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(Photo Illustration by Steve Baker/The Salt Lake Tribune)
By Linda Fantin
The Salt Lake Tribune
Saddam Hussein's tyrannical reign appears to have ended and Brian David Mitchell is behind bars, but the world -- or at least the world according to Todd Strandberg -- is not necessarily a safer place.
By Strandberg's latest calculation, humans are still speeding toward oblivion and Saddam and Mitchell are just two of those with their foot on the gas.
It's all there in the Rapture Index, Strandberg's on-line, end-of-time radar gun. The index is Strandberg's way of quantifying world events and biblical prophecy in order to measure how close -- or, how fast -- the end of time is approaching. It does not, however, gauge support for a Blondie reunion tour despite rumors that such an event could trigger the Second Coming.
Strandberg, an Air Force supply sergeant, invented his doomsday clock in 1987 at age 22 on a Franklin Computer Co. knockoff of the Apple II. He had always been somewhat of a news junkie, and the Rapture Index allowed him to blend his interests in current events with his belief that one day, without warning, true believers in Christ will be lifted to heaven instantaneously.
Evangelicals call this divine intervention the "rapture."
The term doesn't actually appear in the Bible. It stems from the phrase "caught up" in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, which predicts: "the dead in Christ will rise, then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord." The Greek verb for "caught up" is harpazo, which, translated into Latin, becomes raptus, Strandberg said.
As a general rule, Catholics, Protestants, Lutherans, Mormons and most other Christian denominations don't buy into the idea of a secret, premillennial rapture. They believe that Jesus will return only after a period of war and wickedness and prolonged misery. Other, more fundamentalist churchgoers believe the rapture will occur before the tribulation, thereby sparing them from a lot of the bad stuff. In less time than you can say David Copperfield, they believe, the righteous will be whisked right out of their clothes and into the clouds. No time to turn off the iron or switch on the autopilot.
Evangelicals do not know the exact date and time of the rapture, but they believe it is drawing ever near, and an increasing number of them are turning to Strandberg's Web site, http://www.raptureready.com, for clues. So many, in fact, that Strandberg now has 14 servers to handle all the traffic, which is up to 300,000 new visitors a month, he said.
The index, modeled after the Dow Jones Industrial Average, consists of 45 categories of prophetic indicators -- from the Occult and Mark of the Beast to Inflation and the Crime Rate. Each is assigned a value of 1 to 5 depending on the level of activity in that category. The numbers are adjusted weekly, and the higher the number, the faster the world is moving toward the rapture.
As of April 7, the index was at 168, its lowest point of the year. Then again, anything above a 145 is considered "fasten your seat belt" territory.
"Some may look at this and think it is kind of corny," Strandberg said from his home in Bellevue, Neb., just south of Omaha. "But because the rapture and the tribulation that will follow is so profound, somebody ought to be paying attention to this stuff."
Strandberg focuses on the number of occurrences rather than their level of importance, although a high-impact event can prolong the amount of time an indicator stays at a certain level. For example, as soon as Elizabeth Smart was found in the company of Mitchell, a street preacher who claims to converse with God, the False Christs indicator shot up a notch to 3 and has stayed there ever since.
The problem with biblical prophecy, Strandberg said, is the tendency to view big events, especially those connected to the Middle East, in isolation.
The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq is a prime example. But bombing Baghdad has had minimal effect on the economy, drought and earthquakes. And some categories already are maxed out. The threat of biological warfare put Plagues over the top long before Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, made headlines.
Still, Strandberg said, there's just no pleasing some people. Just this week, he received an e-mail from a woman who was angry that the index had dropped five points. He calls these followers -- and this is not a typo -- too optimistic.
They want all categories to be at a 5. They can't help it. They're ready to go, Strandberg said.
"Some people get a little carried away and, when it gets up to 180, they call and say, 'Is this it, Todd?,' " he said. "The index is a good reminder, but I would never tell people, 'If it's below 160, don't be afraid to go into a bar, but if it reaches 160, you had better be in church next Sunday.' "
Mike Eaves, manager of Lifeway Christian Store in Salt Lake City, is a little surprised the war has not been better for business. "I would have thought our store would be bombarded with people asking questions about biblical prophecy or doing research," he said. "We saw a lot more people during the Gulf War."
Maybe people are desensitized to it. After all, wars and rumors of wars are nothing new.
"I've been in two of them," said Eaves, a veteran of Vietnam and the Gulf War. "Are we getting close to the rapture? I think we are. But Paul the Apostle thought the Second Coming would happen during his lifetime, too, and that was 2,000 years ago."
Eaves, for one, has never heard of the Rapture Index, nor is he fond of fixing a mathematical formula to the Bible. "You either believe it or you don't. You either take it serious or you don't."
Strandberg is plenty serious. He's busy trying to figure out how to keep the Web site operational once the you know what occurs and you know who departs.
"The rapture is going to be the most shocking event to ever occur, the greatest media event of all time," he said. "We're expecting a huge traffic surge."
Rapture Index
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God bless,
Kindgo
Inside the will of God there is no failure. Outside the will of God there is no success.
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