This Generation.
JESUS had spoken of the destruction of the temple; of wars and rumors of wars; of famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes; of persecutions, afflictions and death for the faithful; of the arising of false christs and false prophets; of the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom in all the world, for a witness to all nations; of the setting up of the abomination of desolation in the holy place; of the great tribulation which is to come upon the apostate nation; of seeing the sign of the Son of man in heaven, and His coming as the lightning in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory; and of His sending. His angels to gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. And then He added, “Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled. Heaven arid earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away.”
Now the question is, What did Jesus mean by “this generation”? Did He mean the ordinary lifetime of a man? Did He mean that the people who were alive at that time would not die till all these things were fulfilled? This certainly could not be His meaning, for all those people passed away nearly eighteen centuries ago, and yet most of the things He mentioned have not yet taken place The temple was indeed destroyed, and there were persecutions and afflictions, but the abomination of desolation was not yet been set up in the temple, and the Son of man has not yet come with His mighty angels, and the elect Jews have not yet been gathered. So Jesus must have meant something else, for His word must stand even though the heavens fall.
Now we must turn to the scriptures to see what He meant, for He would not use the word generation with a different meaning from what is found in scripture. We will ask you, then, to turn to two psalms to see how the word is used there.
In Psalm 12, a class of wicked people are spoken of who oppress the poor, and cause the needy to sigh. And in verse 7 we are told that the Lord will preserve these poor and needy; ones “from this generation forever.” Here, then, the word “generation” is used for a class, or race, of wicked men.
Now turn to Psalm 24. In verse 4 another class of people is spoken of: “He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart, who hath not lifted tip his soul to vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.” And in verse 6 it says, “This is the generation of them that seek Him,” etc. So if in Ps. 12 we have the “generation” of the wicked, in Ps. 24 we Kaye the “generation” of the righteous.
Now, turning back to the gospel of Matthew, we shall see that Jesus uses the word generation in the same sense; that is, for a class, or race of people. In chap. 23, speaking to the scribes and Pharisees, and those who were opposed to Him, He calls them a “generation of vipers,” and speaks of the judgment of God that would come upon them for their wickedness, and then adds, “Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.” He did not mean merely those who lived in that day, but He meant the race, or generation of the Jews who would not have Him as King. And in chap. 24, where He says, “This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled,” He means the same people—the wicked race of the Jews who would not have Him as their King
And how true His words are! for we see this race, or generation of people, the Jews, all around us. God has preserved them for, blessing when Jesus comes. It has been said that the preservation of the Jews is a standing miracle. And indeed it is very wonderful how God has preserved them through all these centuries, even though they have no country or land where they can dwell by themselves. God is keeping them for a future day of blessing on the earth when Jesus comes to reign over them. God’s, judgment will fall on the generation of the wicked, but He will work a remnant who will fear His name, so that they will have “clean hands” and a “pure heart, and they will be counted as “the generation of them that seek Him.”
I hope my young reader is of those who now fear God, and believe on His Son Jesus Christ, the Saviour. Happy are all they who put their trust in Him.
ML 07/03/1904