Is there a connection between the eclipse and the flooding left by hurricane Harvey?

I’ve recently read of folks using the end time scenario trying to make the connection between the eclipse and eschatology. These incidences happend within a week of one another. Typically, when something of the magnitude of Harvey hits us the end times speculators spring into action.

Others relate catastrophes that hit America to our support or lack of support of the current political state of Israel. What is missing from the equation? Most do not seem to consider America’s national sins can of themselves bring national calamity.

If there is some connection between the phenomenon of the eclipse with Harvey, there may be a better Biblical explanation. In both Testaments, when God pronounced judgments upon nations, his language dealt with withdrawing light and turning nations over to darkness and destruction. We see this pattern in the New Testament, when God judged the churches in the book of Revelation. He warned of removing their candle stick (light), if they do not repent and make things right with the Almighty.

Here are other examples from the Old Testament. When God pronounced judgment upon Babylon, He stated, “Behold, the day of the Lord comes, cruel, with both wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate; And He will destroy its sinners from it. For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not give their light; The sun will be darkened in its going forth, And the moon will not cause its light to shine. I will punish the world for its evil, And the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud, And will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. I will make a mortal more rare than fine gold, A man more than the golden wedge of Ophir. Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth will move out of her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hosts and in the day of His fierce anger” (Isaiah 13:9-13).

In another passage, God pronounced judgment upon Egypt. He declares, “I will also water the land with the flow of your blood, even to the mountains; And the riverbeds will be full of you. When I put out your light, I will cover the heavens, and make its stars dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light. All the bright lights of the heavens I will make dark over you, and bring darkness upon your land,” Says the Lord God” (Ezekiel 32:6-8).

We know God created the sun, moon, and stars not to be worshipped, but as a source for mankind to know His awesome power, glory and Godhead. He also created them to give light and as a mechanism to tell time and seasons. When a nation crosses the line with the Almighty, He also uses the language of their existence as a warning and a pronouncement of judgement.

Now here is the thing. We know from history God judged the nations He warned. We also have no record of any physical phenomenon happening in the heavens. When God chooses that specific language it is prophetic, symbolic language that basically states that God is removing His light from men and nations due to their abominable practices.

This is exactly the same language that the Apostle Peter utilized when explaining the outpouring of God’s Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Quoting the prophet Joel, Peter states, “And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your young men shall see visions, Your old men shall dream dreams. And on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days; And they shall prophesy. I will show wonders in heaven above and signs in the earth beneath: Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord” (Acts 2:17-20).

Most rejoice on the promise being fulfilled about the Holy Spirit manifesting in the early church. They tend to glaze over the latter part of the promise being fulfilled and that concerns the language of judgment, “I will show wonders in heaven above and signs in the earth beneath: Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord.”

True to God’s Word and warning, He birthed the church, established His Kingdom, filled His believers and in 70 AD judged the nation of Israel.

So, is there a connection between the eclipse and God’s judgment? You be the judge.