9/23/17: The Great Sign Thread

Saturn Presents: Rapture (The Ultimate Blondie Tour) on 9/23 in Birmingham 😬

Good point, Markos! I remember somebody mentioned this before, but I don't remember where. Yes, it is probably significant about Saturn being in Ophiuchus.

wbgillis , I can tell you how I view the sign, but I cannot vouch for others. I may have a strange perspective.

I look at the situation in 3 levels.

1: What we see as the sign
2: What John Saw
3: What physical and spiritual events will actually take place in the heavens and on earth


#2 - What John Saw.
John describes the scene he saw pretty clearly.  He says he saw a women crying and in labor and I believe him.  He didn't see a star pattern.  I think the woman really had a crown on her head with 12 stars in it.  I think he then saw a great dragon, the birth of a child, and the child caught up to the throne.  At some point in his vision he saw the war in heaven and the dragon cast down.  The woman, now on the earth after fleeing into the wilderness was protected and fed. I won't go on, but the point is, John saw real images "acting" out this film.  

#3 - What physical and spiritual events will actually take place in the heavens and on earth
Now, those images actually represented a real event that would take place at some point.  I believe that point is still future.  Many others believe it has already passed. So what are those events?  How will they play out in heaven and on earth?  Well parts of the imagery are defined for us in other parts of the bible.  We can gather information about who the woman might be and who the dragon is.  Why the dragon has horns and heads and what those might represent in the "real" universe.  Even as we glean from scripture what those images represent - there is disagreement.  Some people say one scripture should be used to interpret, others say a different scripture should be used.  And in some cases, we have yet to find a scripture to help us resolve the images.

#1 - What we see as the sign
This brings us to the heart of your question.  When the sign completes on 9/23-9/24, we will not see what John saw (unless God produces the images again for us).  We will see a very skeletal representation of what John saw.  We will see the key parts - the sun, the moon, the stars of Virgo, the stars of Leo, the planets.  If we are honest with ourselves, we will know that our view of the sign is not perfect in the presentation of the images that John saw.  

We see no crying, no labor, the crown does not look like a crown, jupiter may enter a bit late or leave a bit early, or poke out midway through.  There may be more than 12 stars above virgo's head, the sun may not perfectly clothe her and the moon may or may not be "under" her feet.

And, as you point out, she does not go to earth (although she does set), we do not see her flee to the wilderness, etc.  Some have tried to make a story of all of this happening in the sky with the astronomical events that take place after 9/23.  I think, at some point, we are grasping because those images are not defined for us. 

Now, the debunkers and the primary girth of christianity see the parts I put in blue and say - It is not the sign because it is not perfectly what John saw.  They use the parts in blue to dismiss the alignment.  And from a purely logical standpoint, I suppose they could have a case.  Unfortunately, we can tell that their case is not to be trusted because of all the other reasons they then supply:

• misrepresenting astronomy, or even sky observing, as astrology
• being disingenuous with the identity of the child (they mention he rules with an iron rod and neglect the verse in rev where the child will be given that right)
• attacking the idea of watching at all - or labeling our acknowledgment of the sign as setting a date
• the claim that no man knows the day or the hour, when that phrase does not even refer to this sign
• ignoring all the scriptures commanding us to watch, look up, be aware, signs in the sky, etc.
• personal attack on the laity or intelligence of the watchers
• accusations of false prophecy

Indeed, we are not seeing exactly what John saw.  We are seeing a representation, a reminder, a warning, a promise, to use today's internet terminology - it is a mention or a tag.  And for some reason, God has woken some people to be aware of this and others to be blind. For those of us who have been given eyes to see (and I doubt it is anything about us or our actions that has caused this), we have already seen the sign in our hearts.  We are not concerned with the exactness of it's fulfillment, we simply hear the Word, look up, see the Sign, and say Amen!  And we know that we are in the time of the end.  How it all plays out from here - not even the watchers know.  But we are awake!

Hope that helps.

EDIT: I will add here - that even though we are not concerned with the "exactness" of the fulfillment - that is not to say that the fulfillment is completely off.  As a matter of fact, this is as close in human history as we have come to an alignment that could be the fulfillment of what John saw.  The only way we could have a "better" fulfillment is via supernatural means. 

@silentknight , very good analysis! I really appreciated it. Since the sign is not exactly what John saw (i.e. A literal shining woman in labor with a crown if 12 stars and standing on the moon), it takes a measure of faith to see the Sign and believe it is what is described. Faith is the requirement and has always been the requirement for all our belief. It makes perfect sense to me.

wbgillis , another reason the woman is Virgo, I believe, is that in the Old Testament, God gave Isaiah the prophecy for a sign of the coming messiah: "Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel" (Isaiah 7:14). Obviously, this is the sign used for Jesus' birth, who was born of a virgin. But God often through the scriptures fulfills prophecy in multiple ways, sometimes in a short term and then in a longer term or in parallels. The man-child that the woman births is both Christ and the Church, so I can see a Sign of a virgin giving birth representing both births, that of Christ 2000 years ago and that of the Church into heaven.

edit: in fact, silentknight provided even more awesome insight on that verse here: www.unsealed.org/2017/09/o-come-o-come-emmanuel.html

First time poster but long time reader, but Rev.12 sign has been seen as seeing the moon-jupiter birth-12 stars over the head, and then the rapture. But "hērpasthē" /"was caught up" is in verse 5. We all saw the new moon on the 23rd so the feast day Rosh Hashanah was over at that time. We are now in the gap between verse 3 to verse 5. That is all we know right now till the rest of the sign in the heavens. verse 3 and 4 shows up. Whatever that is and when that will happen? Gaps are a time to testing.

I wonder, has anyone such as Scottie Clark or Adam of the Parable of the Vineyard reported actual visual sighting of the Rev12 sign at dusk on the 23rd or at the 24th dawn? One of Scottie's videos implied (if I understood or recall correctly) that such should have been possible. Otherwise the "appeared" would have to be in the other secondary sense of the original Greek word meaning "perceived" (in this case via astronomy software).
Professor Al, Ph.D., Th.D., Bible professor and evangelist in an undisclosed unreached mission field