Apocalyptic? #34: After Armageddon—Disney, Daniel, Jesus, and John

 

The Biblical Pattern of “Overview-Followed-by-Details” and Even Longer-Term Prediction

From the very first chapters of the Bible, there is a literary pattern pertaining to history.  Genesis provides, in chapter one, a rapid-fire synopsis of creation events, followed, in chapters two and three by a more detailed explanation of day six, explaining the situation in which the first female (Eve) was brought into being and the circumstances that led to the command to “Be fruitful and multiply.”  In chapter one, the six “days” of creation are presented rapidly, sequentially, from the creation of mass and light energy to waters and firmament to land and vegetation to seasons and years to elemental-then-advanced animal life to God’s crown of creation, man, both male and female, to whom He commanded: “Be fruitful and multiply.”  Then, in chapters two and three, Genesis backs up to the sixth day—even after the part of day six in which He creates the beasts, cattle, and creeping things—and focuses more intently on the creation of Adam, bringing Eve, and the Fall, and then projects far into the future, in apocalyptic fashion, by God “put[ting] enmity Between [the serpent] and the woman, And between [the serpent’s] seed and her Seed; He [the seed of woman] shall bruise [the serpent’s] head, And [the serpent] shall bruise His heel” (Genesis 3:15 NKJV).

By way of comparison, in now-closed Disney attractions, the “Universe of Energy” at EPCOT visually traced the same rapid-fire sequence from a secular perspective--starting with the “Big Bang.” If you search online for “youtube universe of energy,” in a very short span of time near the first of the video, you will view a sequence of events that many scientists believe occurred over a period of 13 to 14 billion years, but which is very similar in sequence to the Genesis 1 account.  What you are viewing is Disney’s visual interpretation of the origins of the universe, according to secularly-accepted views in physics.  If you search online for “youtube living seas preshow film,” you will view a more detailed sequence from a secular perspective of the development of the seas, the eventual visibility of the sun, moon, and stars, and the beginning of life forms (plant to animal), which is very similar in sequence to the Genesis 1:9-22 account, providing further details skipped over by the Universe of Energy exhibit.  Disney, thus, provides a representative anecdote for understanding the “biblical pattern of overview-followed-by-details.” 

Returning to the bible, in layer upon layer of apocalyptic chronological sequence, Jeremiah begins, counting from the year Nebuchadnezzar became king of Babylon and, subsequently, captured Daniel and his fellow-Jews and carried them away into Babylon.  Jeremiah 25:12 (NKJV) prophesies: “Then it will come to pass, when seventy years are completed, that I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity,” says the Lord; “and I will make it a perpetual desolation.”  Jeremiah 29:10 (NKJV) states: “For thus says the Lord: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place [i.e., Judea].” Counting seventy years from when Nebuchadnezzar became king in Babylon (in 605 B.C.) brings us to 535 B.C.  The Persian king Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon (the land of the Chaldeans) and freed the Jews from exile in 538 B.C. 

The proverbial seventy years may have been considered an overview for Daniel, realizing that he is living near the end of the prescribed “seventy years,” for the process of “return[ing] to this place,” the land of Israel.  Daniel considers the proverbial seventy years in order to prophecy concerning seventy sabbatical years, i.e., 490 years.  Daniel 9 describes in greater detail than Jeremiah regarding that process of “return[ing] to this place,” i.e., the land of Israel: “I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the Lord through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem” (Daniel 9:2 NKJV).  Daniel, however, receives an updated and more detailed prophetic explanation in Daniel 9:24-27 (NKJV):

“Seventy weeks are determined For your people and for your holy city, To finish the transgression, To make an end of sins, To make reconciliation for iniquity, To bring in everlasting righteousness, To seal up vision and prophecy, And to anoint [same Hebrew root as Messiah/Christ] the Most Holy.

“Know therefore and understand, That from the going forth of the command To restore and build Jerusalem UNTIL MESSIAH the Prince, There shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; The street shall be built again, and the wall, Even in troublesome times.
“And after the sixty-two weeks MESSIAH SHALL BE CUT OFF, but not for Himself;
And the people of the prince who is to come Shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.
The end of it shall be with a flood, And till the end of the war desolations are determined.
Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week; But in the middle of the week He shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering.
And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate, Even until the consummation, which is determined, Is poured out on the desolate.”

