This year brings amazing signs in skies and Scriptures. Blood moons, solar eclipses, Jewish festivals and a Sabbath year align in startling ways for anyone with eyes to see and ears to hear.
Springtime Holy Days
God designed the Jewish year's seven special festivals around His prophetic calendar. Best- known is Passover, announcing Spring, promising new life and harvest.
At Passover, a spotless lamb was slain to apply its blood on the door of the home and to be roasted for a festal meal, picturing Calvary: "Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us" (1 Cor. 5:7). The Jewish people celebrate exodus from slavery, and Christians find liberation from sin and death through the cross. We are redeemed by the "precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish" (1 Peter 1:19-20).
The feast of unleavened bread follows, as the observant Jewish family removes all leaven from their household and diet for seven days. Leaven symbolizes sin, spreading secretly, puffing up with pride. "Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth" (1 Cor. 5:8).
On the cross Christ forever put away our sins: "now, once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself" (Hebrews 9:27). As leaven was put out of the house, our record of sin has been forever removed. "My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought! My sin, not in part, but the whole, Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more, It is well, praise the Lord, oh my soul!"
Removing leaven calls every believer in Christ to diligently search and remove sin from his life. Christ has removed the guilt of our sins, now let us remove their reality and practice: "let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness" (2 Cor. 7:1).
Within the week comes the feast of firstfruits, the first day after the Sabbath, which foretells the resurrection of Jesus: "But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept" (1 Cor. 15:20). As the Jewish worshipper came before the Lord to wave the first stalks of planting, so Jesus was the first to rise from the dead never to die again! His first fruit offering anticipates an abundant harvest, and His resurrection is the pledge of many more on that day when He returns (1 Thess. 4:16-17).
Signs in the Heavens
The Jewish festivals of 2014-2015 are bounded by four "blood moons" (total lunar eclipses, with reddish tinge). Eight times since Christ a series of four eclipses (called a tetrad) have landed on God's holy days. The current tetrad began with Passover last year, continued through the Fall Feast of Tabernacles, marks this year's Passover (April 4), and concludes on this year's Feast of Tabernacles (September 28).
Previous tetrads coincided with world events affecting Israel. In 1493-94, Jews were expelled from Spain, a pattern Europe followed. In that time, an Italian Christian of Jewish descent, Christopher Columbus, navigated back from the "New World" of America. In a few hundred years, the United States rose to be a safe haven for Jewish immigrants from all over the world.
In 1949-50, the tetrad followed Israel's official rebirth as a nation (May 1948). After two world wars, God's ancient people were allowed access to their ancient homeland. The Israeli government was installed in 1949 and regional peace treaties signed by 1950.
In 1967-68, four blood moons heralded the "Six-Day War," when Israel was attacked by Arab neighbors seeking to annihilate her. God gave a mighty deliverance that astonished the world and stunned her enemies. Israel captured additional lands and took back the ancient city of Jerusalem.
And now come the blood moons of 2014-15. The Islamic State (ISIS) marches through Syria and Iraq, seeks to take Jordan and maybe Saudi Arabia, killing Christians and some Shiite Muslims. They intend total obliteration of Israel. Terrorist groups Hezbollah, Hamas, and al-Quaedi are renewing attacks. Iran presses to gain the nuclear bomb. Once radical Islamic states and terrorists have nuclear weapons, everything destabilizes.
Elsewhere, Egypt and Turkey turn a cold shoulder to Israel. Fearful Europe has backed away from support, now accusing Israel of war crimes. The once-reliable United States has taken a long step back from helping. Dangerous days for Israel are here. We may soon witness a Mideast war unlike any recently seen. Joel prophesied and Peter proclaimed, "I will shew wonders in heaven above...the sun shall be turned into darkness [solar eclipse] and the moon into blood [lunar eclipse], before that great and notable day of the Lord come" (Acts 2:19-20).
Spring arrives this year on March 20 with a total solar eclipse, visible in Europe, North Africa, North Asia, and Iceland. A partial solar eclipse happens this September 13 to South Africa, South India, and Antarctica. That last date holds considerable interest.
Sabbath-Year Economic Reset
Those familiar with Jonathan Cahn's works—The Harbinger and The Mystery of the Shemitah—will know 2015 also marks the end of the Sabbath year, or shemittah (Hebrew "release" of debts, Deut. 15:1-3). Many of the biggest U.S. stock market corrections landed on these seven-year cycles of God's calendar, always in September or October. The last one was the largest single-day point drop of the Dow Jones index ever, October 1, 2008. Seven years prior, on September 18, 2001, the stock market steeply fell due to the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center.
If the Lord is judging America by toppling our false gods and idols, money would head the list. Seeing no significant signs yet of national repentance and turning back to the God of our fathers, we expect the economy may well take another big hit in 2015. The Jewish new year's eve, when debts are recalibrated, falls on September 13, as a solar eclipse darkens the southern hemisphere, and two weeks before the final blood moon of this tetrad comes on September 28.
Putting it all together, we have an incredible convergence of events beyond manipulation by man. A cycle of four blood moons over two consecutive years ... each total lunar eclipse falling upon a Jewish holy day ... with total solar eclipses between the blood moons ... landing in the Jewish seventh-year of debt release ... leading past 2015-2016 into the next Jubilee Year (when God sets captives free, restores property, and proclaims liberty in the land). Is the Lord shouting at those with ears to hear and eyes to see?
The 2nd annual Prophecy in the News summit will be held March 5-7 at the Hyatt Regency Orlando Hotel in Orlando, Florida. The summit, featuring 26 speakers such as Rabbi Jonathan Cahn, Paul McGuire, Jerome Corsi, Joseph Farah, Dr. Kevin Clarkson, Thomas Ice, Bob Cornuke and many others, starts on Thursday at 3:30 p.m. and ends on Saturday at 9:30 p.m. Call the office 1-800-475-1111 to register or go online at prophecyinthenews.com. The cost is $90 per person for all three days.
Dr. Kevin Clarkson is the host of Prophecy in the News and the senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Moore, Oklahoma. He has pastored four churches during the last 30 years. Clarkson has a deep love for the nation and people of Israel, and a love of all things related to Bible prophecy.
