Hi all,
A husband and wife had invited 2 couples who were good friends, for dinner. He was late from work so their friends had already arrived before him. When he came through the door they all greeted him and his wife asked, “How was your day honey?” To which he replied to her and all, “OK, good day, had a nice lunch, presentation went well, a little traffic on the way home. Pretty normal.”
And with that, he thought he had just told everyone everything about his day. He couldn’t imagine why anyone would want any more information than what he just shared. He was wrong.
In his wife’s thinking, he hadn’t told her anything. Earlier in their marriage she may have wondered to herself, ‘Why doesn’t he talk to me?’, but through the years she learned it wasn’t that he was withholding information, it was just that he was a man. So he couldn’t be totally blamed.
It starts
One of the other wives who knew a little about his job asked: “How is the new salesman working out?” He replied, “Pretty good. He’s young and eager but doesn’t have much experience. Messed up some paperwork. I paired him with Jim who has been with us 15 years, so that will help quite a bit.”
The husband of that wife joined the conversation, “I think I passed you at lunch time, where did you eat?” The husband replied, “You probably did see me. A group of us went to the new Mexican restaurant at the edge of town, it was pretty good; they use the thin white corn chips that I like rather than the thick yellow chips most places use, so it was good. We should all go there sometime.”
As long as everyone was getting details, his wife jumped in: “And how did the big bosses like your presentation?” “Really good actually, though Fred questioned my conclusions, but that’s just him needing to be heard. Everyone thought I did a good job and they’ll take it to the Board next week.”
About that time the other husband threw a question out to all, asking; “Did any of you see that wreck tonight?” To which the host’s wife turned to her husband and asked if the wreck was part of the traffic he had mentioned earlier.
“Yeah, I saw it. The wreck was at the construction site where 2 lanes merge into one, a fender bender, no one hurt, but it backed up traffic and the police had a hard time reaching them because of it.”
And with that, his wife felt like she had finally learned about his day. He thought he had just been questioned under a spotlight by a team of hardened Detectives prying into every detail in his life.
Disclaimer: The names have been withheld to protect the guilty. Any resemblance to any husband is merely coincidental. The above story is not intended to be a stereotype of every marriage, but if you are a man and suffer from ‘Information Withholding’ symptoms, please administer the “Man’s Prayer” as seen on the ‘Red Green’ TV show: “I’m a man, but I can change, if I have to, I guess.”
One conversation
The husband came through the door and offered a basic outline of his day, but his friends learned more details as the conversation continued, concluding with details of the traffic accident at the end of the day.
But those additional details were all part of the one conversation that started with a vague sketch and ended with tiny details. If you were to take a transcript of the conversation later for review, and pull one exchange in that conversation out of context, you could get the wrong idea about his day. There was more to his day than chips and salsa. Don’t get focused on the chips and salsa.
Now think of that as it relates to different prophecies about the blood moon scattered around the Bible. They are all part of one conversation.
Here we go
Joel’s prophecy in 850 BC of the dark sun/moon is part of the same conversation as Jesus’ Matthew 24 prophecy of the dark sun/moon, as Peter’s quote of Joel in Acts 2 of the dark sun/moon, as John reporting his vision in about the year 100 AD of Jesus’ future return and the dark sun/moon. It is all the same conversation as much as the conversation between the husband and wife and their guests above.
We make mistakes when we look at prophecy on a time line, like along a rail road track, starting on the left and going to the right, separated by segments and culture and time, but the I AM is ever present so time and culture dissolve away leaving only what the Spirit said. It is all one conversation inspired by the Holy Spirit.
Years ago the Father told me something that helped me understand: He said to think about (Him) and all the prophecies on a subject being put on a table and you are looking down from above at that table top. They are all on the same table. You can move independently from Joel to Jesus to Peter to John through 950 years of history because you are above the table – above time. That is I AM. Not in a line like a human being, but above time as I AM. From that perspective you can see all the prophecies (and Word in general) are part of the same conversation.
These prophecies are not separated by 950 years as it seems in the natural, in reality they are all standing next to each other on the same table, all saying what the Holy Spirit told them, all having the same conversation about the signs surrounding the return of Christ.
So in my parable above Jesus in the gospels is…
Aside from my fun with the differences between men and women, in my parable above Jesus is the man walking through the door initially giving just the basic sketch of the day – Jesus’ prophecy of the last days in Matthew 24 is that basic sketch:
“After the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light; and the stars will fall from heaven and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth shall mourn…”
But more details come out in Joel chapter 2 for his part of the conversation:
“Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain. Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord comes…a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness…the earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble, the sun and the moon shall be dark and the stars withdraw their shining…the sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord…”
And Peter at Pentecost in Acts 2 repeats some of Joel’s part of the conversation but understands parts of it from a different perspective:
“…And I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood and fire and vapor of smoke, the sun will be turned into darkness and the moon to blood before the great and notable day of the Lord comes. And it will come to pass that whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.”
While still in the same conversation, John in The Revelation 6 sees still different detail:
“And I beheld when he had opened the 6th seal, and lo there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood. And the stars fell to the earth like a fig tree casting her untimely figs when shaken by a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.”
“And the kings of the earth and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every man free and slave, hid themselves in the dens and rocks of the mountains saying, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the day of His wrath has come, and who can stand before Him?”
Conclusion: We can see the sun/moon descripton that Jesus, Joel, Peter, and John talked about are 4 parts of one conversation. It occurs at His return which will be after the anti-Christ is seen in the temple in Jerusalem, as our Rock laid the contextual foundation of the conversation.
If you want a well-researched book on feast days and how historical events have lined up down through history, I recommend the late Grant Jeffrey’s book, “Appointment with Destiny”. If you want to know more how the 6th seal, trumpet, and bowl all have to do with the return of Christ, and the other seals, trumpets and bowls, I’d recommend my Revelation series.
Just remember, don’t argue over chips and salsa, there is a larger conversation going on.
New subject next week, blessings!
John Fenn
