Regarding the SYMBOLS used in Matthew 24.
Matthew 24:29-31 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: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.I believe that the Bible interprets itself.
Look at these pictures....
Isaiah 13:1, 10,13 - BABYLON'S
fall.
Ezekiel 32:7-8 - EGYPT'S
fall
Isaiah 34:4-5 - EDOM'S
fall
All of them speak of the stars and sun blackening. But none of that occurred literally.
They descriptions of divine displeasure and judgment. A sword never came down literally upon Edom any more than the sun went black literally. All these things are metaphors, and these verses prove that the Bible speaks using these manners of language. Same with Matthew 24. I thought as many of you did for years, until I saw these other verses.
Genesis 1 speaks of the sun and moon as though they RULE the night and day. RULERS. That is why God uses them as darkening to indicate KINGDOMS falling. Lights out for those kingdoms!
The stars falling and the sun turning black and the moon to blood is FIGURATIVE of KINGDOMS being destroyed. Look at the Old Testament references to the same thing, when in actuality the sun and stars did not literally stop shining. You have to take all these figures from the Old Testament. My opinion is that saying these things are literal is to speak from a lack of awareness of the idioms used in the Bible elsewhere.