Business Man Closes Up Shop to Prepare for Rapture; UPDATE: Now He's Hosed

Yeah, I'd have advised against that.

Harold Camping could not be reached for comment.

SPRINGFIELD, Tenn. - One Springfield man has "closed up shop," and is now preparing for the return of Jesus.

Gary Rastelli shut down his Springfield business last Saturday and notified the customers of his lawn mower repair shop.

"I'm not going to charge you anything," he said to his last customer Friday.

Rastelli also made preparation for those he calls the "non-believers." He says he's saved up some water and food, as well as a generator and a well to produce water.

Rastelli is among those who believe that the world is coming to an end on October 21, but he hopes not to be around for that, because he says May 21 is the date of the Rapture.

"There have been many people that are taking it as a joke," he said. "There are a few who are humbling themselves, are frightened or scared."

The Family Radio Network and owner Harold Camping placed billboards around the United States and even the Mid-state area last December claiming that the world will come to an end on Saturday.

Camping predicts the destruction of the earth will begin at 6 p.m. with a massive earthquake.

Theologians and some people in the Christian community have pointed to biblical scriptures like 1 Thessalonians 5:2, which says, "For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night."

"But the rest of that verse says that you are not children of darkness that that day should overtake you as a thief," Rastelli said.

He says he understands that there have been dates given before, but believes Saturday is it, and he's doing his part to spread the word even up until his last customer Friday night.

"I'll check it out. I'm Church of Christ, and I don't... I have to totally disagree with anybody," one customer said.

Nick Braunsheneider, the pastor at Belmont Heights Baptist Church, told Nashville's News 2 that he does not believe the predictions about Saturday.

"It seems to be a contradiction to what Jesus said in the Gospels," he said, adding, "We will not know the day or the hour, and even the angels in heaven don't know the day or the hour. He will come like a thief in the night and we are to be expecting that, we're to be waiting, we need to be ready."

The question a lot of people want to know is how will Rastelli feel on May 22 if he's still in his home in Springfield, Tennessee?

"For me to doubt or the waiver in my belief basically would be sin, because I'd be saying I don't believe God's word, the bible," he said.

Rastelli has already referred his customers to other businesses in town.

Video here.

Cross-posted.