I just had the privilege of joining the fifth and sixth graders
in their Sunday School class. They had submitted some questions
for me ahead of time, which was good, because I had enough trouble
answering them as it was. Here are some of them:
"What do we look like in heaven, young or old?"
"What happens if a baby dies the very day it is born? Does
it go to heaven or hell?"
"To go to heaven, must you be completely sin-free?"
Of all the people in the world, Christians have the most to say
about the future. Children may ask what will happen in heaven,
what we will look like there, what is coming up in history, and
so on. But most of the rest of us, if we're honest, want to know
what's coming in the future as well. The Bible has a great deal
to say about that. We know the Lord who has planned it from beginning
to end, who is glorifying himself in the events of human history.
Jesus had a fair amount to say throughout the course of his ministry
about things to come. He did so especially during a session he
spent on the Mount of Olives, answering questions from his disciples
as they looked over the city, just a short time before he was
to be executed.
That Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24-25 (see also Mark 13 and Luke
21) is the subject that we're studying in this series of four
messages. The reason we're studying this passage is in large part
because this year is filled with questions and foreboding about
the future-millennium fever. The stirring of such questions in
our culture suggests that we would do well to study Jesus' words
in order to receive comfort ourselves and to have answers for
those around us. The previous message was an overview; now we'll
begin looking at the text in more detail.
There are roughly three sections to this discourse. The first
one, which we're going to consider in this message, is summarized
in Jesus' warning in 24:4: "Watch out that no one deceives
you." In the second, farther on in chapter 24, Jesus predicts
events to come. We'll talk about that in the next message. The
third and by far the longest section of the Olivet Discourse is
a series of teachings Jesus gives about what to do in the interim:
What responsibilities do we have? How should we think about life
between now and then? What should we give ourselves to? We'll
consider that in the fourth message.
Let's read Jesus' warning in Matthew 24:1-14:
Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. "Do you see all these things?" he asked. "I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down."
As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. "Tell us," they said, "when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?"
Jesus answered: "Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains.
"Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come."
The disciples call Jesus' attention to the great edifice of
the temple with its massive stones, and Jesus begins to predict
the end of the temple. In the passage we'll pick up in the next
message, Jesus will talk about the near-term destruction of the
temple that stood during his lifetime (Herod's temple), and how
that looks forward to a final tribulation, a destructive period
at the very end of the end. But before these predictions, he issues
this warning: "Don't be deceived."
As important and encouraging as it is for us to understand what
the Scriptures teach about the future, as much as we are called
upon to long for the coming of the Lord, as often as the wonderful
Aramaic prayer "Maranatha [Come, O Lord]" has been on
the lips of Christians historically, an orientation toward the
future has a difficulty associated with it: We can lose our commitment
to the responsibility of staying at the tasks of today.
Birth pangs
Consider the metaphor Jesus uses about the nature of history:
"All these things are the beginning of birth pangs."
History can well be understood as analogous to childbirth. I was
twenty-four years old when our daughter Sarah was born. That was
the first up-close and personal experience I had with childbirth.
I didn't know very much at all about what to anticipate in pregnancy.
I knew it took nine months, and I had some understanding of fetal
development. Leslie and I went to classes on preparation for childbirth,
where we learned breathing techniques, among other things. I was
to be the coach. At various stages along the progression of labor
different breathing techniques are called for. It's not so hard
at the beginning. The initial contractions are difficult, but
they're not unmanageable. Then they grow more and more intense
and closer together, more all-encompassing and powerful.
Jesus said history is very much like that. There is going to be
a tribulation at the end of history, a worldwide, completely engulfing
period of struggle and difficulty, a sense that all is out of
control and that there is no good reason for hope left. It will
be as dark as it has ever been. It is difficult to find language
to describe the tribulation of the end. Those days immediately
precede the glorious return of the Lord. Life will come after
sorrow, just as in pregnancy the great struggle at the end of
the labor precedes the coming of the baby who is so much longed
for and who changes everything.
But painful and difficult contractions occur before the final,
powerful, overwhelming contraction that leads to childbirth. And
before the end of history there will be spasms of difficulty that
occur in various places and times. Jesus is saying, "Don't
over-interpret them. Don't focus so much on them that you lose
your way. Don't be deceived by the difficulties that precede the
final difficulty."
There are five categories of circumstances that Jesus wants us
to understand, and in each case he's saying that this will happen,
but it's not the end. We must not allow ourselves to be deceived
or thrown off track, to give up our faith or our focus, to quit
our responsibilities.
Deceptive voices
The first category is deceptive voices. Verse 5: "For
many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ [Messiah]....'"
