Wednesday, July 6, 2022 PM

Prayer for Confidence in God’s Promises

Father, we come before you today and we thank you for loving us, we thank you for giving us your son, and we know that you having given us your son, you will freely with him give us all things. We may come before you in confidence, knowing your character and knowing your promises, and that we may pray with confidence and that we may pray with hope.

And we ask tonight that you would bless our reading and our understanding of your word, and that we would rejoice in its truth and apply its meaning to our lives. And we pray all these things in the name of Jesus.

Amen. All right, well let's begin reading Luke chapter 21 beginning in verse 20. But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her.

For these are the days of vengeance that all things which are written may be fulfilled. But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days, for there will be great distress in the land and wrath upon this people.

And they will fall by the edge of the sword and be led away captive into all nations. And Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. All right, so here we have Jesus very clearly warning his followers, warning those who would hear about the coming destruction that he's been talking about in various ways for quite some time.

As he began his ministry, he proclaimed the gospel of the kingdom, and he was healing many and delivering many from demon possession. And while some folks wanted him to delay and to stay and to heal more, deliver more, he said he must keep on preaching the gospel of the kingdom, in which he identified himself as the son of man.

The son of man is the title given to Messiah in Daniel chapter 7, the one to whom all the authority will be given in heaven and on earth and everlasting dominion. And Jesus proclaimed himself as the son of man, the king of this kingdom.

The kingdom had drawn nigh because he had come nigh. And he wanted people to recognize that authority to repent and turn to this good news, to this message. And while some of the crowd misunderstood him, as he began to tell his parables, as he began to explain how things were going to work in light of him fulfilling the Old Testament, fulfilling the Old Covenant, what would it be like with no more sacrifices?

What would it be like when you don't have a Levitical priesthood anymore? What would it be like when we don't have the feast days and the ceremonies and so on? And so Jesus began to tell parables describing how it was going to be, and the necessity for it as well.

In many of his parables, he would talk about again and again the unfaithful servant or the unfaithful steward or the unfaithful son that would come under the judgment. But then somebody else would take the place and there would be servants or sons or stewards coming from a surprising direction.

And they would be given charge of the kingdom or stewardship of the kingdom. And we've seen the Jewish religious leaders increasingly become more and more upset with Christ, angry at him, for they recognized, we read in the text, they recognized he was talking about them, that they were the unfaithful stewards, that they were the unfaithful slaves or son, and that judgment was going to come upon them.

And the situation has come to a head in that Jesus paraded into Jerusalem declaring his kingship, and he judged the temple, he cleansed the temple. The religious leaders have now plotted, they're plotting to kill him, they want to destroy him.

And Jesus has taken to now warning very carefully his people about the scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and so on. Now, given the importance of the temple to the Jewish religious leaders, Jesus, in more than one way, has taken aim at this idol in their life, just like Jeremiah did in the book of Jeremiah.

He took aim at the big idol in the life of the religious Jews. They worshipped the temple rather than worshipping at the temple. And so Jesus has been taking aim there. His disciples tried to say, well, look how wonderful it is.

Look at the grandeur, the gold, and so on. And he told them that not one stone will be left upon another, that this place was going to be destroyed. Now, this was unthinkable for them. They grew up with the cultural assumption that the temple was indestructible.

And so, for the temple to be destroyed would mean the end of the world. So, they want to know more about this. And so, Jesus begins to instruct them. And that's what we've been reading about here in Luke 21.

Now, Jesus has told them that this is going to, this destruction, this judgment upon the temple, the destruction of Jerusalem, is going to occur within this generation. And the judgment is going to fall upon this people, he says.

And we see that. Now, they have, now his disciples have asked him for something very particular. Verse 7, so they asked him saying, teacher, but when will these things be? And what sign will there be when these things are about to take place?

Now, you've got to understand, the temple is at the most prominent part of Jerusalem. It is the most defensible part of Jerusalem. And for the temple to be destroyed, that would mean that the whole city would have to be destroyed.

And so, they're asking a very sensible question. Would you please tell us when this is about to happen so we don't have to be here? All right, okay. That's a very sensible question to ask. And while he has delayed his answer, while he has delayed his answer and pastored them about other things.

Now, when you hear rumors, when you hear these things, don't be scared. And when you hear people teaching you the wrong thing, don't be deceived. And so, he says, he takes care of all those preliminaries and now he's answering their question.

Now, he's answering their question. Here's the sign that they need to be ready for. Okay, and then here it is in verse 20. He says, but when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near.

