The Abomination of Desolation

took a little break to wrap up VBS

Picking right back up in mark. Chapter 13 vs 14-23

Mark 13:14–23 ESV

14 “But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not to be (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 15 Let the one who is on the housetop not go down, nor enter his house, to take anything out, 16 and let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. 17 And alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! 18 Pray that it may not happen in winter. 19 For in those days there will be such tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will be. 20 And if the Lord had not cut short the days, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he shortened the days. 21 And then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘Look, there he is!’ do not believe it. 22 For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders, to lead astray, if possible, the elect. 23 But be on guard; I have told you all things beforehand.

Prayer

For nearly 3 years, Jesus has been doing active ministry. He has been healing and preforming miracles. But he has also been teaching and discipling both large crowds and a smaller group of 12 men. What we are dealing with here in chapter 13 is this smaller group of men.

To remind us of the scene before us, Jesus has been in the temple for the last several days teaching and answering questions. In what is the last week of ministry before going to the cross, we are at Wednesday afternoon/evening. They have left the temple to go back to Mount Olive. On the way back, they look at the temple and some of them comment about how beautiful it is. Jesus then tells them about the destruction of the temple.

When he told them about this, naturally they had questions. We had begun to deal with the questions in our last sermon in Mark. They wanted to know when and how would they know. You could argue that he didn’t necessarily answer the question that they asked but actually was answering the question they should have been asking. But he mainly focused on the destruction of the temple.

In our passage today, this idea of destruction continues. We hear about a person or a figurehead that will come. We are also going to deal with the idea of dual fulfillment as well because it is important to our passage.

We do have a main point in our passage today so if you are taking notes, write this down.

Main Point: Be On Guard Against Those Opposed to God

This is not something that is unique to the time of Jesus. We still deal with this today. People are opposed to God. This is a timeless truth that we can get from our passage today and apply to our lives. I want to take us through this passage now and use this idea of being on guard.

Be On Guard Against the Abomination

We have this title here that is not something we would often say in our world today. Jesus, in context of what is being said here, is being prophetic. He is speaking about something that would happen.

Mark 13:14 ESV

14 “But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not to be (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.

The abomination of desolation. Two words put together to describe someone. An abomination is something that is loathsome to God. This abomination is desolate, it has been abandoned. So the abomination of desolation is someone who has abandoned God and has become loathsome to him because of this.

What we need to know also to understand this is that this person has already been prophesied about. If we go back to the book of Daniel, he spoke of this person 3 different times. This is where we get into dual fulfillment. Dual fulfillment is when something is prophesied about and it actually is fulfilled more than once.

See, when Daniel prophesied about this person, it actually happened in 167 B.C. There was this guy who came into the temple, he sacrificed a pig on the altar of burnt offerings and he set up an altar to Zeus. This led to an event in history that is known as the Maccabean Revolt. Daniel referred to this person 3 times in his prophecy as the abomination of desolation.

So, is Jesus talking about the same person? No, he is not. The disciples of Jesus would have known about this person doing this to the temple. This is why the author adds in “let the reader understand”. They knew about this kind of person. They knew that the one previously was where he should not have been, so Jesus points the same thing out to them.

In his prophecy, Jesus is both pointing backwards to remind them of what has happened while at the same time he is pointing to the future. When we get to 70 A.D. in history, we have yet another person standing where they ought not be at the destruction of the temple. The one who is leading this destruction, the Roman general Titus, goes into the temple, into the holy place. They set up idols there and begin to sacrifice to them.

We have in history, already, 2 instances where the abomination of desolation goes into the temple. Jesus is giving his disciples a warning here. He begins in verse 14 by telling them that the ones who are left in Judea need to flee to the mountains.

Mark 13:15–18 ESV

15 Let the one who is on the housetop not go down, nor enter his house, to take anything out, 16 and let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. 17 And alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! 18 Pray that it may not happen in winter.

Mark 13:19 ESV

19 For in those days there will be such tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will be.

He gives these examples as an urgency to the matter. Destruction is coming. You don’t have time to look back. If you are on the rooftop, don’t bother going back in to grab anything. If you are in the field, don’t bother picking up your clothes that you have laid down. If you are pregnant or have small kids, this will be especially difficult for you to flee because you will be slowed down. And if it is winter time, travel will be much more difficult because it will be slower. And this will be a tribulation like nothing that has happened before.

What has happened over time is that we read these verses and we get this uneasy feeling. This verse has been taken and used to describe the end times. Here is what I can tell you with great certainty.

When Jesus is talking about these things, we know for sure that he is talking about the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. Could he also be talking about the end times when Jesus returns again? Yes he could. There absolutely could be some dual fulfillment going on here with what Jesus is saying. I think that this is very possible from what Jesus said in verse 19. But we do not have certainty that he is talking about that when he is saying these things to his disciples.

Maybe you are here and you believe this. That is perfectly fine. There are many different views on the end times. We have Premillenial, Postmillenial, and Amillenial. I can give you material on all of these views if you want to do some research. What I ask is that you don’t get your end times view from our culture but from scripture. If you have determined what you believe about the end times because you have read Left Behind, you may want to put that down and pick up a bible.

