What If Joel’s “Moon To Blood” Already Happened On The Night Jesus Died

A red moon grabs headlines. But what if the most important “blood moon” already rose over Jerusalem? We take you beyond hype and into history, tracing Joel’s prophecy through Peter’s Pentecost sermon, the Gospel accounts of noon-day darkness, and the early church’s symbolic imagination. Along the way, we explore why Passover rules out a normal solar eclipse during the crucifixion, how astronomy points to a partial lunar eclipse on April 3, AD 33, and what ancient writers like Thallus and Phlegon recorded about strange skies and earthquakes under Tiberius.

Rather than build timelines from eclipses, we lean into how prophets used cosmic language to describe world-shaking change. For the first Christians, the cross and resurrection were the turning of the ages—the moment creation groaned, the veil tore, and history shifted. The “sun turned to darkness” and “moon to blood” were not a code for the next news cycle; they were the vocabulary of redemption’s arrival. We unpack how church fathers understood eclipses as natural phenomena, why they resisted sign-chasing, and how a Christ-centered lens restores clarity in a polarized media world.

If you’ve felt whiplash from end-times headlines, this conversation invites you to trade fear for the finished work of Christ. Let wonder rise when the sky turns red—but let it lead you back to Golgotha and an empty tomb, where the decisive sign already sounded. Listen, share with a friend who needs a grounded take on prophecy, and if this helped, subscribe and leave a review so more people can find thoughtful, hope-filled conversations like this.

Transcript

A Kingdom Lens On Headlines

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All right. What's up, everybody? Welcome to the Mark Casto program. I hope that you are enjoying these uh daily lives. We're going live on YouTube, we're on Facebook, we're on Instagram, and I really just have a heart to do these to help bring some kingdom commentary to today's headlines. Guys, we as a nation are so divided and polarized in the media. And I feel like we have uh the left perspective, we have the right perspective, left and right, uh, Republican, Democrat, but very few times does that commentary create a kingdom commentary. So I want to bring a fresh imagination to today's headlines and think through a Christological lens. Can we see the world through the lens of Christ? And let's use some early church imagination. If you read early church fathers, um, you know that they have a way different perspective than we have in Western Christianity. So I just kind of want to walk through this today. Um, I actually read an article the other day on uh charisma here about blood moons. We're back to blood moon eclipse um 2026 biblical prophecy coming to pass. Um and just read through this article. And man, you know, my my thoughts are there there are several things that I think that I feel called to cover. Um, obviously, I wrote a book in 2017 on spiritual warfare, calling out the myths that we've created in spiritual warfare that is absent of the finished work of Christ and a true understanding of the gospel. But another big piece that I feel like I carry is eschatology. And guys, we are all the time getting articles like this about blood moons and signs in the heavens and and how it's connected to Bible prophecy. And I do think blood moons are prophetic, but I do believe that they have they are pointed at a particular time period instead of us trying to create those things now. And so I kind of want to walk through um just my thoughts about this article. Uh, certainly not uh an attack or some something against this individual who wrote it because I don't even know who this individual is, but it's just some thoughts because I feel like we are recycling things in Bible prophecy. I'm just kind of scrolling through here. Um, we're just kind of recycling Bible prophecy and end-time eschatology messages, and we're really not getting back to what does the early, what did Jesus say? What's the Bible say? What is the early church? Uh, how would they have interpreted this? And that's what I kind of want to go into today. So we're gonna be talking about this, and this will be really interesting because um I believe that there was a blood moon, and I'm gonna prove this around the time that Jesus died. And that's really important for you and I to understand this. So let me ask you for a quick favor before we jump into this teaching. If you're

Why Blood Moon Stories Keep Returning

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watching me on Facebook or YouTube, why don't you do me a favor, hit that like and subscribe button? If you're watching us on Facebook, make sure you hit that like, but also share it, guys. There's a lot of people out there that need a good news perspective about what's happening. We need to interpret these things through the finished work of Christ. So why don't you go ahead and share that with friends? Why don't you drop some comments below? Let me know where you're watching from, let me know who you are. And if you got questions, guys, put them on there. I would love to engage with our audience here at the end of the teaching. All right. I think you guys are ready to jump in. Uh, let me know in the comments, just say yes. If you're ready to jump in, just say yes. Okay, guys, we're gonna jump into this teaching today. All right. A few days ago, like I said, I came across this article circulating online. And again, I showed you just a minute ago, the headline suggested that this lunar eclipse, or what astronomers would call a blood worm moon, might be connected to biblical prophecy. So if you spend any time in Christian circles, you've probably seen headlines like this before. A lunar eclipse appears in the sky, the moon turns a deep shade of red, and suddenly people start asking the same question: Is this a sign? And the article leaned into that curiosity and it points readers toward several passages in scripture where the Bible says something striking. This is what it says. Okay, this is from Joel's prophecy. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood. And those words come from the from the book of Joel, and they appear again in the book of Acts. And similar imagery appears also in the book of Revelation. And for centuries, those verses have captured the imagination of readers. When you hear language like that, it immediately sounds dramatic, almost cosmic in scale. The sun's going dark, the moon is turning to blood, the heavens themselves reacting to something that's happening in the earth. And um, it's the kind of language that really sticks in your mind. That's why uh people that are not even believers can, they are mysteriously intrigued with blood moons. Okay. So it's not surprising that when a lunar eclipse happens today, when the moon really does appear red, people start wondering if they're seeing the fulfillment of biblical prophecy. Okay. But when I read that article, another question comes to mind. Now, listen, this is

