3. The Catastrophe
This will be a more detailed explanation of how the Flood actually happened, according to my interpretation of the vision from God.
If you haven’t read The Layers of Earth from this series, I highly recommend it. I’ll start though with a quick synopsis, or overview of what happened, and then drill down deeper into each facet of the great breaking of Earth. But first, the timing.
Timing
According to the Bible, on the seventeenth day of the second month (not on our Gregorian calendar), in the year 1656 (anno mundi—year of Earth), is when the Flood began.
When Noah was 600 years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the underground waters erupted from the earth, and the rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky. The rain continued to fall for forty days and forty nights.
(Genesis 7:11-12, NLT)
Isn’t it fun to know the exact date that the Great Flood began? No other explanation (apart from God’s word) can tell you this.
And since the Bible has clues as to the year we are living in now, we can firmly say that the Flood started roughly 4300 years ago. This means that there is no civilization, culture, or continent on Earth that is older than that. Yes, I said continent. After reading this full series, you will understand this comment.
The only reason why mankind has a history predating this exact moment is because Noah and his family were spared by God in His mercy and grace.
This is why Young Earth Creationism is called biblical creationism; because it follows the teaching of the Holy Bible, God’s Word.
Overview
Imagine a meteorite, careening toward the unsuspecting planet (well, Noah and his family suspected something). This celestial object is probably fairly large and moving at incredible speed. It crashes through the Atmosphere, the Soil Layer, the Crust Bedrock Layer, the Water Layer, and comes to rest deep within the Mantle of Earth.
When it breaks the Mantle open, Lava comes gushing out. When the Lava comes gushing out, it contacts the Water Layer, causing a tremendous explosion as the super hot Lava meets the cooler (but hot) water.
The Water Layer, expanding into vapor, pushes the Bedrock Layer to its breaking point. The Bedrock cracks and as the interaction quickly spreads around the world, the Bedrock Layer shatters into many pieces and falls to the fractured surface of the Mantle beneath the Water Layer.
In this global explosion, water, rock, pyroclastic debris, dirt, ash and smoke are flung high into the atmosphere or beyond. And as the Bedrock collapses, the torrential, steaming water of the Water Layer is released to cover the Earth. Land gives way to mud and scalding hot water.
All life, both flora and fauna, is consumed by the soil turning to mud and is pulled down to the mirky, turbulent depths. All plant life, all land-based animal life is torn up and wrapped in scalding mud, to be encased in mud turning to rock in a very short time. In probably less than one hour, everything on Earth, save the Ark passengers and crew, and some sealife, is terminated. Nothing that was on land will survive, and only some of the sealife will find a way to avoid destruction. Only a few pockets of good, cool water are still available for fish and sea animals to find shelter in. All is lost.
Not Just Rain
By the time Noah and family got over the initial jolt of water hitting their boat, all life around them was gone—buried alive in the muddy depths (up to 2 miles down). Some were instantly torn to shreds, others were boiled, others simply drowned, but all died very quickly and may I add mercifully. Before a drop of rain fell, there were no heads left to fall upon; they were all gone by then.
My guess is that the Crust Layer was decimated within an hour, globally. But then the rains began—with a vengeance. It was a rainstorm the world has never seen, before or since. This is because the water emerging from the Water Layer (called the Fountains of the Deep in the Bible) was extremely hot. Any meteorologist will tell you that super hot water meeting tepid skies will cause instant fog that grows into giant towering cumulonimbus monsters (storm clouds) in no time flat. But these towering cumulonimbus clouds were likely formed in a non-stop blanket of ferocity like no one has ever seen around the world in a continuous cloud. (It was a white planet.)
The rains would have begun instantly and not stopped until the 40 days ran out, as told in the Bible by the One Who did it.
Global Cooling
Since the water was so hot coming out through the Crust Layer, those on the Ark were lucky that the soil (turned to mud) had a cooling effect. That may have saved them. But then the quickly forming clouds, with the rising heat, also had a cooling effect. In fact, the cooling continued at such a rate that, within a rather short time, it began producing sleet, snow, and ice on the poles and to about the 40th parallels. Antarctica and Greenland are likely still covered by the very same snow an ice at the ground level.
Shattering Piñatas
A piñata is a container made of cardboard and paper that is used in birthday parties and other festivities. It is usually filled with candy or other goodies to be released when it is broken open and torn to shreds. It was used originally as a symbolic gesture of taking out bad luck or demons, or whatever fears the people wanted to get out of their lives.
I like to use the piñata as a metaphor, like a strawman, for when people wish to make an opposing point of view seem silly and easy to beat up on. They create a piñata of a story that is not the real story and begin to wail on it with a proverbial stick.
The application to Noah’s Flood is that schools and scientists (without any apparent faith or imagination) talk of a 40-day rain not being able to cover Mt. Everest (at 29,000’ and everything else on Earth), which is actually quite true. But they don’t allow God to be true and every man a liar (Romans 3:4).
Well, my model of the biblical Flood account smashes their local flood piñata to bits. It wasn’t just rain, but a global sinkhole!
All Life Vanished
Just like the Bible says, no one on This Broken Planet survived this catastrophe except the 8 people and thousands of animals that were onboard the Ark that Noah built. (Well, some sealife made it through also.) It was a Global Extinction Event (GEE) caused by a meteorite impacting the Earth where Iceland is located now. That makes Iceland a scab over the wound from the celestial bullet that is now lodged deep in the Earth’s broken Mantle.
As you will see in other parts of this series, the world is mortally wounded (from this flood event) and will not last very long. It is doomed to a slow death which will not allow life to be sustained at some point in the distant future.
The Great Hope
Lucky for us, the same God Who ruined this rebellious planet is merciful, and will return to us in bodily form (as Jesus), and He will rule here for a thousand years from His throne in Jerusalem. Then, after that millennium is over, He will give us a brand new Earth and solar system and universe, which will be free of the decay and depravity that this Physical Realm is cursed with now. And He will destroy hell at that time as well. Yay God!
I encourage you to see how God’s Word is truly the real story and that what we have been given from men, since the “enlightenment”, is completely false. They tried to make a piñata of the biblical story in order to remove it from our global consciousness. Well, now we can show how fragile their piñata is and beat it with a stick. Have fun as you do so!
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