Andrew Meredith’s Reviews > Paradise Restored: A Biblical Theology of Dominion > Status Update

Scripture's prophecies are not codes for us to crack. If we find ourselves scanning the latest news headlines for clues to interpret Ezekiel, Daniel, Matthew 24, or Revelation, we are doing our hermeneutics wrong.

The first important thing to point out when looking at Jesus's discussion of the "great tribulation" in Matthew 24 is that Jesus gave His disciples an approximate timeperiod for when it would take place. "This generation will not pass away until all these things take place" (v.34). Which means that everything up to verse 34 took place before the generation then living passed away.

Witnessing to all nations? Yes. The Tribulation? Yes. The coming of Christ on the clouds? Yes. Even the stars falling??? Yes (we'll get to that, don't you worry). Christ declared that it would all take place within a 40 year span. Do you believe Him?

Many Christians today honestly don't, and so they play games with the word "generation" instead. Sure, it appears 43 times in the New Testament (and even more than that in the LXX), and in every case without exception it always carries the exact same common meaning, that is the people currently alive in a given 40 year span. BUT HERE, and here alone in all of Scripture, it means something else. Here Jesus (and Matthew) are using it figuratively, you see, to mean a very, very, very long time (at least 2000 years and counting) or perhaps it means "race" as in the "Jewish race."

[Andrew's Thought Bracket: Of course, these expositors happen to do the same with "the time is near" (Rev 1:2; 22:10), "I am coming soon" (Rev 22:12), "the end is at hand" (1 Pt 4:7), "the day is drawing near" (Heb 10:25), "the Judge is standing at the door" (Ja 5:9), and "your salvation is drawing near" (Lk 21:28). Imagine if my waiting friend texts me, "How close are you?" And I respond, "I am coming soon," then "I am near," then "I am standing at the door right now," when what I really mean is, "I'll be there in a couple thousand years at least." (I genuinely thought they would pick up on the subtle nuance of my figurative language.)

One wonders how the Holy Spirit could possibly be more clear about a seismic judgment event coming upon Israel really, really soon after the NT was written? If we can just somehow insert two full millenia and counting into each one of these rather clear temporal statements, than words have no meaning and just do whatever you want with any text.

But "a day is to the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years are but a day!" So that line gives God carte blanche opportunity to practice what we would normally consider to be lying? "Did I say 'soon'? Well, I meant 'soon' for me, not you, and I'm timeless after all. So, take heart! Hold on tight to the faith during this current intense persecution at the hands of the Jews. I'll be there to save you soon in a couple thousand years."]

To further set the stage in understanding The Great Tribulation, we must look at the context of Matthew 24 to determine what Jesus was talking about in the first place. We find that He was answering very specific questions. The chapter begins with the disciples praising the beauty of the Temple and Jesus foretelling that it would soon be completely destroyed. The disciples then ask Him, “When will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming and of the consummation of the age?"

The destruction of the Temple, the coming of the Messiah in judgment upon the covenant breakers and vindication of the faithful, and the end of the age (note: not the world), were all foretold by the OT prophets and therefore were expected to soon take place (Dan 9:26; Mal 3-4; cf. Mat 3:7-12). So, when Jesus obviously references the apocalyptic events without showing any intention of carrying them out yet like He was foretold to do, His disciples want to know when they will be and what will be some signs to look for that they are about to happen.

Jesus obliges His disciples by giving them not just one, but four signs. He begins by warning them about what won't be signs: false messiahs, wars (both hot and cold), and natural disasters. These sadly common events have always been interpreted as portents of impending doom, but Jesus warns that, though they will continue to take place as they have since the Fall, they are not to be taken as immediate signs of the end.

The four signs He gives, in order are:

1.) Intensifying persection (v.9): His followers would face escalating opposition from all nations eventually culminating in a systematic effort to wipe them out. This would prove true as the young Church would face intense persecution under Emperor Nero and lose many of it's Apostles to martyrdom, including both Paul and Peter, in close succession before 70 AD.

