Lunar Lunacy!

I really didn’t intend to get up.

Hitting the sack at 10:30 meant 3:00 was a mere 4 ½ hours away. Too short of a night, in my book. After all, last week I had written about the need for stewardship of the “temple,” and I know my “temple” doesn’t function well on fewer than 6 ½ hours of sleep—7 is optimal.

So, when the question was posed as to whether I would be getting up to watch the lunar eclipse, I fudged with a less-than-enthusiastic “We’ll see….”

The idea of getting up at 3:00 a.m. for this event came about with the intersection of three primary factors.

One, of course, was the unusual lunar phenomenon. Dubbed the “Beaver Blood Moon,” it’s called the “Beaver Moon” because the full moon occurs at the time of year when beavers are working feverishly to get their dams built before winter sets in. It’s called a “Blood Moon” because of the red coloring of the moon’s surface at the peak of the eclipse. Doesn’t happen very often. Lunar eclipses occur roughly every 18 months, but the next total eclipse doesn’t occur until in March, 2025.

Second, our daughter (who currently lives with us) wanted her 8-year-old son to witness the phenomenon. She’d been talking with him about it for days, hyping it up as a great adventure. They’d make special “moon cookies” and fix hot chocolate to warm them in the 30-something-degree air. He was all in…quite excited about it. They even got a telescope for the event.

Third, the weather was supposed to be very cooperative. Cold, yes…but a clear sky. Not a given in November in northwest Illinois.

As mentioned, I wasn’t particularly planning to get up for this. But at 3:00 a.m., the pitter-patter of feet small and large awakened me, as did the sound of doors opening and closing. I heard it all, but battled opening my eyes and mustering the will to do anything about it. Then my eyes peeled open enough to see that Chris had joined in the lunar lunacy—that left me the only party pooper.

Then the guilties hit.

Then the thought that maybe my grandson would really like it if Papa joined in on the “fun.”

How can you go back to sleep with all that going on in your head? It’s a lost cause. So by 3:30 I was outside with the rest of them.

The eclipse had already begun—the shadow very gradually making its way across the Old Man’s face. The grandson was indeed excited. Perhaps a moon cookie and some hot chocolate stoked his energy, but as soon as I came outside, he couldn’t wait to tell me how he had gotten the telescope set up all by himself and locked in on the moon.

I showed him the cluster Pleiades…where Mars was. On his own, he picked out Orion.

He had found the Big Dipper—but where was its smaller counterpart? I showed him how to trace the line from the edge of the dipper to Polaris and then the rest of the Little Dipper.

And the shadow kept creeping across the face of the moon. We returned often to the telescope to adjust and re-center the moon in the eyepiece. His enthusiasm awakened me fully.

While he went inside to warm up for a bit, I relocated the telescope to another location in the yard where the neighbor’s tree didn’t obscure the view.

At 4:50, I called him back outside. The deepest redness was but nine minutes away. We fixed our gaze on the moon, first with the naked eye…then through the telescope…back and forth.

Finally, the peak hit—the middle point of totality, as it’s called.

We could have stayed outside for another 45 minutes to watch as shadow slowly dissipated, but alas, everyone was sufficiently cold, satisfied with what we witnessed, and ready to return to the warm indoors.

Thankfully.

I tried to just stay up at that point. After all, the alarm was set for a mere twenty minutes later. Shut the alarm off, fixed some coffee, got my Bible and journal out, and enjoyed some quiet time. An hour later, I fought to keep my eyes open, so I gave in and got another hour’s sleep.

At one point in our time outside marveling at the progressing eclipse, Chris mentioned to our grandson how amazing it is that we could know the exact day and time the lunar eclipse would occur…when the moon would enter the penumbral shadow (2:01 a.m. CST) who could see it in totality…what was the precise middle point of totality (4:59 a.m. CST), and so on.

She pointed out that this was because God is a God of order and precision (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:33). So precise and reliable, in fact, that you can visit the NASA website and see when every lunar eclipse will occur in this century!

In this regard, Juliet got it wrong.

You remember the scene in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet where Romeo attempts to pledge his love to Juliet?

“Lady, by yonder blesséd moon I vow,” he croons
“That tips with silver all these fruit tops—”

But Juliet interrupts him—

“O, swear not by the moon, th’ inconstant moon,
That monthly changes in her circled orb,
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.”

Well, on the surface, it seems she has a point. After all, last night’s full moon will be slightly not tonight. And gradually it will wane over the next several days. Seems inconstant. Seems like not a good image to pledge one’s love upon.

And yet, the moon quite constantly goes through exactly the same process month after month…year after year…since the day of its creation.

So, dear Juliet, the “inconstancy” of the moon is an illusion!

When it comes to the fascinating nature of the moon, its cycles, the occasional eclipses, the strange “man” whose face appears there, errors in human history have been committed far worse than Juliet’s misperception. Some have treated it as a god, worshipping the moon as if it has some supernatural power. Lunar lunacy, for sure.

The God who created this celestial orb warned against such practices, telling His people:

“Therefore, watch yourselves very carefully,” He warned.

“Beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven.” (Deuteronomy 4:15, 19)

By the way, did you notice God made these celestial objects for the benefit of mankind? I’ll not belabor the reader to recite all the ways. Suffice it to say, earth would be uninhabitable without the sun. And man never would’ve figured out navigation without the stars. Nor would we have developed much of a “calendar sense” without the moon. Indeed, the Psalmist writes, “He appointed the moon for seasons….” (Psalm 104:19)

But there are even greater purposes for the moon’s presence in the night sky.

They point us to the Creator and His steadfast love—His “steadfast love,” that is, His faithfulness to the word of His covenant.

“Give thanks to Him…who made the great lights, for his steadfast love endures forever;
the sun to rule over the day, for his steadfast love endures forever;
the moon and stars to rule over the night, for his steadfast love endures forever….” (Psalm 136:7-9)

These celestial wonders should lead us in another direction.

“When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place…” hymnwriter David penned. Can you see him out on the hillside tending the sheep, late in the evening, looking up at the night sky? The profundity, the immensity, the grandeur of it all!

But rather than compelling him to offer a sacrifice to the moon-god, he worships the Lord God—yet, not for the heavenly bodies.

He continues,

“…what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?” (Psalm 8:3-4)

Surely, David was as awed by the heavens as we. What a powerful, almighty God put it all in place! But more, he marvels that the Creator God thinks of us at all—puny, insignificant creatures on this tiny little ball floating in the vastness of the universe!

Ah, but He more than merely thinks of us. He cares for us! Even loves us!

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)

By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:9-10)

He who made all the components and established all the mechanisms of the universe to enable a lunar eclipse actually remembers, cares for, and loves people on this planet!