If the rapture (the disappearance of all true believers in Jesus Christ) were to really happen and the world was left to wonder in disbelief, would your foreknowledge of these scriptures and the fact that most of the “fundies” or “believers” you knew in life were suddenly gone, be enough proof for you to believe in God? Or would you have a rational or logical explanation? And if so, what would your explanation be?
1 Thessalonians 4:15-17
*According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. *
Revelation 3:10
*Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole world to test those who live on the earth. *
Matthew 24:36-41 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will taken and the other left. Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.
FTR I do believe someday this will happen. It could be tomorrow or 1000 years from now. I think the world would come up with it’s own explanations and I also think many minds would be changed.
Well, assuming that I woke up to find that millions of people had disappeared overnight, then believing in the literal truth of the Bible would be rational and logical.
You write as though rationalists (a term I prefer to “atheist”) are just stubbornly denying God’s existence out of spite, but that’s not how it is. We just don’t think the the accounts in the Bible are compelling enough to cause us to believe in God. If you introduce soemthing as startling as the Rapture into the data, then one would have to be foolish to ignore it.
You may take it that way, but I know without a doubt that it isn’t true. I think I’ve read enough posts from you and other atheist’s on this board to know your’re being entirely honest when you say you just don’t believe.
Not much of a bible scholar here, but aren’t things supposed to go to, well, Hell, shortly after the Rapture?
If people got called up and then nothing else changed, with business as usual here on earth, then I think the old saying works: whoever wins gets to write the history. All the devout Christians would be gone and everybody else would get to explain what happened.
I mean, what if we got up tomorrow and all the left-handed people were gone? Or everybody who had had their tonsils out? At least with Christians we have some indication that they might all have gone someplace, but really, if they don’t leave a note behind, how are we supposed to know for sure?
Say, that’d make a setting for the perfect murder… “No, he’s not dead–he experienced the Rapture and vanished! Honest!”
What other explanation do you think the non-believers would come up with that would allow them to avoid that conclusion, dreamer? We’d probably spend a few days checking for fundamentalist Christians hiding under their beds, but when you’ve exhausted those kinds of explanations, what else is left? It’s not like we’re suddenly going to start developing irrational theories to deny the hypothesis that best fits the available facts.
And by the way, how many years of no Rapture occurring would it take you to conclude that it’s not going to occur at all?
I’d consider it compelling, if not conclusive, evidence. On the other hand, I’d be way pissed at God if I was behind one of those dudes with the bumper stickers and got in a wreck as a result.
I am reminded of a religious discussion/debate in which I once engaged. A proponent of Christianity stood up and said something like this…
“What do you people want? What proof would be good enough? Do you want angels to fly through the air shooting fireballs from their hands? Do you want God to rearrange the stars in the night sky so they say ‘Hi, I’m God. Believe in me.’?”
To this, one of the “atheist” stood and said, “That would be sufficient.”
I’m not trying to be facetious. I know I can’t demand God show himself. Its all part of the “divine mystery” which demands that you believe something entirely on faith. Fine. I don’t have that faith. I think its painfully convenient that God made one of the requirements for worshipping Him that you would have to believe he is just “there”. Why would He do that? Would it kill Him to stop by every century or so and check in? He is infinite, afterall. Its not like he has a tight schedule to keep. He used to do things on earth all the time-- before video cameras were invented.
As for the OP… If the rapture occurs, my explanation will simply be, “I was wrong.” God can boot my ass into the fiery pit Himself if he sees fit.
Possibly, but what’s the point of asking this question? It does not appear that God particularly wants persons to beleive in His existence based only on manifestations of His power. If this were not so, one would think that He would regularly schedule such demonstrations.
As for potential explanations for a Rapture scenario, I would have none, prior to such an event taking place. AFAIK, there has never been a mass disappearance of people from any single location, much less multiple, widely dispersed locations. If and when such a thing ever happens, I will make a judgement based on whatever descriptive reports of the event are available. If a supernatural explanation seems credible, so be it.