 

Notice that, in Daniel 9:2 (cited above) the seventy years of Jerusalem’s desolation would not be the last of Jerusalem’s desolations, according to Daniel 9:27.  Daniel points to another, future abomination of desolation in Jerusalem.

 

A total of 69 (7 + 62) weeks of years (or 483 years) would be needed to “finish . . . transgression [and] to make an end of sins” (which Jesus did), to “make reconciliation . . . [and] bring in everlasting righteousness” (which Jesus did), and “to anoint the Most Holy” (Jesus).  Daniel is told to begin counting the 69 weeks of years at the “going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem.”  But which command to do so?  According to https://letgodbetrue.com/bible-topics/index/prophecy/cyrus-decree-to-rebuild/:

 

In the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, we find four royal commands issued by Median and Persian kings that could possibly qualify as the “commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem.” The first command was by Cyrus in Ezra 1:1-11. The second was by Darius in Ezra 4:24 and 6:1-12. The third was by Artaxerxes in his 7th year in Ezra 7:7-26. The fourth was also by Artaxerxes in his 20th year in Nehemiah 2:1-8.

 

Without becoming endlessly bogged down by debates among these possibilities, I simply observe that, of these commands, the command of Artaxerxes in his 20^th year (Nehemiah 2:1-8), for example, occurring approximately 456 B.C., when added to by the 483 years of Daniel 9, brings us to 27 A.D., near the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.  The final one “week of years”= 7 years (“in the middle of” which He shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering.  And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate”), Jesus in his Olivet discourse expands and provides details: “Therefore when you see the ‘abomination of desolation,’ spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place . . . .” (Matthew 24:15, et. al. NKJV). 

 

Jesus then, knowing that he is living near the end of the prescribed “seventy weeks of years,” puts a time limit on when this final week of years will occur: “Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place” (Matthew 24:34, et. al. NKJV). 

 

John, in Revelation, then, realizing that he is living near the end of the prescribed “generation,” writes in much greater detail of things that must happen soon.  John repeats his consciousness of the “what must SOON take place” throughout Revelation.  John predicts that the "time" is "near" (Revelation 1:3, 22:10), that Jesus is "coming soon" (Revelation 3:11, 22:20), that the dragon’s "time is short" (Revelation 12:12), and that these things “must soon take place" (Revelation 22:6).  As I have demonstrated in previous blogposts, John’s and Jesus’ predictions concerning all that was prophesied to occur up through the Battle of Armageddon were amazingly precise!  Even though I have not previously taken the opportunity to mention the more minute detail about the Plague of the Sun Burning in Revelation 16:8 (NKJV), “Then the fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and power was given to him to scorch men with fire,” I find that it is mentioned by Josephus in terms of the Samaritans in Mt. Gerazim, prior to the Battle of Armageddon:  The Roman armies under Vespasian’s commander Cerealis killed 11,600 Samaritans on Mt. Gerazim by laying siege to the mountain.  Josephus writes: “[T]he Samaritans, who were now destitute of water, were inflamed with a violent heat (for it was summer-time, and the multitude had not provided themselves with necessities) insomuch that some of them died that very day with heat,” the rest of them being slain by the Romans (Wars III.VII.32).

John, furthermore, does not stop with the first half of the week of years (=3 ½ years) that concluded with the end of the Battle of Armageddon and the “end to sacrifice and offering” as prophesied by Daniel.  He writes of the second half of the week of years (=3 ½ years), and then continues to project history for more than 1000 years into the future.

Is There Human History on Earth “After Armageddon”?

Revelation 20:9-15 does not seem to allow time for ANY human history on Earth (at least, on the first Earth) following the Battle of Gog and Magog. Instead, it moves, rapid-fire, from sending down fire to consume Gog and Magog to casting the devil into the Lake of Fire (where the Beast [Nero] and the False Prophet [Jewish High Priests] already were) to God’s judgment throne at which time God cast Death and Hell into the Lake of Fire, along with all whose names were not written in the book of life.

