THE KING TELLS HIS LOYAL SUBJECTS
HOW TO ESCAPE THE
COMING JUDGMENT ON HIS CITY
(Suggested Reading: Chapter 21)
What does God think of what we offer to Him? The answer is given us here for "the rich and poor meet together. The Lord is the Maker of them all." Prov. 22:2. The rich cast their gifts into the Temple treasury. A certain poor widow cast in two mites— the minimum amount which could be contributed. Since both offered their money to the Lord, only the Lord could evaluate the offerings. He said, "all these have of their abundance cast in unto the offerings of God, but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had." This widow appears at the Temple near the close of the Lord's life, as Anna did at the beginning. Anna served the Lord directly. The widow here contributed her money so others could serve Him. She displays great devotedness of heart. The Temple was adorned with precious gifts which only the rich could supply. But both the Temple and the rich gifts adorning it came under the Lord's judgment— "as for these things which ye behold, the days will come in which there shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down." Thus were the gifts of the rich destroyed, but the gift of the poor widow has been imperishably recorded in the Word of God.
The Lord Warns His Own so They Will Not Be Trapped in Jerusalem When It Is Besieged—21:7-24
The Temple was the very heart of Judaism. The rich Jews from foreign nations poured their wealth into it so that it became the St. Peter's of the ancient world. Little wonder, then, that its prophesied judgment raised the question, when will this happen? What sign will be given to warn us that such a solemn thing is about to take place? For the Temple could not fall unless Jerusalem did. The Lord knew this, too. In the next chapter, He will be betrayed. With the Cross before Him, His desire is to protect His own from the judgment that is to fall on those who will crucify Him. He answers their questions so they will know how to escape the wrath to come. "Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end." Beautiful love of Jesus to be thinking of His own when everybody was about to turn against Him. Here are the Lord's warnings then:
Antichrists— The Lord's first warning concerns those who would come in His Name— after He had returned to His Father and before the destruction of the Temple. Such should say "I am Christ." The Apostle John wrote, "Even now are there many antichrists" 1 John 2:18. Simon the sorcerer is an illustration— "to whom they all gave heed from the least to the greatest saying This man is the great power of God" Acts 8:10.
Wars and Riots— This refers to the period of war and insurrection following Nero's death two years before the Temple was destroyed.
Natural Disasters— Earthquakes head the list here. There was a huge one in Phrygia in A.D. 61. Vesuvius, the great volcano near Naples, erupted in A.D. 63, engulfing the twin cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in lava. Famines occurred in the reigns of Claudius and Nero.
Fearful Sights and Great Signs from Heaven— This is the subject of the historian Josephus' pen, which we would likely dismiss as the product of an overactive imagination if it were not for the Lord's own words. In The Wars of the Jews, Book 6, Chapter 5, he tells us of a star resembling a sword, which stood over the city, and a comet, which continued for a year, and also how, before sunset, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running about among the clouds and surrounding of cities.
Testimony and Persecution for Christ's Sake— In verses 12-19, we are given a summary of the events recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, so there is no point in going into detail here. Notice the apparent contradiction in the Lord's words in verses 16 and 18, however. In verse 16, He says they should be put to death in verse 18, that not a hair of their head should perish. This entirely agrees with His teaching to fear not those who kill the body and afterward can do no more. He looks beyond this to the resurrection of the body so His own can suffer no loss. These events the witness to Christ recorded in the Acts of the Apostles transpired before the destruction of the Temple, which neither Peter nor Paul, the two great Apostles of the Acts, lived to see.
The Roman Armies Encircling Jerusalem— This was the great and final sign which the Christians were to watch for. The other signs only indicated that the time of Jerusalem's destruction was near. A similar general warning, supplementing these signs, was the Epistle to the Hebrews, which encouraged the Jewish believers to cling to the kingdom which could not be moved. Eusebius tells us that the Church at Jerusalem was warned to flee the city by an oracle to their leaders— Epiphanius says by an angel. This may be, but all Scripture tells us is the Lord's warning to evacuate Jerusalem when the Roman armies approached. Remember that only forty years elapsed between the Lord's words here and the destruction of Jerusalem, so that His words would be fresh to two generations of believers. The record is clear that the entire Church fled Jerusalem and went to Pella. This mountainous city was under Agrippa's protection, and sheltered the Jewish Church until Jerusalem was destroyed. Jews were banned from the site of the city and its suburbs after its destruction. The first Jews who were granted permission to return to the area were the Christians, who evacuated the city and fled to Pella in obedience to the Lord's warning. Here they established a settlement— all that remained of once-populous Jerusalem, except the Roman soldiers of the famed Tenth Legion who were stationed in the area for many years.
The Time of the End—the Lord Warns the
Godly Jews of the Coming Day of the Last Crisis—21:25-38
The Lord's discourse is in two parts. The first part, which we have just considered, was a warning to the early Church to flee Jerusalem— which they heeded. The second part is prophetic, and unfulfilled as yet. It is a message aimed at the godly Jews, who will arise after the rapture of the Church and will pass through the period of great tribulation described in the Book of Revelation. Note how the Lord says, "this generation shall not pass away till all be fulfilled." That is the key— "till all be fulfilled." The Lord has in mind a continuous generation a generation— of men from a moral viewpoint— which continues without interruption from the time of His first advent to His second.
