Revelation

On August 27, 1883, the Earth let out a noise louder than any it has made since. It was 10:02 a.m. when the sound emerged from the island of Krakatoa, which sits between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. It was heard 2,000 miles away in Western Australia and even 3,000 miles away in the Indian Ocean Island of Rodrigues. In all, it was heard in over 50 different geographical locations.

Think just how crazy this is. It’s like being in Boston and clearly hearing a noise coming from Dublin, Ireland. Travelling at the speed of sound it takes a noise about four hours to cover that distance. This is the most distant sound that has ever been heard in recorded history.

So, what could possibly create such an earth-shatteringly loud bang? A volcano on Krakatoa had just erupted with a force that tore the island apart, emitting a plume of smoke that reached 17 miles high. This explosion created a deadly tsunami with waves over a hundred feet in height. One hundred sixty-five coastal villages were entirely destroyed. In all, it is estimated the death toll was between 36,000 and 120,000 people.

The British ship Norham Castle was 40 miles from Krakatoa at the time of the explosion. The ship’s captain wrote in his log, “So violent are the explosions that the eardrums of over half my crew have been shattered. My last thoughts are with my dear wife. I am convinced that the Day of Judgement has come.”

A barometer at the Batavia gasworks (100 miles away from Krakatoa) registered 172 decibels of sound pressure, an unimaginably loud noise. A jackhammer emits about 100 decibels while standing near a jet engine the level is 150 decibels. The human threshold for pain is near 130 decibels. The Krakatoa explosion registered 172 decibels at 100 miles from the source.

Amazingly, for as many as five days after the explosion, weather stations around the globe observed this unprecedented spike in pressure recurring approximately every 34 hours. That is roughly how long it takes sound to travel around the entire planet. In all, the pressure waves from Krakatoa circled the globe three to four times in each direction.

Possible Preaching Angle:

When the Lord returns, the trumpet sound will be heard around the world. Everyone who has ever lived, both alive and dead, will hear and respond to the sound.

Queen Elizabeth II passed away on September 8, 2022, at the age of 96. But it turns out that Britain's longest-reigning monarch still has something to say. We just won't know what it is for another 60 years or so. That's because a letter that she wrote to the people of Sydney, Australia, is sealed in a vault with instructions not to be opened until 2085, about 100 years after it was written.

The Queen wrote the letter in November of 1986 on one of her 16 visits to Australia. She addressed the letter to "the just and honorable Lord Mayor of Sydney, Australia" with very specific instructions: "On a suitable day to be selected by you in the year 2085 A.D, would you please open this envelope and convey to the citizens of Sydney my message to them." She then signed the mysterious message, "Elizabeth R.”

The secret letter left by Queen Elizabeth II to the people of Sydney was written to honor the restoration of the Queen Victoria Building. This building was first constructed in Sydney in 1898 for the occasion of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, who was also the Queen's great-grandmother. The Queen chose to celebrate that restoration, completed in 1986, with her secret letter.

The letter is located in a restricted part of the historic building inside a glass case. The Queen did not even tell her personal staff what the message to the future contains. Only the Queen was aware of the letter’s contents and it’s to be opened by the city’s future mayor.

Possible Preaching Angle:

1) Bible; Word of God – The scriptures can only be truly read and understood by God’s people (Isa. 29:11-12; Matt. 13:11); 2) Prophecy; Secret – God has revealed many things in his Word--past, present, and future. But there are some things that God has sealed up until the proper time. God told Daniel to “seal up the vision for it concerns the distant future” (Dan. 8:26). At the proper time it will be unsealed along with the prophecy of Revelation for all to read “Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this scroll because the time is near” (Rev. 22:10).

Rabbis in Israel have spent many years searching for a qualified red heifer. Finally in September of 2022, a Texas man has delivered five red heifers to four Israeli rabbis so the young cows can be slaughtered and burned to produce the ash necessary for a ritual purification prescribed in Numbers 19:2–3.

Some Jews believe the ritual is a step toward the reconstruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Some Christians believe that “third temple” will set the stage for the Antichrist.

Editor’s Note: The red heifers must be monitored for defects by the rabbis until they are three-years-old. At that time, if unblemished, they would be suitable for use as sacrifices in the red heifer ritual. The Mishnah, which is a written embodiment of Jewish oral tradition, teaches that only nine red heifers were sacrificed from the time of Tabernacle worship until the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 AD.

It was the height of summer in the UK and then the sky darkened. On the evening of July 21, 2021, hailstones the size of golf balls fell from the sky, smashing windows and battering cars.