By contrast, there are at least 3 ½ years of human history on Earth following the Battle of Armageddon, until the “war” is over.  Then, there is that bothersome millennium, during which time (although the Beast [Nero] and the False Prophet [Jewish High Priests] had already been cast into the Lake of Fire), the dragon-serpent-devil-Satan was only “bound” and “cast into the bottomless pit.”  Many Amillennialists, as their name implies (even if that name was coined by Premillennialists in an attempt to discredit this school of interpretation), want to eliminate the millennium from Revelation altogether. Therefore, many Amillennialists equate the Battle of Armageddon with the Battle of Gog and Magog.  That equation is impossible.  The prefix A- before the term “millennium” is a prefix of negation (as in, there is NO millennium).  It compares to the A- prefix in Atheism (as in, there is NO God).  Nevertheless, the “millennium” figures prominently in Jewish teaching concerning how long the Messianic Kingdom will last, plus in Revelation itself, plus in the history of the interpretation of Revelation.  The topic of the millennium deserves its own blogpost, which I shall provide in the future.  For the present, we shall consider the remaining 3 ½ years.

Josephus’s Interpretation of Daniel’s 3 ½ Years

The language in Revelation 11:2-3, related to the "forty-two months" = "a thousand two hundred sixty days" (= three and one half years) corresponds to Daniel 9 and the times of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.  In fact, the "three and one-half years" of the testimony of the Witnesses (11:3) and the "three and one half years" of the trampling of the city by the Gentiles (11:2) appear to be either one or both halves of the "last week of years" described by Daniel in chapter 9.  In the "middle" of that last week, the desolator(?) "shall cause the offering and sacrifice to cease" (Daniel 9:27).  Dividing the final seven years in the "middle" leaves two periods of "three and one-half years" each--one before the cessation of sacrifice and one following the cessation of sacrifice.  Daniel concludes in 12:11 with the words:  "And from the time the daily [sacrifice] shall be taken away, and the abomination that makes desolate set up, a thousand two hundred ninety days [= roughly, three and one-half years]," after which will come qeytz (a word which means "end" but is easily associated, for plays on words, with the verb "to awaken," cf. Ezekiel 7:6).  Perhaps the Semitic play on the words "end" and "awaken" has Burke's "reidentification" sense, in which the “end” and the “beginning” meet.  Alpha meets Omega.  The “first” meets the “last.”  At any rate, it is clear that Daniel saw a thousand two hundred ninety days (= roughly, three and one-half years) period of time FOLLOWING what John will call “Armageddon.”

Josephus’s Use of the Term Desolation: Josephus is well-aware of Daniel’s prophecy of a coming desolation.  He describes the desolation of the countryside of Judea:

[The Romans] had cut down all the trees that were in the country that adjoined to the city for ninety furlongs [=11 miles] . . . those places which were before adorned with trees and pleasant gardens were now become a desolate country every way . . . its trees were all cut down . . . now . . . as a desert . . . all signs of beauty quite waste (Wars VI.I.1).

 

After the fall of Jerusalem, Josephus comments:

 

[T]his was the second time of its desolation . . . the king of Babylon conquered it, and made it desolate . . . .  It was demolished entirely by the Babylonians . . . to this destruction under Titus . . . .  And thus ended the siege of Jerusalem” (Wars VI.X.1).

 

Josephus’s Use of the Terminology Three and One-half Years:  Josephus offers the “example [of] Antiochus . . . Epiphanes . . . this city was plundered by our enemies, and our sanctuary made desolate for three years and six months” (Wars V.IX.4). 

Josephus fixed the exact date when “’the Daily Sacrifice’ had failed and had not been offered to God” along with his statement to the Jews—“Who is there that does not know what the writings of the ancient prophets contain in them,--and particularly that oracle which is just now going to be fulfilled upon this miserable city?” (Wars VI.II.1).  William Whiston, whose translation of Josephus we are using, in his footnote commenting upon this passage in Josephus finds it:

[R]emarkable [that] . . . Daniel’s prediction . . . [was precisely accurate:] the Romans “in half a week caused the sacrifice and oblation to cease.” Dan. ix.27; for from the month of February, A.D. 66 [when the war began] . . . to this very time, was just three years and a half.

