Synoptics - Matthew 24

Matthew 23 as the Immediate Context for Matthew 24

Well, I guess I'll put this off as long as I can, huh? It does seem that way. We actually started this chapter and then immediately rushed therefrom for various and sundry other reasons. Oh, by the way, Abdullah Kunda this morning asked me to send his greetings to you all.

He was in our chat channel this morning and just happened to say, say hello to the Sunday School class for me. Since I had mentioned we had watched the video, I said, so I remembered to do so. But Matthew chapter 24, we already began looking at this text and we noted that it is a continuation of the judgment passage in Matthew chapter 23.

Remembering that chapter divisions are rather arbitrary and much later in the text. And after Jesus has announced that, behold, your house is being left to you defilate in Matthew 23, 38. We then have in verse 39 a key to a big question in Matthew chapter 24.

And that is, it seems strange. The chapter division here really does cause problems. Because I have been asked in Matthew chapter 24 when the disciples asked Jesus in verse 3, and what will be the sign of your coming?

How did the disciples know anything about Jesus' coming? I mean, this wasn't you know, how would they have known anything like that? The door is unlocked over there, I'm not sure why. It just reminded me to lock that for relief.

I'm not sure why it's that way, but I get freaked out by stuff like that. Especially after we got ripped off here once already. Anyway, how would they know anything about that? But if you get rid of the chapter division and you just read it as a whole, the very last verse 39, for I say to you from now on, you will not see me until you say, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

So here's the direct antecedent that gives the answer to the question that would be asked of the disciples. Well, how would the disciples know anything about the coming of the Lord? Well, because he's just mentioned it.

He's just, one of the last things he says, the words were still echoing in their mind as they're leaving, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Well, that wasn't just the coming into Jerusalem the first time.

I mean, they had already heard those words, but now Jesus is talking about something else. And so they ask the question, they come to him privately after he has blown them away. I mean, they have been, they've walked out of the temple precincts and they point out the temple buildings to him and it must have been quite a sight to see these things.

Do you not see all these things? Truly I say to you, not one stone here will be left upon another which will not be torn down. Now, he's talked about Jerusalem. He has said that your house is being left to you desolate.

Now he is saying that this great structure, which is the central aspect of the worship in Jerusalem and the Jewish nation as a whole is going to be destroyed. The temple worship is going to cease. And it had been many years in the building and it was going to be destroyed.

And so they go out of the city to the Mount of Olives where, as I understand, you can see the temple precincts very clearly. And the disciples came to him privately saying, tell us when will these things happen?

And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age? For surely in their thinking the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish state had to be the end of the age as far as they could tell.

Remember, these are the same men who at the Ascension are saying, are you going to restore the kingdom now? There's a lot of stuff going on here. And it's interesting, as again I read through Matthew chapter 24, I was reminded how deeply our traditions do influence us because I was raised with a particular eschatology.

And it's very difficult for me to read this without that eschatology inserting itself and all sorts of thoughts coming to mind and fulfillments coming to mind. And if it's difficult for me, it would have been difficult for the disciples as well to make the kind of differentiation that we need to make.

Now I will not pretend to have an answer to every question that could be asked about this chapter by any stretch of the imagination. It would require, as I mentioned before, there are probably a few chapters that have spawned more speculation and more writing than Matthew chapter 24, normally separate from 23 and 25, but as it may, it would be a major undertaking on anyone's part to even begin to survey the literature on this particular chapter, let alone master it.

And one would have to have a real deep interest in the associated subjects to do so, and I will confess I do not possess said interest. But be that as it may, it seems to me that what you have here is a the questions that the disciples ask are answered in different stages by our Lord.

And the answers are fundamentally focused upon, first of all, when will these things happen? When will every stone be torn down in this structure? What will be the sign of the coming destruction of the temple in Jerusalem?

I think that any interpretation of Matthew chapter 24 that simply skips that cannot in any possible way be a correct interpretation. Now, there are some who would say, well, yes, that is an immediate fulfillment of certain elements of the chapter, but there is a greater fulfillment of other elements of this chapter.

