Current Lessons
Lesson No. Thirty Six

A Total Solar Eclipse is Joyful Evidence of a Supreme Creator

The Great North American Eclipse took place over Mexico, the United States, and Canada on April 8, 2024 – Susan and I with five of our children and several of our grandchildren were on the “path of totality” and experienced a total solar eclipse in Nashville, Indiana. We also thrilled at seeing the “diamond ring”. This happens twice and only during a total solar eclipse. It is the moment when the last light from the ball of the sun is seen at the beginning or the first light from the ball of the sun is seen at the end of a total solar eclipse. This moment of brilliance along with the sun’s corona creates a beautiful “diamond ring.” I wrote about the unique and remarkable experience of being on the “path of totality” when our family attended the Great American Eclipse in Rexburg Idaho on August 21, 2017. (See Current Lessons #10)

All things in the heavens above and in the earth beneath testify of Christ – In a revelation to Enoch, recorded by Moses, and later included in the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible, the Lord said: “And behold, all things have their likeness, and all things are created and made to bear record of me, both things which are temporal, and things which are spiritual; things that are in the heavens above, and things which are on the earth, and things which are in the earth, both above and beneath; all things bear record of me” (Moses 6:63). (I wrote more fully on this important scripture in Lessons on the Plan of Salvation #13)

A total solar eclipse is joyful evidence of a Supreme Creator. The facts behind a total solar eclipse are simple yet amazingly profound.

1. God’s order provides that the orbits of the sun, moon and earth will occasionally align perfectly and create a total solar eclipse visible from the earth. The sun is 100 times bigger than earth, and earth is 4 times bigger than the moon. Therefore, the sun is 400 times bigger than the moon. Also, the sun is also 400 times farther away from earth than the moon is from the earth. Because of these amazing facts the sun and the moon appear the same size to people on earth. Therefore, at the rare times when the sun crosses exactly behind the moon there is a total solar eclipse on the earth.

2. God created the moon’s orbit around the earth to be slightly elliptical. In its 5-degree elliptical orbit there are times when the earth, moon, and sun line up in their orbits, but because the moon is further away from earth it appears smaller, not covering the entire sun. This creates a ring of fire around the moon which is called an annular eclipse. I experienced an annular eclipse in Delta Utah on October 14, 2023. Annular eclipses are impressive, however, eclipse glasses must be worn because the sun is not completely blocked by the moon.

3. The order of God’s creations makes it possible for man to accurately calculate when a total solar eclipse will take place or has taken place on the earth to within 100 feet and within one/tenth of a second. A total solar eclipse is seen from a particular place on earth once in approximately 375 years. The next total solar eclipse viewable for the United States will be on August 23, 2044. However, a total solar eclipse takes place somewhere on the earth, usually over the ocean, much more frequently. The next total solar eclipse will be seen from Iceland on August 12, 2024. (I am making plans to be there)

4. God created the sun so that its corona, visible only during a total solar eclipse, would sustain life on the earth. The solar corona is the outer atmosphere of the sun. At 2,000,000, it is the hottest thing known to man. In comparison the surface of the sun is only 10,000 degrees. One billion tons of plasma or solar energy from the corona is continuously projected from the sun’s corona. It travels to the earth at approximately 2,000 miles/second. Variation from the normal solar energy we constantly experience, depending on degree, would cause uncontrolled havoc and could easily destroy life on the earth.

Beware of blind guides who deny God’s hand in the universe or on the earth. During the last week of His mortal life Jesus used very descriptive words to condemn “blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel” (Matthew 23:24, also 13-33). Like the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus’ day, the prideful who are often the learned and the rich, are usually the blind guides in our modern world. They rely on their learning and status, and by doing so they intellectually “strain at a gnat and swallow a camel.” At last week’s April 2024 General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Elder Quintin L. Cook quoted a modern blind guide who because of his status and learning is able to influence many people as a professor of biology, neurology, neurological sciences, and neurosurgery at Stanford University. This professor, who preaches disbelieve in God, wrote in part: “this is a vast, indifferent, empty universe.” Elder Cook concluded, “I could not disagree more strongly.” I agree with Elder Cook.

Lesson for our day: Our joy will increase as we develop the ability to see, with an eye of faith, God’s hand in our lives. Unlike modern blind guides, people who learn to see with an “eye of faith” (Alma 5:15; 32:40; Ether 12:19) will experience “the joy of our redemption” (Moses 5:10-11). They will also experience the joy that comes by recognizing that “the earth and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator" (Alma 30:44).

Released on April 14th, 2024.