Joel’s Prophecy And Peter’s Claim

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this is what I say. Um, uh, this is a statement that was handed down to me by a spiritual father is religion dumbs us down and doesn't allow us to ask questions. Religion always tells us what to think, but it doesn't tell us how, like, or it tells us how to think and or or what to think instead of how to think. Okay. And so what I love in this past 11 years that I've been walking this path towards the finished work of Christ and union with Jesus and coming into a more orthodox understanding of the gospel is I start asking questions. Okay. And this is the question that comes to mind. Not whether the moon might turn red, but how the earliest Christians would have understood those passages. And I think that's a really important uh conversation to lean into because the first generation of Christians lived much closer to the world of the Bible than we do. And they spoke the languages of ancient texts, they inherited the interpretive traditions of Jewish prophecy. They lived in a culture where astronomy and symbolism and theology was constantly interacting. So if anyone would have recognized prophetic signs in the skies, it would have been them. So how did they read those verses? Did they expect lunar eclipses to signal prophetic events? Did they believe that certain moons were warnings from heaven? Or did they understand those passages in a different way entirely? And the deeper that, guys, that I began to look into that question, the more fascinating the story became because it turns out that the Bible really does describe a moment where the sun went dark. And when you follow that story carefully, something remarkable begins to emerge. There may have been a night in history where the moon truly did appear red over Jerusalem, not as a prediction about the future, but as a sign marking one of the most consequential moments the world has ever seen. Okay. And the phrase that that captures so much attention appears first in the book of Joel. Joel was one of the prophets in ancient Israel. Now, this is very vivid imagery. Okay. Um Joel describes smoke and fire and darkness and the heavens reacting to the unfolding of God's purposes in history. And if you read the prophets of the Old Testament, you quickly notice that they often use cosmic language like what I just shared with you. The fall of kingdoms is described as the stars falling from the sky. The collapse of empires is portrayed by

Darkness At The Crucifixion Explained

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the heavens shaking. The prophets spoke in images that made historical events feel as large as the universe itself. But Joel's prophecy didn't just stay in the Old Testament. Centuries later, one on a on a certain morning in Jerusalem, the apostle Peter, on the day of Pentecost, he quoted this prophecy from the book of Joel. Guys, we know that moment as Pentecost. Jerusalem is literally crowded with pilgrims from all across the Roman world. Jews from every region had gathered for this festival. And something extraordinary begins to happen. The followers of Jesus, who had been hiding in fear in a closed room after his crucifixion, suddenly began speaking boldly in languages that they had never learned. The crowd gathered. There were people in shock. Some were amazed. Others mocked them because they were like drunk men. And Peter stood up to explain what was happening, and his explanation wasn't subtle, it was very specific. He said, This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. Okay. And then he quoted the whole passage, not just the outpouring of the spirit, which many of you that grew up Pentecostal and charismatic like me, we all know that part of Joel's prophecy. But then he quoted this passage: the sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood. And guys, it's easy to miss the significance of what Peter said, because he wasn't talking about something that would happen thousands of years later. He was saying something in their present moment was fulfilling Joel's prophecy. And that statement raises a very fascinating question. Okay. If Peter believed that Joel's prophecy was being fulfilled right then, what events might the people standing in the crowd have remembered? What happened in Jerusalem recently that could possibly fit the language of the sun going dark and the moon turning to blood? And to answer that question, we have to go back several weeks, back to Passover, back to a Friday afternoon when three crosses stood outside the city walls. Okay. Now I want to talk about this. I think this is very, very fascinating. Okay. Um, very, very fascinating. So the crucifixion of Jesus is one of the most documented events in ancient history. It appears not only in the New Testament, but also in Roman and Jewish historical references. Okay. But one detail recorded in the gospel has puzzled readers for centuries. The gospel writers describe something unusual happening during the crucifixion. Okay. According to the accounts, Jesus, we know this by scripture, was nailed to the cross sometime in the morning. By midday, the scene had settled into the grim routine of Roman crucifixion. Crowds gather, religious leaders mocking him, soldiers stood to watch, but then something unexpected happens. Around noon, the scripture even tells us the sky began to grow dark. The Gospel of Matthew records it this way: From the sixth hour until the ninth hour, darkness came over all the land. The sixth hour in ancient Jewish timekeeping was noon. The ninth hour was three in the afternoon. Okay, so according to the Gospels, the land was covered in darkness for roughly three hours in the middle of the day. And for centuries, guys, readers have wondered what in the world caused that type of darkness. And the most common assumption is that it must have been a solar eclipse.

