1
Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to
call his attention to its buildings.
[They] were remarking about how the temple was adorned with beautiful
stones and with gifts dedicated to God.
One of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!”
2
“Do you see all these great buildings?” he asked. “I tell you the truth, as for what you see
here, the time will come when not one stone here will be left on another; every
one will be thrown down.”
3 As Jesus was sitting on the Mount
of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John and Andrew came to him
privately. “Tell us,” they asked, “when
will these things happen? What will be
the sign that they are about to take place, and what will be the sign of your
coming and of the end of the age?”
Matthew 24:1-3, Mark 13:1-4, Luke
21:5-7
So
the questions that the disciples asked in v.3 can be summarised as follows:
1.
When will the temple be destroyed,
and what sign can we expect to see which tells us that it is about to happen?
2.
What will be the sign of Christ’s
coming, i.e. his return to earth?
3.
What is the sign of the ending of
this age?
It
is important to differentiate between questions 2 and 3. In the narrative it appears to be one single
question, because the disciples expected that Christ’s coming would bring about
the end of the age. The return of Christ
to this earth is indeed the end-point of this age, with his millennial reign
then following on from this. However,
the Greek word which is translated as ‘end’ in verse 3 is sunteleia. This word means
‘ending,’ rather than ‘end’ which would be the Greek word telos.
Telos means the end-point (i.e. referring
to the actual return of Jesus to earth), and so refers to his coming in
question 2. However, sunteleia means the ‘ending,’ i.e. the
period of time which leads up to the end-point, the period in which things are
wrapped-up and brought to their final conclusion, as it were. So the sunteleia
is the last chapter in a book, or the final scene in a film, rather than the
actual end of the film or book where we would see the words ‘THE END’ appear,
which is the telos.
So
the sign of ‘the ending of the age’ is not the same thing as the sign of ‘the
end of the age,’ because sunteleia
and telos are referring to different
things. Therefore the disciples’
question in v.3 expands into questions 2. and 3. above which, as we shall see,
have different answers.
Jesus then took these three questions and
answered them in the order in which the disciples had asked them. So the answers in the narrative are given in
the order 1-2-3. However, because
question 3 refers to the sunteleia,
and question 2 to the telos, the answer
to question 3 takes place chronologically in history before that of
question 2. The answers are given by
Jesus in the order 1-2-3, but they are played out in history in the order
1-3-2, as Figure 6.1 illustrates.
This is the key to understanding what Jesus taught in this passage
about the end times.
Figure 6.1 The order in which Jesus’ answers play out in history
We
will now look at each of these questions in the order in which they were asked
by the disciples, and we will see how Jesus answered each of them.
Question
1: When will the
temple in Jerusalem be destroyed, and what is the sign that we can expect to
see that will tell us that this is about to happen?
Jesus
gives his answer to this question in Luke 21:12-24. It is not recorded in either Matthew’s or
Mark’s account. However, he begins
his reply in Luke’s account in much the same way as it is recorded by both
Matthew and Mark, by speaking about the signs of the times and the need to
avoid deception before Christ’s return to earth at the end (telos) (see Luke 21:7-11, Matt. 24:4-7,
Mark 13:5-8).
However,
he then starts to speak about the persecution of the early Jewish believers and
the events leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in AD
70. The key words here are ‘But before all this…’ in v.12. So Jesus’ answer to question 1 (as Luke gives
it) is as follows:
12
“But before all this, they will lay hands on you and persecute you. They will deliver you to synagogues and
prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account
of my name. 13 This will
result in your being witnesses to them. 14
But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend
yourselves. 15 For I will
give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist
or contradict. 16 You will be
betrayed even by parents, brothers, relatives and friends, and they will put
some of you to death. 17 All
men will hate you because of me. 18
But not a hair of your head will perish.
19 By standing firm you will gain life.”
20 “When you see Jerusalem being
surrounded by armies, you will know that its desolation is near. 21 Then let those who are in Judea
flee to the mountains, let those in the city get out, and let those in the
country not enter the city. 22
For this is the time of punishment in fulfilment of all that has been
written. 23 How dreadful it
will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! There will be great distress in the land and
wrath against this people. 24
They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all the
nations. Jerusalem will be trampled on
by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.”
Luke 21:12-24
In
this passage from Luke, Jesus gives a potted history of the period from 33 AD
to 70 AD when Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed by the Romans. In v.20, Jesus tells the disciples what sign to look
for, which will tell them that this destruction is coming soon: ‘When you see Jerusalem being surrounded by
armies…’ So this is his answer to their
first question.
