During the first Gulf War in 1990 and 1991 I noticed that many pastors in our communities changed their preaching during the conflict. No matter what they’d been preaching about prior to the conflict, it seemed like pastors throughout our nation decided that the conflict in Iraq would be a great time to preach about end times Bible prophecy. I especially noticed this on a local Christian radio station, as it seemed like every radio preacher was preaching about Babylon, the second coming of Jesus Christ and the battle of Armageddon.
I’ve since learned that times of war are like that. Because we feel so unsettled during times of war, many Christians find it difficult to resist the temptation to speculate about the significance of the war as it relates to biblical prophecy and the end of the age. This has been true of Christians of every generation going back 2,000 years. When World War I broke out, a Christian leader named C. I Scofield speculated that it was the start of Armageddon (Kyle, The Last Days Are Here Again p. 103). Many Christians said the same thing during World War II. In fact, identifying the "antichrist" and predicting the battle of Armageddon has become an American obsession, especially during times of war. And I’m sure that if our conflict in Iraq drags on for more than a couple of weeks, we’ll see the same thing happening.
Now I have mixed feelings about this trend. On the one hand I think it’s good for Christians to look forward to Jesus Christ’s second coming. He certainly promised to return again to this earth some day, and times of crisis remind us of his promise. It’s good for us to live our lives in light of that hope. Looking forward to Christ’s second coming gives us hope in the midst of despair, resolve in the midst of discouragement.
But on the other hand, living our lives too far into the future can lead us to neglect life in the now. You see, there’s a big difference between living our lives today in light of Christ’s second coming, and living our lives totally focused on the future.
Now we’ve been in a series through the New Testament book of Mark called following Jesus in the Real World. In this series we’ve been learning how to live as disciples of Jesus in our world today. The last few weeks we’ve been looking at the events of what Christians call holy week. It all started on Palm Sunday with Jesus coming into Jerusalem on a colt. We’ll be celebrating Palm Sunday in just two weeks, as we remember Jesus riding into the city of Jerusalem as Israel’s rightful king. Palm Sunday launches the start of holy week.
On his way to the Jewish temple the next day, Jesus cursed a fig tree because it failed to produce any figs. I suggested that when Jesus cursed of the barren fig tree he was symbolically pronouncing a statement of judgment on the Jewish temple. The barren fig tree was a symbol of the Jewish temple. Just as the fig tree had leaves but no figs, the temple was impressive looking from a distance but it wasn’t producing the fruit of a godly living among the people of Israel.
Once reaching the temple, Jesus caused a scene by overturning the tables of the money changers and caused the sacrifices to stop for a brief moment. I suggested that Jesus wasn’t cleansing the temple, but he was symbolically judging the temple. Just as the fig tree was cursed from the roots up for its barrenness, so also the temple was judged for its spiritual barrenness. The temple had outlived its usefulness, and now Jesus himself was the place to find forgiveness of sins.
The next day the religious leaders in the temple confronted Jesus, as they demanded to know where Jesus got his authority to make a scene in the temple. This leads to a series of debates with various groups of religious leaders, and in each debate Jesus comes out on top. We looked at two of those debates last week, the debate over whether Jews should pay Roman taxes and the debate over which of God’s command was the greatest.
Now you might notice that the common thread in these various events from chapter 11 on has been the temple. Today we’re going to start chapter 13 of Mark, where Jesus continues talking about the impending doom of the Jewish temple. In fact, I almost titled today’s message "Jesus Christ and the Temple of Doom." We’re going to see how we can live in the now.
1. The Sermon On the Mount of Olives (Mark 13:1-13)
Today we come to Jesus Christ’s sermon on the Mount of Olives. Today we’re going to look at the first half of this sermon in vv. 1-13, and then next week at the second half of the sermon. This is the longest teaching block in all of Mark’s story, which tells us that it’s pretty important.
Let’s start by looking at the first half of this sermon in vv. 1-13. Now the immediate question is, "What is Jesus talking about here?" It seems like Jesus starts this sermon talking about one thing, and ends it talking about something entirely different. That’s made this sermon notoriously difficult for Christians to understand and apply to their lives.
One possibility is that this whole sermon is about the Jewish revolt against Rome from 66 to 70 AD. And this event certainly appears to be where Jesus starts his sermon, since he’s been focusing on the destruction of the Jewish temple since chapter 11. As they leave the temple after a series of debates, Jesus and his closest disciples walk onto the Mount of Olives, where they can see the whole temple structure from a distance. Remember the temple was massive, probably the largest and most elaborate religious temple in the entire ancient world at this time. Jesus’ disciples are awestruck by the sight, as they admire the great buildings. This leads Jesus to predict the temple’s demise, that not one stone will be left on another.