And how you where you make the division, where you make the dividing line between when Jesus is talking only about the destruction of Jerusalem and when he starts answering the further question that is the sign of his coming and the end of the age, or even how you divide those questions is a matter of great debate and difference of opinion.

For example, there would be some that would say, okay, when these things will happen, destruction of Jerusalem, what will be the sign of your coming? Well, some would attach coming with the end of the age in the second coming of Christ.

Some would see the coming of Christ in judgment upon Jerusalem and the Jewish people, and some might even see the end of the age being this particular age as far as the Jewish nation, but would differentiate between that and the end of the age because in Jesus' teaching there is no question, as far as I can see, about the fact that he has this age and the age to come.

That's it. I mean, there's not this age and then there's going to be another age where this is going to be the conditions and then there's going to be another age where this is going to be the conditions.

No. In Jesus' teaching in this age, you've got the tariff and the wheat and the church and so on and so forth, and in this age they marry or are given a marriage. In that age, not. So, you've just got two ages as far as Jesus is concerned.

So, the end of the age, how they understood it at this point in time, is that identical with Jesus' teaching or does he have to make some corrections? Lots of disagreements and discussion about that. It would seem, the direction that I go with it is that the majority of this discussion, especially where there is specific signs given is about the destruction of Jerusalem and then when we talk about the coming and the end of the age, all of a sudden the signs become specifically less specific.

Or in other words, what you're told is to watch and pray, not be doing what we see on certain television networks or these days on YouTube. Oh my. I should have I should download this thing. Did you see this?

Did you see it last night? I cut it off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the first one, I saw a YouTube video. I should throw it on my iPad and project it for you because you folks, some of you folks live in a very sheltered theological world.

You really do. I saw something last night. There's this guy, he's got a channel on YouTube and he calls himself, is he the third eagle of Revelation? And co-prophet of the end times. Something like that, yeah.

Someone linked me to a video he put up last night where he spent ten minutes explaining how, he had charts and he printed these things out and Bible verses and stuff and it's all explaining the relationship between this guy.

Remember back in November there was a guy who shot at the White House with an AK -47? Remember you heard about that? Well, what you didn't know is if you take his name and the number of rounds he fired from an AK -47 and the date, which was 11 -11 -11 How can that not be significant?

And then on this side, you put Whitney Houston and Whit and Hughes White House. And then if you go to Ezekiel I mean, it's just like, wow! I mean, ten minutes of this and the man never cracked a smile.

I mean, he really does believe what he's saying. And you're just like, does this man drive? I mean, I don't want to drive where he's driving. I mean, seriously. Oh, goodness. Oh, does he have time on his hand, yeah.

I don't think his social calendar is overly filled, no. I don't think so, no. Wow. I don't know who that is, but No, no, no, no, I don't know. This guy is just... So, we want to try to avoid ending up on YouTube with any type of speculations we do.

I mean, Matthew 24 has gotten its share of speculations, but this was absolutely truly amazing. We don't want to go there. I think that the best way to approach this is to recognize that if you're thumbing through Revelation trying to figure out how to make a connection between the locusts and helicopters, I'm not going to be going there.

I mean, if that's your thing, great, fine, wonderful. I've seen those books, read the comic books, all the rest of that kind of stuff, and makes for Let me put it this way, any book that has been written on that subject has sold a whole lot more than all of my books combined.

So, there's a real interest in that kind of thing out there, there's no question about it. But, I just don't go there. It would seem to me that the best way to handle this material is to recognize especially when we get into the discussion of the use of Old Testament texts, such as the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken, etc., etc.

I have been raised hearing that interpreted separately from its Old Testament usage. I was raised with that interpretation. And so, in my mind, immediately what you think about is catastrophic cosmic events that end up in movies that sell real well and are shown on New Year's Eve at the Bible Baptist Church.

Which, again, that was where I came from, that's the things I see. But, in my recollection anyway, and I could be wrong about this, but in my recollection anyway, I never remembered anyone going back to those Old Testament texts and saying, hey, this was language that was used of the destruction of Babylon, for example.

Well, do we really think that there were cosmic signs in the sense of the sun winking out, or changing colors, or massive earthquakes all over the world, 2012 movie style, you know, Mayan calendar stuff, when Babylon fell?

