Have you booked your ticket for a New Year vacation? If so, you can probably think again. There is one person who says that the world is going to end this year. So you can cover your concerts, movies and vacations this month.
As the year of cataclysmic changes, violence and population shifts draws to a close - so does the life of the world with the arrival of Jesus, according to a Christian computer scientist. Nora Roth examined the Book of Daniel and found that the New Year will bring a new gift to the world - its last breath.
The Book of Daniel talks about the story of Jewish people's forced return to Babylon. Roth wrote that God "told the children of Israel to plant and to harvest their land for six years and then let the land rest the seventh year."
Some complex calculations have indicated her conclusion, she said. She looked into Biblical passages and probed into "God's clocks of the sevens" based on the so-called "sevens" prophecy. She said that "everlasting righteousness will be brought in" and Earth will be "left to rest" for another thousand years.
In her blog, 'The Mark of the Beast', she revealed: "Are 6,000 years of sin almost over? Will Jesus come in 2016? The Bible presents enlightening, logical, and compelling answers to these questions. In short, yes!"
Gabriel said in his story: "Seventy sevens are decreed [...] to put an end to sin." The "sevens" are one unit of time known as the Jubilee Cycle, said Roth. By extending the scale, she said the world will end in 2016.
She calculated: "The 70 Jubilees began in 1416 BC when God's children entered Canaan. The 70 Jubilees will end 3,431 years later in 2016 AD."
However, she also admitted that the Bible is not really clear about the exact date of the end.
After all, Matthew 24 has said: "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only."
Roth's theory did not find too many takers. It was quickly dismissed by Baptist minster Mark Woods,
He said: "This way of reading the Bible is called 'millenarianism', and it tends to be a function of extreme biblical literalism and a lot of social stress - war, poverty, social change etc. There's a lot of that going on at the moment."
It would be a "sheer coincidence" for anyone to arrive at the "exact conclusion" that the world is going to end, he said.
The Books of Daniel and Revelation need to be read and interpreted carefully, he explained.
He said: "They are difficult books, and we should be very cautious about how we interpret them. As a general rule, it's safe to say they haven't got much to say about the future, but they have a lot to say about the present. And while Ms Roth is almost certainly wrong about the Rapture coming by December 31, Jesus also tells his disciples to watch and be ready for his coming at any time."
Hence, if you believe him, it is clear that you can still book your ticket for the New Year's vacation hotspot. Still, to be on the safer side, you can probably complete your holidays before the New Year begins.
