My Dear Friend,

Never before in human history had there been such a thing. A flood covering the entire earth? It was unthinkable. Laughable. Unscientific! Absurd food for hungry morons!

At least, so the antediluvians thought, as they undoubtedly shared rounds of raucus jokes and hearty laughs over "the fool," Noah, and his whole insane idea.

After dismissing Noah's nonsense, they continued living exactly as they had been living. Marrying and giving in marriage. Buying and selling. Building and planting. Drinking and partying. Stealing and robbing. Maiming and killing. Day after day, year after year. Without remorse or repentance. Without the slightest inclination to believe in Noah's God, much less his utterly discredited "warning" of things to come. But they had overlooked one key fact.

Almighty God had spoken! Focused on this key fact, Noah, in contrast to his laughing peers, believed God and, assisted by his three sons, obediently built an ark of rescue, being motivated by the fear, or awe, of the Lord daily. "By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household" (Hebrew 11:7, NKJV). By inspiration Peter adds that Noah also preached "righteousness" - that men should fear God and get right with Him before it was too late (2 Peter 2:5). He knew God's clock was ticking.

One hundred and twenty years passed, filled with silent suspense. Who would win the unofficial contest underway, Noah or his peers? Whose words would prevail to the eternal dismay and shame of the others'?

Then, suddenly, without further warning, the unthinkable happened: torrential rains began covering the whole earth. Noah was surely grieved, yet not afraid. He knew he and his family were safe in the ark, which also contained (probably) small, young members of every species of animals and different types of food for them as well as Noah's family.

It was then that, for the first time in their lives, Noah's peers thought of changing. Then they took Noah's God and warning seriously. Then they tried desperately to enter his ark. Some possibly tried frantically to build their own. But it was too late. The door of the ark was shut - by God! And as the waters rose, their voices were gradually silenced. The flood overwhelmed them.

As Almighty God had spoken. As Noah had believed. As Noah had preached. And as his disbelieving neighbors had mockingly considered foolishly impossible because, as everyone knew, it had never happened before in human history! But in the end, it was Noah's peers who were found foolish and Noah wise, in fact, the wisest, most far-seeing man in human history to date.

Fast forward thousands of years. Noah's world looks totally different in this twenty-first century. We enjoy rapid transportation worldwide. We enjoy instant communication all over the globe. We have dreadful thermonuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Flights into space are becoming common. Many fields of recorded scientific and technological knowledge double every year. And some in less than a year. We can even clone some of God's creations.

But underneath all our glossy, shining, prideful intelligence, all our entertainments and great men and women, nothing has essentially changed. Heaven seekers still consider Noah a hero of faith and earth dwellers are still averse to believing and obeying Noah's God. They are still building and planting. They are still buying and selling. They are still marrying and giving in marriage. They are still stealing - more than ever! Still violent. Still murderous. Still maddened by the pursuit of pleasure and entertainments, as if our social order will last forever. Still without one serious thought of believing, fearing, and obeying Noah's God. Even if He appeared in person to warn them of things soon to come upon this postmodern world.

News flash: He did come! In the person of His Son - one Jesus of Nazareth, the Jewish Messiah, or Christ - He appeared on earth 2,000 years ago, lived righteously under the law, spoke soaring eternal truths, showed otherworldly powers, demonstrated unmatched compassion, died for our sins, rose for our justification, and returned to heaven. But before leaving, He made this monumental declaration: "I will come again" (John 14:3). But He did not say when . . . or how . . . or why.

Those most important prophetic revelations were left to two of His closest disciples, John and Peter, and to a short, Jewish, Pharisee-turned-apostle, Paul. And, wouldn't you know it, they said the Lord warned them another "flood" is coming!

Not of water but of divine judgments. As in Noah's day, just judgments for prolonged worldwide wickedness, especially rampant violence, are long overdue. Along with all the Jewish prophets, and Jesus Himself, these apostles warned of a coming "Day of the Lord," a period in which God openly intervenes in the affairs of this world for judgment (the Tribulation) and blessing (the Millennium). Why must judgment come first?

In this extremely wicked, last-days culture we live in, God cannot bless His church, Israel, or the nations until they repent of their preferred sinful disorder and begin living in His perfect divine order. His intervention in judgment is the Tribulation, a seven-year period in which Seal, Trumpet, and Bowl judgments will be released by Jesus from heaven and summoned and controlled on earth by two special "witnesses" (Revelation 11:3-6).

Like the judgment of Noah's day, the Tribulation intervention will bring this world to a complete standstill and utterly destroy its God-hating, beast-worshiping, antichrist government, all for one purpose: to establish Christ's thousand-year kingdom on this earth! What does our proud, self-sufficient culture say about these prophecies? They consider them a big joke that evokes belly-laughter and mockery from this world's hubris-filled, secular intellectuals. But John, Peter, and Paul also said something else is coming.

Something even more laughable. More ludicrous. More unscientific. More absurd food for hungry morons! It is this: before the Tribulation comes, Jesus will suddenly appear in the sky to catch away His faithful followers from this earth and take them, alive and in immortal bodies, along with resurrected Christians, to heaven. There, safe in the "ark" of Christ, they will be kept "from" the horrific, massively destructive Tribulation judgments (Revelation 3:10).

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 gives the essential details concerning His appearing for anyone interested in confirming this humble reporter's story. Long ago Isaiah cried, "Who hath believed our report?" (Isaiah 53:1). And thousands of years before Isaiah, Noah almost certainly cried the same. To no avail!

Today I feel pressed to repeat their earnest, love-driven query. Who among us, in this hyper-sophisticated, technical, humanistic, age of information, believes this information: that Jesus is truly going to appear and catch away His faithful followers? Without warning? And take them with Him to heaven? And there, with all heaven in attendance, initiate the 2nd worldwide flood, a deluge not of water but of Seal, Trumpet, and Bowl judgments? Why? There is no easier way to bring this rebellious world into submission. And that must happen before Christ's earthly kingdom of truth, justice, and love can begin.

And please consider this. Never before in human history has there been a mass translation of mortals from earth to heaven without experiencing death. Nothing even remotely close has ever occurred. Only two individuals, Enoch and Elijah, have been translated. (Jesus ascended, or was merely transported, to heaven after being killed and resurrected.)

But, as in Noah's day, Almighty God has spoken. Again. So, the question before us is, who will be considered wise and who foolish when our generation's story is written for all the saints to read for the rest of eternity?

And who will believe this report in this piece? Be a Noah? Believe? Stand in awe? Preach or tell of righteousness? Prepare an ark of trust and obedience in their daily tests of faith, patience, loyalty, and endurance and (1) be "kept from" the hour of testing that is coming soon (Revelation 3:10), and (2) "escape all" (Luke 21:36) the sufferings it will bring by being suddenly taken up?

And who, being intelligent in their own eyes yet ignorant of God's awesome power, will dismiss this report as unthinkable? Laughable? Unscientific? Moronic nonsense? And remain smugly unchanged? Until its too late? Until, shocked by Christ's appearing and their Christian friends' disappearance in a blink of the eye, they find themselves left behind? And the "door" of escape tightly shut and bolted (Revelation 4:1-2), just as Jesus warned, "They that were ready went in with him to the marriage; and the door was shut" (Matthew 25:10)?

Only you and I, and our peers, can answer these questions. Let us do so wisely.

In the spirit of Noah's warning,

Dr. Greg Hinnant

GREG HINNANT MINISTRIES