‘Blood moon’ sets off apocalyptic debate among some Christians

Well, I have to say that I am not convinced that this series of eclipses is a harbinger of the return of Jesus.

There have been literally thousands of eclipses since the time that Jesus allegedly walked the earth, and he did not show up after any of those. Perhaps this is simply a convenient ploy to garner more donations or sell books?

Indeed, as heavenly bodies, pun fully intended, orbit each other simple math says that eventually they will pass in and out of view of each other. Nature's rule Daniel-san, not mine.


But Hagee, ever present and pessimistic, seems to think this will cause something to happen to Israel. Not sure what, nor doe she appear to know, but something. Note to Hagee. The concept of Israel predates the myth of Jesus considerably.

So, whilst I have two cases of water in the garage, simply because I went to Costco, and a bunch of leftover .22 ammo from the last plinking session, I am not quite worried about end of times here.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...b76502-c4be-11e3-9ee7-02c1e10a03f0_story.html


Could a series of “blood moon” events be connected to Jesus’ return? Some Christians think so.

In the wee hours of Tuesday (April 15) morning, the moon slid into Earth’s shadow, casting a reddish hue on the moon. There are about two lunar eclipses per year, according to NASA, but what’s unusual this time around is that there will be four blood moons within 18 months — astronomers call that a tetrad — and all of them occur during Jewish holidays.


A string of books have been published surrounding the event, with authors referring to a Bible passage that refers to the moon turning into blood. “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord,” Joel 2:31 says.

In the New Testament, Acts 2:20 echoes the same doom: “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and notable day of the Lord.”

Recent books capitalizing on the event include “Blood Moons: Decoding the Imminent Heavenly Signs” by Washington state author Mark Biltz; “Blood Moons Rising: Bible Prophecy, Israel, and the Four Blood Moons” by Oklahoma pastor Mark Hitchcock; and “Four Blood Moons: Something Is About to Change” by Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee.

Hagee’s book is drawing the most attention, with his book now No. 4 on The New York Times best-seller list in the advice/how to section, and No. 80 on USA Today’s best-seller list. The book by the controversial 74-year-old founder of San Antonio’s Cornerstone Church has also spent 152 days in Amazon’s top 100 books.

In his book, Hagee says something will happen to the nation of Israel due to the tetrad. The four eclipses occur on April 15 and Oct. 8, 2014, and April 4 and Sept. 28 next year. The ones in April occur during Passover, and the ones in October occur during the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles.

Jewish holy days revolve around a lunar calendar with Passover beginning on the first full moon after the beginning of spring, and the Feast of Tabernacles occurring on the first full moon after the beginning of fall. Hagee writes that every time a tetrad occurs on Jewish feast days, something traumatic and “world-changing” happens to Israel.

In 1492, the Jews were expelled from Spain and Christopher Columbus discovered America, giving the Jews a place to go. In 1948, the modern state of Israel was born, and in 1967, Israel won the Six-Day War and recaptured Jerusalem.

During the 300-year interval from 1600 to 1900, there were no tetrads at all, according to NASA eclipse expert Fred Espenak.


This time, Hagee suggests that a Rapture will occur where Christians will be taken to heaven, Israel will go to war in a great battle called Armageddon, and Jesus will return to earth. Hagee planned a special televised event on Tuesday (April 15) on the Global Evangelism Television channel.

But NASA does not consider tetrads as especially rare, saying in a statement that there will be eight sets of tetrads before the year 2100. The most unique thing about the upcoming tetrad is that they are visible from all or parts of the United States, NASA stated.

A publicist for Hagee said the pastor was not available for an interview.

“When you see these signs, the Bible says, lift up your head and rejoice, your redemption draweth nigh,” Hagee said in a sermon, according to the San Antonio Express-News. “I believe that the Heavens are God’s billboard, that He has been sending signals to Planet Earth but we just have not been picking them up.”

Greg Boyd, a pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minn., called the predictions a waste of time, maybe even bordering on astrology.

“You have an entire population buying into this stuff so no congregation is immune to this,” Boyd said. “It can strike fear into people, which is so unnecessary and wrong.”

The Jewish holy days carry less theological significance than Jesus’ resurrection for many Christians, said Sam Storms, a pastor of Bridgeway Church in Oklahoma City. Any connection between the two events should carry less weight, he said.

