THE TRIUMPH OF GOD COMES THROUGH AND AFTER

LONG SUFFERING

Matthew 24: 1-28

INTRODUCTION

Matthew 24 may be the most controversial chapter in the Bible among those who believe the Bible is the word of God.   There are massive scholarly books, dozens of scholarly articles and an endless succession of popular literature written about this chapter.   When I was in seminary the most intellectually challenging of all my classes was my Systematic Theology class on eschatology, which is the study of the last things or, the end of the world.   I read scores of pages of arguments about the meaning of this chapter, as it is one of the key chapters in deciding what we know about Jesus’ second coming and the end of the world.   What I am going to try to do this morning is talk about what this passage says without trying to answer the way each of the four major eschatological systems uses the details of this text to support their position.   I simply don’t have time and probably not the intellectual capacities to keep all the arguments clear enough to make any sense to you.

Part of my problem this morning is that I don’t know what you all have been influenced by.   I’m sure some of you have never even thought about the end of the world except in the most general terms.   Others of you have either been taught or read very detailed accounts about what the end of the world is going to look like.   How many of you have read the “Left Behind” series?   Those of you who have been given lots of details about the end of the world are going to find my explanation of this passage very unsatisfying.   My method is to simply try to explain what this text is saying without referring to dozens of other texts to try and support my views on the millennium, the rapture and the tribulation, etc.   I do believe that the best way to read the Bible is to first try to figure out what is being said in the context and then to try to synthesize what is said with the rest of the Bible.   Quite honestly, most of the literature that is seeking to promote a particular view fails at this very point.

That this chapter is about the end of the world is apparent beginning with the disciples question in v. 3 and the frequent references to “the end” and to the coming of Christ.   This chapter is a private conversation between Jesus and his disciples.   In this chapter Jesus is trying to explain to the disciples, to his people, the church, what is going to take place between the time of his death, resurrection and ascension and his coming again to save his people, punish the wicked and create the new heavens and the new earth.   The entire premise of this chapter is that this world, as we know it, is going to come to an end when Jesus Christ appears for the second time.   As Paul says in Titus 2, as Christians, we are waiting for this “Blessed hope, the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.”   Jesus in this chapter seeks to describe for us what sorts of things will be happening to us and around us as we wait.   Notice in v. 13 he says, “he who stands firm to the end will be saved.”   Then in v. 25 he says, “See, I have told you ahead of time.”   Jesus tells us what we can expect so that we will endure and be saved.   He needs to say these things because of who we are and because of the pressures we face to stop waiting.

MAIN POINT

Jesus tells his people what to expect while they wait for him to come save them because…

I.   We don’t like waiting (vv. 1-3)

These opening three verses are key to understanding what follows.   We cannot understand these three verses without remembering how the disciples have responded to Jesus throughout the three years they have spent with him.   These twelve men are fully convinced that Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah.   In Matthew 16 Jesus asked them “who do you say that I am?”   Peter, responding for the rest of the disciples confessed, “You are the Messiah, the Son of God.”   Jesus told Peter that he was absolutely correct and that the reason he knew this was not because he was so smart but because his Father had given him eyes to see and a mind to understand.  

When they confessed that Jesus was the Messiah this meant that they had a whole boatload of expectations about him and his work that came from what they had been told the OT taught about the Messiah.   There minds were full of OT promises like these from Micah 4: “In the last days the mountain of the Lord’s temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and peoples will stream to it.   Many nations will come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob…   ‘Rise and thresh, O daughter of Zion, for I will give you horns of iron; I will give you hoofs of bronze and you will break to pieces many nations.’   You will devote their ill-gotten gains to the Lord, their wealth to the Lord of all the earth.”   They were absolutely convinced that Jesus, because he is the Messiah, was going to set up his kingdom on the earth in the very near future, with Jerusalem as the capital.   He was going to destroy the Roman armies, throw out the corrupt religious leaders and take over the world.   This would mean that they, the disciples would be his closest advisors and receive the highest positions of honor and power.