However,
Jesus goes further and says that, when the city and the temple are destroyed,
many Jews would be killed, and many others would be taken as prisoners and slaves, and
dispersed through the nations. And this
is exactly what happened as the result of the siege of Jerusalem under the
Roman general Titus from 67-70 AD. Tens of thousands of Jews were killed, many others were enslaved and/or dispersed, and both the city and the temple were destroyed,
with not one stone being left upon another.
From
that time on, the city of Jerusalem and the province of Judea remained under
Roman rule, and, in 135 AD after the final Jewish rebellion, the Emperor
Hadrian renamed the whole area as Syria Palaestina (Syria Palestine). This area remained under Gentile domination
and rule, first under the Romans and then later under Islam. This continued right up until 1948 when
Israel was proclaimed a nation once again, after which many Jews began to
return to their historic homeland en
masse. The times of the Gentiles
(i.e. the period during which Gentiles ruled over this historically Jewish land
and city) finally came to an end in 1948/1967, when Israel once again became a
sovereign state (1948) and then regained control of the whole city of Jerusalem
(1967).
So
Jesus’ answer to the first question relates this Jewish history, taking us all
the way from around 33 AD right up to 1948/1967.
Question
2: What will be the
sign of Christ’s coming, i.e. his return to earth?
After giving his answer
to the first question, Jesus’ narrative then logically returns to the point
where he had started, i.e. to talking about the need to avoid spiritual
deception and the ‘signs of the times.’
The passage in Matthew 24:4-31 forms one complete section, and it gives
us the answer to question 2 about the sign(s) connected to Jesus’ return to
earth in his Second Advent at the end-point (telos) of this age. To make
it easier to study and understand, this passage conveniently splits into two
parts, vv.4-14 and vv.15-31, and we will consider these separately below.
So
the first part of this section consists of vv.4-14 as below. These are synthesised together from the three
gospel accounts, but this time the verse numbers have been omitted to avoid any
confusion.
Jesus
answered: “Watch out that no-one deceives you.
For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am the Christ,’ and ‘The
time is near!’ They will deceive
many. Do not follow them.”
“You
will hear of wars and rumours of wars, but see to it that you are not
alarmed. Such things must happen, but
the end is still to come. Nation will
rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines, great earthquakes and
pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from
heaven. All these are the beginning of
birth-pains.”
“You
must be on your guard. Then you will be
handed over to the local councils to be persecuted and put to death. On account of me you will stand before
governors and kings as witnesses to them.
Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand
about what to say. Just say whatever is
given you at the time, for it is not you speaking but the Holy Spirit.”
“At
that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each
other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Brother will betray brother to death, and a
father his child. Children will rebel
against their parents and have them put to death. All men will hate you because of me. Because of the increase of wickedness, the
love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be
saved. And this gospel of the kingdom
will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the
end will come.”
Matthew 24:4-14, Mark 13:5-12, Luke 21:8-10
There
are different opinions prevalent among commentators about when the descriptions
in this section begin historically. Some
see the reference to ‘wars and rumours of wars’ as referring to the time from
1914 onwards, beginning with World War 1.
Some would see it as following on logically from where Jesus left off in
his answer to question 1, i.e. as referring to the time from 1948 onwards, when
the times of the Gentiles came to an end.
It is certainly true that both WW1 and WW2 had great significance for
the Jews and Israel. It was during WW1
that their historic homeland was freed militarily from the rule of Islam (the
Ottoman Empire), and then, following the Holocaust in WW2, the state of Israel
was proclaimed in 1948 and Jews began to return to their homeland en masse.
Others
see the reference to wars, earthquakes, famines and pestilences as increasingly
descriptive of the end times in which we presently live, as they are worsening
in frequency and intensity. Jesus called
them the beginning of birth pains. And
such events are certainly descriptive of human history in general, because they
have always been part of human life.
However,
notwithstanding the merit of such different views, if we are to be consistent
with 1 Thessalonians 5:3, then real birth pains will kick in after the rapture,
when the ‘day of the Lord’ begins. At
that time, these things will certainly increase in regularity, frequency and
intensity, leading up to the Second Advent of Christ. So it might well be that Jesus is referring
here to the time of tribulation, to the beginning of the real birth pains which
are triggered by the rapture event. They
are not a sign that the Second Advent is just around the corner, because Jesus
said of them that ‘...the end is still to
come.’ (v.6).