The AD 33 Lunar Eclipse Possibility

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But there's a problem with that explanation. A solar eclipse happens when the moon passes between Earth and the sun. And that only occurs during a new moon. So Passover, however, always happens during a full moon. That's important. Did you hear what I just said? A solar eclipse happens when the moon passes between the earth and the sun, and that only occurs during a new moon. But the Passover, the Jewish feast, they're always celebrated on the moon cycle. Passover always happens during a full moon. So what am I trying to say to you? The timing of Passover makes a solar eclipse astronomically impossible. This means that the darkness recorded in the Gospels was not a normal eclipse. Something else must have happened. Some historians suggest a massive dust storm. Others speculate about unusual atmospheric conditions. The biblical writers themselves don't even try to attempt to explain the phenomenon. They just simply record that, hey, the sky went dark. But the story doesn't end with the darkness because later that evening something else occurred. Something that modern astronomy has actually confirmed with remarkable precision. And when you discover what happened that night, the phrase the moon turned to blood begins to sound very different. Okay. So let me let's let's jump into like um let's let's just go a little deeper into it. Okay. So one of the advantages that modern scholars have is something that the ancient world lacked. We can actually now calculate celestial events thousands of years into the past. Astronomers can reconstruct the positions of the sun, the moon, and the planets with extraordinary accuracy. And when they do this for the period surrounding the crucifixion, something interesting appears in the sky. Many historians believe Jesus was crucified on April 3rd in the year AD 33. Okay. And according to astronomical calculations, a lunar eclipse occurred that evening. Okay, again, a lunar eclipse happens when the earth passes between the sun and the moon, casting the earth's shadow across the lunar surface. Okay, so during certain phases of that eclipse, the moon can appear dark red. Now, this is because sunlight passes actually through Earth's atmosphere, and that causes it to be filtered and it filters out the blue wavelengths and leaves a reddish glow. It's the same effect that makes sunsets appear red. So the result is what people today call a blood moon. I hope that helps people understand what we mean. We're saying a blood moon. And according to astronomical simulations, a partial lunar eclipse would have been visible in Jerusalem that evening. So when the moon rose over the horizon, it likely appeared dim and reddish. Now, I want you to imagine the sea, the sequence of events from the perspective of someone living in Jerusalem. Earlier that afternoon, the sky had gone dark during the crucifixion. Now, as night falls over the city, the Passover moon rises, but instead of its usual bright silver glow, it appears red. So to people living in the ancient world where celestial signs carry deep symbolic meaning, that sight would have been striking. And yet, as fascinating as the astronomy is, the story becomes even more interesting when we look at historical

Ancient Sources On Midday Darkness

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records from outside the Bible. Okay, because some ancient writers appear to have noticed something unusual that happened in the sky around that same time. Guys, I hope this is interesting to you. I'd love to hear from you in the comments below. Okay, so let's jump into blood moons, prophecy, and the night that the sky went dark, okay? So when when people talk about the crucifixion, they usually focus on the eyewitnesses inside the gospel account. So they're thinking about the disciples, the Roman soldiers, the religious leaders, the crowds that gather outside of Jerusalem. But historians often ask another question: did anyone outside the Christian movement record what happened that day? Because if the sky truly went dark in the middle of the afternoon, that would have not been a small event. It would have been noticeable. Okay. So not just to followers of Jesus, but to anyone paying attention to the sky. And when a group of researchers began combing through ancient historical writings, they did discover something really intriguing. They there are a handful of references scattered across the ancient world that appears to mention an unusual darkness during the same general time period. And these references are not clear enough to prove anything definitively. I do want to say that. But they are interestingly enough, or they are interesting enough that historians have been discussing these things for centuries. So to understand them, though, we need to look at a few ancient names that most people today have never heard of. And one of those names is, and I hope I'm getting this right, is Thallus. Okay. Thallus was a historian writing sometime in the first century. Guys, if I screw up these names, I'm sorry, I'm from West Virginia. Um I'm doing the best that I can. But but Thallus or Thalus was a historian writing sometime in the first century. And most scholars believe that his work appeared around AD 50 or slightly a little later. Um, unfortunately, none of his original writings survive today. His work's been lost to history. Okay. But fragments of his writing are preserved in later sources that actually quoted him. And one of those later sources was a Christian historian named Julius Africanus, who lived in the third century. And Africanus was writing a chronicle of world history, and in the process, he referenced Thallus, and he referenced his explanation of the darkness recorded in the crucifixion story. So according to Africanus, Thallus attempted to explain the darkness as a solar eclipse. And at first glance, that explanation might sound reasonable. After all, solar eclipses can cause the sky to grow dark during the day. But Africanists immediately pointed out a major problem. A solar eclipse can only happen during a new moon, and the crucifixion happened during Passover. And remember, Passovers always occur during a full moon, which means a solar eclipse was astronomically impossible. And Africanists wrote that he believed that the explanation was incorrect. But an interesting detail, uh, but that but the interesting detail isn't the explanation. The interesting detail is that Thallus appears to have acknowledged the event in the first place. In other words, he seems to have been aware of the reports that something unusual