While the hailstorm was unusual in its severity, it was mild compared to a hailstorm that struck Calgary in Canada in June 2020. Hailstones the size of tennis balls caused damage to at least 70,000 homes and vehicles, destroyed crops and left the area facing a $940 million repair bill.

And climate change is altering the pattern of hailstorms. In the last three years in Texas, Colorado, and Alabama, the records for largest hailstone have been broken, reaching sizes of up to 6.2 inches in diameter. Hail damage in the US now averages more than $10 billion a year.

Hail forms as droplets of water are carried upward into a thunderstorm. Updraughts carry them into parts of the atmosphere where the air is cold enough to freeze the droplets. Moisture from the air accumulates on the outside of the drops of ice as it moves through the air, causing the hailstone to grow in onion-like layers.

Hailstones of less than 1 inch diameter typically fall at 25-49 mph. But downbursts can feature vertical windspeeds of 156-179 mph with correspondingly destructive hail. The heaviest hailstone ever recorded fell in Bangladesh in 1986, weighed 2.25 lbs. The hailstorm killed as many as 92 people and injured 400.

But just how big can a hailstone get? Experts now estimate the largest possible hailstone at 10.6 inches across or "bowling ball sized.” Meteorologist Matthew Kumjian of Pennsylvania State University said, “Strong 'supercell' thunderstorms produce the world's largest hailstones. So, the strongest of these storms today is probably capable of producing a supergiant stone.” It's clear that the really big stuff is likely to still keep hurling down at us. All we can do is prepare, and find a decent shelter.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Throughout Scripture God has used hailstones as a form of judgment upon his enemies. This will be particularly true in the end times when hailstones weighing 100 pounds each will bring devastating judgment to the earth. “And men cursed God for the plague of hail, because it was so horrendous” (Rev. 16:21).

Biblical prophecy mentions huge numbers of horses in end time battles. Is this just a figure of speech or is there something more to it? A secular video produced by Not What You Think describes the practicality of using mules/horses in modern warfare. The video says:

Supply lines are crucial in modern warfare. Armies must supply their soldiers with weapons, ammunition, fuel, water, medicine, and equipment. Before you dismiss the idea of pack animals being used in modern battlefields, consider this: The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) spent $42 million dollars developing a robot packhorse known as Legged Squad Support System (LS3). The LS3 was supposed to help marines and soldiers carry up to 400 pounds of supplies. But it turned out to be a flop. Not only was its range limited by fuel, it would constantly break down, and worst of all it was (very) loud (making a loud noise like a motorcycle).

Mules are often called the AK-47s of logistics for their rugged utility. A mule costs only a few thousand dollars compared to ground tactical vehicles that can cost $350,000 dollars apiece. Pack animals can reliably carry hundreds of pounds of water, fuel, munitions, and equipment in terrain that is too difficult for motor vehicles to traverse. Compared to vehicles, mules are also harder to detect either optically, or with radar or infrared. Pack animals have been used for thousands of years. For example, during World War II, German logistics were supplied by more than 600,000 horses.

A big problem for ground vehicles is that they require fuel. And a lot of it. A defense science board estimates that by tonnage, as much as 70% of supplies needed to sustain army operations is fuel. And that’s a big problem. Modern weapons, such as drones and portable guided missile systems can destroy supply convoys in no time. The Russian experience in Ukraine is a perfect example of this. Pack animals don’t need fuel, as they can survive on water and forage for food in their environment. Relying on pack animals also reduces the need for spare parts and costly maintenance of ground vehicles.

The warfare of the future calls for simple, cheap, and portable platforms that do not need a decade to be designed and tested. The plan that is currently in the works is calling for the use of pack animals, such as mules and horses. Pack animals might be the best option for supply logistics in mountainous and wooded regions. Currently, the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center teaches marines and army special forces how to employ and care for pack animals. There are growing calls within the Pentagon to expand the use of pack animals in the future.

You can view the video here (time marker 4:23 to 7:56).

Possible Preaching Angle:

This interesting video supports the Bible prophecies that indicate that the battles of the end times will be carried out using horses (Rev. 19:18-19) and ancient weapons, such as bows and arrows and swords (Ezek. 38:4; 39:3, 9-10). Some Bible scholars believe that these references may simply be the best description the ancient prophet could give of modern warfare. But others say that these prophecies may indicate that due to the Antichrist’s peace treaty (Dan. 9:27, etc.) there will be universal disarmament (“unwalled, defenseless villages” Ezek. 38:11) and that the warfare of the last days will utilize non-tech weapon systems.