Or is this the type of language that is used to describe fundamental and massive changes where God is intervening and changing the landscape of world powers? And then, the same texts are quoted by Peter on the day of Pentecost as having fulfillment in the day of Pentecost.

And you go, there's nothing in the text about darkness and the moon not giving its light and the stars falling from the sky on the day of Pentecost, but there is the coming of the Holy Spirit, and there is this again, a radical transformation of what's going on on earth.

God's doing something completely new, in the sense of the cross has been the center point of history, and now the sun has returned, he's ascended to heaven, and now the spirit's been outpoured and the church is being founded, and the spiritual power that is going to build Christ's church and Christ's kingdom has come into this world.

And isn't that a bigger thing than any type of movements of the earth's crust on a little planet around the sun in the galaxy? It seems so. So, if we keep that in mind, if we keep in mind that,. A, the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish nation is central in what Jesus has just been saying in Matthew 23.

He says, your house is being left to you desolate. God's now going to be doing something that involves the building of God's kingdom, the gospel's going to the Gentiles. It's not going to be focused in a city anymore.

It's not going to be focused upon a building anymore. The temple is now going to become the very people of God. I mean, I can see how certain forms of dispensationalism fit in with this type of eschatology, when you have this idea that, well, the people of Israel remain the objects of these passages of fulfillment, and yet Paul's understanding is going to be, who's the true circumcision?

Who is the true circumcision? It's those of us who worship God in the Spirit, is what he told the Philippians. And the purpose of that temple and its sacrifices has been fulfilled. It makes perfect sense that it would be done away with.

So, if we keep all that in mind, then we can, I think, have some idea of what's going on here. So, what do we see immediately? Jesus answered and said to them, see to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in my name, saying, I am the Christ, and will mislead many.

You will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not frightened, for these things must take place. But that is not yet the end. I don't know how many times I hear people even this day going, well, we're hearing of rumors of wars in Iran.

And, well, yeah. We are. But to be honest with you, is there almost any time in the past 1900 years of church history that there have not been rumors of wars? And wars, I mean, the African continent. Is there ever a time when someone isn't killing somebody else there right now?

It's a tragedy, but it's true. But that is not yet the end. And there are four decades to pass between when Jesus says these things and the destruction of Jerusalem. And a lot of folks just don't like the idea that, well, I just don't see how this could be relevant just to that time period.

Well, that was a very important time period in the history of the church. You're talking about the time period when the apostles are still alive, when the scriptures are being written, when the biggest decisions concerning the nature and direction of the Christian church were being made.

Were right then at that time. And especially in light of the fact that there was no New Testament during that time period. It was just starting to be written. I mean, Paul starts writing in the maybe late 40s.

So you're talking, what, maybe at the earliest 19 years down the road, something like that, you get some of your very first epistles. But the gospels, a little bit after that, all this is going on at this particular period of time.

And so there is a concern, as you see in 1 John and in 2 John, about people who are coming along and claiming spiritual insight and prophetic status. And the apostles have to warn them, stand fast, examine these people.

The book of Revelation commends the church that tested those who called themselves apostles, but were not. This is a very important time. And it's easy for us to look back and go, well, you know, God was in control and all the rest of it.

Yeah, what would we have been doing at that particular point in time? I mean, how easy would it have been for us? We get to stand on the shoulders of 2 ,000 years worth of church history. They didn't have that.

And it was a critical period of time. So it doesn't really surprise me that Jesus would warn about the fact that there's going to be false Christs. And there were. I mean, there had already been before him.

There were after him. There in Jerusalem and the land of Israel, the Romans were constantly having to try to dampen down the movements amongst the Jews. And a number of people ran off into the wilderness with folks and started their own movements.

Wars, Rumors of Wars, and the Beginning of Birth Pains

Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in its various places there will be famines and earthquakes. Well, we know that there was a famine that deeply impacted Jerusalem. We know that from the book of Acts.

We know that Paul was very concerned about making collection for the church of Jerusalem. Why? Because of the famine in the land. And earthquakes back then, they hadn't quite really figured out some of the engineering stuff that we have today in the sense that, you know, you make a building that's really firm, it doesn't handle earthquakes real well.