How The Ancient World Read The Sky

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happened in the sky around the time of the crucifixion, and he tried to give a natural explanation. So that alone tells us something. Even outside of Christian circles, the story of an unusual darkness was definitely circulating. But Thallus isn't the only ancient writer who may have noticed something strange. There's another person that appears in historical discussions about the crucifixion, and his name is Felgian. Okay. Felgian was a Greek historian, and he lived during the second century. Okay. And he served during the time of the Roman Empire and wrote a work known as the Chronicles. And like many ancient historical works, most of Felgian's writings, they've been lost, but fragments survive through later authors who quoted him. So in one of those surviving references, Felgian describes an extraordinary event. He writes about a great eclipse. And an unusual darkness that occurred during the reign of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. Now, the passage describes a darkness that fell during the sixth hour of the day. In ancient timekeeping, the sixth hour corresponds to noon. Guys, that detail is striking. Why? Because the gospel account describes darkness covering the land beginning at noon during the crucifixion. So Felgen also mentions earthquakes occurring during the same general period. Again, the Gospels record that the earth shook during the events surrounding the crucifixion. Now, historians are careful not to jump too quickly to conclusions. Ancient chronologies are sometimes imprecise, and the fragments that we possess are many times incomplete. So when you're trying to think through the lens of an historian, no responsible historian would claim these accounts prove the gospel narrative. But they do something interesting. They show that ancient writers were aware of unusual atmospheric or celestial phenomenon occurring during the time of Jesus' crucifixion, events that were significant enough to be recorded in historical works. And when you place those historical references alongside the gospel accounts, the picture becomes intriguing because the biblical writers were not alone in describing a strange darkness around that period. So to understand why these events would have made such an impression, we have to remember how the ancient world viewed the heavens. In the modern world, we tend to think of the sky as something predictable. We understand planetary motion, we know the uh the mechanics of eclipses, we have scientific models explaining how celestial bodies move through space. I mean, if you did a science experiment or did a science fair project, you probably created one of those models. But in the ancient world, the sky

Early Christians And Symbolic Imagery

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carried profound symbolic meaning. The heavens were not just physical objects, they were signs, they were markers of time, they were indicators of divine order. So across ancient cultures, from Rome to Persia to Israel, people watched the sky carefully. Kings would, you see this in stories all the time, kings would consult astronomers and priests studied celestial cycles. The movement of the sun, the moon, and stars shaped calendars and festivals and agricultural rhythms. So when something unusual happened in the sky, people noticed and they talked about it. A sudden darkness in the middle of the day would not have been dismissed casually. It would have raised questions. People would have wondered what it meant, what event might be connected uh, what event might be connected to it? And in that cultural context, the sequence recorded in the gospel narratives become even more dramatic. First, the sky grows dark in the middle of the afternoon, then the earth trembles, then hours later, the moon rises over the horizon with a reddish hue. And for ancient observers, that combination of events would have felt deeply symbolic, not necessarily predictive, but it would have been meaningful. Something in the order of the world has been disturbed. Now, let's jump in a little bit to the perspective of early Christians. Okay. For the earliest followers of Jesus, these events were not random as uh uh atmospheric phenomena, okay? They were signs, but they were not signs pointing toward the future, they were they were literally signs pointing toward um something that had already happened, okay. And what were they pointing to? The crucifixion. When early Christians reflected the day the death of Jesus Christ, they often described it in uh how can I say this? They would describe it in cosmic terms, okay? The cross was not just the execution of a teacher, it was the turning point of history, the moment where the powers of sin and death and hell were confronted, the moment when redemption entered into the world in its most dramatic form. So when the gospel writers described darkness covering the land, they were not simply reporting weather conditions. They were telling the story of a moment where when creation itself seemed to respond. The sky darkened, the earth shook, the temple veil tore, and the world shifted. And in that sense, the language of Joel begins to take on a new dimension. The sun will be turned to darkness, the moon to blood. And so for the earliest Christians, those words were not a code to decipher future events. They were a poetic description of a moment when history itself reached a decisive turning point. And that turning point was the cross, which brings us back to the question that started this entire exploration for me. When people today talk about blood moons and they talk about prophecy, they often assume that those passages are predicting astronomical events that will occur in the future. But the early Christians may have actually understood those words differently. They may have believed that the most important cosmic sign had already happened. Not centuries later, but on a Friday afternoon outside of Jerusalem, when the sky grew dark, the earth trembled, and that evening the moon rose red over the city. To them, those signs did not predict the future. They marked