The Lord uses symbolism to depict the conditions which will prevail in the end times. His warnings of the coming destruction of Jerusalem were unsettling events on the earth; in that day, there will be signs in the heaven. The sun speaks of supreme authority, the moon of derived authority, the stars of lesser powers. Since the powers that be are ordained by God, the symbolism teaches us of unspecified judgments on governments great and small, without telling us who they are. These judgments produce distress of nations on the earth, men "ready to die through fear and expectation of what is coming on the habitable earth.”
This interpretation is confirmed by the Lord's words, "for the powers of heaven shall be shaken." Then the Lord appears in a cloud with power and great glory. "And every eye shall see Him and they also who pierced Him and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen." Rev. 1:7.
This is completely different from the Lord's coming for the Church. Here He is coming in judgment on the world, and we shall be with Him. That is why the Son of Man is said to appear with power and great glory after the powers of heaven are shaken. Now He appears, after overturning man's power and glory, to set up His earthly millennial kingdom. Hitler used to boast that his Third Reich would last a thousand years, because Satan planted the thought in his mind as a counterfeit of Christ's coming thousand year rule when he will be chained in the bottomless pit Rev. 20:1-3. Depend upon it, God will never let any man rule the earth for a thousand years, except Christ!
The Lord now tells the parable of "the fig tree and all the trees"— the last parable in our Gospel. "The fig tree" is always Israel in Scripture; "all the trees" are the Gentiles, without specifying the nations involved. In this setting, the trees speak of powers, for trees are rooted in the earth and provide shelter, fruit, etc., for man. Israel's fate, then, is mixed up with "all the trees"— that is, she is involved with the Gentiles as the time of the end approaches. These conditions already apply in the world, so that we, as well as the godly Jews soon to come, know that the end is approaching rapidly. Consider Israel's return to the land after a two thousand-year exile, for example— partially fulfilling Isa. 18. In this connection, some Christians are puzzled at the Lord's words, "Jerusalem shall be trodden down by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled" v. 24. Now it is true that Jerusalem, at the time of writing, is in Jewish hands. But the force of the Lord's words is not that the Jews shall never hold it temporarily, but rather that the Gentile powers will subjugate it at their pleasure "until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled." The proof that this is so is that present-day Jerusalem, declared the capital of Israel by the Knesset in 1980, will be attacked and overrun by the nations to the North and the South in the future Dan. 11:40-45. "The times of the Gentiles" began when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the Temple at Jerusalem and will end when Christ sets up His earthly kingdom.
The Lord summarizes His teaching in verses 28 and 31. "When these things begin to come to pass"— that is, divine judgments on the great powers of the world, "then look up, for your redemption draweth nigh." "So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass"— that is, Israel and the Gentile nations in the melting pot with Israel beginning to bud again— "the kingdom of God is near." That will be earth's summertime when men can rightfully exclaim "blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God." The Lord assures men that though heaven and earth shall pass away, His words shall not pass away. There are "great earthquakes" and "great signs" 21:11 "great distress" 21:23 but the end is "great glory" 21:27. Although victory is assured, the righteous are exhorted to be watchful as to their personal lives and not to fall into a trap like "them that dwell on the face of the whole earth." The expression "them that dwell on the earth" is a technical one found in the Book of Revelation. It describes those who are living in the world after the rapture of the Church. They are viewed as a special class those who have heard the Gospel call to the Father's House but ignored it, choosing this world instead as their home. This class can now be identified. They are the ones whose hearts will fail with fear when God begins to judge the world in earnest. Even now they are becoming apprehensive, as many Christians can testify.
Many years ago I had an appointment with an engineer in the company for which I worked. At the end of the meeting, I rose up to gather together the charts and tables we had been working on. Without any warning, he said to me, "I suppose you think that when I die, I'll go straight to hell!" Now I had never spoken to this man about Christ or the Gospel. It was because our relationship was strictly a business one that I was so surprised, and so I said nothing. He continued on: "I suppose you would like to telephone me at two o'clock in the morning and ask me if I'm saved. I know people who would do that. Maybe you belong to them.”
I said a few brief words in reply, and left him a Gospel tract I had written. Some time later, he returned it with a remark: "That is well written and would prove your point if I could accept the Bible you quote from as being authoritative." So I gave him an article later by a Harvard mathematician purporting to demonstrate scientifically that the Bible is inspired. Now, I do not believe this can be proved, for if it could, faith would not be our guiding principle. The article in question was really a probability statement and, as an intelligent man, my engineer associate would recognize this. It should at least have made him pause and consider. But what did he do? He returned the article to me and said, "I always thought Christianity was a religion of faith, not of reason." My reply was, "Bob, I gave you faith and you demanded reason; when I gave you reason, you demanded faith. You won't have Christ, no matter how He is presented to you.”
The sequel to this incident occurred some time later. We were walking together to work one day when he unburdened himself. Here was a man who belonged to "them that dwell on the earth"— the class of men who have heard the Gospel, refused it, chose the world instead of heaven, and then are terrified when God begins to shake their choice. He burst into a long lament over what was happening in the world. "It's the decline and the fall of the Roman Empire all over again," he said, "even to the reappearance of the barbarians— the Chinese Reds. It isn't worthwhile even to bring children into this world and educate them," he cried.
And so he went on. Oh, that he had been like the people at the close of our chapter who came early in the morning to hear words of life from the Lord of glory!