A Twisted Crown of Thorns ®

Harold Camping began his ministry as a conservative reformed follower. However, smoke started to rise from Harold’s ministry as he refused to sit under anyone’s authority. We should have known there was a fire burning.

As the years passed, Harold, a civil engineer, incorporated strange numerology and allegorical interpretations to his teachings. As is almost always the case, when a teacher starts to lean left, their trajectory rarely corrects back to the center, it veers more radically left. And so it goes with Harold Camping.

It is not uncommon to hear Harold tell his followers, “Never before have you heard a teaching like this.” Hebrews 13:9 was written for a time such as this. “Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings.”

The moral to the story

What can we learn from this unfortunate side-show?

1.       Accountability through the local church is important.

2.       Run from teachers who say, “I have a new interpretation.”

3.       Never stop being a Berean!

4.       Never fear to hold ANY teacher’s feet to the fire.

There will be more Harold Campings and more false teachers. We must always be willing to “mark those who cause division contrary to what we have learned, and avoid them (Romans 16:17).