The Cross As The Cosmic Turning Point

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the moment that the world changed. Okay. So if you step back and look at the story that we've been tracing, okay, something interesting begins to emerge. First, there is the biblical account. The gospel describes covering the land, like darkness covering the land during the crucifixion. Then when we examine the astronomical record, we discovered that a lunar eclipse likely occurred that same evening. And we look at the fragments of ancient historical writings, guys, we find references to unusual darkness during that same period. And all of those pieces together raise a compelling possibility. But they also raise another question. How did the earliest Christians interpret these events? Because if anyone would have been inclined to see prophetic significance in celestial phenomenon, it would have been them. They lived in the world where the sky mattered. The movement of the sun and the moon shaped religious calendars. Festivals were literally scheduled according to lunar cycles. Astronomy and theology were deeply entwined. And I still believe that. And yet, when we examine the writings of the early church fathers, something surprising appears. They rarely treated ordinary astronomical events as prophetic countdowns. Instead, they approached these passages through the through the language of biblical symbolism. And guys, we've got to go into this because in order for you to understand why, we need to look at how prophets themselves use cosmic imagery. It's really important, guys. The language of the prophets, we've got to understand the language of the prophets. If this is helping you, put yes in the comments. Okay, if this is helping you. Okay, so when modern readers encounter passages about the sun darkening and stars falling, it's easy to assume that the Bible is describing literal astronomical catastrophes. Okay. But the but the reality is the prophets of Israel often use cosmic language as a way of describing political and historical upheaval. So for example, when the prophet Isaiah described the fall of Babylon, he used words that sound almost apocalyptic. And here's what he wrote. Okay. He said, the stars of heaven and their constellations will not show their light. The rising sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light. And guys, if you read that passage without context, you might assume Isaiah was predicting the end of the world. But Isaiah was actually describing the downfall of a powerful empire. In the language of the prophets, the collapse of kingdoms was portrayed by the shaking of the heavens. When rulers fell, it was as though the stars themselves were falling from the sky. And this was not a scientific description of astronomical events. It was poetic imagery used to describe world-changing historical moments. Guys, the prophets spoke in pictures

Resurrection Reframes The Signs

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that made earthly events feel as large as the cosmos. I've said that before. Okay, so for the earliest Christians, the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus represented the greatest turning point in history. They believed that the life and the death and the resurrection of Jesus marked the transition from one age to another. The old covenant system centered around the temple, that was coming to an end. And a new covenant community was being formed. The kingdom of God was breaking into the world in a new way. And guys, when events of that magnitude occur, the language of the prophets become the natural way to describe them. The heavens tremble, the sun grows dark, the moon turns red, the world itself seems to react. So when early Christians read passages like Joel's prophecy about the sun turning to darkness and the moon turning to blood, they often interpreted those words through the lens of the crucifixion. Not as a prediction of future eclipses, but as symbolic language describing the upheaval that accompanied the arrival of the Messiah. And guys, that perspective shows up in early Christian writings. And again, I feel like one of the things that the Lord's asked of me is to help us see the world through a Christological lens and to also get some early church imagination back into our thinking. Again, guys, if this is if this is helping you, click that like button, make sure you subscribe, and also hit that share button so other people can hear this because a lot of people are confused about blood moons and the signs of the times and eschatology because we don't hear teaching like this. So I'm hoping this is helping you. Okay. So let's jump into the voices of early church fathers. Okay. Some of the earliest theologians to reflect on these passages that we've been kind of talking through lived in the second and third centuries. Men like Irenaeus or Origen and later Augustine spent enormous amounts of time studying the prophetic text of scripture. And their writings reveal a range of interpretations. Some believe cosmic disturbances would accompany the final return of Christ. Others emphasize the symbolic meaning of prophetic imagery. But even when they expected future cosmic signs, they did not treat normal celestial cycles as a prophetic signal. They understood that eclipses were a part of the natural order. So Greek astronomers had been predicting eclipses for centuries before the time of Christ. So the early church did not treat every unusual moon as a message from heaven. Instead, they focused on the deeper meaning of the prophetic imagery. So for them, the most significant cosmic event in history was not an eclipse, it was the crucifixion. The cross represented the moment when the powers of darkness were confronted and defeated. When the sky grew dark during the crucifixion, early Christians saw that darkness as a sign that something cosmic had occurred. Not merely the death of a man, but the death of the Son of God, the turning point of redemption. And guys, when we start looking through this perspective, this perspective also reflects something Jesus himself said about the signs. So if you go throughout the gospels, people frequently asked Jesus for signs from heaven.