When Christopher Columbus reached the Caribbean in 1492, he named the inhabitants "Indians." He thought he had reached what Europeans of the time referred to as "the Indies" (China, Japan, and India). In fact, he was nowhere close to South or East Asia. In his path were vast regions of land, unexplored and uncharted, of which Columbus knew nothing. He assumed the world was smaller than it was.

Have we made a similar mistake with regard to Jesus Christ? Are there vast tracts of who he is, according to biblical revelation, that are unexplored? Have we unintentionally reduced him to manageable, predictable proportions? Have we been looking at a junior varsity, decaffeinated, one-dimensional Jesus of our own making, thinking we're looking at the real Jesus? Have we snorkeled in the shallows, thinking we've now hit bottom on the Pacific?

Brett McCracken writes in his book, The Wisdom Pyramid:

I live in Southern California, where climate-controlled houses and air-conditioned cars give us a measure of mastery over summer's triple-digit temperatures or winter's atmospheric river storms. But we can't escape nature completely. A mudslide washes away parts of Highway 1, making it impassable. The Santa Ana winds will blow, causing us to cough on the air that "tastes like a stubbed-out cigarette" as the poet Dana Gioia (aptly) says. Months of no rain crisp the Sonoran landscape, making it ripe for autumn wildfires. The weather doesn't ask for our opinion. Nature reminds us there is a world bigger than the one we've made.

A headline in the Los Angeles Times that sums it up well: "We may live in a post-truth era, but nature does not." Perhaps that's one of the reasons I've always loved nature—God's beautiful and terrifying creation. In a world where man thinks he is the measure of all things, nature begs to differ. There is a givenness to nature that is sanity in an insane world. It is there to sustain our lives, to be enjoyed, but also to challenge us, to put us in our place, and to impart to us wisdom—if we are willing to listen.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Scripture is our supreme and only infallible source of knowledge of God. But Scripture itself tells us that wisdom can be found in God's creation (Psa. 19:1-6; Rom. 1:19-20). Nature’s glory is not an end unto itself. It’s not a god to worship. It’s a prism and amplifier of God’s glory. It’s a theater, a canvas, a cathedral, but God is always at center stage.

In his book With, author Skye Jethani describes the mausoleum of Galla Placidia in Italy:

Fifteen hundred years ago, the emperor of Rome built a tomb for his beloved sister. The small building was designed in the shape of a cross with a vaulted ceiling covered with mosaics of swirling stars in an indigo sky. The focal point of the mosaic ceiling was a depiction of Jesus the Good Shepherd surrounded by sheep in an emerald paradise.

The mausoleum of Galla Placidia still stands in Ravenna, Italy, and has been called “the earliest and best preserved of all mosaic monuments” and one of the “most artistically perfect.” But visitors who have admired its mosaics in travel books will be disappointed when they enter the mausoleum. The structure has only tiny windows, and what light does enter is usually blocked by a mass of tourists. The “most artistically perfect” mosaic monument, the inspiring vision of the Good Shepherd in a starry paradise, is hidden behind a veil of darkness.

But the impatient who leave the chapel will miss a stunning unveiling. With no advance notice, spotlights near the ceiling are turned on when a tourist finally manages to drop a coin into the small metal box along the wall. The lights illuminate the iridescent tiles of the mosaic but only for a few seconds. One visitor described the experience: “The lights come on. For a brief moment, the briefest of moments—the eye doesn’t have time to take it all in, the eye casts about—the dull, hot darkness overhead becomes a starry sky, a dark-blue cupola with huge, shimmering stars that seem startlingly close. ‘Ahhhhh!’ comes the sound from below, and then the light goes out, and again there’s darkness, darker even than before.”

The bright burst of illumination is repeated over and over again, divided by darkness of unpredictable length. Each time the lights come on, the visitors are given another glimpse of the world behind the shadows, and their eyes capture another element previously unseen—deer drinking from springs, Jesus gently reaching out to his sheep that look lovingly at their Shepherd. After seeing the mosaic, one visitor wrote: “I have never seen anything so sublime in my life! Makes you want to cry!”

Possible Preaching Angle:

It is difficult to experience the glory of God in our daily lives and when we do, it is only for brief moments. Yet, there are time when God breaks through the darkness of this world and reveals himself for a brief moment. Like Isaiah’s experience (Isa. 6:1-5), these moments should be life changing.