We see their expectation so clearly in a couple of passages in Matthew.   In Matthew 16 right after Peter proclaims that Jesus is the Messiah, Jesus tells them that he is going to Jerusalem and that he will be betrayed and handed over to the religious leaders and they along with the Gentiles will torture him and kill him.   Peter immediately takes Jesus aside and declares “Never, Lord, this will never happen to you.”   Do you remember what Jesus said to him?   He said, “Get behind me Satan, you are not setting your mind on the things of God but on the things of men.”   Then just a few days prior to Jesus’ speech in chapter 24 the two sons of Zebedee, John and James talk their mother into asking Jesus for the right to sit on the thrones closest to him.   Again, these men are like a dog salivating over the smell of a steak bone that he knows is going to be given to him.   They expect Jesus to take over and put them in positions of power at any minute.

However, something that Jesus said in chapter 23 has caused them some trouble.   Jesus, after condemning and rejecting the Jewish leadership expanded his denunciation to include all of Jerusalem, including the temple.   Jesus’ declaration that the house of Israel, as typified by the city of Jerusalem and the temple, is going to become desolate, does not compute with their view of how things are going to happen.   How can the nations stream to Mt. Zion if it is destroyed?   How can it be that they are going to destroy all the nations who oppose God’s people if they are destroyed as a nation?   Therefore, with these amazing words of Jesus ringing in their ears, as they leave the temple, they point out this marvelous structure that is the place where God said he would dwell in the midst of his people, the place where he would put his name forever.   They are clearly inquiring of Jesus how this can be?   Does he really mean to say that the temple, the place God said he would dwell forever, is going to be destroyed?   That is exactly what Jesus means to say.   He says, the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple is going to be so complete that not one stone will remain upon another.   Their incredulity at this statement would be like the shock someone living in New York would have felt if they were told in January of 2001 that the twin towers of the World Trade Center were going to come crashing down and no longer exist.

You can just imagine the small group of Jesus and his disciples leaving the city of Jerusalem in the late afternoon and making their way into the Kidron valley and then up the hill to the top of Mt. Olivet where they were staying in the town of Bethany.   The disciples are urgently talking with one another in low voices as they walk, trying to remember OT passages that talk about the coming of the Messiah and the destruction of the temple.   After dinner, as they sit and watch dusk turn to dark over the city of Jerusalem and watch the last rays of the sun glint off the golden dome of the temple, they ask Jesus, “When will these things happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the world?”   In the minds of the disciples the destruction of the temple and the appearing of Jesus in power as the ruler of the world are simultaneous events.   Apparently they had been able to synthesize enough verses to arrive at this conclusion.   They are absolutely convinced that Jesus is going to rule in the very near future and have simply added the destruction of Jerusalem into their understanding.   What they want to know is how soon is it going to happen?   They are showing their impatience and their longing for the power to enforce their will upon the wicked world.   They don’t want to wait for heaven to come, they want to create heaven on earth, with themselves as Jesus’ closest advisors.   We know this is their motive behind the question not only because of how they have been treating Jesus prior to this but also because in Acts 1, after Jesus’ resurrection, they are still asking the same question!   They ask Jesus, during the 40 days of his resurrection appearances if it is now he is going to restore the kingdom to Israel?   As though they were just off by about 20 days on their prediction on the end of the ages.

We do need to appreciate these men’s position.   Three days after this conversation with Jesus, he is going to be dead and they are going to be cowering in fear, wondering which one of them will be next.   However, they don’t know that.   They don’t understand the fact, nor the meaning of Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension.   However, their question is motivated not simply by confusion about putting together seemingly contradictory pieces of evidence.   Rather their question reflects an all too human demand that God rule the world on our timetable and as we desire.   We don’t like to wait.   If Jesus truly is God’s Son and all who trust in him truly are God’s children, than we expect some earthly benefits right now.   We are impatient with God’s timetable.   We don’t want to put up with sickness and disobedient children and mean-spirited store clerks and broken down cars and habitual sins in ourselves or others.   We want heaven on earth, now, not later.   If we were God, the world would work better than it does.   Jesus knows the hearts of these men and he knows our hearts.   He knows how much we yearn to have the comforts of heaven without the sufferings of the cross.   So he graciously tells confused and impatient disciples what we can expect while we wait for his glorious appearing.