You see, that matches their question. That's the answer to their question. They wanted to know what sign, where they'll be when these things are about to take place. Well, here he gives them the answer.

When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near. So, his instructions then seem a little bit incongruous. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let those who are in the midst of her depart and let those, let not those who are in the country enter her.

Now, Jerusalem was the most fortified city in Judea. In fact, the most fortified, notoriously difficult to conquer. At this point, walls and it was set upon an elevated plain. It had an internal water source.

Good luck. This would be the place you can destroy the temple so that one stone may not be left upon another. In order to accomplish that grand feat, you would have to have a grand through Judea, either coming from the south or coming from the north.

And it just makes sense that when foreign armies are on the march, everybody who lives in the general and the safest place was Jerusalem. It was always the best place to go and hide. Many, many stories in the Old Testament we read, wherein the enemies of Israel sweep through and take out all their other fortified cities and everyone's holed up in Jerusalem and it's the last bastion and that's where they survive and they rebuild their life from there.

That happened many times in the history of the Jews. But here Jesus is saying, now when you see armies surrounding Jerusalem, do not go into Jerusalem. Do not run into the city. You're going to be trapped there.

That's a sign that her desolation is near. In fact, what you need to do is to flee to the mountains. In fact, you need to, you need to get out of the hole. You need to get out as far as you can for your safety.

And he says the reason why, for these are the days of vengeance that all things which are written may be fulfilled. So Jesus says two things. One, the reason why Jerusalem is going to be destroyed and the temple is going to be destroyed is because these are days of vengeance.

Vengeance is mine, I'll repay, sayeth the Lord. So God is going to destroy the temple, destroy Jerusalem as an act of vengeance. That's what Jesus is saying. Vengeance for what? Well, vengeance upon those who were guilty of all the blood of the prophets, Jesus says.

Guilty, those who would soon be killing the heir. Remember the parable of the wicked tenants of the vineyard? When the owner of the vineyard sends his servants time and again and they persecute them and they mistreat them and they kill them and then finally he says, I will send them my son.

Surely they will respect my son. And then they say, oh, and they cast him out of the out of the vineyard. Well, the destruction that's to come is going to be a day of vengeance, an act of vengeance from God upon those who said of Jesus, let his blood be upon us and our children.

And as we see so often in the scriptures, God, when he dispenses judgment, gives to people exactly what they ask for. Romans 1 says he turns them over to a reprobate mind. We have the example of the children of Israel in the wilderness.

They said, we want quail. He gave them quail so much that it came out their nose. And when this generation, these Jewish leaders who conspire together to murder the son of God, Jesus of Nazareth, and they said his blood be upon us and our children, God in his wrath and his vengeance says, wish granted.

Okay, so these days of vengeance. Vengeance is the Lord's and he will indeed repay. Now, the reason why these instructions are somewhat incongruous also is that, you know, how are you going to get out of Jerusalem if it's surrounded by armies?

That doesn't make sense. That's going to be pretty difficult to do. But the answer lies in what happened. Nero was pretty upset with the Jews and so he sent he sent Cestius, a general with the Roman legion to go take care of these upstart Jews.

And they showed up about halfway through the year 66 AD and they ran through the countryside. There was not a very well organized defense and they were able to close quarter to the walls of Jerusalem.

In fact, they had began their assault even upon the eastern gate, the gate that would lead into the temple itself. And they were using their famous turtle formation in which all the shields were covering over every single angle and they were busy burning the gate of the temple.

And to all observers, historians and military alike, Cestius had this thing won. And the people inside the city were going all to pieces. Half of them wanted to surrender and point the finger and say, well, we always wanted to cooperate.

It was them who wanted to resist and all of this is very well documented. Also documented is the fact that right when Cestius had the victory in his hand, as Josephus says, for no reason in the world, he turned and retreated and left.

And this created a rout of the Roman legion to the point where barely anything of the legion was left. He made a very bad decision to flee through a narrow valley that had the nickname of the tooth. So narrow it was called the tooth.

If you've seen pictures of this valley, it's two very steep slopes like this covered in rocks. And you can imagine a Roman legion trying to make their way through the bottom and the Roman zealots just, you know, kicking rocks down the slope, taking care of business.

Well, they were able to kill the Roman legion, loot them for their armor and their weapons, and then they felt like now we really bested the Romans. We're going to become independent. Jesus, this is the reason why Jesus is saying, don't go to Jerusalem.

Don't flee to Jerusalem. Don't gather in Jerusalem when you see Roman armies surrounding it. Okay, you need to flee. You need to leave. The temptation would be to gather in Jerusalem for a great victory.