Because
the next part of this section (i.e. vv.15-31) certainly talks about the second
half of the seven-year ‘day of the Lord,’ (what we call the Great Tribulation),
then it would certainly be appropriate to consider vv.4-14 as describing the
first half of this. And this is certainly
when the real birth pains will kick in.
So this would then mean that in Matthew 24:4-31 Jesus is describing the
whole period of tribulation.
In
this first part (i.e. vv.4-14) the descriptions are general. There will spiritual deception and false
prophets going around; there are these signs of the times and birth pains;
there will be a time of persecution of believers, especially of Jews in Israel
who have received Jesus as their Messiah during that time (just as the early
Jewish believers were persecuted, cf. Luke 21:12), so this will be a time of thlipsis or tribulation for them (v.9); it will be a time of turning
away from the faith on the part of some, and betrayal of believers, even by
family members; wickedness will increase, and the gospel will be preached in
the whole world.
To
a greater or lesser extent, all these things are characteristic of the days in
which we presently live. However, they
will become increasingly so as we move towards the time of tribulation, and
will become much more prevalent after the time of tribulation begins. So all these things precede the end (telos)
of this age, the Second Advent of Jesus (v.14).
The
second part of this section consists of vv.15-31 synthesised together from the
three gospel accounts. Again, the verse
numbers have been omitted to avoid any confusion.
“So
when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes
desolation’, spoken of through the prophet Daniel – let the reader understand –
then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let no-one on the roof of his house go down
to take anything out of the house. Let
no-one in the field go back to get his cloak.”
“How
dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! Pray that your flight will not place in
winter or on the Sabbath. For then there
will be great distress, unequalled from the beginning of the world until now –
and never to be equalled again. If those
days had not been cut short, no-one would survive, but for the sake of the
elect whom he has chosen, those days will be shortened.”
“At
that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or, ‘There he is!’
do not believe it. For false Christs and
false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even
the elect – if that were possible. So be
on your guard; I have told you everything ahead of time.”
“So
if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the desert,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here
he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it.
For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west,
so will be the coming of the Son of Man.
“Immediately
after the distress of those days ‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will
not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies
will be shaken.’ On the earth, nations
will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea. Men will faint from terror, apprehensive of
what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken.”
“At
that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the
nations of the earth will mourn. They
will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great
glory. And he will send his angels with
a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from
the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens.”
Matthew 24:15-31; Mark 13:14-27; Luke 17:37, 21:25-27
This
section begins by talking about the ‘abomination of desolation’ standing in the
holy place (Matt. 24:15). This is spoken
of in Daniel 9:27 and happens at the mid-point of the seven years of the
tribulation period. This is when
Antichrist sets himself up in the re-built temple in Jerusalem, declaring
himself to be God (2 Thess. 2:4).
It
is clear from this section that the Jews are back in their historic land by
this point in time, and also that they have rebuilt their temple and are using
it for regular worship (cf. Rev. 11:1). In
fact, it is important to note that this whole narrative is spoken by Jesus to
his Jewish disciples, and that this section is about what will happen in Israel
during the tribulation. So the elect
that Jesus is referring to in v.22 are Jewish believers, not Gentile
believers. They are Jews who have become
believers during the time of tribulation.
The word ‘elect’ here is not referring to believers who were raptured
before the tribulation began. As we will
see later, one of the purposes of the tribulation period is to bring the Jews
to true faith in Jesus as their Messiah, so many will become believers then.
It
is after the abomination of desolation is in the temple (at the mid-point of
the seven year period) that the time of great distress which we know as the
Great Tribulation will break out (v.21).
The Greek word thlipsis used
here means ‘distress,’ ‘great pressure,’ ‘oppression,’ ‘affliction’ or
‘tribulation.’ So the sign that Jesus gave to
show that the Great Tribulation is about to begin is the setting up of the
abomination of desolation in the re-built temple in Jerusalem. And Jesus said to his disciples, when you see
this happen, get out of Judea just as quickly as you can, to escape from the
terrible things which are going to happen!
The
passage in vv.16-20 is very similar to that in Luke 21:21-23. However, these two passages are not speaking
about the same thing. The passage in
Luke is talking about the events of 70 AD when Jerusalem was destroyed by the
Romans, whereas the passage in Matthew 24:16-20 is talking about the time of
tribulation prior to the Second Advent of Jesus. So what this means is that the events of 70
AD were a prophetic precursor of that which will happen in Judea and Jerusalem
during the end-time tribulation. To put
it very simply, if you want to know what it will be like in Judea during the
tribulation, think about 70 AD and you’ll have a pretty good idea!
