Running for Cover

God’s Full Wrath

Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”

– Revelation 6:15-17

The Sixth Seal

The first five seals of the tribulation have been precursors to the full release of God’s wrath upon Earth. When the sixth seal of God’s judgment is opened in heaven, the world’s population enters a time of terror even worse than the worldwide obliteration of creation in Noah’s flood.

Some will even recognize the source of this judgment. Revelation assures us there will be a great harvest of humanity for Christ during this time as the veil between earth and eternity is rent. At the opening of the fifth seal, we are given a glimpse into the altar in heaven. Here the souls of those martyred during the tribulation are comforted. Since Christ has promised His Bride will not experience the time of God’s wrath, these can only be those who have come to Christ after the rapture of the church and who must be carried through this time, as was Noah and his family.

These “elect” from the tribulation are again identified in Revelation 7.

After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; and they cry out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.”

– Revelation 7:9-10

Who is this multitude?

These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

– Revelation 7:14

An assault on Earth from space, possibly from either asteroids or a comet, will be terrifying, especially with the resulting earthquakes from widening fissures and shifting land masses as the crust fractures. Imagine feeling the only safe place is below ground. Scripture makes it clear both rich and poor, slave and free, will be running for cover. Some—the military, preppers, and the rich—will have bunkers already prepared.

Switzerland is riddled with bunkers.

A country committed to political neutrality on the world stage, Switzerland has dedicated its efforts instead to its national survival. Switzerland hosts a slew of bunkers; thousands of military bunkers lie beneath its surface and dug into its mountains. Some are camouflaged as homes or cabins.

Nearly 310,000 public and private bunkers and fallout shelters exist as well, enough to shelter all its citizenry in time of war. Most of these were built out of fear generated by the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. In 1963, the first regulations were passed requiring fallout shelters for citizens.

Today, Swiss Federal Law on Civil Protection requires all new dwellings to be fitted with shelters, and all inhabitants are required to have a quickly accessible, secure shelter.

Until 2006, Lucerne, Switzerland had the distinction of creating Switzerland’s largest bunker, the Sonnenberg tunnel. Created in 1976, the tunnel could accommodate 20,000 people. Though the tunnel is a motorway, seven floors above the tunnel were built in to provide services in the event of an attack or nuclear disaster.

The complex had glitches, however, not the least of which was the two weeks it would take to shut down the motorway below and convert it into a space for human habitation. The Sonnenberg was downsized in 2006, and the logistics center kept operational. It now has the capacity to house 2,000 people if needed.

Since 1951, Israel has required all residences, offices, and industrial buildings to have shelters. Today, the nation is well-equipped to ride out attacks from outside. Hospitals and schools are especially protected, some with reinforced concrete and bomb-proof windows. Residences have one-room shelters called “mamads, or “mammads.” Photographer Adam Reynolds has documented thousands of bomb shelters in Israel since 2014.

The October 7th, 2023, massacre testified to the importance of Israel’s shelters.

Though the safe rooms weren’t enough to protect every Israeli during the attacks, they undoubtably saved lives.

Until a few years ago, the concept of a safe room was still foreign.

In the Western world, even the idea of preparing for some catastrophe needing that level of protection would have drawn the “prepper” label and jokes. The COVID-19 pandemic, however, rattled our sense of personal security. It opened our eyes to the collective dangers around us and created a new wave of unapologetic preppers outfitting their own personal safe spaces.

In a September 4, 2022, article in The Guardian entitled, “The Super-rich ‘Preppers’ Planning to Save Themselves from the Apocalypse,” humanist Douglas Rushkoff discusses his interactions with billionaires preparing doomsday bunkers.

Meanwhile, a non-profit organization in Japan has built a model nuclear shelter and is actively encouraging the Japanese to build their own shelters against the rising threat of aggression from Russia and North Korea.

Not everyone, of course, will have such a resource available in the event of a national or world-wide catastrophe. Many will simply find whatever cave or man-made hole into which to hide.

Understanding what we do now in current events, Revelation 6 no longer seems implausible.