Why The Fathers Didn’t Chase Eclipses

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They wanted proof, something spectacular, something undeniable. But Jesus often resisted that kind of demand. At one point, he even told his listeners that a wicked generation was constantly seeking signs. Not because signs were meaningless, but because sometimes people sometimes chase signs instead of recognizing the meaning of the moment they are already living in. And guys, I guess that's probably my biggest issue with where we are at today is that everything has become a sign. Everything now is an end-time headline. Everything now is Jesus is coming back tomorrow. And it ignores the full context of scripture about the coming of Christ. I think I've been pretty clear on the internet uh in the past couple of years. I don't believe in a pre-tribulation rapture theory anymore. Um, but I still believe, according to the apostolic creed, in the second coming of Christ. I believe Jesus Christ is literally going to appear from heaven and he's going to be seated in Jerusalem in the Zion realm, and he's going to rule and reign the nations with his people. I believe that. Um, but I believe that now many of us Christians have lost a uh credibility with the culture because we've made these signs into something that they're not. And now to everybody, these signs are meaningless. Um, and we've become sign chasers instead of recognizing the moment that we're already living in. And so going back to the early church, for the earliest Christians, the crucifixion itself was the sign, the darkness, the earthquake, the, the, the, the tearing of the temple veil. These were not clues pointing towards some distant future. These were signs pointing to the meaning of the cross. So when we bring the astronomical evidence back into the picture, the story takes on an almost cinematic quality. Okay. Imagine the scene. Here I go with my my cinematic quality. Okay. Imagine the scene as evening falls on Jerusalem. The city is quieting after a day filled with tension and confusion. Could you imagine three hours of darkness in the middle of the day? Earlier that afternoon, the sky grows dark, rumors are spreading. Some say the temple curtain tore in two. Others uh like they're talking about how the ground shook, and now the sun is set, and the city waits in the stillness of that evening, some of them probably in fear and anxiety. And slowly over the eastern horizon, the Passover moon begins to rise, but the moon does not appear as it normally does. Instead, it's of its usual pale brightness, it carries a deep reddish hue. And to people living in the ancient world, that sight would have felt heavy with meaning. A darkness, a darkened sky earlier in the day, a trembling earth, and now a red moon rising over the city. Guys, the heavens themselves seemed to be responding to something that had just happened. And yet, at that moment, almost no one understood what it meant. The disciples were scattered, the crowds were confused, the Roman authorities believed that the matter was finished. A teacher, some even thought he was a prophet from Galilee, had been executed. Another failed messianic movement had come to an end. But guys, we all know the story wasn't finished. In fact, it had just barely begun. Because within three days, something would happen that would transform how the earliest Christians understood everything they had witnessed. The darkness, the trembling earth, the red moon, all of it would take

From Sign Chasing To Christ Centered

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on a new meaning. But that meaning would not become clear until the morning of the third day. Okay. I hope you're still tracking with me. I know this is a lot, but I think this is going to be super helpful for those of you that are kind of reading through articles and talking about blood moons and the signs of the heavens and all these things. I think this is going to be helpful to you. Okay. So by the time the moon had set that night, Jerusalem had returned probably back to somewhat of a normal rhythm. Passover pilgrims slept, Roman soldiers are rotating their watches. The disciples of Jesus are hidden behind closed doors. They're stunned. They're afraid. Everything that they had believed about the future now seemed shattered. Just days earlier, they had followed Jesus into Jerusalem, expecting something very different. The crowds were welcoming him as a king. Palm branches filled the streets. People shouted words from the Psalms. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And for a brief moment, the air felt electric with messianic hope. But that hope had collapsed quickly. Within a week, Jesus had been arrested, tried, and executed by Roman authority. Guys, crucifixion was not simply death, it was humiliation, a public demonstration that Rome held absolute power. Messianic movements ended on crosses. Everyone in the ancient world knew that. So when Jesus died outside of the walls of Jerusalem, the assumption was simple. Another teacher, another failed revolution, another story that would fade into history. But there were some strange details. What about the darkness? What about the earthquake? What about the torn curtain in the temple? What about the red moon rising that evening? People talked about those things, but strange events in the sky did not resurrect dead men. And that is what made the mourning of the third day so astonishing. So the earliest witnesses to the resurrection were not kings or men of great esteem or priests. They were women. I think this is important. In the ancient world, women were rarely treated as credible witnesses in legal matters. And yet, every, I love how God does this. Every gospel account records that women were the first to arrive at the tomb. They came early in the morning. This is how what the scripture says that God would use even the foolish things to confound the wise. In that time period, for a woman to be the uh evidence or the person who claims this would have really shaken up the culture. So these women, they come to the tomb early in the morning while the city was still quiet, Sabbath had ended, and they intended to finish, they were coming there to honor and do the finishing touches on the burial preparations that had been rushed before sunset two days earlier. But when they arrived, we all know the story, the stone had been moved. The tomb was empty. And at first they were scared. It didn't bring them clarity. It actually brought them confusion. And the the women assumed that the body of Jesus had been taken. So they ran to tell the disciples, Peter and John rushed to the tomb. They found the burial clothes lying there, but Jesus himself was gone. The man that they all seeing crucified was alive. This is the power of the gospel, man. And once that realization took hold, everything else began to look different. Even the strange events surrounding his death. Guys, the resurrection changed the way the earliest Christians understood the crucifixion. What it looked like defeat now appeared

