Mork,

I'll answer your question. But your question, like countless others before it, is not really the issue is it? I can go into great detail with an answer to this question and you will still come out unconvinced and unsatisfied. So the issue is not about why God did not send Jesus earlier. The issue is this:

Please understand I'm not trying to disparage your belief system, but isn't all of this just a lil too far fetched to really put this much thought into it?

That's really the point. When I'm done answering your question, there will be another question because it's all just too far fetched. In other words, God is not big enough. Your issue is with God and how God operates. So, I accept that and I come at this question knowing full well that it's not a question that you really need answered. It's more a question that is inteneded to cast doubt. And that's fine. Wherever there is faith, there needs to be the potential for doubt.

First: "The Reboot"

God didn't start over because of his initial promise. God promised right from the very start that he would redeem his fallen creation. He said that salvation would come by the seed of the woman. See Genesis 3:15. Satan will be defeated by the offspring of the first woman. That is very clear. So, to "reboot" the whole thing would turn God into a liar. It also gives us an idea of Satan's motivation all through the Old Testament. The whole time he is searching for this one child that would spell his defeat. Think of the final plague in Egypt. Think of the decree of Herod at the birth of Christ. These things are not coincidences. There are more forces at work in the world than the forces of good. I think Gandalf said that.

Second, "Why not send Jesus sooner".

I think that the Old Testement always points to the New Testement. The flood is a clear message to all of us that God is just. God does not treat sin lightly. He wants relationship with us, but he doesn't want us living like pigs. God is not a pig and he loves us too much to let us live as pigs. So, even though we see the flood as God's harsh judgement on humanity, the reality is that we really deserve to be wiped out. Your question seems to even acknowledge that fact. We don't deserve to be here. This place is a mess. Reference the father in Austria. God would be justified in starting again. But he didn't. He loves us. He wants us. That's the miracle of scripture.

The story of Noah is meant to teach us something about God. Sadly, like so many things, we miss the message. Either we reduce it to a children's story about animals, or we see it as a story about how God is a mean dictator. But the story is really about relationship. God wants us. He wanted everyone to be in the ark. If he didn't, why would he even bother allowing Noah to spend all of that time building it? Why not just end it? Why give all of those years for people to change? Why give all of those years for people to repent and turn back to him? Why give the opportunity to climb on the ark?

So the same is true today with Jesus. He wants you. He wants you, Mork. This is what I've been saying for years and I will keep saying it just as Noah kept on saying it to all of those people who laughed at him. God wants you. He doesn't want you to be apart from him.

Perhaps God allowed us to have the story of the flood because he loves us? I think that's the point.

That's the best way I can answer your question. I do not know if it is the "accepted" answer to your question, but it is how I see it. I believe that it is what God has revealed to me and I believe it with all of my heart.

As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
-Matthew 24:37-39