Signposts Along the way to Judgment Day

Matthew 24:1-14

Jesus Predicts the Destruction of the Temple

1 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. 2 And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

The Signs of the Times and the End of the Age

3 Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"

4 And Jesus answered and said to them: "Take heed that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many. 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

9 "Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake. 10 And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another. 11 Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. 12 And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. 13 But he who endures to the end shall be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.

These are the signposts along the long way to judgment given by our Lord to the apostles and recorded for our edification.  The end times as we are so fond of calling these things began with the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD as prescribed by Jesus in verses 1 and 2, telling the hearers to expect the total leveling of the grand temple that was no longer being used to worship God in the spirit of holiness.  Because the people of God rejected Him and His Christ, the temple that they put their faith in (Matthew 23:16-17, 21-22) instead of the Lord of the temple was to be taken down (1 Kings 9:6-7), stone by stone until only a pile of rubble remained as it happened before when Israel was taken into bondage in Babylon (Ezra 5:12).  Then the times leading to the end of time after the judgment day was put in motion with signposts along this way.  The apostles asked Jesus in private about the exact time of the end; they asked specifically about the sign of His coming back and the sign of the end of the age with the consummation of all things.  His answer began not with details of the end or of His return, but with a warning to the readers long after the disciples of that moment were dead.  He warned us as we read these words to look out for those who would deceive us by claiming to be the Christ come back as cults have and continue to do like the so called witnesses of Jehovah and some others in the past century.  He then told us the signposts had pictures of endless wars and threats of war as we have seen over history and increasingly even now.  These latter days began with the razing of the temple and only intensify and increase in frequency as the end looms nearer.  There will also be increased famines, diseases, and earthquakes throughout the world as we also bear witness of in our present time.  Jesus told us not to label this as the end, however, but as the mere beginning of the terrible end of His judgment on the world when we all will face Him on His unforeseen and unpredictable return (Matthew 24:27, Hebrews 9:27-28) with great sorrow for not believing Him and repenting to trust His word and works in saving faith.  Those who busy themselves with nailing down the exact date through various methods of guessing only distract themselves and others from the proclaiming of the gospel to rescue lost souls from the wages of sin (Romans 6:23) and to escape eternal suffering and death.  

Those who live in these times from then to the end will suffer increasingly pressing times we call tribulations and some will be killed as well as hated for this gospel message holding us all accountable to God for our sin.  We will not be spared such tribulation and more will only find they are taken out of it by death alone and not just escape by a rescue mission out of the worst of this tribulation time.  Instead, those with the testimony of Jesus Christ will be persecuted and hated for the name of Jesus ().  Some will even entice others to stop witnessing as a roadblock leading to apostasy in their being offended to avoid the suffering for Christ’s sake and name and even betray those standing firm on the truth.  We see this more in these present times in the West where standing even for godly living against the culture results more and more in hatred of us which will eventually lead to harsher persecution even to death at some point.  The lawlessness predicted here is clearly seen in the coldness and loss of love between people, but the faithful do not join in this.  No, we choose to follow Christ by loving others in spite of the opposition and oppression, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God in Christ and bearing witness of Him to all the world and His transforming grace until the end.  This is how we remain faithful and true to Him in the tribulation leading to the consummation of all things and not be sidetracked in determining dates, seasons, signs, and times (Mark 13:32, 33, 35-37) of the end as Acts 1:7-8 tells us.  We read the signposts along the way to judgment day but are more concerned with being about our Father’s business than being sidetracked with the preoccupation of knowing or trying to predict the end times and the return of Christ.  Yes, we do not need to be consumed with these things, but prepared and busy about our Father’s business of proclaiming the gospel.