Jesus tells his people what to expect while they wait for him to come save them because…

•  We don’t like waiting

•  And because…

II.   There are many reasons to stop waiting (vv. 4-14)

As we look at Jesus’ answer to their question, we must remember that in their minds they are asking about events that will happen at the same time.   They think the destruction of Jerusalem and the establishment of God’s kingdom on the earth by Jesus, the Messiah, which is the end of the ages, were simultaneous events.   However, Jesus knows that the destruction of Jerusalem and his return, will be separated by a long period of time.   We need to watch carefully how he answers their question to make this time distinction clear.   In vv. 4-12 Jesus begins by declaring that their greatest threat is going to be deception.   Many are going to come in the name of Jesus, even claiming they are the Christ himself.   Many people will be deceived and follow these false Messiahs.   We are not told what the disciples thought as they listened to Jesus’ answer but it is not hard to imagine their consternation at such a statement.   How can mere humans successfully impersonate the Messiah when he is visibly and gloriously ruling the earth?   Jesus goes on to explain how this can be by describing the chaotic condition of the world that will enable men to impersonate him.   The picture Jesus paints is the opposite of what these men expect.   Rather than a peaceful and stable kingdom of peace there will be all kinds of chaos, sin and misery.   Deception will be so prevalent because, when things are tough, people are looking for a savior to make things right and will follow anyone who promises to make things right.

In vv. 6-12 he describes things that are not signs of the end of the world.   These are the things that false Christ’s will attempt to exploit to get people to follow them but none of the events he describes are signs of the imminent appearance of Jesus but are only the beginnings of birth pains .   This metaphor that Jesus uses in v. 8 is very helpful.   He immediately shows that his appearance to end the world is going to happen at the end of a long process of unknown length that will be characterized by pain but will result in joy, just like labor and the birth of a baby.   The various kinds of pain that he describes are deceiving imposters, wars, rumors of wars, nations being in conflict with other nations, famines, earthquakes, persecution of the church, the martyrdom of many Christians, hatred of all Christians by the nations of the world, the turning away of many professing Christians from the Christian faith, the betrayal of faithful Christians by unfaithful Christians, false teaching and more deceived people, increasing wickedness in the professing church and in the world, and the love of most professing Christians for God and people will grow cold.

Jesus says in v. 6 that all these things are necessary to happen.   Who says they are necessary?   God does.   These things are all a part of God’s grand design and purpose for the world.   This is everywhere in the OT.   Consider this one verse from Micah 4, “But now many nations are gathered against you.   They say, ‘Let her be defiled, let our eyes gloat over Zion!’   But they do not know the thoughts of the Lord; they do not understand his plan, he who gathers them like sheaves to the threshing floor.”   Again, as Paul says about the nations in Acts 17, “From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.”   Or as Jeremiah says in Lamentations 3, “Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it?   Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?”   Jesus says that just like labor pains are necessary for birth to take place so these troubles are part of God’s necessary preparation for his appearing to end the world.   These calamities and troubles are only the beginning of birth pains.   So when people point to earthquakes and famines and wars and persecutions as “signs” that the coming of Jesus is upon us we should ignore them.   That’s the point Jesus is making.   These are not the signs that Jesus is about to come back.   They are merely the beginning of the birth pains.