What Happened, Then, in Those Final 3 ½ Years? 

According to Daniel 12:  qeytz (a word which means "end" but is easily associated, for plays on words, with the verb "to awaken)."  The “end” of the Jewish state, but, I think, the “awakening” of many faithful Jews and Christians then in the grave (i.e., the first resurrection, according to Revelation 20:5-6).  Many unbelieving Jews would flee to the fortified mountains that remained in Judea as possible refuges.  John writes: “Then . . . every mountain . . . was moved out of its place. And the kings of the [land] . . . hid themselves . . . in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!’” (Revelation 6:14-16 NKJV).  The church that had fled Judea at Jesus’ and John’s warnings would have their “covenant” “confirmed (via Rapture?).  According to Daniel, “Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week.” Nevertheless, in the spirit of the Biblical Pattern of “Overview-Followed-by-Details,” now that I have offered you a quick overview, I will supply the details in the next few blogposts, à la Disney, Moses, Daniel, Jesus, and John.

Hidden Mickeyisms 12: The De-Atheizing of Disney (Bye Bye, Bill Nye!)

“Atheizing” is the process of inserting an atheistic worldview into a culture.  “De-atheizing” would, therefore, mean the process of removing an atheistic worldview from a culture.  Just in case you did not already know:  The Universe of Energy exhibit (aka, Ellen’s Energy Adventure, starring Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Nye [the science guy]) closed in 2017.  The Universe of Energy originally opened, along with EPCOT Center in 1982, and was then modified to Ellen’s Energy Adventure in 1996.  In my book Disneology:  Religious Rhetoric at Walt Disney World (Say Press, 2010, p.3), I write:

“The religion that most strongly influenced Walt Disney was Christianity.  But, Disney was also influenced by Science, and science has historically had some major rhetorical conflicts with religion, in general.  Many, if not most, of the religious issues lurking in WDW are disagreements between Christianity and an approach to science that tends to eliminate theological considerations from its messages.  Although not all scientists who refrain from discussing theological issues are atheists, some are.  Atheist rhetorical issues will, therefore, be found in WDW.”

The premier example of the atheist perspective in Walt Disney World has been the Universe of Energy/Ellen’s Energy Adventure.  In Disneology, I encourage readers to:

“Visit the attraction “Universe of Energy” at EPCOT.  Starting with the ‘Big Bang,’ in a very short span of time, you will view a sequence of events that many scientists believe occurred over a period of 13 to 14 billion years.  What you are viewing is Disney’s visual interpretation of the origins of the universe, according to accepted views in physics.”

In the Worksheet for Studying the book, I pose the following question to readers: “What would change, if God were inserted into the ‘Universe of Energy’ exhibit?”  Despite multiple references to creation, creator, and God in Walt Disney World, there has been, for many years, a counter-statement:  the assertion that the universe came into existence without any contribution from or reference to God.  On pages 4-5 of Disneology, I comment: 

“WDW is unafraid to present religious rhetoric in favor of Christian Realism.  Born in the 19^th century, Walt Disney was a huge fan of President Abraham Lincoln.  Lincoln is the president who receives the greatest attention in the ‘Hall of Presidents’ at the Magic Kingdom [MK].  Disney could have chosen to highlight purely secular comments from Lincoln.  Nevertheless, Disney highlights quite religious philosophy, as expressed by Lincoln.  His belief in ‘divine providence’ is mentioned in his debates.  Lincoln quotes Jesus from Mark 3:25: ‘A house divided against itself cannot stand.’  Lincoln asserts that all men are ‘created’ equal.  He identifies the Declaration of Independence as the ‘truth.’  He states his faith in God: ‘I know there is a God and that he hates injustice and slavery.  I see a storm coming; I know his hand is in it.’  Mention of the ‘creator’ in the Declaration of Independence is reiterated in the ‘American Adventure’ in EPCOT.  Just outside the ‘American Adventure,’ between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, annually, multiple daily presentations of the Candlelight Processional proclaim strong Christian rhetoric concerning the divine birth of Jesus.  Year-round, Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe, in the MK, celebrates the Christmas holiday.  Indiana Jones is featured prominently in Disney’s Hollywood Studios [HS].  His most famous quest, the search for lost Ark of the Covenant, presents viewers with theological concepts of a God who communicates with humans, yet is invisible.  [Although, the physical depiction of the lost Ark that was prominent in the Great Movie Ride vanished in 2017 with the closing of the Great Movie Ride.  So far, the Indiana Jones Stunt Show, based on the Lost Ark remains.  Perhaps, in the future, HS will include the Ark as a visual somewhere in that attraction.]  Walt also once remarked, ‘I know drinking and smoking are sins because you aren't taking care of the body God gave you.’

