In Yellowstone National Park in America there is a famous geyser called the Great Steamboat. A geyser is a fountain which suddenly blasts out a tall column of boiling water and steam at intervals. It is truly a spectacular sight when it happens. Great Steamboat is the biggest geyser in the world. The scientists who try to predict an eruption are called vulcanologists, and they study the signs that herald its coming. The time periods of previous eruptions are analysed carefully to see if there is a pattern of prior events which may give a warning that an eruption is imminent. Their predictions are posted in the Park Visitor Center. They are honest enough to admit that it is hard to be accurate in predicting an event the timing of which is variable. Even “Old Faithful,” another famous geyser in the park, is, so they say, often off-schedule for no apparent reason.
On this day in August, 2000, there was great anticipation. Most of the signs indicated that a really big eruption of the Great Steamboat was imminent. Expectant crowds gathered on the boardwalks around the sulphurous geyser pool, waiting. The temperature was 96 F° and the sun was hot. There were many families with infants, including a pair of tiny twins wrapped up in a shawl to keep off the fierce sun. The park rangers had indicated some final signs that could herald the coming event. One was a particular type of water movement on the surface of the pool. Another was the behaviour of the steam. All eyes were glued to scrutinize every bubble and swirl.
When I arrived at the pool, some watchers had already been several hours on the boardwalk. I stayed and watched intently like others for three hours, and the crowd thickened at first. But as the delay lengthened, many drifted off disappointed. Deciding that not all the expected signs were yet in place, I wandered off to look at some other curious volcanic features. Suddenly, a great cry went up, and I rushed back to the pool to see some violent activity in progress in the pool, just as predicted. Hearing the cry, many other people ran too, in eager anticipation. We watched the turmoil in the pool for half an hour, and to our great dismay it subsided, and the expected geyser eruption did not follow.
Thoroughly disillusioned, and baked by the sun, the crowds drifted off until the boardwalk was finally deserted.
The great eruption
Just before dawn, at the cockcrowing, while I was in bed, two early risers were walking hand in hand along the boardwalk when, with a thunderous roar, the great geyser erupted, firing a column of boiling water 150 feet into the air, and then a fierce jet of steam twice that height. I was asleep. I missed everything. By the time I had rushed to the scene, it was all over. I was too late.
The vulcanologists were right. They knew there would be an eruption. But they were also wrong. They did not know the day or the hour.
A valuable lesson
Which things are an allegory. As students of prophecy we know all the signs, or at least we think we do. We know the scripture time periods: 430 years to the end of Amorite wickedness, then deliverance; 70 years of captivity, then restoration; 490 years to Messiah the Prince, then the bringing in of everlasting righteousness; 40 years to the destruction of Jerusalem, then Israel’s scattering; 1000 years of millennial reign in Jerusalem, then God all in all.
I have been reading several confident predictions of the great eruption. Bro. John Thomas was sure of one date, Bro. Robert Roberts even more convinced of another. I have just read through a book by Bro. Walter Carter. His scriptural reasoning is very convincing. I can understand why his readers in the 1940’s and 50’s would have been on tiptoe with expectation.
Why did we all drift away from the pool? We knew the geyser eruption was a certainty. Yet only two lovers were there to see it in all its majesty! The rest of us had gone to sleep.
Jesus knew why we lost interest. “Keep watch, because you do not know when the time is — whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping” (Mark 13:35-36).
Of all God’s time periods specified in Scripture, the only one which Jesus said even he himself was uncertain about is the time of the biggest event of all, his second coming. Why?
Ever since, to my chagrin, I missed that big eruption a few weeks ago, I have been troubled about the answer to that question. The only possible conclusion must be that the time of the Big One really has never been fixed immutably by our Father at all, for reasons that He knows best. Is that why Jesus over and over and over again urged his followers to be “ready,” to be “watching,” to be “awake”?
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One