2.) Rampant Apostasy (vv.10-13): The intense persecution would cause many early converts to abandon the Faith, denounce Jesus, and turn back. The book of Hebrews, written during the very thick of this prophecy's fulfillment, warns repeatedly of what will happen to those who don't persevere to the end.

3.) Roman Empire-Wide Evangelism (v.14): Here's yet another place where modern translation bias leads readers astray. "And the εὐαγγέλιον of the Kingdom shall be preached throughout the whole οἰκουμένη as a witness to all ἔθνος and then the τέλος will come." εὐαγγέλιον I've discussed at length earlier. οἰκουμένη is not "earth" or "world," it was the common word for the Greco-Roman World (i.e., the Roman Empire). ἔθνος is ethnic people groups, or families. And τέλος means fulfillment.

So, "The announcement of the reign of Christ the King shall be proclaimed throughout the whole Roman Empire as a testimony to all people groups, and then the fulfillment shall come" (the fulfillment of "the consummation of the age" under discussion). This happened, and the Scriptures themselves bear witness to it.

Colossians 1:5-6: "The εὐαγγέλιον which has come to you, just as in all the οἰκουμένη also it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing."

Romans 10:18: "Have they never heard [the εὐαγγέλιον]? To the contrary, the voice has gone out into all the Land and their words to the ends of the οἰκουμένη."

(See Colossians 1:23 and Romans 1:8 for indication of an even more universal announcement of the Kingdom.)

4.) The Abomination of Desolation (vv.15-18): "Therefore when you see the Abomination of Desolation, spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains..." The last and most specifically close-proximity sign of the bunch. Here Jesus cites Daniel 9:26-27 which foretells the coming of armies to destroy Jerusalem and the Temple.

There has been much debate about what this "Abomination of Desolation" was or is, but the Daniel quotation in Matthew and the parallel passage in Luke make it clear (Lk 21:20-21; which helpfully doesn't leave it to the readers to [mis]understand): “But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is at hand. Then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those who are in the midst of the city must leave, and those who are in the countryside must not enter the city." ("Abomination of Desolation" = "surrounded by armies").

Once again, this historically happened. Caught up in an intense apocalyptic fervor around 68 AD, Jerusalem violently rebelled against Rome. In respose, Emperor Nero sent an army of 60,000 soldiers (led by Vespasian) to surround and lay seige to the city, but soon afterwards (June 9, 68), Nero himself died, which threw the Roman army (and all of the οἰκουμένη itself) into confusion as four Roman officials (including Vespasian) all declared themselves Emperor in rapid succession.

With the empire in upheaval, literally tearing itself apart at the seams, Vespasian's seige army withdrew from the walls of Jerusalem to regroup and determine their next course of action. All of this was interpreted by the Jews as a miraculous sign from God that their time to take the world was now. Over the next few months, thousands upon thousands of Jews flooded into Jerusalem armed and ready for war against a bewildered Rome. Even schismatic, hermetic groups like the Essenes abandoned their wilderness cloisters and headed toward Jerusalem to join the cause.

But not the Jewish Christians. They expected the fall of the city and the end of the Temple (they had already begun to sell their property in and around Jerusalem as early as Acts 4-5). Because of their Lord's warning in this very passage, they recognized the sign of the times and, as early Christian historians noted, they fled Jerusalem, moving out while everyone else was streaming in, and headed north, eventually ending up in Pella.

This was the last chance to escape. Emperor Vespasian successfully seized control of Rome and, not forgetting Jerusalem, sent his general Titus to turn the army around and march back to finish the job.

By all accounts the seige was a horrific, grueling affair for both sides, and when the now blood-hungry Romans finally broke through the walls, they took out their pent-up vengeance on anyone and everyone that they could find within, massacring everyone indiscriminately. They then tore down the walls, annihilated and burned the Temple, and began hunting Jews down all over Judea. Over a million Jews were killed, almost a million more were sold into slavery, and the whole of Judea now lay smoldering in desolate ruin. This was The Great Tribulation, "the days of vengeance," and with it the Old Covenant came to it's cataclysmic, bloody end.

"Let Him be crucified! Let Him be crucified! His blood be on us and on our children!" - Matthew 27:22-25