Flood, Blood & Fire.

"To a land that dwells in darkness there has come a Great Light."- transliteration of Isaiah 9:2

The earth is said in the scriptures to be groaning for the coming of the Savior, that is the very ground cry's out to God to be cleansed. God is attentive to these cry's He answers them with three cleansing elements, the first is water.
 During the great flood of Noah God cleansed the earth of all unrighteousness, all wicked people perished and only righteous Noah and his household were saved. But he also cleaned the land itself, all the blood that had been spilt was washed away and the whole earth was given a new beginning. Of course it wasn't long before Sin increased again and more blood was spilt in anger, again defiling the land so we were back to square one. God of course had made a covenant to never again destroy the earth by water. So he had to use another element. Blood.

Israel are Gods covenant (chosen) people and God sealed the covenant with blood, animal blood. More animal blood was spilt in the land of Israel than your average abattoir. They where a people under blood and it was intended that all nations would be blessed by their observation and reverence of  Israel. Israel was the altar of God where he offered sacrifices to cleanse the whole earth. They were to be a sign.
But we know from reading the bible that Israel was unfaithful to the covenant and broke it. So God did what He promised to do if this occurred, He destroyed the nation and scattered a remant of Godly seed over all the face of the Earth.

There is no longer any blood sacrifice that can be offered because since God sent Jesus to die for the sins of the entire world He no longer accepts blood sacrifices, the cleansing power of blood the cleanse the land has now finished, because although Christs blood has power to clean any and all who come to Him, it can't clean unbelievers, so the land is still defiled. The Blood covenant does not cover the whole earth, but only those who chose to obey God and come under it, The church of Christ is clean and is spread out over all the earth ( at least most of it thanks to missionaries), so this is a temporary, sprinkled, cleansing of the land but it lacks completeness. And God has promised to, at some point, remove the church from the earth via the rapture. This is where Jesus returns not to the earth but to the clouds from where he will catch up all those who are trusting in His name.

When this happens the earth will have no covering, Nothing to prevent God from poring out His wrath on the earth. Indeed that is what He promises to do. But this will not be a complete destruction. He again will show mercy in that He will only allow Himself short outbursts here an there. And although these outbursts will be incredibly devastating He will not destroy all till the end. And the final element will fully and finally cleanse the earth forever, fire.

The whole earth and the universe will be consumed by fire. That is completely destroyed. End of story.......

Well not quite because there still remains the promise of our wonderful God to make a completely new start. He going to start from scratch. He will create a whole new universe, the old one will pass away but a replacement will be brought into being. this land I believe will never be defiled because there will be no marriage and no new people procreated, the only inhabitants of this new earth will be those who have been cleansed forever by the blood of the Lamb. No blood will ever be spilt in anger in Gods new world. Jesus has paid it all on this old, passing away, earth.

This is why Jesus said Heaven and earth will pass away but the word of the Lord abides forever!
Glory to God in the highest, peace on the earth toward men.