There's got to be give. There's got to be sway. And I was up in the Twin Towers only a year before they went down, in fact. And, you know, they talked about how it was engineered to be able to sway a certain distance.

And when you were at the top, man, if you just fixed on a... that was freaky to me. They had this one thing where you could actually, the very observation area where they had the little museum thing and the movies and stuff, there was this thing where you could actually step out onto glass over on the very side.

Trust me, I did not do that, okay? If you know me, I don't want to get on a ladder on a roof. And so being up at the top of that thing, I got... it was about over there. And I did this number and said, oh no, no, no, don't think so.

And everybody else going, oh, this is cool. And I'm just like, oh, oh. But you could up there, you could feel it, especially on a windy day. It was weird. Anyway, they didn't really recognize the need for that back then.

And so it's amazing that, for example, the... well, you look at like the Parthenon and places like that. They ain't in good shape, okay? There's been a few earthquakes over the years. And they fall down.

That's just the way it is when you build them the way that they were built. That's what's amazing to me about the Colosseum in Rome, is that so much of it is still there. Now, of course, over the past hundred years, they've done a lot of shoring up and things like that to keep what was there there.

But still, it made it through to that point in time. And that's pretty amazing. I've stood in there and just... don't know how they did the things they did. But anyways, so there were these things that took place.

But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pains. Sounds to me like, you know, when I see these charts on, again, certain television networks, spike in earthquake activity, rapture imminence, you know, I just go, sounds like Jesus is saying, okay, it's tomorrow.

It says all these things are merely the beginning of birth pains. Then they will deliver you to tribulation and will kill you and you'll be hated by all nations because of my name. Well, that took place during Paul's life.

I mean, Paul even uses the language I think it's to the Colossians, where he said the gospel has already been preached to every nation under heaven. And what they meant by that was the gospel had infiltrated the Roman Empire.

I mean, we look at the world and we think of it as a spinning orb in space because, you know, I have a globe in my office and every classroom you've ever been in had a globe someplace, you know. And we think of it like that.

And so, on an absurdly literalistic reading, the gospel going in all the world would have to mean that the dude living at the top of the most remotest peak in the Andes has, you know, a Jack Chick track in his hand.

And there! We did it! We got the last one! Woo! Yay! And that's really not how the New Testament writers would have been thinking. That's not I think a meaningful way of reading into how they would have understood all this.

So, hated by all nations well, a number of the nations that exist today didn't exist back then. In fact, almost every nation that exists today didn't exist back then. Very few have had that kind of historical continuity.

But, there had been, by the time the destruction of Jerusalem, persecution of Christians all across the Roman Empire, and undoubtedly beyond that. I mean, you know, I was listening to a debate yesterday that took place just a few weeks ago.

A friend of mine, Tony Costa, Dr. Tony Costa out of Toronto did a debate, and man, he put himself in a tough position. I think I probably would have accepted the same debate he did but I would have gone into it realizing it was two-on-one, no matter what.

He did a debate on who is Jesus with a Muslim, Shabir Ali and an atheist. And what was worse was the atheist is one of these radical, loony, fringe guys that doesn't even believe Jesus even existed. Look, when Robert Funk of the Jesus Seminar John Dominick Crossan and Bart Ehrman can all agree that it's really stupid to think Jesus didn't exist, then it's really stupid to think Jesus didn't exist.

That's just all there is to it. And this atheist was this remind me of a sophomore philosophy student. Ever met a sophomore philosophy student, Brother Callahan? They've got a couple classes under their belt, and man, they think they've got it all figured out.

And this guy was just so arrogant, and yet so shallow. It was disgusting. But, anyway why was I going to tell you about this, what was being said here? What was the connection? It was a really good connection too, and it's really bummer when that happens.

I'm going to blame it on the Mucinex, if you don't mind. The Mucinex and the Zyrtec together, it was a really good point that was being made. What was it? Not to mix medications? Yeah, you have to. The Mucinex doesn't stop the sinuses, and the Zyrtec doesn't stop the coughing.