Yes, we're going to turn the Jesus says, no, no, that's not how it's going to end up. You need to get out. Because the way it turns out is not so long after that, two legions from the south under the command of Titus and two legions from the north under the command of the Thespasian invade and there was no way out.

And the bloodbath that ensued, hundreds of thousands of Jews dying in their cities north and south until over a million Jews died in Jerusalem. So there was instructions from Jesus to his followers saying, vengeance is coming.

Don't stay in the city. Don't go to the city. When you see armies surrounding Jerusalem, this is your signal. Time to get out. Time to leave. So Jesus gives this warning, but we need to think about why he gives this warning.

He definitely has compassion on those who are going to be involved. He says, woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days. It's going to be very difficult for them to flee.

And the parallel passage in Matthew and Mark, he says, you know, pray that it won't be on the Sabbath, right? Because if it's the Sabbath, nobody's going to take you in when you flee and cook a meal for you because it's the Sabbath.

And then he says, for there will be great distress in the land and wrath upon this people, right? Why? Because they were, they broke the covenant. If you go back and you read in Deuteronomy and Leviticus about what happens to Israel when they break covenant with God, and then you read Luke 21, Matthew 24, Mark 13 about the judgment that comes upon them, they match.

So God is being faithful to his word. He's keeping his word. He's keeping his promises. He told them, if you break my covenant, this is what I'm going to do. Verse 24, they will fall by the edge of the sword and be led away captive into all nations.

That is a great summary of Deuteronomy 28 about the curses that come upon Israel when they break covenant. And in fact, that's exactly what happened as those who, the Jews that did survive were sold into slavery.

And Jerusalem will be champled by Gentiles until the time that the Gentiles are fulfilled. So two things to think about. One is simply the consistency of God, how he keeps his word, right? How when God says he's going to do something and gives instructions that he follows through.

He does exactly what he said he would do. One minor example is simply this. Do you remember the instructions what to do when your house becomes leprous? Like, well, you got, you know, I know when I become leprous, I have to, you know, I have to leave the camp and I have to wear funny clothes and I have to say unclean, unclean until hopefully God cures me.

I didn't show myself to the priest. But what happens to your house if it becomes leprous? Well, you have to clean it. You have to clean it. You can't, you can't pick up your house and put it outside the camp with a sign that says unclean.

You have to clean your house. You have to scrub it. You have to be very, very careful and you must thoroughly, thoroughly clean out the entire house. And then it's, and then if it's gone and if the mold or whatever it was is gone, okay, great.

You can stay in your house. But if you come back to the house and after all that cleaning up, it's leprous again and it's diseased again, do you know what the Old Testament remedy for that is? You must break down the entire house and not leave one stone upon another.

Jesus comes to the temple and cleanses it. He finds it leprous. He finds it a mess. He cleanses the temple and everyone says, well, what, what are you doing? And he says, you, this is a den of thieves.

This is supposed to be a house of prayer for all nations and you've made it a den of thieves and he cleanses it. Well, the cleansing didn't take. And he says, I'm going to come back, right? I'm going to come in judgment.

I'm going to, there's going to be a vengeance. And guess what? The house that he cleanses, see God, God always follows through, doesn't he? And Jesus, remember, Jesus fulfills the law. Always keep the law.

Didn't he fulfill it to the end? And he's applying it to the fullest degree. Also consider just how hard it is sometimes to obey Jesus's instructions. I mean, how difficult would it be to follow these words?

When you see the great grand city that survived the attack, that launched the counterattack, that beat the Romans, the temptation would be to stay in this fortress forever. But we were to walk by faith and not by sight and to live by the words of Christ rather than by the, the chance of the culture around us.

And in a practical baseline sense, if they were and set it all away to follow his instructions, they would be saved from vengeance. Now, in a much more important sense, much more vital sense, isn't that what Jesus calls us to do?

He who would seek to save his life will lose it. But he who loses his life for my sake and the gospels will find it. Eternal life is found in following Jesus and believing in his word. And I think that's the...

Following Jesus’ Warning Instead of Trusting Jerusalem

Any questions or thoughts before we turn our attention to some prayer time? Well, it could be taken in a variety of sense, but the main thing to remember is that in this context, Jesus says all these things will happen within this generation.

So the Romans took over Jerusalem, renamed it, and began using it basically as a military outpost and definitely trampled the place for quite some time. And after that, if you read the history of the city of Jerusalem, you'll see that indeed it's been trampled ever since.

But certainly, Jesus is making a point that they should not be looking to this place anymore for hope. All right. Well, we would like to have a.