Looks like the Rapture has been rescheduled… again
From nuclear fallouts and zombie outbreaks to a natural disaster deadly enough to wipe out all of humanity, the apocalypse, or the end of man—or the manner in which it will manifest itself—is a highly contested topic explored across pop culture and throughout various religions.
The Holy Bible, particularly the Book of Revelation, interprets this as the Tribulation, which is described as a seven-year period of war, famine, disease, and the rise of the Antichrist—the end of times. However, according to scripture, after these seven years, God will descend to Earth, defeat the forces of evil ruling over the land, and establish his kingdom among the remaining faithful.
But, it is also stated that before this Tribulation, a select portion of his church will be brought up into heaven and spared from the seven years of suffering. Like Noah’s Ark: They refer to this as the Rapture.
“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,” reads The First Book of Thessalonians (4:16-17).
Our latest Rapture appointment
Think of the obsession with the end of the world in 2012 because of the Mayan Calendar, and every other “apocalypse” we’ve lived through. They built up anticipation and panic, and were later disproved. And yet, that doesn’t stop the next fool from delivering their next prophecy.
The same applies to the Rapture, and our most recent prediction which came from Joshua Mhlakela, a pastor from South Africa.
In a YouTube podcast with CENTTWINZ TV, Mhlakela said that the Lord appeared to him in a dream in 2018 and said, “The rapture is upon us. There will be no World Cup 2026, because life on earth will not be business as usual for those that are left behind.”
He also shared another, more specific dream, where God appeared to him in robes and gave him the exact date of his return. “From the time Israel became a nation in 1948, there will be 77 years to the exodus. On the 23rd and 24th of Sept. 2025, I will come to take my church.”
TikTokification of the Rapture
As insane as it sounds for God to be talking about the World Cup, Mhlakela’s prediction wasn’t exactly met with the same level of pessimism as previous ones were—in fact, a mixed response teetering between satire and full-on belief.
On one end, reports of the faithful selling their belongings at highly discounted prices, while other TikTokers were seen poking fun at the prediction—with a user playing the horns at full blast in an attempt to fool the unsuspecting faithful.
Meanwhile, some have taken offense with the very act of predicting the Rapture: “The rapture is not and will never be planned out for humans to know. If it causes you fear, anxiety, and depression, that’s not from God,” says another TikTok user.
Believing in the Rapture is one thing, but adjusting one’s life for an unlikely supernatural event only gives Catholicism and Christianity a bad rep—frankly, going outside a house so the roof won’t get in the way of the Rapture is cultlike behavior that will in all likelihood get clowned on.
In God’s time
As with any version of the apocalypse, we just can’t help but attempt to pinpoint its exact date. While these and their so-called prophets have received their fair share of ridicule, perhaps our desire for setting doomsday clocks and end of the world conspiracies is in itself a rebellion against the very idea of the end—that by knowing when it will come we can somehow take hold of our fates against the great and the supernatural. It’s in our nature after all.
