This paper
(OK, so it’s digital; I’m old school) may well startle you in the ideas it
presents. Most certainly, you have probably never heard some of them before. My
career in meteorology has contributed at least in part to some of these ideas,
otherwise they are a result of just studying the Bible with an open mind and
spirit. Nothing here contradicts the Apostle’s Creed or the Nicene Creed.
The Book of
Genesis describes a global flood that can hardly be interpreted any other way. Gen
7:19 The water prevailed more and more upon the earth, so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. Bible literalists have no doubt that it occurred. Flood stories exist in
ancient cultures all over the world. A global flood may explain a large part of
the fossil record as well as the production of oil.
There are
problems with the flood theory though; ice core samples from Antarctica
reveal annual rings that go back tens of thousands of years without any break
in the pattern. Does this mean that the global flood didn’t happen, or that it
was regional not global? Not necessarily. A global flood could have melted many
years or decades of record in the ice core and we might never know.
For the
purpose of this paper we will assume that the flood did occur and that it was
global in extent – pretty easy to do since that’s what the Bible says. Why it
occurred is explained clearly in Genesis; man’s ways were evil only and God
decided to destroy mankind and remake it through Noah and his family. Also,
there were angels who were abandoning their stations and somehow having sexual
relations with the daughters of men.
In this
paper we are going to look at how the flood came about, that is, the mechanics
involved. How and why those mechanics came about is what is so fascinating. Did
God employ some natural mechanics? He usually does. During the parting of the Red Sea , He created a strong wind all night. When He fed
the Israelites quail in the desert, He brought them with a strong wind.
As children it becomes obvious to us that the geographic features of the earth seem to fit together like a puzzle. Remove the oceans, do a little twisting and shuffling and presto, it’s one big continent. Most everyone is familiar with the theory of plate tectonics – that’s science’s answer to the obvious geographic puzzle. Trouble is they believe that continental drift has occurred over millions of years; I think it happened in 40 days and 40 nights, or, at most, one year.
It rained
upon the earth 40 days and nights to produce the flood that covered even the
tallest mountains. The Bible says that it did not rain upon the earth prior to
the flood. The flora was watered from springs, rivers and dew. In the Garden of
Eden, Adam and Eve wore no clothes until after they sinned and then only to
cover their shame. Consequently, there were no diurnal temperature extremes –
not too hot in the day or too cold at night. We can then conjecture that there
were no weather systems of any consequence.
So, how did
it rain for 40 days and 40 nights without weather systems? The very stable
temperature pattern could only have happened if there had been something in the
atmosphere to prevent the heat from the earth from escaping. Cloudy nights are
warmer than clear nights. The creation story in Genesis tells us that God
separated the waters above the earth from the waters below the earth. This
seems to imply that there were waters in the atmosphere. Of course, there is
lots of water in the atmosphere which exists in the form of vapour. Sometimes
it is visible as clouds, sometimes it is not. Even if it was not dense enough
to be visible, it may have been thick enough to form the thermal canopy needed
to keep the temperature comfortable.
Now we have
a water source but in order to have clouds and rain we need a lifting
mechanism. Air that is lifted cools and condenses forming clouds and eventually
rain. Without frontal weather systems we have to look elsewhere for a lifting
mechanism. This is where it starts to get really surprising.
I believe
that the lifting occurred by the literal expansion of the earth. I believe that
God expanded the earth as if He were blowing up a balloon. This would result in
the tearing apart of the mega-continent into the current continents and their
rapid movement into roughly their current positions. It also created the space
for the great oceans to develop. All of that water had to go somewhere; much of
it ended up in the oceans and much of it evaporated and returned to the skies
but not nearly enough to produce the pleasant temperature patterns of pre-flood
years.
Why would
God do that? Are you ready for this? God destroyed all the people on the earth
except Noah and his family, and since souls are not destroyed with our bodies,
God needed somewhere to put what was probably a few million souls – He created
Hell.
There is no
mention of Hell in Genesis anywhere before the flood. There is a good question
as to where the souls of lost people were kept before the creation of Hell; I
don’t have an answer for that. But it is clear from many scriptures that lost
souls go to Hell and that Hell is located deep in the earth.***
*** Matt
5:22,29,30; Luke 16:23; Eze 31:16
Eze 32:24;
Num 16:30,33; Job 17:16; Job 24:19; Psalm 9:17
