Acts 2:20 describes dramatic signs in the sky, the sun darkened and the moon turned to blood, that will come before the great and glorious day of the Lord. Peter speaks these words on the day of Pentecost, quoting the prophet Joel to explain what the crowd is witnessing. Peter is addressing the Jewish men of Jerusalem and the pilgrims gathered there for the feast.
The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and glorious day of the Lord comes.
Acts 2:20 (WEB)
What Acts 2:20 Means
The verse uses the language of cosmic upheaval, the kind of imagery the Hebrew prophets used to describe God stepping into history with decisive judgment and salvation. When the sun is “turned into darkness” and the moon “into blood,” the picture is of the familiar lights of the sky failing, as if creation itself is shaken. Peter is saying that the coming of the Lord is no small event, and that it will be preceded by signs no one can miss.
What the verse does not do is offer a calendar or a chart of astronomical events. Peter is not giving his listeners a timetable or a checklist to scan the heavens. He is pointing to the seriousness and the certainty of God’s purposes. The verse promises that the day of the Lord is real and will arrive, and it asks its first hearers to take that seriously rather than to predict its date.
The Context of Acts 2:20
Acts was written by Luke, the same author who wrote the Gospel bearing his name, and it records the early growth of the church after Jesus’s resurrection and ascension. Luke’s audience appears to be a non-Jewish reader, perhaps someone named Theophilus, and his account shows how the message of Jesus spread from Jerusalem outward. The speech in which Acts 2:20 appears is the first recorded sermon of the apostolic church, delivered to Jews from many nations gathered in the city.
The verses just before it, quoted from Joel, describe God pouring out his Spirit on all people, so that sons, daughters, young men and old men prophesy and dream. The verses just after it, which you can read in the surrounding passage, turn to Jesus of Nazareth, whom Peter says his hearers crucified and whom God raised up. Read in that setting, the cosmic signs are not an isolated warning. They frame the outpouring of the Spirit and the saving work of Christ as the great and glorious day unfolding in the present.
Key Phrases in Acts 2:20
Joel 2:31
The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes.
(WEB)
This is the prophetic source Peter is echoing, using nearly the same language of the sun turned to darkness and the moon to blood. Reading it alongside Acts 2:20 shows how the apostles understood their own moment as the fulfillment of Israel’s prophecy.
2 Peter 3:10
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up.
(WEB)
Peter later writes about the day of the Lord coming like a thief, bringing sudden and decisive change. This passage helps you see that the day of the Lord is a moment of accountability and a call to live faithfully while you wait.
A Short Prayer From Acts 2:20
Lord, you hold the sun and the moon in your hands, and nothing in creation moves outside your will. When the world feels unsteady and the signs around me seem heavy, remind me that your day is coming and that you are faithful to finish what you have begun. Keep my heart from fear and from complacency, and help me live each day with honest trust in you. Let your Spirit work in me and in those around me, so that when that great and glorious day arrives, I may be found ready and rejoicing in your presence. Amen.