In verse 11 he adds, "...Many false prophets will appear
and deceive many people." Now, false messiahs and false prophets
are not the same thing, but they are each offering an alternative
to Jesus. Their voice, should you listen to it, will replace the
voice of the Holy Spirit and the voice of Christ in the Scriptures
for us. False messiahs pose as a direct alternative, someone who
would be savior in place of Jesus, someone who says, "Rely
on me to tell you of God, to make a way into God's presence for
you. I am the answer, the one who has come for you." David
Koresh was a messianic figure for those who followed him to their
deaths. Sun Myung Moon has spoken of himself somewhat obliquely
but increasingly clearly over time as a messiah in place of Jesus.
The leader of the Heaven's Gate cult was a messianic figure.
False prophets are those who urge us to veer from the clear path
of historic, Biblical Christianity. We can go back a hundred years
or so and find Joseph Smith and Mary Baker Eddy and those who
have founded religious diversions of that sort as false prophets.
Many in today's world are harder to identify. They don't often
set up completely new organizations or write new authoritative
scriptures. Many voices today offer us the promise of financial
security. They point to a way of obtaining spiritual authority
or personal power, obtaining more of the Spirit by dint of some
effort, as if he were a commodity that could be passed from one
person to another. They claim to know the place of power, to have
the secret to success.
Jesus says that because life will be confusing and tumultuous,
and at times history will spasm and seem out of control, at least
where we are, we'll wonder if God has forgotten. What used to
work won't work anymore, and we'll be vulnerable to voices that
promise to give us what they cannot. And so Jesus issues the warning:
"Don't be deceived."
Wars and rumors of wars
The second category about which Jesus warns us is "wars
and rumors of wars...nation will rise against nation, and kingdom
against kingdom." That could be taken from recent headlines.
But it has been true as far back as we have recorded history that
somewhere in the world, virtually all the time, there is war.
War is the lasting virus of the human heart.
Even the phrase "rumors of wars" is a telling one, because
in war the first fatality is almost always the truth. Propaganda
replaces accuracy; we're told in order to fire nationalistic fervor
that the opponents have done certain things, we're the innocent
victims, and retribution is required. It's difficult to know who
is telling the truth. Each side has a stake in controlling the
dissemination of information. So whether wars are taking place
as reported or we're getting only rumors, it's hard to know.
Wars, like the spasms of labor pains, can be disconcerting. Just
what we know of what has befallen some of the people in the Balkans
in the last few months is almost beyond description: the wrenching
apart of families, the raping of the young, the killing of the
innocent, the destroying of identity, the loss of hope. What happens
when that struggle, that spasm, is close to home? People give
up their faith. They wonder whether God knows or cares. They turn
toward the circumstance and away from God. They lose their witness.
I can point to scores of folks I knew in my era who went off to
Vietnam as believers and came back hardened, jaded, not believing
in God or humanity or anything.
Wars will always happen, Jesus is warning. Ancient and simmering
hatreds last for generations. National pride replaces reason.
The quest for wealth and power are at the heart of sinful humanity,
and over and over again they rear up and do terrible things. But
this doesn't mean that God has lost control. It doesn't mean that
we ought to listen to some phony answer in place of the gospel.
Jesus is saying that this is not indicative of the end of everything.
Natural disasters
The third category that Jesus speaks of is natural disasters:
"famines and earthquakes." Luke's rendering of this
teaching includes the word "pestilences" (21:9). The
earth is broken because the human race is broken. In Romans 8:19,
Paul talks about the earth's longing for the children of God to
be made visible because it wants to be restored. In the course
of almost any year, somewhere on the globe a natural disaster
of some kind will strike: a flood, famine, earthquake, epidemic.
Hurricane Mitch destroyed most of the infrastructure of some Central
American countries and produced a famine; the crops were gone
and the means to grow them had been destroyed. AIDS has ravaged
entire countries in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of this country.
We can think of our own experience with earthquakes in California,
and the much more terrible experience of countries that don't
have the kind of building codes we do, so that great destruction
happens in times of earthquake and other natural disasters. There
are people who view such things and give up their faith.
Persecution
Fourth, Jesus speaks of persecution by ungodly states and
of Christians who fall away and betray their believing friends.
I know two men, one in Pakistan and one in Indonesia, who give
leadership to Christians who are facing persecution. Towns are
destroyed specifically because they are Christian towns. Threats
from the government and from neighbors are up front, part of the
culture, deliberate. It has been pointed out that in the twenty
centuries of the history of the church, the twentieth century
has seen more persecution of believers than the other nineteen
combined, whether in countries that are or were communist, in
countries that are under the thumb of Islam, or in countries dominated
by greedy materialism. There are any number of ways and reasons
that real faith is persecuted. But Jesus is saying persecution
doesn't mean that the world has spun out of control, that God
has lost his love for us or his ability to protect and care for
his own. It doesn't mean that the end is about to happen and we
should throw off all other responsibilities. Don't draw wrong
conclusions from such things.