So you've got to do those things. I know that and I'm trying to remember the point that was brought up in the debate that was relevant to verse 9 of Matthew chapter 24, and the persecution of Christians, and all the stuff related to that, and I don't remember what the application was now.

But it's an interesting debate to listen to, so you might want to track it down. Hated by all nations. Yeah, well definitely, this wasn't the point I was going to make, but it is an interesting application, is that the poor Christian was the one guy.

I mean, the Muslim Shabir I was really surprised with what he said. I would expect, given that a Muslim believes that Jesus did exist, that he worked miracles, that he was virgin born, that he raised the dead.

In fact, the Muslim believes Jesus did things that we don't believe Jesus did. The Muslim believes Jesus made little clay birds, and then breathed on them, and they became alive and flew away. You would expect that actually the two supernaturalists would have been pretty much allied against the atheist, but it was the Muslim and the atheist pretty much allied against the Christian, which I predicted would happen before I started listening to it, and that is what happened, but it still surprised me just a little bit.

In any case, there was another very interesting application, and it just went whoosh, just like the little birds, just flew right out, and that's just how it goes. We'll go on from there. There was a tremendous amount of persecution of the Christians up until that period of time, fulfilled in what we see in the rest of the New Testament, and historically.

Oh, there it goes. I knew if I just started talking long enough. What I was going to say was, we don't even know the extent of the persecution that Christians faced, especially as they went east. We know something about when they went west, because we have Acts, and we have the Pauline Epistles, but we know the church went east rather quickly, and would have experienced persecution in those areas.

In fact, tradition tells us there was very severe persecution outside the Roman Empire to the east of Christians as they went, and the connection that I had made in my mind was the naive historiography that this atheist used, where basically it says, well, there's just so little historical evidence of someone named Jesus, and I just want to go, we do not have historical documentation of the existence of 99 .9999 of the human race up until barely 200 years ago.

Did they not exist? Somebody built those buildings. Somebody fought those wars. I mean, if you want to talk about individuals, and we just don't have almost anything from the contemporaries of Jesus. Well, excuse me, but we can't find the archives of the Jerusalem Times.

You know, their MP3 players must have died, or something. I don't know, but this guy is literally demanding that unless somebody was running around with a HD video camera recording what Jesus was doing, well, we just don't have any evidence he was there.

I just wanted to ride off the road into a cactus to feel a little bit better listening to this stuff. It just drives me insane when I listen to these people who have PhDs just showing such an incredibly naive view of historical sources from the ancient world.

It just drives me insane, and that's what the connection was in my mind as I was listening to this guy. Well, where's the contemporary accounts? Well, where's the contemporary accounts of almost anybody?

I mean, unless you were the Caesar living in Rome and there were historians in Rome, 99 .9 of everybody we know from history, history records it after the guy was around. I mean, that's just... Especially those young people, you go to a community college, you go to ASU, I don't care how many letters the guy has behind his name.

Most of these guys that I'm listening to, look, we live in a day where the amount of data out there is so much that no one can master it all. I mean, the Renaissance man is past. What was the Renaissance man?

That was someone who basically mastered all fields of human learning. And maybe Erasmus was somebody like that, but that was a long time ago because no one can barely master their own field anymore, let alone all the fields that are out there.

Our brains just weren't designed to hold that much data and understand that many things. And so you'll get people, especially people who get degrees in science, and they think that because they know biology that makes them a theologian, that makes them a historian, and that makes them a philosopher.

I mean, I listen to Richard Dawkins and this man when it comes to philosophy, logical thought, theology, and history is a moron, but he will not allow anyone to question that he is the smartest man on the planet.

And the media just bows down before him and will not challenge him on these things. And then he then spawns little guys who spawn littler guys, and then the really little guys teach in the local universities.

I'm serious. I'm sorry if that sounds harsh, but I've seen it. And it's just like So, do not be intimidated. Look past the degrees and find out if this guy even thinks logically, thinks rationally. You know, this guy, this atheist, was just, oh, from a historian, oh, bad, really bad.

