Series

As he was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!"

[2] "Do you see all these great buildings?" replied Jesus. "Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down."

[3] As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John and Andrew asked him privately, [4] "Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?"

[5] Jesus said to them: "Watch out that no one deceives you. [6] Many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am he,' and will deceive many. [7] When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. [8] Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.

[9] "You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. [10] And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. [11] Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.

[12] "Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. [13] All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.

[14] "When you see 'the abomination that causes desolation' standing where it does not belong--let the reader understand--then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. [15] Let no one on the roof of his house go down or enter the house to take anything out. [16] Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. [17] How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! [18] Pray that this will not take place in winter, [19] because those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now--and never to be equaled again. [20] If the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would survive. But for the sake of the elect, whom he has chosen, he has shortened them. [21] At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or, 'Look, there he is!' do not believe it. [22] For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and miracles to deceive the elect--if that were possible. [23] So be on your guard; I have told you everything ahead of time.

[26] "At that time men will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. [27] And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens.

[28] "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. [29] Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. [30] I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. [31] Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.

[32] "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. [33] Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. [34] It's like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.

[35] "Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back--whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. [36] If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. [37] What I say to you, I say to everyone: 'Watch!' "

No, I am not like Chicken Little who ran around the barn yard screaming that the sky was falling. The world is coming to an end. Contrary to most secular people’s beliefs, human society is not going to just keep going for millions of years into the future. History had a beginning, when God created this world, and it will have an end. World events are moving inexorably toward a predetermined conclusion under the sovereign hand of Almighty God.

As Jesus and His men were leaving the Temple area, one of them pointed out the huge stones used in the building, and seemed pretty impressed with them. And, in fact, the stones used in the Temple, and especially in the walls that built up the whole Temple area, were really huge. But Jesus said something that shocked them: Not one of these stones will be left on top of another. So a little later, four of the disciples asked him privately, Mark 13:4, “Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?”

In Mark’s gospel, it sounds like these two questions are essentially the same, but in Matthew, we can see that they really asked two different questions. Matthew 24:3, "Tell us," they said, "when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?" Mark didn’t bother to separate these two questions out because the Jews could not imagine the Temple being destroyed before the end of the world, so they probably thought of these two events as happening at the same time.[1] But in Jesus’ answer, we discover that these two events do not come at the same time, but rather, as history has proved, they are separated by at least 2,000 years. To make things even more confusing, what Jesus says is not in neat chronological order, where first He talks about the destruction of the Temple, and then He shifts gears and talks about His return. Rather, these two events are all mixed in together in what He says. So I’m going to take them out of the order in which Mark reports them, and try to treat them more or less chronologically.[2]

Mark 13:14-17, "When you see 'the abomination that causes desolation' standing where it does not belong--let the reader understand--then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. [15] Let no one on the roof of his house go down or enter the house to take anything out. [16] Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. [17] How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers!”

I love Mark’s little editorial phrase, “let the reader understand.” Don’t we wish we could! The “abomination that causes desolation” is a very puzzling phrase that has mystified scholars for centuries.[3] Here’s one strong possibility: When the pagan Romans sacked Jerusalem and stood in the Temple and tore it down block by block, that could certainly fit the description of an abomination that caused the Holy Place to be deserted and desolate. There may be other interpretations as well, but I don’t have time to go into them. [4]

Why did God allow the Temple to be destroyed? Was this just another instance of secular men interfering in the plan of God for history? Not at all. Jesus had come. The Lamb of God had offered Himself as the perfect Sacrifice for the sins of all humanity. There was no longer any need for the entire sacrificial system that found its culmination in the Temple. All those sacrifices merely pointed to the one great Sacrifice that Jesus would make on the cross, and now they were finally and completely fulfilled. So it was necessary for the Temple sacrifices to stop, because otherwise, we would have had two God-ordained means of dealing with sin co-existing side by side with each other—the Temple sacrifices and the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus’ sacrifice was better, so the Temple had to go.[5]

Some of the signs that Jesus mentions seem to be for both time frames—both sooner and later.