“We need to stop giving into some of these sensationalist speculations,” he said. “Maybe Christians are more gullible. One has to twist the data to make it appear as if these are the fulfillment of some biblical prophecy.”

 

Godless libs better hope Jesus does not return soon.

 

Well, if he comes back with cookies, I would be cool with that. Everyone likes cookies.

As for the hope part, I think it is safe to say that you and I will never live long enough to see this prophetic event happen.

 

No one knows when.

But when it does libs re going to be real sorry.

 

He was supposed to stage his final comeback in his disciples' lifetimes. He's 2000 years overdue. He's not coming.

 

Oh colonel, I doubt if Jesus will even bother with your miserable little country.

 

Eclipses are mathematically predictable down to the exact day, and the ancients were no slouches when it came to their calendars. So those that were in charge of writing religious texts at the time could make up whatever prophecies that they wanted to coincide with those lunar eclipses. Color me unconvinced.

That was still an impressive show that God put on for us last night, though!

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I doubt that his rainy-assed country could even see the moon last night.

 

I guess in your church, insulting others due to political ideology is considered Christian.

 

Pagans are fair game.

They insult themselves by being outside of God.

But it does makes me a bad Christian for not worrying about saving their eternal soul.

 

everyday, christians remind me that Hell will a much better place than heaven.

 

The REAL cause is ATHEIST space kids with LOTS of cans of spray paint.

COMMUNIST space kids.

GAY, COMMUNIST space kids.

ISLAMO-FASCIST, GAY, COMMUNIST space kids.

ILLEGAL ALIEN, ISLAMO-FASCIST, GAY, COMMUNIST space kids.

ILLEGAL ALIEN, ISLAMO-FASCIST, GAY, COMMUNIST space kids ON WELFARE.

 

Nah.....I don't buy any of that silliness. BUT I DID really enjoy watching the beautiful moon last night. It was spectacular......very large, full, and bright.....around 9pm. Got a great picture of it. I didn't make the Blood Moon part as it was 2am.......but will try in October.

When I look at...and enjoy....the wonders of this beautiful world, it's hard to believe it would have all been just happenstance. Been watching the "Cosmos" series....and even the Scientist hosting the series seems to share those same feeling at times. BTW, it's a wonderful series......

 

It was quite an amazing site and I only learned about it two hours before I took this picture, sorry it's a bit blurry. I took it about 20 minutes before it's peak time of 7:46 UTC.

 

A great show indeed

 

I'm Catholic, we don't associate with the likes of you

 

So will christians who like to hate. Or have bad thoughts.

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Insulting is a trait that won't let 'christians' into the pearly gates. But some seem to forget that.

 

In every crowd of godless libs there are always a few like you.

 

Roughly 6000 since the time of Christ. They occur in a repeating pattern called eclipse season (a month long even that happens every 6 months). Each year the month moves one earlier, example, next year eclipse season will start in March, the year after Feb and so on. So using basic maths, every day of the year has enjoyed 16 Luna eclipses since the time of Christ. The monthly pattern has repeated 166 times.

From straight numeracy or pattern repetition there is nothing to single out this set of eclipses as being any sign that Christ is returning

 

Matthew 23:12 ESV

Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

 

Great picture!!!! This was taken at 7:46??? Where?

 

Well, we know that in your church, all sins are forgiven if we confess to them. So all that he has to do is confess to insulting others and your church must forgive him, right?

 

what they are actually referring to is the tetrad which is a series of four consecutive total lunar eclipses, with six full moons in between, and no intervening partial lunar eclipses. These are not all that uncommon but it is the timing of this set that is interesting The April 15 eclipse will happen during Passover and subsequent blood moons will occur during the Feast of the Tabernacles later this year, Passover in 2015, and the Feast of the Tabernacles in 2015.

A tetrad also occurred in 1949/1950 when Israel was still fighting to be declared a nation and in 1967/1968 when Israel took over Jerusalem. I won't go as far as to say this one heralds the second coming but we surely live in interesting times

 

I took it 1:49 AM local time which is 6:49AM UTC, so this was taken an hour before it's peak. Stood out of my sliding door in Wisconsin. I do wish I had a tripod though.

 

I think people who think this natural event is some Big Deal Somehow are Blood Morons....but, hey, if ya can make a buck of the Gullible, make a buck.

 

As long as there is contrition