The reason we need to know about these birth pains is because any of these things could cause us to lose heart and to quit waiting for the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.   How many people say that the reason they have abandoned Christ and the church is because of wars, famines and earthquakes?   Just this week I heard part of an interview with the author of children’s books, like, “Where the Wild Things Are.”   He is Jewish and went through the Holocaust as a teenager.   His father died in a prison camp and he lost many other relatives to the Nazi extermination campaign.   The interviewer asked him why he didn’t have any faith and he simply said the Holocaust ended any faith he might have had in God.   The logic is simple.   If there is an all powerful and all good being ruling the world he wouldn’t permit such atrocities to occur.   They occur, therefore he does not exist.   Again, when you are persecuted for being a Christian it is not hard to understand how you might stop waiting for Jesus if by stopping you can avoid persecution.   When a Christian friend abandons Christ and is not unhappy but actually seems to be getting on better in the world, it’s not hard to see how that would put pressure on you to consider if it is worth it to keep waiting for Jesus.   When Christian leaders are found out to be cheats and liars and adulterers and sexual perverts it isn’t hard to see why many members of their churches would stop hoping in the return of Jesus.   I can’t tell you how many people I’ve met in Janesville who will not darken the door of a church because of ungodly pastors.   When a charismatic speaker tells you that you can have heaven on earth right now, with no painful waiting, it’s not hard to see why you might stop waiting for the true Christ and embrace a false Messiah.   When you see the wickedness in the world and when you see wickedness in the church and nobody seems to be suffering for their wickedness and you think about the claim of the Bible that a powerful and holy God is ruling over this world it is not hard to see how the love of most would grow cold.   The reality of suffering, sin and hostility to the gospel all put pressure on professing Christians to stop waiting for Jesus and to either abandon the church or follow one of the multitude of false prophets who offer a more attractive salvation.

Now notice the optimism and hope that Jesus inserts in vv. 13-14.   During the labor pains that are necessary to bring forth the joy of his return, while the love of most grows cold, there are many who will endure, who will keep on waiting to the very end.   These, and only these will be saved.   You are not saved because you made a decision to ask Jesus into your heart one time long ago.   You are saved because you keep waiting for Jesus to return, your love for him remains hot, to the end of your life.   Like a woman longing for the birth of her child, the true children of God long for the return or Jesus.   Then, those who are enduring will be preaching the good news about the kingdom of God to all the nations of the world, thus hastening the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ.  

Verse 14 is the only sign of Jesus’ impending return mentioned in these verses.   The gospel will be preached by those whose love is hot for Jesus as a testimony to the nations of the world and when all the nations have had this witness of Christ’s lordship preached to them, then he will return.   Jesus is not saying every person will hear the gospel.   He is saying that every nation, every people group in the world will have a culturally relevant proclamation of the gospel given to them at some point prior to the coming of Jesus.   If you want to see a sign that Jesus’ coming is closer now than it has ever been, then simply notice that the number of unreached people groups continues to shrink year after year.   Let the missionary advance of the gospel fill you with hope and join in that effort out of your white hot love for Christ, so that you can hasten the day of his appearing and of the end of this wicked world.

Jesus tells his people what to expect while they wait for him to come save them because…

•  We don’t like waiting

•  There are many reasons to stop waiting

•  And because…

III.   There are catastrophe’s that threaten to destroy all hope (vv. 15-21)

Notice how Jesus has handled their misinformed question.   He has first told them that his appearing as the sovereign king of the universe is a long ways away.   There is a long birth process that must take place that will be full of suffering and pain for the whole world and for the church in particular, that is all a part of God’s plan.   The pain points to the certainty of the birth.   Women don’t go into labor and then not deliver a baby.   The preaching of the gospel to the Gentile nations is the only sure sign that Christ’s return is imminent.   He’s showed them their misunderstanding about his return but what about the first part of their question, about the destruction of Jerusalem?   That’s what he talks about in vv. 15-21.