I have heard too many preachers be so dogmatic about this issue. As my friend, Tony Thomas once told me, we can believe what we want but need to realize that our view of the end times can change mid-air.

Jesus is teaching his disciples here, and we also need to hear and understand about the abomination of desolation. And we need to be on guard against any abominations.

Be On Guard Against False Christs

For the true Christians, this is not something to fear. We know the one and only Christ is Jesus who came and lived a perfect and sinless life because he is God, went to the cross to die, and rose from the grave 3 days later. But, we still must be on guard against false christs.

In our time, this is not something that comes up often. In more recent time, the most notable one would have been David Kuresh in the early 90’s. For these to come into public knowledge, they must first garner a following. Which is what we would call a cult.

As we look at this, I want us to look at verse 20 and you may think that this is out of place, but I want us to take that and what he says about false Christs and look at it together.

Mark 13:20–22 ESV

20 And if the Lord had not cut short the days, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he shortened the days. 21 And then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘Look, there he is!’ do not believe it. 22 For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders, to lead astray, if possible, the elect.

In this tribulation, if God had not cut short the days of it, no one would have been saved. If it would have continued, everyone and everything would be destroyed. But God stepped in. He did this for a reason. For his elect. Some people may not like this word. It indicates God choosing us. The majority of Christians today feel as though salvation is a choice. It is not. I can tell you that when I was saved, I was not searching for Jesus because I had my eyes on a girl.

If you look in scripture, look at the salvation of Paul. Paul was killing Christians and one day was smacked upside the head by Jesus and was blinded. He knew who Jesus was. He knew that he was the Lord of everything. He was not looking for Jesus but Jesus saved him. It was not a decision. No one convinced him that what he was doing was wrong and that he needed to follow Jesus. He was radically saved by Jesus out of nowhere. A choice of following Jesus means that there is a choice of not following him. I believe that my salvation is everything in my life and it was not a choice I made but it was something that was given to me because God adopted me into his family.

God cut short the destruction to preserve his elect. If you are a Christian, you are one of the elect. And because of that, God has given you purpose. He has preserved you for the work of the gospel. It is our duty to share this gospel with others.

Gospel presentation

But God also protects us through the gospel too. If we believe the true gospel, then we cannot be led astray. And we should praise God for this because there are false gospels out there continuously trying to lead us astray. But we have the true gospel to look to. The saving work of Jesus. Knowing that he was perfect and went to the cross to die for us. Knowing that he has ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the father and that he will return to get his children one day.

So, if people say that there is someone who is the Christ who has come, don’t believe it. He will return in the same way that he left. It doesn’t matter if they are doing signs and wonders, don’t believe them. We must be grounded in the truth. There are too many things to distract us. We must be on guard. But also, be comforted.

If you notice, Jesus warns against being led astray as the elect. I love what he says. “If possible”. We know, through God’s word and through history, that if someone is truly the elect, that it in fact is not possible for them to be led astray by false Christs. If you were able to be led astray, then you would be rejecting the true Christ. And a true Christian cannot do that. So, take comfort in the sustaining of your salvation through the work of Christ and the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life. But be on guard for false Christs.

But that isn’t the only things we need to guard ourselves from.

Be On Guard Against Ourselves

Sometimes, our biggest problem is ourselves. Even as Christians, we get in our own way. But we should know better. We have no excuse for ignorance as Christians.

Mark 13:23 ESV

23 But be on guard; I have told you all things beforehand.

Here is where we nail all of this down. We must be on guard. You have probably been trying to formulate in your head how we do this. And here it is. We are on guard through the word of God. Reading it, knowing it, soaking it in. It comes from God’s word. Jesus is telling his disciples that he has told them all things beforehand.

Specifically, he is telling them about the events that would unfold for them. But that isn’t all that he has told them. He may not have taught them quadratic equations, but he has taught them how to be disciples, to be followers of him. He has taught them things to do and things not to do. And for us, the wonderful thing is that we have those same things.

There is so much direction that we have right here in God’s word. All the way back in Genesis and all the way to the book of Revelation. We believe that the word of God is sufficient for all of our spiritual needs. It teaches us how to be encouraged and also convicts us of our sins. It teaches us how to love God with everything that we have and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

For us to be on guard, we must be in God’s word.

Challenge and conclusion

So here is my challenge for you. Think about how much time you have spent in God’s word this past week. I want you to take that amount and double it. If you were in your bible for 2 days last week, be in there for 4. If you were in it 5 days last week, take the amount you did each day, and double it.

But it isn’t just about being in God’s word. It is about letting the word of God guide us and make us more like Christ. So when you are reading God’s word, grab a notebook and pen, grab a highlighter, slow down what you are doing. It isn’t about efficiency, it is about effectiveness. Let God’s word be effective in you. Take notes, highlight important things, write down context clues and what it meant for the original audience and what it means for us. These are all important bible study tools.

If you don’t have a bible you can read, let me know and I will get you one. If you don’t know where to start, go back to the beginning of Mark and start there.

God is working in each of our lives. Lean into it. These things might seem weird for us to do. Lean into the weird and awkward things. Because God has chosen you. Choose to know him and be in awe of him because he is worthy.