No MATTER how we try to explain them, these are solemn, portentous words: "And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. . . . And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your heads for your redemption draweth nigh." One thought in connection with these momentous words of the Lord Christ, is that perturbations of the heavens, of the earth and the seas are directly associated with the signs, or abnormal conditions which are to appear in the visible heavenly bodies. Are we not, therefore, forced by the words of our Lord to the conclusion that God lays His hand, which is another name for His law, upon the "sun and the moon and the stars," when He intends to shake the heavens, and set the seas and waves thereof roaring.
In plain words, is it not here distinctly taught that this is God's regular and normal way of causing phenomena which we witness in the earth, much as storms, tidal waves, earthquakes, and all kindred disturbances? Personally, we do not doubt that such is the case, and neither do we doubt that God will use the same means and methods, when, in the fulness of His purpose He determines to wind up this dispensation, and so awfully to increase these disturbances in the heavens and the earth, as to make men's hearts fail them in looking after those things which are coming to pass on the earth. We do not believe that it can be gainsaid that famine, earthquakes, wars, storms, destructive tidal waves, and volcanic violence, have, in all the history of the human race, been so universal or so generally destructive as during the period thru which we are yet passing. "Signs in the sun" have increased in the same proportion. What do they all mean? Who can show that they do not have direct relation to the solemn words of Christ, and that they are not intended to remind us that God's plans are ripening fast, and that "our redemption draweth nigh?"—Editorial from Word and Works, April, 1907, edited by Irl R. Hicks, the great weather forecaster.