Mark 13:5, “Jesus said to them: ‘Watch out that no one deceives you. [6] Many will come in my name, claiming, “I am he,” and will deceive many.’” In the first century, there were any number of men who claimed to be the Messiah, and attracted small followings until they petered out. The book of Revelation describes a much more effective imposter, called the Beast. This person appears to have had a fatal head wound, but it was healed. People will be so amazed at this that they will follow him and even worship him.

Mark 13:7, “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. [8] Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.” There was a war between the Jews and the Romans, which resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem and the effective destruction of the Jewish homeland. But of course, that was not the last war on earth. There have been many since then, including two in the last century that engulfed most of the world’s nations.

Jesus said, Mark 13:19, “…those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now--and never to be equaled again.” Certainly, the time of the destruction of Jerusalem did bring terrible distress to the people of Judea. In 70 A.D., the Roman general Titus, who would later be Emperor, laid siege to Jerusalem. Jesus had warned people to flee to the countryside, but many of them crowded into the city, and were starved to death in the siege. Josephus reports that 97,000 people were taken captives, and over a million either starved or were killed in the fighting.[6]

There have been wars and rumors of wars for the last 2,000 years since Christ left. There have been earthquakes and famines all over the world ever since then. These signs are the just beginning of birth pains[7], meaning that they assure us the End is coming, but they are not the End.

The book of Revelation also describes a coming time of terrible distress, called the Tribulation, just prior to the return of Christ, and that will be a lot worse than what happened in Jerusalem in 70 A.D.

Mark 13:9-13, “You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. [10] And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. [11] Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit. [12] Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. [13] All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.” The first believers were persecuted both by the Jews, who saw them as a cult, and by the Romans, who saw them as rebels because they would not worship the Emperor. Jesus said that the lines of loyalty to Him would run right through the middle of families, and that was unfortunately true.

That kind of persecution is still going on today in many parts of the world, particularly in areas that are dominated by fundamental Muslims. It is a capital offense for a Muslim to become a follower of Christ in some countries, just preaching the gospel can get you in very serious trouble, and very often it is a family member who reports Christians to the authorities.

So some of the “signs” Jesus mentions would happen in the lifetime of the disciples, rather soon, and some would happen later, all through history, and increasing in intensity right before the return of Christ.

He also mentions some signs that seem to apply mostly to the later time before He comes back.

Mark 13:19, “…those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now--and never to be equaled again. [20] If the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would survive. But for the sake of the elect, whom he has chosen, he has shortened them.

Some of this is probably figurative language, but it’s hard to tell how much is figurative, and how much should be taken literally. Many of these phrases are found in the Old Testament and repeated in Revelation. The point is to try to communicate something that no one can conceive, namely, the Great and Terrible Day of the Lord. It’s going to be the worst time in the history of the world, right before Jesus returns.

Then Jesus says, Mark 13:28-31, "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. [29] Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. [30] I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. [31] Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.”

This is a difficult passage (in fact, the whole chapter has been described as the most difficult chapter to understand in all of Mark!) The problem is that it sounds a lot like Jesus is saying that He would be back very soon, within the lifetimes of His disciples. And in fact, the early Church did tend to believe that Jesus would return in their lifetime. But He obviously has not come yet, so how do we understand this? Here are two ways to go about it that appeal to me somewhat, and there are many other possible interpretations that have been suggested.

First, what is the meaning of the word “generation”? “This generation will not pass away until all these things have happened.” The word “generation” can mean the people then living, or a time-span of roughly forty years. The word can also mean “race”, as in the human race. So if we take it that way, Jesus is saying the human race will not die out before all these things happen.

Another way to understand this is to say that most of the things Jesus talked about as signs of the end—the abomination of desolation, deceivers, persecution, wars, rumors of wars, famine, days of terrible distress—all of that did happen in the first century. There is still more of them to come, but they did start happening even then.