This was literally fulfilled in 70 AD when the Roman general Titus and his soldiers leveled the temple. The Roman soldiers were led to believe there was secret gold hidden in the temple, so they literally tore it apart stone by stone, looking for the loot that wasn’t there. The Roman historian Josephus tells us that the fire they set to the temple burned for months, until nothing was left but a pile of rubble. So it makes sense that in this sermon Jesus is talking about the events of 70 AD, events that for us today are in the distant past. Christian author R. C. Sproul believes that this whole sermon is about that event.
The problem with this view is that other features of this sermon don’t fit the events of 70 AD. For instance later in the sermon in v. 24 Jesus will say that immediately after these events the sun will be darkened, the moon won’t give light, and stars will fall from heaven. Then in v. 26, Jesus says, "At that time you will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory." Clearly that didn’t happen in 70 AD unless Jesus is being really symbolic.
Because of the way this sermon ends, others think this whole sermon is referring to a future period of time immediately prior to the second coming of Jesus. This would make all the events Jesus talks about in this sermon still in the future for us rather than in the distant past. Many so-called Bible prophecy "experts" take this view. And certainly the sermon seems to end with Jesus Christ’s second coming.
But the problem with this view is that it rips this sermon out of it’s context. Since chapter 11 Jesus has been speaking about the temple that stood in his own day, that this temple would be destroyed, that it was barren like the fig tree. And this temple was destroyed in 70 AD, so to think that it’s referring to some future rebuilt Jewish temple seems farfetched. Certainly Mark’s original readers would’ve taken it as referring to the temple they saw destroyed by the Romans in their own time.
Others say that this section is referring to BOTH the Jewish rebellion of 70 AD and the future events surrounding Christ’s second coming. In this view, Jesus starts talking about the events of 70 AD, but at some point in the sermon he transitions to the second coming. This makes better sense with the context and with how the sermon ends with Christ’s return. Of course, the difficulty is figuring out when Jesus stops talking about 70 AD and when he starts talking about the second coming. Which features of this sermon lie in the distant past for us, and which features are still yet future?
Let me share with you some of my own thoughts on this. I think vv. 1-13--the section we’re focusing on today--refers primarily to the Jewish rebellion in 70 AD. The disciples of Jesus ask Jesus when the destruction of temple will occur and what the signs of the fulfillment will be. Jesus’ disciples think they’re asking Jesus one question, because in their mind the destruction of the temple can only mean one thing: That the end of the age had dawned. They can’t imagine the temple being demolished and the end of the age not following that event. But without realizing it, they’re asking two questions: When will the temple be destroyed and when will the end of the age come? Jesus knows that those are two very different questions, and he’s going to answer both.
So instead of giving them signs of the end of the age, in these verses Jesus focuses on what are NOT signs of the end. Jesus calls false messiahs, wars, earthquakes, famines and suffering "birth pains," not signs. In other words, these things are simply characteristic circumstances that we’re living in between Jesus Christ’s first coming and his second coming. And although we can expect them to get more intense as we draw nearer to his second coming--like birth contractions--the existence of these things is simply part of the age that we live in. So wars, false messiahs, earthquakes, famines, and persecutions are not signs of the end. They’re signs of the times, characteristics of life in between Christ’s first and second coming.
So when Mark’s readers see these kinds of things happening during the Jewish rebellion, Jesus is warning them not to freak out. We know from history that these things did happen in the years leading up to the Jewish rebellion. Many false messiahs stepped up and claimed to be the Christ. And we know from Roman historians that this period of Roman history was full of conflict and crisis. There were earthquakes throughout the empire, famines in the region of Judea. And during the Jewish war against Rome the Christians were caught in the middle.
Many Jewish leaders persecuted Christians because the Christians wouldn’t take up arms and join in rebellion against Rome. But the Romans thought Christians were part of the rebellion, so Christians were caught in the middle. Christians were hated by all, with many Romans claiming that they were guilty of horrible crimes. Christians were arrested and tortured, as the authorities tried to get them to turn on their Christian friends and family members.
Jesus is warning people alive at the Jewish rebellion against interpreting these things as signs that the second coming of Christ is imminent. These are simply signs of the times, part of what it means to live between Christ’s first coming and second coming. Things like war, false messiahs, natural disasters and persecution do not signal that the end is near, back then or today.
The closest we get to a sign of the end of the age comes in v. 10, where Jesus says, "The gospel must first be preached to all nations." Before the end of the age can come, the good news of Jesus Christ must be proclaimed to the ends of the earth. That still hasn’t happened yet, though of course we’re closer than we’ve ever been before. So I think vv. 1-13 refers to the entire church age, with special reference to the events of 70 AD.
