Rapture!

On today's drive home, MercyMe's "I Can Only Imagine" came on the radio and spurred a trip down memory lane...

It was the summer of either 2003 or 2004, meaning I was 16 or 17, and I was at the lake house, in the middle of a long vacation. I was in the habit of going to bed with the radio tuned to the local pop station because I liked falling asleep to music.

This night was no different-- after a long day of skiing and swimming (and probably eating), I settled into bed in the front room, in the same bed that I now have in Dallas, and turned on the FM. I dozed off, lulled by the sweet sounds of Beyonce, Kelly Clarkson and Lifehouse and a fan breeze on my face.

Then, sometime during the middle of the night, I woke up, startled: the secular station to which I had fallen asleep was playing a Christian song. The lyrics were a dead giveaway: "Surrounded by your glory, what will my heart feel?" as was the twinkly accompanying piano. My first thought? Rapture! There could be no other explanation for something so ludicrous.

I was terrified. I had been one of those left behind. What did this mean? What about the rest of my family? My grandma, a wonderful, God-fearing woman, would be the litmus test. If she was still around, the whole radio thing was some sort of fluke. I sprinted to her bedroom, only to find her peacefully asleep, very much still present in this life. My heart started to slow down, and I went back to bed, said a few extra prayers, and fell asleep.

In the following weeks, I discovered that my night of terror was simply a result of MercyMe making the transition over into the secular music market, but I've since always had a bit of disdain for that song.

Interestingly enough, that was the first of a handful of rapture scares at the lake.