Why Aren't There Any Missing People?

Late last month, someone left a book on the doorstep of my church called Where Are the Missing People? by Jimmy Evans. It showed up right after yet another one of those moments in history when a self-appointed prophet tried—and failed—to predict the end of the world. This time, like all the others, the world kept turning and nobody was "taken up to heaven" or "left behind." 

Now, I don’t usually write about books like this. Frankly, they’re everywhere—part of a whole cottage industry built around the idea of the “rapture,” that supposed moment when believers will be whisked away to heaven while everyone else is “left behind.” You'll recall Hal Lindsay's infamous fiction, The Late Great Planet Earth, and, of course, Tim LaHaye's all too creative Left Behind series. So I don’t mean to single out Jimmy Evans or pick on one author. Many authors in the last several decades have written lots of books—and made lots and lots of money—selling this story. He’s just one of many carrying on a long tradition of misguided eschatologists. But since the book ended up on my doorstep, it seemed worth honoring the gift by giving it a fair reading and perhaps saying something about the theology it represents—and why it’s not only wrong, but dangerous.

The idea of the “rapture” does not come from the Bible. It was invented in the early 1800s by John Nelson Darby, an Anglo-Irish clergyman and a key figure in the Plymouth Brethren movement. Darby was fascinated by prophecy and the end times, and he developed a novel system of interpreting scripture that broke sharply from traditional Christian thought. He pieced together a handful of verses from different parts of the Bible—especially a passage in one of Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians that includes the Greek word harpazō (“to take” or “to seize”). That word was later translated into Latin as raptus, the past participle of rapere, which eventually evolved through Medieval Latin raptura into the English word “rapture.”

From this linguistic trail, Darby constructed an elaborate theology of end-times escape, which became the foundation of what is now called dispensationalism. This system divides history into distinct periods—or “dispensations”—and presents a futurist scenario in which Christ will return secretly to remove the faithful from the earth before a period of tribulation. It was a sharp departure from centuries of Christian eschatology, which focused on resurrection, judgment, and the renewal of creation. By taking verses out of context and weaving them into a dramatic story of escape, Darby created a vision the early church would never have recognized.

And yet, somehow, despite its Theological and exegetical implausibility, this 19th-century innovation has captured the modern imagination so deeply that millions of Christians today live in anxious expectation of being “taken up,” often shaping their faith and daily lives around this fantasy rather than the hope the Bible actually offers and the invitation to live as citizens of Christ's kingdom here and now.

When I read Evans’s book, I could tell he sincerely believes what he’s saying, whether or not he should actually know better. It’s written as if he expects the rapture to occur any moment, and someone left behind will find this book in an abandoned house or bookstore (which—let’s be honest—feels more like a movie plot than theology) and finally understand what happened. The presumptuousness of that premise is staggering and it shows the alarming level of dramatic delusion the author has wandered into. But even more concerning is what this kind of teaching does to people’s faith and mental health.

Belief in the rapture trains people to see the world not as God’s beloved creation but as a sinking ship from which to escape. It fosters fear instead of faith, passivity instead of participation, and despair instead of hope. It has even been used to justify—and at times to fuel—the genocide of the Palestinian people and the militant forms of Zionism that have made peace in the Middle East seem like an impossible dream, for an example I wish were more fringe than it is. It can cause deep psychological and spiritual harm, especially to those who grow up terrified that they—or their loved ones—might be “left behind.” I’ve met people who still carry that fear years later, haunted by sermons or books that turned God’s love into a cosmic sorting hat. This is all not to mention the deep psychological damage to the soul that must happen if one conditions themselves to eagerly look forward to the world's end. 

But the good news of the gospel is something entirely different. The Bible doesn’t call us to hope for rescue from the earth; it calls us to hope for the renewal of the earth. It calls us to participate in God's work of justice, not to justify the horrors of injustice with false prophesy. Scripture tells a story of incarnation—a God who enters the world—and a story of resurrection, not evacuation; of God making all things new, not discarding them. Our hope is not in escaping the world but in joining God’s work of healing and reconciliation within it.

So, while I don’t recommend Where Are the Missing People?, I do think it’s a useful reminder. It shows just how easily fear can masquerade as faith when we lose sight of the gospel. The world doesn’t need another "rapture" prediction. It doesn't need books for people who will never actually be left behind by authors who feel the need to feed their egos. What the world needs, now more than ever, is a renewed vision of God’s love. one that calls us not to flee from creation, but to participate in its redemption.