Partner With The Work

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as victory. What had seemed like the end of a movement now appeared as the beginning of something entirely new. And those unusual signs that accompanied the crucifixion, the darkness, the earthquake, the torn veil, they began to take on a deeper meaning. To the early Christians, these were not random occurrences, guys. These were signs that creation itself had responded to the death of Christ. The Apostle Paul later described the cross as a cosmic event. He wrote that through the crucifixion, God was reconciling the world and all things to himself, not just human beings, all things, heaven and earth, seen and unseen. And guys, in that sense, the darkness that covered the land was not simply weather, it was a symbol of the gravity of the moment. The death of Jesus represented a confrontation between the forces of life and death, light and darkness. Guys, the cross is where those forces collided. And according to the earliest Christian message, the resurrection revealed which side ultimately prevailed. Now let's jump back into the meaning of the blood moon. So when the earliest Christians read the prophetic language about the sun turning to darkness and the moon turning to blood, they did not primarily interpret those words as a prediction about future eclipses or future events. Instead, they saw them as a poetic description of a moment when the world itself had been shaken. Guys, the crucifixion had looked like a local event, one man executed by Roman authority. But the early Christians believed something much larger had happened. The cross represented the turning point of history, and the signs that accompanied it reflected the magnitude of that moment. When the sky darkened, it was as though the world itself paused. And when the earth trembled, it was as though creation itself reacted, and it did. And when the moon rose red over Jerusalem that evening, the heaven seemed to echo the language of the prophets. The sun turned the darkness, the moon to blood, not as a prediction of something still to come, but as a sign marking what had already happened. So, guys, I just want to point this out.

Bringing Focus Back To The Gospel

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Guys, this perspective explains something interesting about the early Christian movement. They did not develop a system. I'm going to say it again. They did not develop a system of tracking lunar eclipses as prophetic indicators. They didn't attempt to try to predict future events based on celestial patterns. Instead, their focus remained fixed on one central claim. Jesus had risen from the dead. And that claim reshapes everything. It changes how we read the scriptures. It changed how they understood the signs that accompany the crucifixion. It changed how they viewed the future. And for them, the most important sign had already appeared, not in the sky alone, but in an empty tomb. The resurrection became the defining event of their faith. And the cosmic imagery of the prophets served as a way of describing the magnitude of that moment. So when historians look at the rise of Christianity, one of the most puzzling questions is how such a movement spread so rapidly. And the message at the center of Christianity is actually startling. A crucified man had risen from the dead. And in the Roman world, crucifixion was designed to erase movements. It was meant to crush hope. Yet within a generation, the message of the resurrection was spreading across the Mediterranean world, from Jerusalem to Antioch, from Asia Minor to Rome. Guys, small community of believers gathered in homes and public spaces telling the same story. And here's what they would have told the sky went dark, the earth shook, the tomb was empty, and the man they had seen die was alive again. Guys, that message carried power, not because it explained every mystery, but because it offered a new way of understanding the world. Guys, throughout history, human beings have looked to the sky for signs. Ancient civilizations charted the movement of the stars. Kings consulted astrologers. Prophets spoke of the heavens trembling. Guys, the skies have always captured our imagination. But the earliest Christian believers, they believed that the most important sign in the heavens was not an eclipse. It was the moment when dark darkness literally covered the land during the crucifixion. And the moment when the sun rose again on the morning of the resurrection, the heavens were not predicting the future. They were bearing witness to the turning point of history. So imagine that evening one more time. Jerusalem's quiet, the sun set, the Passover moon rises over the eastern hills. Guys, its surface appears dim and red as it climbs through the atmosphere. To the people watching from the city walls, it may have looked like an omen, a strange and unsettling sight. But no one standing there that night could have imagined what would follow. Three days later, the tomb would be empty. The disciples would encounter the risen Christ, and the story that began in a small corner of the Roman Empire would begin to spread across the whole world. The darkness, the earthquake, the red moon, these events became a part of a larger narrative, a narrative that declared something extraordinary had happened. The world had turned and history would never be the same. Oh man, this is exciting, guys. So thankful for the gospel today. So thankful for

Wonder, The Heavens, And History

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what the Lord is doing. And guys, before we continue into any of this today, what we're talking about, I want to just give a take a brief moment and talk about partnering with us. Okay. Guys, um, conversations like the one you're hearing today, um, teaching like what you're hearing today, don't just happen by accident. It requires time, it requires research, writing, and and and growing a media infrastructure so we can bring thoughtful conversations about faith, history, culture into the public square. So that's part of the vision behind Long Pass Studios. Our goal is to build a platform where ideas that matter, ideas rooted in the truth, wisdom, thoughtful reflection on the finished work of Christ can reach people all over the world. So, guys, if you believe this kind of conversation matters, if you want to help us continue creating podcasts, live streams, writing books, and producing content that challenges and encourages people, I want to invite you guys today to partner with us. You can become a monthly supporter of this work at Mark Casto. It's M-A-R-K-C-A-S-T-O.co backslash donate. Guys, when you go do that, your partnership helps us continue building long past studios and expanding the reach of this program. And if you're someone who knows, I'm going to switch gears here a little bit because I'm not just asking for partners, I'm also asking for people that you feel like you have a message. Okay. Like if you're someone you, if you're someone who knows that you carry wisdom that can genuinely help people, if you spent years and years learning, leading, teaching, or even thinking deeply about things that could benefit others, but you've never built the platform to share it. That's exactly why we created Longpath Creator Academy. Guys, inside of this academy, we help thoughtful leaders, teachers, and creators turn their God-given wisdom into meaningful content and digital products that impact lives. So if you've ever thought, I know I have something meaningful to say, I just don't know how to build it, then Longpath Creator Academy is designed for you. You can learn more about that in the link in the description of this or in the podcast show notes below. And uh guys, let's finish up. We're about to land this plane today as we continue to talk about was there a blood moon when Jesus died? And this really comes again, if you're just joining us uh here now, this really comes from reading articles and all this stuff swirling about the blood moon and the the Jewish day on the calendar of Purim and and and Esther being delivered from Haman's plan. And there's a lot of things swirling prophetically. And I'm not saying that there's nothing to it. What I'm saying is we've become sign chasers in America instead of keeping our focus on the centrality of Christ. And so I want to bring us back to the good news. Okay, so let's get ready to land this plane. Okay. The fascination with blood moons has grown dramatically in the modern world. Every few years, when a lunar eclipse occurs and the moon takes on that deep red hue, headlines begin to circulate. Articles appear, videos are shared, speculation spreads across social media like wildfire. People begin asking the same question. Is this a sign? And for some, the idea feels exciting. For others, it feels unsettling. But the deeper question is not whether the moon can appear red. Astronomy explains that quite easily. The deeper question is that is is what those biblical passages actually meant in their original context. And when we step back and examine the earliest Christian interpretations, something interesting becomes really clear. Their attention was fixed on something else entirely. For early Christians, the center of history was not an astronomical event. It was the life and the death and the resurrection of Jesus. Everything else was interpreted in relation to that story. The prophets had spoken about cosmic upheaval, heaven shaking, sun darkening, moon turning to blood. But when the earliest Christians looked back to those prophecies, they saw them fulfilled in the events surrounding the crucifixion. The cross represented