On the other hand, WDW is also unafraid to present nonreligious rhetoric in favor of Scientific Realism.  The ‘Universe of Energy’ attraction at EPCOT present[ed] the origins of the universe from a wholly god-less perspective.  The perspective of physics inform[ed] riders that originally, there was a ‘big bang’ in which a great amount of energy was converted into huge supplies of mass.  Among the pieces of mass that were generated by the big bang was a small piece that became the planet Earth.  The perspective of Geology (the study of the Earth) then [took] over.  This originally very hot planet was a fiery, molten, and gaseous mixture.  The gasses surrounded the planet until the planet cooled; then, water condensed onto the surface of the earth and became the seas.  (Not too many years ago--before they replaced it with ‘The Seas with Nemo & Friends’ ride—WDW had corroborated these views of physics and geology in a preshow to ‘The Living Seas’ exhibit.  Again, no mention of a creator was to be found.)  The perspective of Evolutionary Biology . . . was presented in both the Energy and Seas shows, as plant life is followed by water life, then amphibian life, etc.”

You may still find online amateur videos of both the Universe of Energy and The Living Seas movies.  The following script of “The Living Seas” preshow movie supplies the dialogue (http://www.intercot.com/edc/LivingSeas/lsmovie.html):

“Cast Member: Good (morning/afternoon/evening), everyone. My name is _________ and welcome to The Living Seas. Ocean exploration has come a long way. We now have a better understanding of our involvement with the sea. How did it form, when did it form, and what possibilities lie ahead? Possible answers to these and many other questions are about to surface in a dramatic film simply entitled "The Sea." Please remain seated and refrain from smoking and flash photography during the show. And now, the beauty and splendor of "The Sea."

The lights dim and on the screen a galaxy of stars appears. This is followed by a closer look at planet Earth.

Female Narrator: Try to imagine, just for a moment, that somewhere in the endless reaches of the universe ... on the outer edge of a galaxy of a hundred thousand million suns ... deep within a cluster of slowly forming planets, a small sphere of just the right size lies just the right distance from its mother star ... cooling in the coldness of space. Try to imagine.

A volcano loudly erupts and the lava quickly flows down its sides.

Female Narrator: Now that sphere's creation continues as countless volcanoes spew clouds of gas and steam into the sky of melted mineral formations.

Steam rises from the hardened lava on the ground.

Female Narrator: And then that cloud covered planet waits ... and waits .... and waits ... until finally those clouds of gas and steam condense and rain upon that planet.

Lightning strikes, thunder roars, and the rain pours. It hits the hot ground and more steam rises.

Female Narrator: Rain upon that planet Earth. And they rain ... and rain ... and rain. The deluge.

Rain continues to pour and then we see large amounts of water falling off a large waterfall (most likely Niagara Falls).

Female Narrator: A deluge of such magnitude that the world's greatest waterfalls flowing together for more than a million years would only just begin to approach its results. For when it finally stopped, ... the seas had been born.

The water stops, a few drips fall into a puddle, and then the camera pans up to see the ocean with the sun setting in the background.

Female Narrator: Seas that would make this planet unlike any other within the realm of our knowledge. For it was there, sheltered from cosmic radiation that the means to support life on Earth was able to emerge. Tiny single celled plants – [phyto]plankton [pictures of the organisms appear on-screen]. They capture the energy of the sun and convert it into the most basic of life sustaining elements, oxygen, creating more than half the Earth's supply. But more than that, those same seas interact with that same solar energy and the Earth's rotation to serve as the engine that drives all the world's weather.