But here’s what I think is the main point to be gotten from this whole passage, and this paragraph in particular. We live between the times. The kingdom of God has broken in to the kingdom of this world. The King has come, and He has brought with Him all the powers of the Age to come. He has shattered the power of Satan, has defeated sin and death, and has inaugurated the kingdom of God.

But the kingdom is not yet fully here. We still deal with sin and death; we are still told to pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We live in that awkward time of tension between the “already” and the “not yet.”

We see that tension in this passage. On the one hand, we are told Mark 13:7, “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed…the end is still to come. [8] … There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.” And Mark 13:10, “the gospel must first be preached to all nations.” On the other hand, we hear Jesus say, Mark 13:29, “when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door.” So while we know there is a lot of work to do that will probably take decades if not centuries to accomplish, at the same time we are supposed to live as though Jesus could return any minute. Both are true. We have to live in that tension between the times.

This is the longest passage in Mark where Jesus talks about the end of the world as we know it. But He didn’t just give some clues to satisfy our curiosity about when that will happen—He also used the opportunity to exhort us as to how we are to live while we wait for the end. There are nineteen imperatives in vv.5-37[8], which goes to show how important this was to Jesus. That is really the emphasis in this chapter. I think many Christians get so caught up in the details of when Jesus is coming back that they miss the main point of the passage. Over and over again, Jesus says, Be on your guard! Be alert! Watch!

[5] Jesus said to them: "Watch out that no one deceives you. [6] Many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am he,' and will deceive many.

[21] At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or, 'Look, there he is!' do not believe it. [22] For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and miracles to deceive the elect--if that were possible. [23] So be on your guard; I have told you everything ahead of time.” We have a cultural proverb that says, “To be forewarned is to be forearmed.” If we know what’s coming, we can prepare for it. So we should constantly be on our guard against people who would lead us astray. The cults are one significant danger here. In many parts of the world where there are not well-grounded pastors and teachers, people start new religions almost every day, often building their doctrine[9] on some flimsy Scriptural basis, or on none at all, and people follow them because they are charismatic personalities.

If we are to be on our guard against deception, we will have to become much better students of the Bible. We really need to know what it says, so that when we hear false teaching, we will be able to detect that, and counter it with the truth. I made this point last week, but here it is again—study your Bible! Don’t be satisfied with a Sunday school level of understanding.

Jesus assures us that if we get arrested for being a Christian, we don’t need to worry about what we’ll say—the Holy Spirit will give us the right words at the time. But again, we need to be emotionally prepared for the possibility that people will hate us because we are followers of Christ. They may hate a caricature of Christianity that they have gotten from popular culture and the media, but they may also hate us for the truth. Certainly, in our culture, we are not likely to be arrested, but people do despise us for our insistence that there is only one way to be saved, and that is through Jesus Christ. That kind of “intolerance”, which they see as the unforgiveable sin, is the one thing that makes them intolerant of us.

Jesus concludes, Mark 13:13, “but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.” He’s not saying that if we stand firm in our faith against persecution until the moment we die, then we will be saved, as though that faithfulness somehow saves us. He’s saying that the true faith that saves will endure to the end of our lives. This is called the perseverance of the saints. Just as it is God who calls us and saves us, so it is God who keeps us. We are not able to save ourselves, and we are not strong enough to endure persecution to the end, but God is able to do both for us. But if you don’t know persecution is coming, it can catch you off guard, and you will not be emotionally prepared for it. Jesus is telling us to brace ourselves, so we’ll be ready if we catch flak for being a Christian.

Mark 13:32, "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. [33] Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. [34] It's like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.

Jesus has gone away for a while, but we don’t know for how long, and He has given us assigned tasks; we have work to do. Do not let Him find you sleeping when He returns. Be on your guard against lethargy, against being lazy, against that care-less attitude that doesn’t do your assigned work. Instead of looking for signs of the end, or instead of spending all your time debating the exact order of things at the end, Jesus is saying, get to work!