He pulls a famous quote from the prophet Daniel.   He tells these twelve Jewish disciples that when they see the abomination that causes desolation standing in the holy place, then everyone living in the region of Judea, which surrounds Jerusalem, should flee to the mountains.   Daniel made this prophecy while living in exile in Babylon in about 500 B.C.   Jesus and the disciples all knew that this prophecy was fulfilled in about 164 B.C. when the Roman general, Antiochus Epiphanes captured Jerusalem and destroyed the 2 nd temple which was built in about 400 B.C.   Prior to its destruction, he built an altar to the god Zeus on top of the altar of burnt offering and offered a pig as a burnt offering.   That’s why Jesus says, “let the reader (of Daniel’s prophecy) understand”.   What he is saying is that Daniel’s prophecy doesn’t just apply to that destruction and desecration of the temple but also to a second desecration, which we know occurred in 70 A.D.   Jesus spoke these words in about 30 A.D. and Matthew wrote his gospel around 45 A.D.   What Jesus is doing is warning Christians living in Jerusalem and in the region of Judea to be prepared for the destruction of the temple and to flee when they see Roman soldiers once again laying siege to Jerusalem.   Don’t be misled into thinking that God is going to save his chosen city.   Just as he destroyed the temple by the hand of the Babylonians in 530 B.C., by the Romans in 160 B.C., so he is going to destroy the city and temple again by the hand of the Romans.   His advice when they see this event forming is to flee to the mountains.   Their flight must be in haste.   If they are going to survive they must not try to retrieve any of their possessions, they must simply flee as the danger will be so great.   He displays his compassion in lamenting how terrible it will be for pregnant women and nursing mothers in those days.   He tells them to ask God in the midst of judgment, not to forget mercy.   They should ask that God not send the Romans in the winter or on the Sabbath, as both of these occasions would make their flight more difficult.

Let me just make an aside here about prayer in the midst of catastrophe.   Jesus’ command to pray is noteworthy because of what he tells them to ask God and for what he doesn’t tell them to ask God.   They are not to pray that Jerusalem be spared.   They are not to ask that the Romans be defeated.   This is exactly what God told Jeremiah before the destruction of Jerusalem the first time.   God commanded Jeremiah, “Do not pray for this people or offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you.”   God has determined to destroy Jerusalem and he does not want the disciples to pray that God not destroy Jerusalem.   However, he does want them to ask God that he show mercy on his people who are fleeing from Jerusalem by sending the destruction during mild weather and during the week when there will be no restrictions on travel and work as there is on the Sabbath day.   When we find ourselves in the midst of severe calamity and suffering we ought always to pray for God’s mercy in the midst of it.   We don’t know whether it is God’s will to stop the killing of American soldiers in Iraq or not.   We ought to pray for a speedy resolution.   However, what you can be certain that God will hear is the plea for mercy upon his people who are living in the midst of such calamity.   There are mercies that God wants to give to his people while they live in the midst of the certain and ordained suffering that is necessary to experience during the time of birth pains.   In the midst of the necessary calamities of this age we are to ask God to be merciful to his people.

Verse 21 is the center of much of the controversy surrounding this entire chapter.   The commentators are equally divided between two opinions.   Some view v. 21 as a description of the destruction of Jerusalem.   The horrific slaughter that occurred in Jerusalem at the hands of the Romans is legendary and could be described with the language Jesus uses.   However, others view it as taking the destruction of Jerusalem as a symbol of the great tribulation that will come upon the whole world right before Jesus returns.   I’m not going to give you all the arguments on both sides.   I’m not sure it really matters which one you adopt.   Whether it refers to just what happened in Jerusalem in A.D. 70 or to the worldwide suffering just before the return of Jesus, the main point remains the same.   Prior to Christ’s return some of God’s people are going to experience excruciating, catastrophic calamities.   These are part of the necessary sufferings that will precede the coming of Jesus.   We should do all we can to escape these calamities and pray all the while that God would limit the extent of these calamities for his people living in the midst of them.   The fact that you are experiencing such calamities does not mean that God has abandoned you.   Just like God’s just destruction of Jerusalem was an expression of his righteous judgment, so will there be other expressions of his wrath during human history and we should endure them as well, knowing that it is not a sign of his displeasure with us but part of his displeasure with the world of sinful humanity.

