Matt. 24.
The Beginning of Sorrows.
WE have already seen that after the Lord Jesus comes, and takes the church away, the Jews will come into prominence again. Some of them will be converted, and led to look for the coming of the true Christ, while the unbelieving mass will be deceived by false Christs and false prophets. This will be a time when the true hearted will have to suffer for Christ’s name. But it will also be a time when the nation will pass through terrible trial and sorrow on account of their sins, especially the sin of having rejected Jesus.
Now Jesus prophesies of this beforehand, so that the faithful ones may know what to expect, and thus not be deceived. He says to them, “Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that ye be not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes in diverse places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.”
Well, if these are but the beginning, what must the end be! Alas! alas! for the poor Jews, when their time of great sorrow comes!
Perhaps about seven years will run their course between the time Jesus comes into the air, to take the church away, and the time when He will appear in glory to the Jews, to deliver and bless the godly ones amongst them, and to destroy the others. During this seven years is the time when these things mentioned in Matt. 24, will mostly be fulfilled. The second three and a half years of the seven, will be the time of their greatest sorrow; and what Jesus calls the “beginning of sorrows” will probably be in the first three and a half years. It will be then that the tokens of the coming storm will show themselves. The “wars,” “famines,” “pestilences,” and “earthquakes” will be like the first big drops of rain that precede the terrible cloud-burst which works such fearful devastation.
Perhaps at some time you have been in the field, or some distance away from the house, when you saw a great storm approaching. You saw the great black clouds coming rolling on; you saw the lightnings, the great fireworks of the heavens, playing on the clouds; you heard the noise of the great wind, and the thunders beginning to roar over your head, and you fled to the house, reaching it, perhaps, just as the wind came, and the first drops began to fall. How glad you were to be in the house before the great storm burst upon you in its mad fury!
Ah! dear children, a more terrible storm than that is coming. Is it not well to be sheltered from it? If you flee to Jesus you will find Him a shelter from the coming storm of God’s wrath and judgment. Do not be like the Jews who rejected Jesus, and who have no shelter from the storm. Flee to Jesus now.
ML 01/24/1904