members of the End TV religious cult have been swept out to sea from Plymouth beach. They were watching the asteroid, believing that it was a sign of the end of the world. Hundreds managed to escape by running up a nearby hill.” The BBC interviewed one of the survivors.
“We knew it was a tsunami. The tide had gone out for miles, there were fish on the sand. But they didn’t want to leave. They were convinced Jesus was coming back, and they’d ascend into the sky to be with him in the clouds.”

Zion Ben Nutcase Here

The Bible describes a time of great suffering that will come on the earth (the great tribulation) after Jesus comes back, and the rapture of the Christians, when they are taken to be with Jesus in the clouds. It’s just a question of which happens first. This has always been very controversial. Should Christians look forward to the second coming, and expect to be carried away to heaven on flowery beds of ease, still holding the remote control of their satellite television while they watch Songs of Praise from Australia on the God Channel, or should they dread and fear that awful day? Is it really any of our business, anyway, and if billions of people are going to die and we make up a tiny % of the population, why are we so selfish? To cap it all, why has every generation of Christians passionately believed that Jesus will come again in their lifetime and produced characters that made stupid predictions? Jesus said he would come when we least expect it. I would least expect him to come on the day that some nutter from an American radio station predicted he would come. Radio Cracker say that Jesus is coming next Saturday at half past three in the afternoon. Ha, ha, ha. We all know he isn’t. It didn’t happen in September 1994, on May 21 2011, on October 21 2011, but it’ll be one of those future dates when some future nutter actually predicted that Jesus would come. It’ll happen on that exact day, at that exact hour. That would surprise everybody.

Chapter 2 Foretold

Pastor Bole led his Bible study group in his front room.
“There’s an asteroid on its way towards Earth.”
“You say that every week,” said Carol.
“Well, I think it’s important.”
“Look Pastor,” said Tony, “that thing’ll kill a few thousand people wherever it lands. It’s a terrible tragedy, but it’s not the end of the world. It’s probably got nothing to do with the second coming of Christ.”
“What about the sign of the Son of Man in the sky?”
“It’s only an asteroid,” said Carol. “The sign of the Son of Man could mean anything.”
“Men will faint with fear because of what is coming on the world because the heavenly bodies will be shaken.”
“They don’t seem to be very worried. They think it might miss us,” said Carol.
“Nations will be in anguish at the roaring and tossing of the sea.”
“Even if it hit the sea, it’d be no worse than Fukushima in Japan in 2011,” said Tony.

Chapter 3 Nuclear Terror

BBC News 24 broadcast what would be their last news programme from London, ever. It was also one that people would remember for the rest of their short lives. Two announcers sat in the studio.
“Why is the sky full of nuclear weapons? The Russians aren’t communists any more, the Iraqis haven’t got any, so where did they all come from?”
“Well John, I think the tsunami in the Atlantic Ocean hit some of the radar stations on the east coast of America, and caused their early warning system to malfunction.”
“The government have told everybody to stay indoors, board up the windows and sit in the cellar. But there are crowds congregating on the streets tonight. This report from Melissa in Manchester.”

“Why are you all here tonight?” asked Melissa.
“We believe Jesus is coming again. We expect to be taken out of the world,” said an old lady.
“But the Christians in Plymouth believed that, and they’re all dead.”
“The sound of the atomic bombs will be the sound of the last trumpet,” said a young man. “He will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of Heaven to the other.” The sky lit up.
“Don’t look,” said Melissa. “It’ll damage your eyes.”
“The sign of the Son of Man has appeared in the sky,” said the young man, looking up. “The street lights have gone out.” They hadn’t. The man had gone blind.

The scene returned to the studio.
“Not another bunch of unfortunate Christians who think they will not taste death. They’ll actually taste it a long time before the rest of us do. Melissa, are you still there?”
“I’m still here, John. There was a loud noise like an earthquake. I think the explosion was over another city nearby, possibly Leeds. And John, you’re supposed to be impartial.”
“I was just insulting Christians. You’re allowed to insult Christians.”

Chapter 4 The Maitreya

Pastor Bole drove Tony and Carol to Northampton, to see a man most Christians believed to be Jesus. They turned on the car radio to listen to the news.
“Atomic bombs exploded over 27 European cities last night. In the UK, they exploded over Leeds, Birmingham and London. This broadcast is coming to you from our Cardiff studios. The M1 is still open from Sheffield to Northampton, and most UK airports are still functioning. A man has appeared in Northampton, calling himself the Maitreya and claiming to be Jesus Christ. He believes that the Bible verse about Jesus descending through the clouds was fulfilled when he landed his private jet at East Midlands Airport.”
“I call my followers to come here from all over the world,” said the voice of the Maitreya. “Come and see me in Northampton. East Midlands airport is still open, the M1 is open. The roads in Northampton are sign posted. I will gather my elect from the four winds, from one end of Heaven to the other.”
“Imagine meeting Jesus in the flesh,” said Pastor Bole.
“Is he the real Jesus?” asked Carol.

