Stars Received "Marching Orders"

When God created the heavenly bodies, the sun, moon, and stars, and set them in the heavens, He said "And let them be for signs." Gen. I :14. Just what this expression means is clearly shown by our Saviour's state­ment in Matthew 24:29, when He says, "Im­mediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken."

These signs have all taken place, and the falling of the stars occurred in 1833. The fol­lowing description of the falling of the stars is taken from The Christian Herald, January 14, 1906, and is part of a sermon given by Dr. DeWitt Talmage:

"I have often heard my father talk about it. He was coming from the legislative halls. It was the night of the 12th, and the morning of the 13th, of November, 1833. The sky was cloudless and the air clear. Sud­denly the heavens became a scene never to be forgot­ten. From the constellation Leo, meteors began to shoot out in all directions. During the two hours be­tween four and six in the morning, it was estimated that a thousand meteors a minnte flashed and expired. It grew lighter than at noonday, arrows of fire, balls of. lire, trails of fire, showers of fire, some in appear­ance were larger than a full moon. All around the heavens explosion followed explosion, sounds as well as sights, the air filled with uproar, all the luminaries of the skies seemed to have received marching orders.

"The heavens ribbed and interlaced and garlanded with meteoric display. From hori4on to horizon every­thing was in combustion and conflagration. Many a brain that night gave way. It was an awful strain on the strongest nerves. Millions of people fell on their knees in prayer. Was the world ending? Or was there some great event for which all the heaven was illuminated? For eight momentous hours the phenom­enon lasted. East, west, north, south, it looked as if the heavens were in maniac disorder. Astronomers watching that night said that those meteors started 2,200 miles above the earth and moved with ten times the speed of a cannon ball. The spectacle ceased not until the rising sun of the November morning eclipsed it, and the whole American nation sat down exhausted with the agitation of a night to be memorable until the earth shall become a falling star."

Truly, the "luminaries" of the skies did re­ceive marching orders, and it is well for us now living to prepare for the end of the world and the coming of Jesus.