Love grown cold
Lastly, Jesus makes a chilling statement in verse 12: "Because
of the increase of wickedness [lawlessness], the love of most
will grow cold." Hardness regarding God's law, his truth,
his best intentions for humanity, resisting what is good because
God says it is good, doesn't lead to freedom or fun. Folks who
take standards seriously, who live circumscribed lives because
they reject unrighteousness, get accused of being loveless, uptight,
and prudish. But Jesus says it's just the opposite. It is the
ones who make themselves a law, who deliberately violate and challenge
God's truths, who harden themselves in their lawlessness, who
worship only themselves, who lose all humility-those are the people
whose love grows cold. But even that is not a sign that the world
has spun out of God's control. It's observable, we can see the
destruction that lovelessness does to families. We might wonder,
but we shouldn't draw wrong conclusions from it.
What is the alternative then? Jesus is saying these things are
not indicative of the end. The world will have these contractions
in different places and at different times, although the whole
world doesn't experience tribulation the same way at the same
time. Most people have seasons of life in which they go through
some awful struggle, interspersed with periods of relative relief
from struggle. What should we conclude from the observations that
these contractions will take place, that the age between Jesus'
first and second coming will not be filled with happiness, comfort,
and predictability?
The testimony of standing firm
Verses 13-14 are the Lord's word to us in this: "...But
he who stands firm to the end will be saved." He doesn't
mean the end of the age; he means the end of the test, either
the end of your life or the end of the contraction. The choice
we have when faced with an earthquake or warfare or betrayal,
when the light grows dim, when the world is confusing, when hearts
get hard, when there is opposition, is to move toward the gospel
or away from it. We can let the circumstances dominate our thinking
and remove ourselves from active faith in God, or we can say under
the most difficult circumstances, "I need God more than ever."
"...And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the
whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end
will come." The difficulty can make us more outspoken in
our faith. We can go toward the places in the world where there
is war and famine and difficulty and hurt. We can go with relief
to the suffering. We can go with a message of hope to those in
need. Preaching the gospel, telling the good news, is saying that
this is not all that's true, that Jesus suffered so that we don't
have to suffer death and loss, that the struggles we have in this
life are meaningful. Then other people will see us standing tall,
confident in the Scriptures, in love with those who are Christian
around us, trusting God more in hurtful times and speaking of
him more clearly.
Remember the famous dictum: "Preach the gospel at all times.
When necessary, use words." It is our very enduring and standing
firm that makes the point that there's something invisible at
work, that what our Lord promised is true: He will never leave
or forsake us; Immanuel, born in Bethlehem, is "God With
Us," our companion. He comforts us. He is merciful and good.
His love never fails. His strengthening hand is never taken from
us. He is faithful and can be trusted. Enduring and growing strong
in painful circumstances is the greatest of all testimonies to
the gospel.
That's why Paul says in Romans 5:3-5, "Not only so, but we
also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering
produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character,
hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured
out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given
us." The suffering, difficulty, confusion, questions, uncertainties,
and loss all become occasions for God to make us stronger, more
beautiful, more like him. It's similar to the way gold is refined
in fire (see Malachi 3:2-3); the fire brings the impurities to
the top so the gold can become more pure and beautiful. The world
is tumultuous, unpredictable, and frightening at times, yet those
are exactly the conditions in which real Christianity can display
itself, in which faith can grow, in which character can become
manifest.
The alternative Jesus offers is doing good in the Lord when other
people can see only what is hard and wrong and terrible. Let's
go to the places where we're needed. Let's offer help to people
who are beaten down. Where there's an earthquake, war, or persecution,
that's where we ought to be, because we have something to offer.
At the end of the discourse Jesus speaks of how he will surprise
his followers when the judgment at the end is offered. He has
separated his own from those who don't know him in Matthew 25:34-36:
"Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.' Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we [do these things]?'"
The King will reply, "When you went to Tijuana in the spring
of 1999 and gave piggyback rides to kids with dirty diapers and
built houses for poor people. When you went from where it was
safe to where it was not safe. When you got involved with people
who were failing under the pressure of this world. When you were
there for them and clothed them and visited them and fed them
and gave them what they needed. When you spoke to them of the
good news and didn't let the good news get lost in all of the
cacophony of other voices. When you did it for them, you did it
for me."
Scripture quotations are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers.
Catalog No. 4608
Matthew 24:1-14
Second Message
Steve Zeisler
April 18, 1999
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