This week I want to expand on last week’s post. The gist of my last post was that the flood and the ark were a “mass extinction event”……..a “return to factory settings”. God intervened in a massive…….some would say a catastrophic……way and cleaned up his creation. He eliminated a large number of creatures……..and a large number of people that just didn’t fit in with his plan for his creation. He preserved a small number of people and “kinds” of animals that fulfilled his vision for his creation. This wasn’t a punishment. It was God simply redirecting his creation in order to get it headed to where he had intended it to go from the beginning. God engineered a “return to factory settings” in the form of a “mass extinction event”. He sent the flood…….destruction……and the ark……salvation. This historical event is described, in detail, in Genesis.
And that brings us, mankind, to where we are today. The first book of the Bible describes in real terms God’s first “mass extinction event”. The last book of the Bible describes in largely symbolic terms…….apocalyptic literature…….God’s last “mass extinction event”. The middle of the Bible deals with the world we live in. The middle of the Bible tells us how to live and thrive in God’s creation. It tells us what we must do…….to meet God’s expectations…….of us and of his creation.
So, what about the coming “mass extinction event”?
Revelation is a notoriously difficult book to interpret. It could be literal, but most scholars say that it is largely symbolic. The details of the end of this world cannot be clearly interpreted from Revelation. Especially, the timing of the end cannot be predicted. But, three things are clear:
The end will be unspeakably horrible.
When it is over, there will be a new world that satisfies God’s original plan…….God’s plan, not yours, not mine.
This new world will be populated with people who satisfy God’s expectations of mankind. And what are those expectations? Love God……love everybody else. Those who do not satisfy God’s expectations will be sent somewhere else…….and it will not be pretty.
This “mass extinction event ” will be the second coming of Christ.
And what that will look like……to you……is completely in your power.
Use your power well.
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
Micah 6:8, ESV
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16, ESV