“Holy —” Carl stopped himself. “Excuse me, but I can do without that.”

They all smiled, but the room suddenly grew silent until Carl said very softly, “You know, I left L.A. an agnostic. I don’t understand it all, but I do believe what you’ve been telling us, Charley. But it’s all so new to me that I need to think about it. I know one thing, though. I don’t want to face the judgment. There has got to be some way out of this deal for Lori and me!”

Dave Busby, who had been silent for several minutes, spoke up.

“I believe that what is coming is called the ‘Day of the Lord.’ It’s also called the ‘Day of God’s Wrath.’ Isn’t that right, Charley? In one place the prophet Isaiah called it the ‘Day of Vengeance of our God.’”

“Okay, Dave,” Carl said, grimacing, “I get the point.”

“All over the Old Testament,” Dave continued, “the prophets were warning the people that a terrible day of judgment was coming. One prophet called it the ‘day of gloom and darkness.’ What comes through loud and clear, though, is how short this day is going to be. In one place Isaiah talks about ‘an acceptable year of the Lord,’ but he says it is to be a ‘day of vengeance.”’

“Good, Dave!” Lori laughed. “Keep it up. This is getting scarier all the time.”

Dave stood up, “Look! What we’ve been talking about today is going to happen fast, you know. No messing around—just splat. Then shake, rattle, and roll.”

“That’s good, Dave,” Charley said, shaking his head. “Can you be any more graphic? There’s no way any of this can be seen as funny, but the suddenness and the speed of it all really is part of the good news.”

“Within the next thirty days, max, I’d say,” Dave continued, “and the whole job will be done. In my church we sing a song called, ‘Our God Is an Awesome God.’ I mean to tell you, that’s the gospel truth. He is some kind of awesome God!”

“Dave,” Lori asked, “what is this time we’re in now? Does the Bible give it a name?”

“Yeah,” he said. “It does. It is called the ‘Great Tribulation.’”

“And are we in it?” Carl asked.

“It sure looks like it to me,” Dave said.

“It sounds to me,” Carl said, “like the last hundred years with the Four Horsemen and all could be called a tribulation. What about the Jews and Chinese and Russians Charley was talking about? You had Armenians and Biafrans and Laotians, too, didn’t you? Just to name a few. Call it what you want, but it sure sounds like tribulation for those guys in the rice paddies in Vietnam, the beaches of Normandy, Iwo Jima. That’s about the limit of my history, but you’re saying we’re in tribulation now. So what was it back then?”

Charley stood up and moved around to the sofa where Carl and Lori were sitting. “Carl, you know, you may be on to something. After all, God doesn’t send an angel down with a big gong to announce the beginning of the Tribulation, then another gong when it’s all over. The fact is, on this earth we’re never going to get the whole picture—just parts of it. The apostle Paul said we are like people who are trying to make out shapes on the other side of a foggy window. But I still have to agree with Dave. The time of God’s wrath is short, even though it is horrible beyond imagination.”