TikTok has found its latest obsession: a doomsday prophecy that’s being shared with equal measures of wide-eyed belief and gleeful mockery. At the center of it all is South African pastor Joshua Mhlakela, who insists the rapture is due any moment now.
Mhlakela took part in a now-viral interview with CettwinzTV in June, where he claimed that the rapture would take place today or tomorrow.
“The Rapture is upon us, whether you are ready or not,” he said, claiming Jesus said to him, “very loud and clear,” that he was making his arrival. “He said to me on the 23rd and 24th of September 2025, ‘I will come back to the Earth.”
The rapture — a belief not explicitly found in the Bible — is seen by some Christians as a moment when believers will ascend to heaven to meet Jesus at the end of days. The prophecy has now spilled onto social media, where a flood of TikToks has been dubbed “RaptureTok” — though it’s unclear just how many posters are being sincere with their videos.
For example, one man, who goes by the name Tilahun on TikTok, shared a video in August and said he was selling his car in preparation for the rapture.
“Car is gone just like the Brides of Christ will be in September,” the user, who describes himself as “a prophet and evangelist to nations” in his bio, wrote in the caption of the clip.
Another woman named Melissa said in a TikTok video that she’s preparing her house for the “people who are left behind” during the expected rapture. This meant buying Bibles from Dollar Tree, with little notes on them, and bookmarking a few scriptures.
“Hopefully these books will end up in the hands of people who need them,” she said.
A woman named Hannah, based in Louisiana, posted a nine-minute video on TikTok this week, explaining that earlier this year, she expected a rapture to happen in fall 2025. So, when she heard about Mhlakela’s vision, she “took it seriously.”
@stopwiththebuttholecramp Preparing my home for the #missingpeople after the #rapture #christiantiktok #jesus #faith
♬ original sound - Melissa Johnston
“I prayed, and I asked God that whenever the rapture happens…Can you please just arrange things so I can be home with my family when it happens?” she said, noting that she had asked for the day off from work on September 23, and her request was denied.
However, four hours after this prayer, Hannah was allegedly fired from her job. And ultimately, that was another confirmation to her that the rapture was happening.
“Instead of being upset about not having a job, all I felt was peace,” she said. “Instead of being at work next week, I’m going to be home with my family the entire week. If we’re still here by the end of next week, I’m going to start job hunting again.”
RaptureTok has even spilled over onto X, where users are cracking jokes about the end of the world and noting that doomsday prophecies like this one are nothing new.
“Cleaning my room just in case because that would be embarrassing if it were messy during the rapture,” one person quipped.
“Funny thing is, the Bible never actually mentions the rapture,” another noted. “That’s 1800s fan-fiction that got marketed into doctrine.”
“If I had a nickel for every time some church group thought they'd figured out the date of the Rapture, I could afford to buy a dozen or so eggs,” third tweeted.
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