Stop 14. The whole picture

Turn on every layer and step back.

On the left, four ways of dating Genesis 1 to 11 join at Abraham. In the middle, Israel's story runs on one line, tied to the record from 931 BC on. On the right, three ways of reading the end part at Daniel's 70th week and go to very different futures.

At the top right is the farthest horizon science can see: a Sun that will one day swallow the earth. None of the three lines puts its hope in that schedule. Each one, in its own way, hopes in a person, not a date.

This chart does not tell you which view to hold. It shows where each one puts the events, in its own writers' words, and it marks every place where the record speaks. If you want to weigh the end-times views, Three Ways People Read the End of the Story is on michlaude.com.

Whatever you decide about the dates, the dates are not the point. "Now this is eternal life—that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you sent" (John 17:3).

Picture: Chart 2, the whole chart. All layers.