Now I think vv. 14-23--which we’ll look at next week--refers to both the Jewish rebellion AND the future tribulation period. I think Jesus uses a layering technique in those verses where he uses language to refer to multiple events.
Let me give you just one modern day example of a phrase referring to more than one event. How many of you have heard the phrase, "The day that lives in infamy"? If you’re an American who’s over 55 years old you probably thought of December 7, 1941, the day the Japanese attacked pearl harbor. But many people have used the same phrase to describe the terrorist attacks of September 11th. Both events have been called "the day that lives in infamy." Pearl Harbor and September 11th are similar events, with both being unexpected, both leading us to war, both resulting in the deaths of thousands of Americans. So which event does the phrase "the day that lives in infamy" refer to? It depends on what you mean, because it can be legitimately applied to both.
I think this is how vv. 14-23 refers to both events, as we’ll see next week.
Finally, I think vv. 24-31--which we’ll also look at next week--refers exclusively to the second coming of Jesus Christ. I’m simply not persuaded at all by people who try to say that the sun being darkened, the stars falling from the sky, and everyone seeing Christ coming in the clouds is symbolic. That seems to stretch the language to the point where it no longer means anything.
Now if I’m on the right track in how I’m reading this, it appears to me that Jesus is trying to restrain his followers from speculating when the war breaks out. Jesus is worried that the war will cause his disciples to focus on the future so much that they’re no longer living in the now. So rather than giving us teaching that encourages us to speculate, Jesus is giving us teaching to hold us back.
2. Principles For Living in the Now
Now from these first 13 verses I think we can find some important principles for living in the now. Here’s the first principle: NO MATTER HOW SECURE LIFE SEEMS, NOTHING IS PERMANENT EXCEPT OUR LIFE WITH GOD.
The sheer size of the Jerusalem temple created the illusion of permanence. The square footage of the temple courts could hold twelve football fields (Edwards 387). Josephus says that some of the stones used to build the temple were sixty feet long. Archeologists have discovered one temple stone in Jerusalem that’s forty-two feet long, eleven feet tall, fourteen feet deep, and over a million pounds (Edwards 387). The temple looked as secure as the rock of Gibraltar, as firmly fixed as the earth itself.
That’s why people were so tempted to trust in the temple, to put their security in it. Yet just a few decades later, that very temple was torn down stone by stone, leaving only a heap of rubble that remains to this day. What looked secure was in fact on the verge of total collapse.
We try to build secure lives for ourselves. That’s why we have medical insurance, invest in a retirement plan, and carry life insurance policies. That’s why we invest our money, create goals for our lives, and try to get ahead in life. We plan our weekly schedules in our Palm pilots, and it creates an illusion of security.
But it’s a fragile illusion, because it doesn’t take much to shatter the illusion in front of our very eyes. All it takes is a biopsy that comes back positive or a collapse in our economy, or a drunk driver crossing a double yellow line, or a moment of passion. It really doesn’t take much to shatter our illusion of security.
If you’re a Christian, you of all people should know that nothing in your life is rock solid except your relationship with God. You might lose your family, your finances might collapse, your health might fail. Your children might turn away from you, your spouse leave you, your job fire you. All these things are nothing more than shifting sand. Only Christ is our solid, immovable rock.
So be sure you’re rooted in him, that your confidence is solidly placed in him. Don’t be like these early Christians who’s lives fell like a house of cards when the temple came tumbling down.
We also see here that WE SHOULD BEWARE OF SEPCULATING ABOUT CHRIST’S FUTURE SECOND COMING DURING TIMES OF CRISIS.
Look again at the commands in these verses. In v. 5 Jesus says "watch out," and the word he uses means "be prepared." V. 7 says "don’t be alarmed," which means "don’t be caught unprepared." Some think that these commands are permission to speculate, to chart out the last days, even to the point of identifying the antichrist, setting dates, and pinpointing the battle of Armageddon. But that’s exactly the opposite of what these commands mean.
Jesus is telling us to be clear headed and sober minded in times of turmoil and crisis.
When I was a little boy I’d sometimes get scared when I was at home alone. When that happened, I noticed every single noise in the house. I’d hear every creak in the floor, every bush blowing in the wind, every squeak in the walls. My imagination would run wild, and I’d be sure that someone was trying to get in, that some crazed axe murderer was outside. Now when I was like that, was I clear headed? I was certainly paying close attention to what was happening around me. But I wasn’t clear headed. My imagination and fears were causing me to read into every creak and squeak. I believe the same kind of thing happens to Christians during times of world crisis, like the war we’re waging right now in Iraq.
By telling us to be watchful and to not be alarmed, Jesus is warning us to not let our imaginations get the best of us. We can’t live in the "what ifs" of the future, but we’ve got to live in the now God has given us.
