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Don’t Fear, Endure!
Go ahead and open your Bibles up to know your sermon guide says we are going to stop at 28, but we are actually going to take the whole chapter today.
Just like any other pastor, I have a few commentaries that I consult for every passage of Scripture that I preach on.
And every one of them this week started by saying this was the most difficult section of text in the whole of the book of Matthew.
And I will go ahead and tell you, these are men who if you put my brain in their head, they would walk backwards.
So this morning, maybe even more than normal, we are going to ask the Holy Spirit to guide us as we go through this text.
So let’s pray and start there.
So in today’s text, we are going to see that Jesus prophesies and describes what the Disciples call the “end of the age”.
But one note on prophecy before we look at it.
Prophecy is almost never as straightforward as it looks at first glance.
Prophecy, especially biblical prophecy, is similar to looking at a mountain range.
We have a picture here of the Grand Teton mountain range.
From this angle, you can see the multiple peaks and valleys.
But, if we look at the mountain range from the base of the first mountain, it becomes so much harder to see anything other than one mountain.
And that is how prophecy is.
Sometimes we group events together into one that really are a series of different events.
This passage is no exception.
There are three main ways of looking at this passage.
You have one side that flattens the text out and sees it all as a prophecy between the resurrection and the destruction of the temple in ad 70.
This is called preterism.
You have the other side that flattens out the text and sees it as a prophecy of the future when Christ returns at the end of history.
This is called futurism.
Then, as you can probably already guess, there is a middle ground that sees both prophecies that have already been fulfilled, and those that will be fulfilled in the future.
This is where we will stay this morning.
Matthew 24:1-
So what I want to do is to walk through this text piece by piece, then we will come back and look at some overarching thoughts.
So remembering back to last week, Jesus pronounces woes on the Pharisees and Scribes, and says at the end of Chapter 23 that their house is left desolate and that they will not see Him again.
Jesus has walked out of the Temple for the last time.
He has dropped his mic and walks out.
And the disciples come to him, and sound like they are trying to coax him into taking it easier.
They are pointing out the buildings, and the beauty of what stands.
It is as if the Disciples are saying, it can’t be all that bad, look how beautiful the craftsmanship!
But Jesus responds with no uncertain terms.
It’s all going to be torn down.
And in AD 70, only 40 or so years after Jesus said this, it was.
The Roman Government came in and desecrated and destroyed the Temple.
Matthew 24:
It’s important to see that this is exactly what we talked about.
They are asking one question.
They see the destruction of the temple and the coming of the kingdom as the same act.
But in Greek, its not.
It’s two questions.
The coming and the end of the age are connected.
But even though that is the intention, Jesus answers two questions.
When will the Temple be destroyed, and what are the signs at the end of all things?
However, with what we know of Jewish thought about the reign of the
So some of His answer is going to apply to AD 70, and some of His answer is going to address the return of Christ and the ushering in of His Kingdom.
So which is this part?
To answer that, I am going to have to cheat.
Both.
I think the verses here are addressing both what has already happened, and what will happen.
Jesus says many will come in His name and lead people astray.
We know from history that this happened all over Jerusalem after the resurrection.
We also know that there were wars and rumors of wars in the Roman Empire between AD 30 and AD 70.
We also know that is still a staple of life all over the world today.
Persecution is well documented in the early church, and continues to this day.
There will be trouble from within and from without.
There will be death and suffering from outside, and there will be apostasy and false teachers from within.
Both are a sign.
We are called to endure both.
Jesus says the Gospel will be proclaimed throughout the whole world.
And we know that by the destruction of the Temple in AD 70, the Gospel had stretched to all of the known world.
And we know that we have not yet reached every tribe, tongue and nation with the Gospel yet.
Jesus now turns his attention to the coming destruction of the temple.
He refers to the abomination of desolation, which is referencing back to Daniel.
Matthew adds his own little adage here, saying “let the reader understand” where he is calling the readers of his letter to go back to the prophecy in Daniel.
Jesus is calling for them to look out for something, and Matthew says go back to Daniel and be familiar with what Jesus is referring to.
And what we are looking at is the destruction of the temple in AD 70.
The Roman army comes in, bringing their pagan idols, set them up in the temple, and raze and destroy the entire thing.
And Jesus is telling them, When you see them coming, RUN.
If you are up on your housetop, which was a normal occurence at this time, don’t waste time trying to go down and get your stuff.
Just run.
If you are pregnant or have small children, they are going to slow you down.
Winter and Sabbath are going to make it hard to get away, so pray they don’t come during those times.
Jesus is concerned with the speed at which they can escape, because the wrath of the judgement and destruction is going to be so great.
And we know that believers in Jerusalem heeded Jesus’ words, and when the Roman Army came in AD 70, they fled to the mountains, to a town called Pella.
Jesus goes on to warn them about people who would come and try to lead them astray.
He warns of false Christs and False prophets who are going to come and claim they have new knowledge, that they have secret knowledge of Christ coming back.
And he says don’t believe them.
When the Son comes back it won’t be secret, it will be obvious, like lightning that fills the sky.
A false Christ is someone who comes as a deliverer, a false prophet is someone who claims to speak for God when they don’t.
And we see this everywhere.
We see people claiming special knowledge in false doctrine, in false religions.
Jesus was a good man and a prophet, but Muhammed is the last of the prophets!
Yes, Jesus was good, but I have a new word from God.
And Jesus’ words are true for us as well.
We live in a society that prizes new over old, novel over traditional.
But we are not to be led astray.
There is one Word of God, and it is sufficient for everything we need.
Just about every false religion comes out of a claim of “New inspiration”.
Don’t be fooled.
It may be inspiration, but it is not from God.
We are going to really quickly move through this.
I believe what we are looking at here has a double meaning both for the destruction of the Temple and the end of time.
The imagery used here is familiar to us because of Revelation, but we also see the same imagery used in Isaiah, Ezekiel, Joel and Amos to describe the judgement of God on cities.
God is bringing destruction down on Jerusalem and the Temple, and when Christ comes back He will bring judgment on the nations.
Matthew 24:32
Again, Christ is calling for those believers in Jerusalem to be looking out for the signs to flee.
Just as the fig tree warns you of summer with its leaves, so you will be warned by all these things.
Up to this point, everything Christ has said has addressed the destruction of the Temple in either a single or double meaning.
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