Final Charge And Closing

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the moment when the world itself seemed to hold its breath. Darkness covered the land, the earth trembled, and that evening the moon again rose red above the city. And to them, these events were not predictions about future eclipses. They were signs. It was not setting a pattern of, okay, now we've got to track every blood moon because it's going to be a sign of something. These were signs marking the moment redemption entered the world in its most dramatic form. And I'm going to say this, and I know this is going to be controversial, but hey, I've never shied away from that throughout my years of preaching and ministry. Guys. Oh boy. Many things that we are taught to look for in the second coming, the prophets were talking about the first coming, including the book of Daniel. But I'll save that for another podcast. Just get you intrigued there and maybe get you doing your own study there. Okay. So so let's talk about why we look for signs. Human beings have always looked to the sky for meaning. There's something about the vastness of the heavens that invites reflection. I mean, many times my wife and I and our kids just will go into the on the trampoline in the backyard and just look at the stars, especially if there was a, like we know there's going to be a meteor shower. And when you just stare into the vastness and think about uh space and and the heavens, it does cause you to wonder. And when we see a rare celestial event, a comet, an eclipse, a meteor shower, it reminds us how small we are in the larger universe. It makes us wonder whether something greater might be speaking through those moments. And that impulse is not new. Ancient civilizations did the same thing. I mean, look at 2012 and the Mayan calendar. Like these people studied the stars, the cycles of the sun and the moon. They searched for patterns that might reveal the future. But the message of early Christianity introduced a new perspective, a different perspective. So instead of searching the heavens for clues about what may happen next, the earliest Christians pointed towards something that had already happened, the cross, the resurrection. And guys, those events were not hidden in the sky. They happened in history. Now, I believe that you can see the gospel in the stars. But what I'm saying is those events are not just something hidden in the sky. It actually happened historically in public in a city filled with witnesses. And the story spread not because people decoded celestial patterns, but because they believed they had encountered a risen Christ. So when we return to that Friday outside of Jerusalem, that scene still carries a sense of mystery. To anyone watching that night, those signs may have seemed ominous. Perhaps they were even frightening, but they were not the end of the story. Because again, our focus is on three days later, the disciples would discover that the man they had seen be crucified was alive. And once that realization took hold, everything else began to make sense in a new way. The darkness was not the darkness was not the triumph of evil. It was the shadow of a moment when redemption was unfolding. The trembling was not chaos. It was the echo of history shifting beneath the weight of what had happened. And the red moon rising that night became a part of a larger narrative, a reminder that the death of Christ was not a small event. It was cosmic in its significance. So today, when people see a lunar eclipse and begin asking whether or not it might be a sign, it may be worth remembering that the most important moment in the story of redemption did not happen in the sky. It happened on a hill outside of Jerusalem. The sky did grow dark that day. The earth did tremble that day, and the moon very well may have risen red that evening. But the true turning point came three days later when a stone was rolled away and the world discovered that death itself had been defeated. So let me just say this to you. When you look up at a red moon from this day forward, may it prophesy to you that the Lamb of God was slain to take away the sins of the world. That when you stare up into the heavens, the heavens are beautiful. They inspire wonder. But the story at the heart of Christianity is not ultimately just written in the stars. It's written in history. It's a fact. It has happened. It's a cross. It's an empty tomb. It's a message that has echoed through the centuries. Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.

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Thanks for joining us on today's episode. If this spoke to you, don't keep it to yourself. Share it with a friend, leave a review, and make sure you subscribe so you never miss the wisdom that's shifting lives and systems. Until next time, keep building with clarity and fire.