Anyway, that's what the connection was. I knew if I just started talking long enough, I would figure out what it was, and it would eventually pop back in. And we got there. But I made a nice application thanks to you, brother Ed.

So, it all worked out. Alright, so we know that there was, we know that the church experienced this tribulation. We know that there were martyrs. We know that as far away as Rome, you had Nero, right before Titus and Roman legions destroy Rome, Nero is lighting Christians up in his garden parties, covering them with pitch and putting them on stakes and lighting his garden parties and body parts would be falling off and rolling amongst the guests and all sorts of wonderful things like that.

And it happened outside of the Roman Empire as well. At that time, many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another and, unfortunately, apostasy, heresy, we read the letters to the churches in the book of Revelation and there were some who had fallen away and there were some who you know, I mean, we read today.

I get emails and stuff regularly from Voice of Martyrs, Barnabas Aid, that monitor and keep us informed of persecution in the world and there are the sad comments about, you know, an entire church group is taken into custody and after three or four months, there's only a small group left in custody because the rest have denied their faith or done what they need to do to get out of custody and certainly one of the biggest difficulties the early church faced.

For the next, persecution would continue to 313 A .D. and was worst, it reached its height between 250 and 313, so that last 63 years there was when it was the worst. It ebbed and flowed. It might be really bad in a certain area but not in another area up to that point but it became empire wide there toward the end.

One of the toughest things that the church faced was what do you do when the persecution ceases or relaxes with people who gave in under persecution and of course one of the big struggles was what was giving in?

What did it mean to give in? You know, obviously someone who offered infants on the altar, that was giving in. When you said Caesar is Lord, okay, pretty much everybody agreed that was the worst you could get.

It was the last dying gasps of the empire and the Caesars came to the conclusion that Christianity was one of the primary reasons that the empire was going downhill. The abandonment of the ancestral gods, etc. etc.

You had a whole string of them that sought to crush it because they couldn't control it. It was not until you ended up with a division of powers between the east and west that you have Constantine coming along and Galatius and so on and so forth.

It was a bad time. Many, many, many people died during that time. One of the big issues, as I said, was okay, but what if you didn't offer incense? What if a smelly Roman soldier came to your door and asked if you had any of the Christian scriptures?

What if you gave up the scriptures? What if you gave up your copy of Mark and the Roman soldier takes it outside and burns it, but you get to live? What happens once the persecution is over and some other Christian who didn't give up their copy of Mark and ended up in the huscal, or stoned or whipped or imprisoned or their property confiscated?

They suffered something and you gave up your copy of Mark. What happens then? Can you sit next to them on Sunday morning without discussing what they did? And what if you did like a lot of Christians did and realized that smelly Roman soldiers weren't necessarily literate?

And so, instead of giving them Mark, you gave them your laundry list and they didn't know the difference. But you still gave them something that they thought were the Christian scriptures. See, that was the type of stuff that was causing massive division in the church during that time period.

And you had the rigorous who said, you give up any compromise, any appearance of compromise, out, gone, forever, that's it. And then you had more who weren't the ultra-rigorous, but there'd be a period of time maybe of penance or where people watch you to see if you're going to do it again type thing.

I mean, there was all sorts of different opinions and all sorts of divisions as a result of all that. It was one of the most difficult times. And it's real easy for us to look back and go, oh, they should have done this, they should have done that.

Once we're experiencing it ourselves, then maybe we'll have something to say about it. And that may sound really theoretical, but if you've been following the HHS stuff, if you've been following what's going on in our own nation, fork over the money to pay for abortions, fork over the money to provide certain kinds of birth control, you churches do it, type thing.

It might not be that far down the road. It might not be that far down the road at all. Okay, we'll pick up after the false prophets are rising. Well, actually, we'll pick up with verse 11 next time and continue on from there.

Alright? Let's close the Word of Prayer. Heavenly Father, we do thank you for the time that we have had this morning to once again consider your Word and the work with your people in history past. We would ask that we would take to heart your Word, that we would understand.

Lord, you give us guidance, and that, Lord, as we consider the tribulations through which your people have gone in the past that would fortify us as we look to the future, we truly would be faithful to you.

For all these things in Christ's name. Amen.