How Far is the Judgment Day?

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

   إِنَّ ٱلسَّاعَةَ ءَاتِيَةٌ أَكَادُ أُخۡفِيہَا لِتُجۡزَىٰ كُلُّ نَفۡسِۭ بِمَا تَسۡعَىٰ (20:15)

"Indeed, the Hour is coming - I almost conceal it - so that every soul may be recompensed according to that for which it strives."

ٱقۡتَرَبَتِ ٱلسَّاعَةُ وَٱنشَقَّ ٱلۡقَمَرُ (54:1)

"The Hour has come near, and the moon has split [in two]. "    

إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ عِندَهُ ۥ عِلۡمُ ٱلسَّاعَةِ وَيُنَزِّلُ ٱلۡغَيۡثَ وَيَعۡلَمُ مَا فِى ٱلۡأَرۡحَامِ‌ۖ وَمَا تَدۡرِى

 نَفۡسٌ۬ مَّاذَا تَڪۡسِبُ غَدً۬ا‌ۖ وَمَا تَدۡرِى نَفۡسُۢ بِأَىِّ أَرۡضٍ۬ تَمُوتُ‌ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ عَلِيمٌ خَبِيرُ (31:34)                     

"Indeed, Allah [alone] has knowledge of the Hour and sends down the rain and knows what is in the wombs. And no soul perceives what it will earn tomorrow, and no soul perceives in what land it will die. Indeed, Allah is Knowing and Acquainted."

  صدق الله العلي العظيم

I have recently seen some Islamic scholars' video lectures in that they are trying to predict a specific time when they believe according to the sings implied in Quran the world will end  and consequently the resurrection day and judgement day will follow soon after. 

This is while according to the verse 20:15 above, it is only God who knows when the world will end and he has purposefully hidden this event until it is very close and there are obvious sings such as the moon being split into halves (verse 54:1) and so on.  Basically if people had a way to discover it then it would defeat its purpose of only believers in "Ghaib" unseen would be rewarded.  Only the true believers  in God who have lived their lives for God doing good deeds out of their faith  will survive that day. 

That said, we can look at the world's end-time  in a practical way.  That is, end of the world may either  happen in our life time, which one would reasonably consider it unlikely as our mind tells us that if it has not happened in thousand years already it is unlikely to happen soon, or alternatively our personal world will end by our death which is undeniably coming and will connect us directly to resurrection day. 

The question would now be if anyone can predict his death. The verse (31:34) states that it is again only God who knows where and when we will dye.  This time however, we can form at least a time frame in our mind as to the latest time when we will move to the other world.   That is to say, usually we are about our thirties and forties by the time we take these thoughts seriously in our life.  By then, we will be left with the remaining of average life expectancy in the particular place we are living in, which may vary from another 30 or 40 years later. 

In other words, by the time we potentially take our next life to our heart we have gone already half way.  Looking back at our first half of life on the Earth, it appears to us just like yesterday.  By the same token, perhaps we can come to the belief that our departure from the world would not be too long from now, if not tomorrow.   That is how we realize by our heart that : "Indeed, the Hour is coming".