We see a blue sky and a palm tree followed by a beachfront. Then, using time-lapse photography, dark clouds quickly move into the beach area and then disappear.

Female Narrator: Yet these phenomen[a] occur at only the first few hundred feet of seas that average greater than two miles in depth [shot of choppy water]. And it is there in those depths in an endless night, darker than the darkest light on land, that we are just now beginning to explore an amazing world. There, amid raging underwater storms and [fiery] underwater volcanoes, mountain ranges that dwarf the Himalayas and gorges four times deeper than the Grand Canyon. There two miles deep in that darkness - an amazing world.

At this point, the screen goes completely black and every few seconds it lights up showing a new shot of the deep ocean floor. Each time it lights up, a sound similar to that heard on a submarine is heard. We see strange organisms and plants, rocky formations, and vents that erupt gas and steam.

Female Narrator: A world where the cold sea pours deep into the mountains' warm core through immense cracks in its surface and then rises back to the ocean floor as a super-heated, mineral-laden fluid emitting what to us would be lethal concentrations of poisonous chemicals. Yet, incredibly, around these strange vents, exotic life forms flourish.

Life forms that have astonished biologists by finding the needs for their survival, ... not in photosynthesis and the sun, but in the chemicals of the earth itself. Chemosynthesis. An ecosystem like none other on earth. Until now, scientifically inconceivable. Yet there, nevertheless, deep beneath the sea waiting for our discovery. Waiting in a world where we've spent less time than on the surface of the moon. A world we've only just begun to explore with tools we've only just begun to imagine.”

The Living Seas preshow ceased operations in 1999.  And it, now, appears that Walt Disney World has ELIMINATED BOTH of the exhibits that presented “the origins of the universe from a wholly god-less perspective,” as the Universe of Energy/Ellen’s Energy Adventure closed in 2017.  These two shows that presented a “god-less perspective” of the beginnings of the universe were/are being replaced by much less controversial exhibits.  The Living Seas was replaced by ‘The Seas with Nemo & Friends’ ride.  The Universe of Energy will, apparently, be replaced by an attraction based on the Guardians of the Galaxy movie/s. 

One might infer that the Living Seas and the Universe of Energy were replaced because the attractions were “dated.”  Certainly, there is little dispute that events occurring at the dawn of the universe are “dated.”  [It’s a joke!]  But, it is also true that some of the commentary by Ellen and Bill Nye regarding energy sources (at the end of the attraction) are clearly out of date, given the massive discoveries of natural gas and petroleum in the United States in recent years.  Nevertheless, since both Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Nye are still living, one would presume that such inaccuracies could be quickly corrected with some movie editing.  Finally, the technologically-dated “radio” broadcast portion of the ride could be eliminated or shortened.

Perhaps, the Universe of Energy simply took too long to experience.  Counting the preshow, the audience had to invest 45 minutes.  However, the queue lines alone at other attractions will often dwarf that amount of time investment, and much of the final “radio” broadcast could be shortened.  Throughout my many years of visiting Disney, I often found the 45 minute ride in the dark to be a great way to rest, or even take a nap!

Whether intentional or not, the elimination of the two major “god-less perspectives” of the origins of the universe in Walt Disney World amounts to a de-atheizing of Walt Disney World.  Along with the elimination of the “Wishes” fireworks display in the Magic Kingdom in 2017, which offered various forms of secularized prayer and the incredible doctrine that simply “wishing” for something would make it come true, Walt Disney World has made major strides to de-secularize, as well as, de-atheize the parks.

In an ironic twist, the year before Walt Disney World closed the Universe of Energy attraction, featuring popularist atheist Bill Nye, a creationist Christian who has publicly debated Bill Nye on issues of world origins—Ken Ham—opened his (Noah’s) Ark Encounter in Kentucky, to go along with his Creation Museum.  (Bill Nye has already visited the Ark—and argued with Ham about its message.)  My wife and I visited the Ark Encounter during the same month in which the Universe of Energy closed.  Very interesting argumentation, there!  An abundance of scientific data and reasoning to support his positions, as well as a unique experience in encountering a full-scale model of the Ark, as described in Genesis.  I highly recommend it!