There were tens of thousands of people in a sports stadium somewhere in Northampton.
“I heal people of radiation sickness,” said Maitreya. “If you were standing near one of those bombs as it went off, and if you are feeling unwell, come down to the front.” Maitreya laid hands on people whose skin looked scorched, and whose hair was coming out all over their clothes. They looked normal again. As he lifted up his hands and laid them on people, it was very obvious there were marks underneath them. “I can make you whole, I can make you whole. You’ll know me by the nail prints in my hands.”
“Is he really Jesus?” asked Carol.
“He must be. Like the hymn says, you’ll know him by the nail prints in his hands,” said Pastor Bole.
“That’s just a song,” said Tony, “it’s not from the Bible. It could be stigmata. Lots of Catholics around the world get nail prints in their hands during lent. This could be the same thing.”
“I want everyone to have their national insurance number tattooed on the back of their hands,” said Maitreya. “The National Insurance Contribution Office in Newcastle is still functioning, but you can’t rely on the postal system at a time like this. I have all your national insurance numbers on my satellite linked tablet computer. My assistants will tattoo them on to your hands. You need this number. You won’t be able to get a job without it. You won’t be able to claim benefit without it.”
“I’m having it done,” said Pastor Bole.
“I know my national insurance number,” said Tony.
“I’ve got a little plastic card in my purse with mine on,” said Carol. Pastor Bole went down to the front.
“The church is going to become extremely powerful,” continued Maitreya. “Anyone who disobeys it will be killed.” Now Carol was absolutely sure that Maitreya was the Anti-Christ.

Maitreya stood behind a microphone in the United Nations.
“I propose Resolution 78641. There should be no more poverty and no more wars anywhere in the world.”
“It’s so simple!” said one of the other politicians. “All the world’s problems will be solved.”
“Why didn’t anyone think of it before?” asked another. The resolution was passed unaminously.

A few months later Maitreya made another resolution. Resolution 78642. “Those who oppose this government are enemies of the people. They wish to return the world to a state of war and poverty. They must be killed.”
“Isn’t that a bit harsh?” asked one politician.
“Are you an enemy of the people and Maitreya, as well? Do you want a return to war and poverty?” someone asked.
“No,” said the first politician. “I just think people should be able to disagree.”
“Disagreeing is what people have been doing for thousands of years,” said another. “It’s disagreement that causes all these problems in the first place. I’ll vote for Maitreya. You either take him, or you leave him. You can’t take the bits that you like, you have to have the whole system. And I’m convinced the world’s a better place.” The resolution passed unanimously.

Zion Ben Nutcase Here

Why do we always assume that the Anti-Christ is some sort of socialist do gooder who will set the world to rights, but be secretly evil? This is actually a very western idea, and only came about after the second world war. Hitler was a socialist do gooder who seemed to solve all the country’s problems – I say, seemed to, as any reasonable socialist knows that ending inflation and unemployment is quite easy if you have a low wage economy and a very long war. Not the economic genius many claimed him to be – the UK could do that if it introduced a load of government subsidised jobs at low wages, taxed the rich until the pips squeaked and started world war III deliberately. The memory of Hitler lives on in people’s phobias. The great dictator, in a time of crisis, who says, “I am the answer!” Many stories are told and many books written about such people. One Christian book against the European Union quoted a politician saying, in 1952, at the genesis of the European Union, saying, ‘What we are looking for is someone who can pull us out of the economic morass we find ourselves in, and when we find him, angel or devil, we will receive him.’ The question is whether such a person exists. If all the young people in the country desperately want to join the army, and fight on the front line in a dangerous war for a minimum wage of £6 an hour, that’s probably what National Socialism is like in practice. Hitler’s socialism would appeal to the starving masses of the 1930s, but we might be happier on the dole than with such a terrible dictatorship, and the real economic advantages of state socialism aren’t that great. It seems that, even in countries like Cuba and the Soviet Union, where socialism was a little more peaceful (the Soviets did not start World War III, they invaded Afghanistan but so did we) that the average standard of living was not a lot better than the average English person would expect if they were unemployed and on benefits. In fact, the Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair’s great achievement was designing a benefit system that didn’t penalise people who worked. Now, the main complaint from people on minimum wage jobs is that they are working so hard and only £20 a week better off than when they were on benefit. Nevertheless, ask them if they would rather have lived in the Soviet Union or if they would vote Communist, even imagining that 21st century socialists could create a new form of Communism that didn’t send radical political writers like me to prison, do such people really think they would be better off? Probably not. Tiny apartments without central heating, limited food, and Radio Moscow World Service broadcasting in French, German and English informing short wave listeners across the world how lovely this was compared to the absolute destitution that so many people in the world live in, Communist countries were no wealthier than the unemployed of the UK.

Has the European Union pulled us out of the economic morass we find ourselves in? Far from it. It is trying to create a United States of Europe, where the huge debts of the member countries would be shared, as they are in the United States of America. American dream? The phrase has been replaced, in latter years, by the phrase American nightmare. You work hard, your company fails anyway, you’re made redundant. European intergration just can’t do it.

A left wing dictator couldn’t set the world to rights. It is extremely difficult to do so. Full employment, in a technological society, easily leads to over production, or people sitting in their offices with nothing to do. Let’s have more students, free education, more camp sites for hippies, so there can be more jobs left for people who want them (some of my solutions) but jobs for everybody with a minimum wage of £10 an hour? How? I always felt that some British political parties, like the Socialist Party and others, would promise you the moon on a stick without having to pay for it. The reality of National Socialism is either the kind of debt situation that exists in Greece (or in the UK of the last socialist government in 1976) or a lifestyle of equality resulting in simplicity, the simplicity of my manifesto being what would make my politics rather unpopular. The idea that, somehow, when a dictator comes and sets the world to rights, everybody will be driving around in beautiful cars and have beautiful homes, not caring about the abductions and the deaths as long as he can manage the economy, is a fantasy created in the 20th century. If our understanding of the Great Tribulation is anywhere near right, don’t you think it would be harder still to solve the world’s problems during the last seven years of its existence, when atomic bombs are falling from the sky, asteroids are plunging into the ocean, the climate is doing things that would make global warming look like nothing by comparison, and there is a terrible time of suffering unprecedented since the beginning of time?