Tipping Point Quick Hits (10.5.23)

The Rapture on TikTok, next week's eclipse, and Russia's WW3 drills

The “Rapture” is Trending on TikTok

This week, a series of new videos have been circulating on social media with captions suggesting that they show people disappearing in a Rapture-type event. According to the Associated Press, one video was posted to TikTok and has more than 11.5 million views. It looks like video footage of children vanishing from a school bus as the driver avoids an accident. (The above photo is a screenshot from that video.)

As the AP explains, these are videos that show what might happen during the Rapture but are not real-life videos. They are fictionalized:

The videos were created by a Christian organization to illustrate how the Rapture would appear on camera and encourage people to learn more about the group’s religious message.

The videos were produced by David Jeremiah’s Turning Point Ministries as part of a campaign to give people a user-generated “visual preview” of the Rapture. The campaign, called “Perhaps Today,” shows what it calls “pre-enactments” of the instant when Jesus comes to remove Christians from the earth.

These videos are very creatively made and show footage from doorbell cameras, cell phones and more. Some point to the website. Some end with the question “What will people think when the moment comes?”

Turning Point explains the campaign this way:

When the Rapture occurs, the world will capture the moment—cellphones, security cameras, law enforcement body cams, dash cams, and doorbell cams will all bear video records of the great disappearance.

People will not believe their eyes when they witness what was caught on camera. Men and women, boys and girls taking selfies, recording a sporting event, vacation, family reunion, or church function, and then, some disappear entirely. Gone! The world will reel with concern from watching the strange, mind-boggling, and unbelievable video footage that goes viral across the globe.

I appreciate David Jeremiah’s ministry and I know a lot of this community does as well. Like me, his interpretation of Bible prophecy is Pre-Tribulation and I believe he is a very solid teacher about the end times.

His organization’s videos are getting attention and are a great idea. If people are already sharing them on social media—without knowing the context—then I would say the campaign is a success. But what’s happening is that people are stripping the videos out of the campaign and posting as if they represent real “caught on camera” footage and not “pre-enactments.”

That’s why you have to be careful with what seems to be true on social media. Even videos.

But this moment also represents an opportunity to share with people your hope for the future and the truth of the Rapture. Someday—potentially someday very soon—this event will actually happen.

That’s why David Jeremiah’s team produced the videos and I hope they help the world consider the reality of the Rapture and think about what might happen to them in that moment. Will they be “caught up together with them in the clouds” as Paul describes in 1 Thessalonians 4:17?

Or will they be left behind?

If you see these videos showing up in your social media feed, don’t hesitate to add context but also engage those who get caught up by the realism. You might just impact their eternity.

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“Ring of Fire” Eclipse Visible Next Week