Jesus tells his people what to expect while they wait for him to come save them because…

•  We don’t like waiting

•  There are many reasons to stop waiting

•  There are catastrophe’s that threaten to destroy all hope

•  And because…

IV.   Things are going to get worse before they get better (vv. 22-28)

What you think the “those days” of verse 22 refers to depends upon what you think about vv. 15-21.   I am persuaded that “those days” refers not to the destruction of Jerusalem or to the Great Tribulation that occurs just prior to Christ’s return but rather to the entire period of time from the ascension of Jesus in about 30 A.D. to his second coming.   In other words, he is continuing his description of the world as it exists right now.   The only addition he makes is that the suffering and deception is going to intensify throughout the entire period.   Jesus emphasizes God’s providential care of his chosen people during this time of intensifying deception and suffering that has existed from the ascension of Jesus.  

Let me draw out three implications of what v. 22 says.   First, it is going to appear that the human race is going to be wiped off the face of the earth during the time before Christ’s return.   There have been many times during the course of human history when men have despaired of the survival of the human race.   During the bubonic plague of the 1300’s over half of Europe died in a very short period of time and many were sure the end of the world had come.   In our day we are constantly bombarded with information about various threats of human extinction from disease to World Wars to environmental disaster to meteors from outer space.   Jesus tells us this is to be expected.   Second, Jesus says that none of these threats to human existence will be finally successful.   Rather, God is going to prevent any of these catastrophe’s from happening in their fullness.   Let me just say that does not mean that we should not care about disease or environmental disasters.   Rather, we should not fear for the human race.   We are not going to be wiped from the earth by disease, war, famine, Martians or intelligent robots.   Third, God is going to prevent any of these apparent threats from reaching their conclusion for the sake of the elect.   It is out of his concern for his people that he prevents the suffering from overwhelming human existence.

Jesus ends where he began his description of that period between his first and second appearances and in which we are currently living.   He describes the intensity of deception that will be in the world.   Again, notice that the deception will be so pervasive and so persuasive that it will even appear to threaten the extinction of the Christian church.   However, it is not possible for God’s chosen people to be deceived because they all recognize the voice of their shepherd and follow him.   Every true Christian can spot an imposter and will never follow him or her, no matter what kinds of miracles they perform.   Don’t miss what Jesus says in v. 24.   False prophets and false Messiahs perform miracles.   You cannot tell whether a person is teaching the truth based upon his ability to perform signs and wonders.   The only defense you have against deception is familiarity with the word of Christ, contained in this book.

Then in v. 26 Jesus gives us one of the certain ways you can spot false teachers.   If someone talks about the appearing of Jesus in any way other than a public, impossible to miss appearance, they are a false teacher.   Jesus is not going to show up out in the desert, secretly, apart from human observation.   He is not going to reveal himself to a small, elitist group of faithful people.   He is not going to appear in some private vision.   When Jesus Christ comes again it will be as obvious as a flash of lightning.   It will be as instantaneous as a flash of lightning.   It will be apparent to everyone on the face of planet earth at the same time, from the east to the west.   That coming of Jesus will be a coming of judgment.   It will be accompanied by wrath that creates human corpses upon which the vultures will feed.   The coming of Jesus will be incredibly good news for the elect.   It will be their salvation but it will be a day of doom and destruction for all those who have followed false teachers and false prophets and false Messiahs.   It will be a day of joy, like the birth of a baby for all those who have a white hot love for Christ throughout our lives of suffering and misery but it will be a day of worse disaster than any ever experienced for those who forsake him, who refuse to wait for him to come.

Jesus tells his people what to expect while they wait for him to come save them because…

•  We don’t like waiting

•  There are many reasons to stop waiting

•  There are catastrophe’s that threaten to destroy all hope

•  Things are going to get worse before they get better