What is that work? Jesus mentioned it in v.10, “And the gospel must first be preached to all nations.” Or, as Matthew recorded it, Matthew 24:14, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” The master has gone away. We don’t know how long He’ll be gone, but He has given us some work to do while He’s gone. We are to take the good news that Jesus died for our sins to all nations—all ethnic groups in the world. At the moment, there are at least 6,000 people groups which do not have a viable church. There are still hundreds of millions of people who do not know even one Christian. So we pray—that God will send workers into His harvest field. And we give—as much as we can to missions and missionaries we know and support. And we go ourselves—perhaps on a short term mission trip, or maybe we even consider how God could use our skills on a long-term basis to advance His kingdom.

Because by doing all this, we can actually bring Christ back sooner. Peter wrote, 2 Peter 3:11-12, “Since everything will be destroyed in this way [by fire], what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives [12] as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming…” What in the world could we possibly do that would speed the coming of the day of God? We can preach the gospel to all ethnic groups on earth. I don’t fully understand all of the signs Jesus gives in this passage about when He will return, but this one makes sense to me. This one is pretty measurable: there has to be a church of Christ-followers in every people group in the world before Jesus comes back. The sooner we accomplish that task, the sooner He’ll come. Let’s get to work!

This word from Jesus to preach the gospel to the whole world is addressed to His followers, the servants the Master has left in charge of His household. But what if you do not yet belong to Him? If that’s the case, then the Bible has a different word for you. That word is repent and believe. Acknowledge that your life is not perfect, that you are not what God intended for you to be, and that you therefore need a Savior. Ask Jesus to be that for you. Trust what He did on the cross to make you right with God. And commit yourself to Him as fully as you know how.

[1] Walter W. Wessel, Mark, in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, vol.8, Frank E. Gaebelein, Gen. Ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishers, 1984), p.744.

[2] Many commentators believe that Mark has collected here sayings of Jesus on this subject that were originally delivered at various times and settings. The order may not reflect just one discourse on the End.

[3] We find it first in Daniel 12:11, “From the time that the daily sacrifice is abolished and the abomination that causes desolation is set up, there will be 1,290 days.” Most scholars believe this refers to Antiochus Epiphanes, ruler of the Seleucid Empire, who tried to stamp out the Jewish religion and establish Greek thought and religion in Palestine[3]. In 186 B.C., he offered a sacrifice of pork (which was an unclean animal for the Jews) on the altar in the Temple, set up public brothels in the Temple courts, and put up a statue of Zeus and ordered the Jews to worship it. That was one fulfillment of the prophecy in Daniel. But since Jesus uses this same phrase more than 150 years later, it must refer to something in the future as well.

[4] Some scholars believe that this phrase also applies to the many manifestations of evil that have the collective name Antichrist, who will take his final form in the days just prior to the return of Christ.

[5] Another reason why God had the Temple destroyed is hinted at in this passage—the disciples themselves may have been far too impressed with the size and splendor of that building. Granted, it was a pretty impressive structure for its day, but the comment by the disciples as they were leaving the Temple grounds gave Jesus the clue that they thought too much of it. It would have to go, so that their focus would be on the new temple God was building for His Spirit to live in. This one is built of living stones, the people of God, and is called the Church.

[6] Barclay, p.311.

[7] “To understand aright the significance of the metaphor, one must remember what motherhood meant for the Jewish woman. Without it her life was robbed of its goal and substance. The beginning of travail marked the end of the disgraced that rested on the childless woman, the approaching fulfillment of her strongest desire. It begins with grievous pains, but these pains are to her the promise of that for which she has waited with longing. Even so do the sufferings that come upon the disciples point to the end of the disgrace, which at present rests on them, through the fulfillment of the hope which gives their life its meaning.” Schlatter, Evang. Matt. p.699, quoted in C.E.B. Cranfield, The Gospel According to St. Mark, The Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary, C.F.D. Moule, General Editor (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1959), p.396.

[8] Wessel, p.742.

[9] Barclay has a very good analysis of five sources of heresy, p.314-316.