George
Eldon Ladd expressed this prophetic parallelism in the following words:
‘In Jesus’ own view the historical and
eschatological are mingled, and... the final eschatological event is seen
through the ‘transparency’ of the immediate historical... This foreshortened view of the future [is one]
of the essential elements in the prophetic perspective. In Amos, the Day of the Lord is both an
historical (5:18-20) and an eschatological event (7:4, 8:8-9). Isaiah describes the historical day of
visitation on Babylon as though it was the eschatological Day of the Lord (Isa.
13). Zephaniah describes the Day of the
Lord (Zeph. 1:7,14) as an historical disaster at the hands of an unnamed foe
(Zeph. 1:10-12,16-17; 2:5-15); but he also describes it in terms of a worldwide
catastrophe in which all creatures are swept off the face of the earth (Zeph.
1:2-3) so that nothing remains (Zeph. 1:18).
This way of viewing the future expresses the view that “in the course of
history the eschatological is foreshadowed.
The divine judgements in history are, so to speak, rehearsals of the
last judgement and the successive incarnations of antichrist are foreshadowings
of the last supreme concentration of the rebelliousness of the devil before the
End.”’[1]
It
is after this time of tribulation that Jesus then returns to earth in
his Second Advent at the end-point (telos)
of this age. This is clear from Matthew
24:29-31. Furthermore, Jesus
tells his disciples in v.29 of several signs which will precede this and which
will show that it is about to happen.
Apart from the simple fact that it happens after the tribulation (which
itself is a sign to note down), he says that there will be signs in the sun,
moon and stars, and there will be a shaking of various heavenly bodies. And it is then that the sign of Jesus coming
will appear in the sky (v.30). This is
also a sign to look for, because Jesus warned that there will be plenty of
deception on earth in those days, with many people falsely claiming to be the
Messiah (vv.23-24). When Jesus returns,
he will come from the sky, not from among the people of the earth, and every
eye will see him (Rev. 1:7). His return
to earth in power and glory will be visible in the sky from the east to the
west!
When
Jesus returns, there will a loud trumpet call and Jesus’ elect will be
gathered. This is not the same as the trumpet call of 1 Corinthians 15:52 which is blasted out at
the time of the rapture. The trumpet
call in Matthew 24:31 is what was known as ‘the great trump’ which was blown on
the Day of Atonement, rather than ‘the last trump’ of the Feast of Trumpets
(see chapter 3).
This
trumpet call and gathering at the Second Advent is prophetically foretold in
Isaiah 27:12-13:
‘In
that day, the Lord will thresh from the flowing Euphrates to the Wadi of Egypt,
and you, o Israelites, will be gathered up one by one. And in that day a great trumpet will
sound. Those who were perishing in
Assyria and those who were exiled in Egypt will come and worship the Lord on
the holy mountain in Jerusalem.’
Jesus
will gather his elect people together ‘from the ends of the earth to the ends
of the heavens.’ This is not the same as
the rapture event which happened before the tribulation. It is a gathering of every believer together
to the place where Jesus is on earth, both those who returned with him
from heaven and those who are still alive on earth at the end of the
tribulation.
This
then is the answer which Jesus gave to the disciples’ second question,
concerning the signs that will show that his return to earth at the end (telos) of this age is about to happen.
Question 3: What is the sign of the ending of this age?
So
we turn now to Jesus’ answer to the third question. What is the sign that the sunteleia, the end-period of this age,
is about to begin?
Jesus
gives his answer to this third question in the section in Matthew 24:32-44,
which begins by talking about the fig tree in vv.32-35 and is then followed by
vv.36-44. However, the passage in
Matthew 24:36 – 25:13 forms one complete whole with the addition of the
parables about being ready. Verses 24:45
– 25:13 are omitted from the synthesis below for the sake of brevity.
Even
though this third answer is placed naturally in Matthew ch.24 after the section
dealing with question 2, yet, as we saw above, as it works out chronologically
in history, the answer to this third question happens in time before the
answer to question 2.
As
we read through this section below, we can immediately see that it is of a
different nature to the previous sections that we considered above. This passage has several repeated
characteristic thoughts: the coming of the Lord will happen an unknown time, we
do not know the day or the hour; it will be sudden and unexpected; some will be
taken, others will be left; we must be faithful, we must prepare ourselves, we
must keep watch so that we can be ready, and we must pray that we will be able
to escape what will follow after the Lord comes.
