Ep. 103: Signs of the End Times
CLICK HERE for the corresponding blog post in Yeshua Adored
MATTHEW 24, MARK 13, LUKE 21:5-38
The last denunciation of Jerusalem had been uttered, the last and most terrible prediction of judgment upon the Temple spoken and Jesus and the disciples left the Sanctuary and the City, had crossed the Kidron valley and were slowly climbing the Mount of Olives. A sudden turn in the road and the sacred building was once more in full view, with its gigantic walls built of massive stones, some of them nearly twenty-four feet long.
Some pointed out to him those massive stones and splendid buildings, others spoke of the rich offerings presented at the Temple. It was but natural that the contrast between this and the predicted desolation should have impressed them; natural, also, that they should refer to it, not as a matter of doubt, but rather as of a question. Then Jesus spoke fully of that terrible contrast between the present and the near future, when, as literally fulfilled, not one stone would be left upon another that was not upturned.
In silence, they pursued their way. Upon the Mount of Olives, they sat down, facing the Temple. ‘Tell us, when shall these things be?’ and ‘what shall be the sign of Your Coming, and of the consummation of the age?’
When Jesus, on leaving the Temple, said: ‘You shall not see Me again,’ he must have referred to Israel in their national capacity. If so, the promise in the text of visible re-appearance must also apply to Israel in their national capacity. Accordingly, it is suggested that in the present passage Christ refers to his Advent from the Jewish standpoint of Jewish history, in which the destruction of Jerusalem and the appearance of false Christs are the last events of national history, to be followed by the precarious nature of the many centuries of the ‘Gentile dispensation’
Jewish writings speak very frequently of the so-called ‘sorrows of the Messiah’. They may generally be characterised as marking a period of internal corruption and of outward distress, especially of famine and war, of which the land of Israel was to be the scene and in which Israel was to be the chief sufferer. When Christ proclaimed the desolation of ‘the house’ and even placed it in indirect connection with his Advent. He taught that which must have been both new and unexpected. This may be the most suitable place for explaining the Jewish expectation connected with the Advent of the Messiah.
As regards the answer of the Lord to the two questions of his disciples, it may be said that the first part of his teaching is intended to supply information on the three facts of the future; the destruction of the Temple and his Second Advent and the end of the ‘Age,’ by setting before them the signs indicating the beginning of these events. But even here the exact period of each is not defined.
In the second part, the Lord distinctly tells them what they are not to know and why; and how all that was communicated to them was only to prepare them for that constant watchfulness, which has been to the Church at all times the proper outcome of Jesus’ teaching on the subject. This, then we may take as a guide, that the words of Jesus contain nothing beyond what was necessary for the warning and teaching of the disciples and of the Church.
The first part consists of four sections, of which the first describes ‘the beginning of the birth woes’ of the new ‘Age’ about to appear. The expression, ‘the end is not yet’ clearly indicates that it marks only the earliest period of the beginning. The purely practical character of this teaching appears from its opening words. They contain a warning, addressed to the disciples individually, against being ‘led astray.’ This, more particularly referring to false Christs, with a multitude of impostors, who, in the troubled times between the rule of Pilate and the destruction of Jerusalem, will promise Messianic deliverance to Israel.
This also would be a misapprehension, which has misled Christians into an incorrect expectancy of the immediate advent of Christ; the seductions of false Messiahs or teachers and violent disturbances in the political world. So far as Israel was concerned, these reached their climax in the great rebellion against Rome under the false Messiah, Bar Kokhba, in the time of Hadrian.
From the warning to Christians as individuals, Jesus next turns to give warning to the Church as a whole. Here we mark that the events now described must not be regarded as strictly following chronologically, those referred to in the previous verses. They form, in fact, the continuation of the ‘birth-woes.’ As regards the persecutions in prospect, full Divine aid is promised to Christians, both to individuals and to the Church. And despite the persecution of Jews and Gentiles, before the End comes ‘This the Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the inhabited earth for a testimony to all the nations.’ This is really the only sign of ‘the End’ of the present ‘Age.’
Then the Lord proceeds to speak of the destruction of Jerusalem. There can be no question that the warning of the Lord delivered the Church. As directed by him, the members of the Christian Church fled at an early period of the siege of Jerusalem to Pella. As for Jerusalem, the prophetic vision initially fulfilled in the days of Antiochus would once more, and now fully, become reality and the abomination of desolation stand in the Holy Place. This, together with tribulation to Israel, is unparalleled in the terrible past of its history and unequalled even in its bloody future. So dreadful would be the persecution, that, if Divine mercy had not intervened for the sake of the followers of Jesus, the whole Jewish race that inhabited the land would have been swept away.
But no new Maccabee would arise, no Christ come, as Israel fondly hoped; but over that carcass would the vultures gather and so through all the Age of the Gentiles, until converted Israel should raise the welcoming shout: ‘Blessed be he that cometh in the Name of the Lord!’
Now we turn from the future to the present application for the disciples. From the fig tree, under which they may have rested on the Mount of Olives, they were to learn a parable. We can picture Jesus taking one of its twigs, just as its softening tips were bursting into a young leaf. Surely, this meant that summer was nigh - not that it had actually come! The distinction is important. For it seems to prove that ‘all these things,’ which were to indicate to them that it was near, even at the doors and which were to be fulfilled before this generation had passed away, could not have referred to the last signs connected with the immediate Advent of Christ, but must apply to the previous prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem and of the Jewish Commonwealth.
The Church was not meant to know the mystery of that day and hour of the coming of her Lord and Bridegroom. As in the days of Noah, the long delay of threatened judgment had led to just getting on with life, ignoring Noah’s warnings, so would it be in the future. But that day would come certainly and unexpectedly, to the sudden separation of those who were engaged in the same daily business of life, of whom one might be taken up, the other left to the destruction of the coming Judgment.
This is an extract from the book, Jesus : Life and Times, available for £10 here (Finalist for Academic Book of the year at 2023 CRT awards)