Now when Jesus said all this, he knew that the Jewish war would not usher in the end of the world. Being God’s Son, Jesus had an advantage no one else can claim. I can’t stand up here and say that this war definitely won’t have any implications for the end of the age, because I’m not Jesus. But I can stand up here and say that Jesus warns us against letting our imagination get the best of us in times of war. Let’s not be like that fearful little boy sitting at home alone, reading into every squeak and creak we hear.
Let’s live in the now, not in the "what ifs".
Finally, we see here that TURMOIL AND OPPOSITION WILL NOT PREVENT US FROM FULFILLING JESUS CHRIST’S GREAT COMMISSION.
The trumpet blast of the good news of Christ will ultimately reverberate to the ends of the earth. The Great Commission is our way of describing Jesus Christ’s marching orders for his church.
Look again at v. 10: "The gospel must first be preached to all nations." First before what? First before the end of the age can come.
Things like wars, false messiahs, earthquakes, famines and persecution are like the contractions of a woman in labor, not signs that the end is near. I’ve seen my wife Chris go through labor four times, and you couldn’t pay me enough to go through what she went through. Each time, as the birth got closer, the contractions grew more intense and closer together, until finally the baby was born. Sometimes when a woman in labor isn’t progressing fast enough, they put her on a drug that induces labor, making the contractions faster and harder. When Christians speculate about the second coming instead of focusing on the Great Commission they’re like a woman trying to self medicate herself with a labor inducing drug. And that might be fine for the labor and delivery room, but it won’t work with the labor pains Jesus is talking about here.
Imagine a young couple that’s deeply in love. "Finally," the guy thinks, "I’ve met my soul mate, the woman I can pledge the rest of my life to." So he buys a ring, and when the time is just right, he pops the question. She cries and laughs at the same time, and gladly accepts his proposal. So they set a date for the wedding, and start looking forward to that special day. They imagine looking into each other’s eyes as they repeat their vows to each other. They imagine celebrating at the reception with their family and friends. They imagine their wedding night as they consummate their love with each other. But imagine that they’re so star-struck with their love that they don’t do anything to prepare for their wedding day. No premarital counseling, no invitations, no guest list, no dress or tuxedos, no church, no pastor. They’re so caught up in what their future wedding day’s going to be like that they don’t do any of the things you have to get done to have a wedding. What’s going to happen when their wedding day finally comes along? Nothing. Because they didn’t prepare for their day. If we live so far in the future of Christ’s second coming that we fail to work to fulfill Jesus Christ’s great commission in our own day, we’ll be no different.
Jesus has given us a task to do, a mission to live by, marching orders to carry out. Listen to what Jesus said, "The Father sets those dates," he replied, "and they are not for you to know. But when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, you will receive power and will tell people about me everywhere-in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." (Acts 1:7-8 NLT).
Listen to what he else he said,
"I have been given complete authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age’" (Matthew 28:18-20 NLT).
Listen to the words of Jesus,
"As the Father has sent me, now I am sending you" (John 20:21).
We summarize this Great Commission in our church’s mission statement:
"God has called us to reach unchurched people from the Inland valley and beyond with Christ’s love and to help them grow into fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ who wholeheartedly love God and others."
Friends I firmly believe that the second coming of Jesus will not come until that commission is completed by the Church. He didn’t give it to Israel, he didn’t give it to angels, he didn’t give it to our government. Until Christians complete that commission, we’re still planning for the wedding day and the wedding day won’t come.
In fact, God can actually use turmoil and opposition to further that commission. In the book of Acts Jesus told his church to scatter throughout the Roman Empire after his resurrection, but they stayed in Jerusalem instead. So God allowed a persecution to break out in Jerusalem, and that scattered the leaders to other places. God used persecution to prod Christians to fulfill their orders.
During times of turmoil people are more open to the good news of Jesus Christ. As we watch this war broadcast into our homes on CNN and Fox News, many people feel as if the world is spinning out of control. We have a message of home that’s real, a message that’s anchored in God. If there’s any time for us to be bold in sharing that message, it’s now.
It’s so exciting to me that we had two children come to faith in Christ at our puppet show last week. We had two people come to faith in Jesus at our last Meet LBF Seminar. I think we’re getting ready to go into a season of harvest, a time when we see lots of people come to faith in Jesus Christ. With Easter fast approaching, I can’t think of a better time to celebrate this harvest.
Conclusion
Instead of living in the future, God wants us to live our lives in the now. We should look forward to Christ’s second coming, but we can’t live in the future. We need to live in the present in light of the future rather than living in the future. Only then can we live lives of full devotion to Jesus Christ during this time of war and turmoil.