Again,
the verse numbers have been removed from the following synthesis:
“When
these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your
redemption is drawing near. Now learn
this lesson from the fig-tree: As soon
as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is
near. Even so, when you see all these
things, you know that the kingdom of God is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth, this generation will
certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words
will never pass away.”
“No-one
knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, only the
Father. As it was in the days of Noah,
so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they
knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all
away. It was the same in the days of
Lot. People were eating and drinking,
buying and selling, planting and building.
But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulphur rained down from heaven and
destroyed them all.”
“That
is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. On that day no one who is on the roof of his
house, with his goods inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back
for anything. Remember Lot’s wife! Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life will preserve it.
I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be
taken and the other left. Two men will
be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill;
one will be taken and the other left.”
“Where, Lord?” they asked. He
replied, “Where there is a dead body, there the vultures will gather.”
“Therefore
keep watch; because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. Be on guard!
Be alert! You do not know when
that time will come. But understand
this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was
coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of
Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”
“It’s
like a man going away: he leaves his house and puts his servants in charge,
each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know
when the owner of the house will come back – whether in the evening or at
midnight, or when the cock crows, or at dawn.
If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping.”
“Who
then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the
servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master
finds him doing so when he returns.”
“Be
careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and
the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you unexpectedly like a
trap. For it will come upon all those
live on the face of the whole earth.”
“What
I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’
Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that
is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man.”
Matthew 24:32-44; Mark 13:28-37; Luke 17:26-37,
21:28-36
Firstly,
it is clear that this section cannot be referring to the return of Christ in his Second
Advent which we looked at above.
We do know when his Advent will happen, and there are clear signs
which precede it. The Second Advent does
not happen suddenly and unexpectedly ‘out of the blue.’
Secondly,
the motif of the ‘thief in the night’ is used to illustrate this coming of the
Lord (v.43). This suggests a clear
identification with its use in 1 Thessalonians 5:2 which speaks of the onset of
‘the day of the Lord’ after the rapture.
Thirdly,
the Greek verb paralambanein used in
vv.40-41 for ‘to take’ means ‘to bring someone close to oneself,’ or ‘to be
brought close to another person.’ Also
the Greek verb used for ‘to be left’ in vv.40-41 is aphiemi, meaning to release away from oneself. So the ones who are taken, will be taken by
Christ to be with him (cf. John 14:2-3), and those who are left will remain on
earth and will go through the tribulation.
Fourthly,
Jesus
does not tell his disciples of any specific sign which precedes this coming of
the Lord which they could look out for to tell them that he is coming
soon. This is in complete contrast to
his Second Advent. So this coming of the
Lord will happen suddenly and unexpectedly, and what follows it will be like a
trap for everyone in the whole world, a trap from which people cannot escape.
Fifthly,
the reference in v.36 to the fact that only the Father knows when this coming
of the Lord will happen, clearly links it to the return of the Bridegroom for
his bride, as we saw in chapter 4.
Sixthly,
it uses Noah and Lot as examples of what will happen to believers at this
coming of the Lord. They were saved from
the Flood and from the destruction that came to Sodom and Gomorrah, by being
removed before these happened. Believers
are specifically told to pray that they might escape from (and therefore be
removed from) the tribulation (by being raptured before it begins).
Seventhly,
the short passage which begins this section speaks about the growth of the fig
tree (vv.32-35). Jesus exhorts his
disciples to observe events around them in the world (particularly those which
have to do with Israel which is often represented in the Scriptures by a fig
tree), and to see how these events are lining up with the things which he has
talked about in this chapter. Seeing
the fulfilment in the world of the things which Jesus spoke about is an indication to us that the Lord is going to come for us very soon. Indeed, we are even now in the season when it
will happen, even though we do not know the exact day or hour.
Taken
together, these seven points can only mean that the coming of the Lord that is
being referred to here, is the rapture event which was described in detail in
chapter 4. So it is this
resurrection-rapture event which, when it happens, will trigger the sunteleia, the end-period of this age
which leads ultimately to the return of Christ to earth at his Second
Advent. It is the visible rapture of the bride of
Christ which will be the sign to an unbelieving world that the time of tribulation is
about to begin.
So this is the answer to the disciples’
third question. The rapture
happens suddenly and unexpectedly, without any specific preceding signs, before
the time of tribulation ensues, and, at the end of this time of tribulation,
the Second Advent occurs, as Figure 6.2 below shows:
[1] Ladd, G.E. A Theology of the New Testament, Revised Edition, Cambridge:
Lutterworth Press, 1994, pp.198-199.
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