Joe - high school Jesus Freak
Joe – high school Jesus Freak

This one popped up in my YouTube feeds and for all I know it might be all A.I. BS (the voice-over is admittedly AI and the family image is “digitally generated”… unlike the image above of me as a 16-year-old Jesus Freak). My life was not ruined, certainly not to the extent that this poor fellow’s life was ruined, thinking that the world is going to end in another couple years and there’s no point in planning for a future. First off my parent’s were opposed to my new faith, at least my version of it (mom was Catholic and dad Baptist), so I wasn’t in a position to make those kinds of decisions. But I do feel like I was effected by the idea that anything that didn’t serve promoting or sharing the Kingdom of God with unbelievers was less important, kind of like the kid in the story who wanted to be an engineer but was discouraged against that. I very much got into really studying my Bible and learning everything that I could, but there was part of me that wondered, if this is the most important thing that a person can do with their time, what about all the other things that need to be done so that we can live?

It took a long time, but that question about how can we live if everything is judged based on evangelism or bringing others to God, began to make me feel like there was something wrong with this picture. Many decades later I talked with a friend who worked with people who were just graduating from high school when we were all expecting Jesus to come back. These people didn’t bother going to college, ‘cause, what was the point, if Jesus was coming back real soon, he’d change everything. Again, they didn’t suffer quite as much as the family in this story, but it definitely changed the course of their lives and made them re-think things as Jesus continued to not come back. I know for me that I developed a very existential approach to things and just did whatever I needed to do that was right in front of me, but I couldn’t see anything even five years down the road. And even as my faith faded, it seemed all the more audacious to make assumptions about ones life five or ten-years down the road. 

Here’s the video that started me thinking about how 1970s Rapture-itis effected me:

Honestly I can’t blame all of this on my tenure with the rapture nut jobs. There’s definitely some influence from my dad’s working class status, during which there were some extended times when he was out of work and mom stretched out the budget as far as she could and we didn’t get all the toys that some of our neighbors showered on their kids. So, I saw a very hand-to-mouth means of existing with no real long range plans, except that we all survive, work hard and stay out of trouble. That was it. Work ethic and don’t do anything stupid. Not a bad motto for life, but it does foster a strange relationship with ones own future. Adding God and the soon coming return of Jesus to the mix just made things all the more dysfunctional. I couldn’t imagine turning thirty, much less sixty. 

I guess it’s easy to get this one wrong. Putting off things for a future that never arrives (I’ve seen that story play out several times), or having no plan for the future because there are no guarantees (somehow that feels as foolish as the life cut short). For a long time I couldn’t imagine retiring and planned on teaching right up until the end. Working with middle school students “talked me out” of that idea. But, I still have a weird relationship with the uncertainty of the future. That was one of the attractions of my early faith, believing that I knew what was going to happen NEXT. Sadly, all of it turned out to be delusional and selective thinking. 

I’m curious to hear how others might have been affected by promises of the “Soon Return of Jesus.” If you still believe, how have you been able to adjust your faith in light of what we were all sharing back in the day? Anyone have stories from the more recent predictions of Jesus’ Return (2011, 2023)?  Please share your thoughts and experiences. JBB

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Tags: 1970s Jesus freaks, broken promises, in bad faith, Jesus is coming, religious certainty

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