By Geoffrey Asimwe

THE RAPTURE SCARE

1992. Boarding school. Midnight was coming.

The day had started well. Meals. Chapel. Classes. The usual routine. Nothing unusual. Nothing reported. Until later in the evening.

I was returning from evening prep when the dormitory hit me with it: The rumor of a rapture. Tonight. Midnight. Precise.

Apparently, it was a front page story in the New Vision that day. A prophet from a Korean Based Mission had named the day and hour. His followers had spread it. Pamphlets. Ads. major newspapers.

I was raised in a Christian home. I knew the rapture story.

Before Jesus Christ establishes His Kingdom on the earth, He will come for His church – the born again- in an event commonly referred to as the ‘Rapture.’ The dead in Christ will be raised first, and then His living followers will be caught up to meet them in the air and their Lord together. It will be sudden.

For devout Christians, this expectation is a source of comfort. The life of pain and penury will be over forever.

But it will also be the start.

The great tribulation. Seven years. One government. One religion. One currency. The antichrist in control. Food. Everything you need to live. Under his control.

Christians that would’ve been left behind will be asked to renounce Christ. Pledge allegiance to the Antichrist instead. Refuse? No food. No work. Death.

Unparalleled difficulty.
That is what most of us knew. Still most of us had not taken it seriously. We joked. Right up to lights out.

I said my prayer and went to bed. As I waited on the sleep, I noticed through the curtain-less windows: a cloudless night. Light, probably from earth satellites, flashed through the sky.

All was quiet.
Then one of the senior boys jumped up.

In Luganda, “Eh mwe!, Yesu tajja nga ndi bwerere!” (You guys, Jesus could come when I am naked!)” Thunderous laughter. Every bed. Across the dormitory.
He reached for his suitcase. Pulled out his nighties. Dressed up.
That was it. I didn’t have the sleep.

So I went down to the Common Room. To read up to midnight. One of the books I carried was the bible, and it’s the one I opened after I sat down.

I was so engrossed in a bible story -I don’t remember which one-, forgetting all my fears and that it was almost the midnight hour when it happened.

The night broke.

Noises like deathly screams coming from everywhere. Lights flashing through the windows. Ghostly figures darting the quadrangle.

I was like an antelope caught in a car’s headlights at night. I couldn’t think! It seemed forever, yet it was just for a moment.

Two naughty fellows, covered in white sheets, flashing torches on themselves, darted across the quadrangle shouting as they went along.

After that, the fear got loose.
More boys joined me and we spent most of that night reading.

Yet this is not an isolated story. You only have to look to history and current affairs to see that for the past two thousand years, the world periodically holds its breath. Yes, for the end of the world is the most anticipated world event that has not happened yet.

The list of signs keeps growing.

Climate change. Migration .Wars and rumors of wars. Pandemics. AI. Alien and UFO phenomena. Crime.

These are some of the common problems that world leaders have to grapple with as they attempt to find solutions to sustain life on the earth for future generations because the earth is dying.

The panic isn’t new.

Interestingly, the bible predicts the signs just before Jesus returns to establish his earthly Kingdom. Matthew the 24th chapter from verse 3 reads,

“When shall these things be? What shall be the sign of your coming, and of the end of the world?” That is what the disciples asked Him privately on the Mount Olives.
And He answered.

‘Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that you be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes, in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.”

With benefit of hindsight, all these things have happened and only increasing in intensity.

History records centuries of Christian persecution. False prophets -read false religions- abound. And the love of many has grown cold.

The order is fixed.

The events of the last days must come in chronological order, surely as night comes after day:

The Rapture. The Great Tribulation. Armageddon. The Second Coming of Jesus, His Millennial Rule. And then the End of the Ages must come.

Cynicism should therefore not found in your heart.

If you must, read the bible for yourself. You’ll see that Jesus Christ of Nazareth is a historical figure who has influenced life on earth like no other man dead or alive.

He is coming back soon to establish his earthly kingdom. So the question is no longer “if.”
Are you ready for Him?
WAKEUPCALL

WakeUp! WakeUp! WakeUp!
Because the beginning of sorrows has begun. The end is not a prank. Take action now:

1. Wake up and read: Revelations 2 & 3. Ask: which churches are we living in right now?
2. Wake up and share: Tag someone. Are you ready?
3. Wake Up and Stand: join the Wakeup call conversation

4. WAKEUPCALL