Reflection C.5 / Does God Have A Purpose In Coronavirus? Israel Is An Important Indicator

Today, we’re on to our last Reflection on Matthew 24! This Reflection contains some relatively complex arguments. I just can’t make it shorter. Sorry. If you’re in the mood for something stretching, read on!

As Jesus starts to wind up his answer to his disciples’ question, he says this:

32 “From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. 33 So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 34 Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.”

I want to make a little detour before we approach this. In Romans 9:6 Paul says: ‘For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel’. The translators added some words for clarity. The original is more like: ‘For not all who are of Israel are Israel’. Here, Paul is using the word ‘Israel’ in two different ways. There is ‘Israel/ethnic’, as in ethnic Israel, i.e. Jews. And there is ‘Israel/true’, as in the true people of God, who may have any racial background. Not all who are of Israel/ethnic are Israel/true, Paul says.

It was never the case that Israel/ethnic as a whole would be saved. It was always an elect group from within the nation that would be saved. And although Israel/ethnic had largely rejected Jesus, it had not fallen beyond recovery. There is a remnant, and God is able to graft branches in again. So, in 11:25, Paul says, ‘I want you to understand this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.’ The hardening was partial. Not all Jews had rejected Christ. And the hardening was ‘until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.’ Paul anticipated that at some point in time there would be a turning to Christ from within Israel/ethnic, i.e. the Jews. They – some at least – would be grafted back in to the body of Christ.

Some people, however, don’t see things this way. They think that Christ inaugurated an entirely new ‘Israel’ when he called his 12 disciples, and that Israel/ethnic has no further role to play in God’s purposes. This view is called supersessionism. I think this was the prevailing view in the church. However, Thomas Breidenthal, writing in 1999, commented:

“In the past thirty years, one Christian body after another has officially denounced supersessionism, the doctrine that God has rejected the Jews as God’s chosen people, replacing them with the church.”

OK, end of detour. Let’s return to Matthew. What is this fig tree? In Matthew 21 we read that Jesus cursed a fig-tree. Nobody imagines that Jesus had a grievance against a particular tree; everyone recognizes that it was a symbolic act. D.A. Carson, who has been my go-to commentator for this chapter, comments: ‘Most scholars interpret the cursing of the fig tree as a symbolic cursing of the people of Israel for failing to produce faith and righteousness’. Carson doesn’t see it that way himself, but it seems pretty logical to me!

So, in Matthew 21 Jesus curses a fig-tree and most commentators think the fig-tree represents Israel. Now, in Matthew 24, Jesus refers to a fig-tree. So, it seems reasonable to suppose that Jesus is once again using the fig-tree as a symbol of Israel. In the spring, a fig-tree might look rather dead, but summer will come. Its branches will become tender and it will put out its leaves. Surely Jesus’ meaning is that within Israel, hard hearts will become soft; within Israel there will be a revival. Jesus is saying the same as Paul.

But no commentator I have looked at – and I’ve looked at quite a few – likes this view. One after another, they accept that the fig-tree in Matthew 21 represents Israel, but ignore or reject the possibility that Jesus is referring to Israel when he talks about a fig-tree in Matthew 24. I don’t know why this is but I’m suspicious. Such a view gives a future role to Israel. Maybe that doesn’t fit with their theology. And to make things worse, it has been taken on with relish by Christians and Christian groups which these theologians might not want to align with, such as Hal Lindsey, Timothy LaHaye and dispensationalist and fundamentalist Christians in general.

Moving on to verse 34, commentators are divided as to what ‘generation’ means. Back in the 1970s and 1980s some commentators considered that ‘generation’ could refer to the Jewish race. More recently, however, commentators have been distinctly cool on that. The old 1984 NIV had a footnote against the word generation to show that an alternative meaning is ‘race’, but the present NIV has removed that footnote.