Here’s one to really bake the OP’s noodle: what if the Rapture occurred, but a good proportion of the people that disappeared were not known to be evangelical Christians?
Incidently, this same general theme was covered by a thread back in May 2001.
Hey, wait a minute – why does the OP assume that the non-fundies and non-believers aren’t going to be Raptured, too? God can save whoever he wants, right?
What if archeologists in Jerusalem discovered a hidden tomb containing the skeleton of a crucified man, plus an inscription stating that it was the body of Jesus Christ hidden by the apostles. Let us say that this is verified and found to be incontrovertibly true: would the OP still believe in God if the Resurrection never happened?
Offhand, I’d say that would be pretty convincing. The only problem with your scenario is that is HASN’T HAPPENED. I have to agree with El_Kabong - I don’t see the point of asking the question.
The true believers don’t want to think that all their praying didn’t give them any sort of advantage. Of course we also know that if you surrender yourself to Christ on your deathbed, that is supposed to be good enough. Once I see people going up to heaven, that is the point I may consider christianity.
Adding my opinion, I’d probably be a bit skeptical at first (“checking under the beds” as minty said), but I’d probably eventually accept that you were right. Note, however, that does not mean that I’d re-convert to Christianity. I’d still have some severe issues with a God who set things up the way he ostensibly did.
Now, let’s turn the question around on you. If the Rapture doesn’t occur before you die, will you renounce your literal interpretation of the Bible? (I see you already answered this question: “It could be tomorrow or 1000 years from now.”) At what point do you think you’d be able to admit that you were wrong? Obviously, not after 3000 years… how about 10,000? I guess what I’m asking is: If you were able to somehow look in on Fundamentalist Christians in the year 1,000,000 AD, would you think them foolhardy and stubborn?
I’d also like to ask another question, if I may. Suppose some random non-Christian (but generally a “good person”) were to be Raptured but some random Fundamentalist Christian were not. What influence would that have on your belief system?
Speaking as a polytheist It would have little impact on me. If your god wants to call his “children” home then I say he should go for it. Besides it would open up the job market.
It would also be fun to see Sunday morning television the next week to see which of the televangalists made the cut.
The reason I ask the question is because as I said, I believe someday it will happen and although I personally see enough evidence of his existence around to believe in him, I wonder if the rapture would be enough to convince you.
There will be all kinds of explanations people will come up with. Not everyone is going to believe that God came down from Heaven and took his believers. Many will but in turn will realize that he left them behind which will cause them to be angry at him and not become a believer themselves and turn away. There will be conspiracy thoeries (like Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor mentioned) who knows. The world will be in total chaos and people will be mourning and confused and completely distracted from reality and because of that they could be easily swayed one way or the other to believe something that may make sense to them at the time.
Then I must ask what you would do? You still wouldn’t get all the answers to the many questions you have so would you still be in the same place you are now but just with a “little” proof of his existence?
Well, yes and no. Barring an alternate explanation for the facts (I certainly can’t think of one offhand) it would lead me to conclude that certain parts of christianity are indeed correct. What it would not to is:
Convince me that the entire of christianity was correct - if nothing else there’s the matter of which denomination to accept. Further I don’t believe that the bible has been accurately copied from it’s original form.
Cause me to adopt a christian moral code (except the most basic ‘do unto others’ aspect).
Convert me to Christianity.
Ok, say god exists. Yay, whoopee. The universe has a creator. So… this affects me how? I’m still not going to accept “god says so” as a reason for altering my morality or behaviour. So yes, I’d become theistic, merely not religious. (If that makes any sense, I may be misusing the term).
And no, I don’t consider the threat of eternal torment to be a good reason to do what God says. Frankly, if she would judge like that for not following her, I wouldn’t wish to go to heaven in the first place. An eternity with someone like that? No thank you.
To somewhat echo what others have said, what would you do if there was some similar proof that, for example, Wicca was the one true religion?
