2 Thess 2, Look Up Without Falling In a Hole.

Sunday August 13, 2023

Jesus left the temple for the last time. He said as He left:

Mat 23:37-39

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. 38 "Behold, your house is being left to you desolate! 39 "For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, 'BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!'"

Human history is a drama of God’s love and gift of salvation to a stubborn, stiff-necked world.

The very next event in Matthew is the Lord leaving the temple and scaling the Mount of Olives.

So often, in God’s salvation drama, we get caught up admiring or emphasizing or giving our attention to the wrong things.

God graciously corrects us.

Mat 24:1-2

Jesus came out from the temple and was going away when His disciples came up to point out the temple buildings to Him. 2 And He said to them, "Do you not see all these things? Truly I say to you, not one stone here will be left upon another, which will not be torn down."

In Luke’s account we discover that they were commenting on how beautiful the temple was, and it was.

Luk 21:5

talking about the temple, that it was adorned with beautiful stones and votive gifts,

The house that the Lord just said will be left to you desolate is the very one that the disciples are pointing out to Him and commenting on how beautifully adorned it was.

That temple would be destroyed in 70 A.D. just as Christ said.

Christ, who is the true temple, will be destroyed.

But He will rise again and make a new house – the church.

And by His sacrifice He will tear the veil in half and make every one of the apostles and all in the church who believe the gospel, the very house of God.

Talk about a beautiful story. Do you not want to play your part in it? As God has designed your part?

Christ’s prediction of judgment upon the temple aroused in the disciples the need for answers.

His answers to their questions comprise our Lord’s greatest prophetic discourse, the Olivet Discourse.

The questions concern the duration of the period of Israel’s desolation and the second advent of Christ as King (what do they know of the second advent?).

The Olivet discourse: Mat 24-25; Luk 21; Mar 13.

Answers to:

[click to fly in]

When will these things be?

What will be the sign that they are about to happen?

What will be the sign of Your coming?

What will be the sign of the end of the age?

When will these things be? “Things” refers to the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple. The second question refers to the signs just prior to the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.

“Your coming” refers to the second coming (the rapture is imminent).

To understand the fullness of Christ’s answers, we consult all three Gospels.

Two main events are under consideration: 1) the judgment upon Jerusalem, and 2) the return of Christ.

All three Synoptics begin the discourse similarly. There will come false Christ’s, wars and rumors of wars; nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be famines and earthquakes. Luke alone adds pestilences, terrors, and signs from heaven (Mat 24:4-8; Mar 13:5-8; Luk 21:8-11).

These, the Lord says, are not the end, but the beginning of birth pangs. They could refer to the age of the church or specifically to the first half of the Tribulation, or both. Birth pangs can last a while and they intensify as the new birth nears.

The image of birth pangs (Mat 24:8) shows us that the world must be born anew by the establishment of the Messiah’s Kingdom.

Jesus first teaches of the birth pangs. These defy direct identification. They are all in the Tribulation and some are always here on earth. Birth pangs is a great illustration for them.

Then He says, “But before all these things…” and speaks of the experience of the apostles themselves and the destruction of the temple.

Apostles persecuted and gospel explosion.

Destruction of the temple (70 AD).

Birth pangs (some now, all during first half of the Tribulation).

Tribulation (in 2 halves).

Signs of the second coming.

Second coming and kingdom.

From the destruction of the temple (again) to the second coming there will be Gentile domination of the world (Luk 21:24).

Christ purposely leaves the timing of it all vague enough to defy our attempts to set a schedule. We know the events themselves to be concrete and we even know enough to somewhat confident of the order of events, but if God wanted us to focus on schedules, I think Jesus would have given us one.

The better questions lie outside our pride of knowledge and within the grandeur of God’s program of salvation and judgment – the grandeur of God’s righteousness and justice given to mankind through grace, mercy, and love.

Luk 21:7-11

They questioned Him, saying, "Teacher, when therefore will these things happen? And what will be the sign when these things are about to take place?" 8 And He said, "See to it that you are not misled; for many will come in My name, saying, 'I am He,' and, 'The time is near.' Do not go after them. 9 "When you hear of wars and disturbances, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end does not follow immediately."

10 Then He continued by saying to them, "Nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, 11 and there will be great earthquakes, and in various places plagues and famines; and there will be terrors and great signs from heaven.

“See to it that you are not misled …”

Throughout the epistles we face the problem that arose immediately in the church – false teachers.

2Th 2:3

Let no one in any way deceive you…

Luk 21:12-24 is unique among the gospels. It helps us put the great prophetic discourse together. It is a parenthesis inserted in Luke’s account of coming events. It begins, “Before all these things …”

Luk 21:12-19

“But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and will persecute you, delivering you to the synagogues and prisons, bringing you before kings and governors for My name's sake. 13 It will lead to an opportunity for your testimony. 14 So make up your minds not to prepare beforehand to defend yourselves; 15 for I will give you utterance and wisdom which none of your opponents will be able to resist or refute. 16 But you will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death, 17 and you will be hated by all because of My name. 18 Yet not a hair of your head will perish. 19 By your endurance you will gain your lives.

These were fulfilled in the Book of Acts.

Act 4:3-4

And they laid hands on them and put them in jail until the next day … But many of those who had heard the message believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand.

Evidence of the fulfillment of Christ’s prophecy is that both accounts are written by Luke and he uses the same words in both “laid hands on them.” Jesus said that their arrests would make an opportunity for their testimony.

“They will put some of you to death.” James of Zebedee was martyred first around AD 42 under Herod’s persecution.

Act 12:2

And he had James the brother of John put to death with a sword.

Sign of the destruction of Jerusalem (Luk 21:20-24). The grace given is the opportunity to flee to the mountains and be delivered.

Then Jesus gives the signs of His coming – events of the second-half of the Tribulation.

Terrible things await the world. The wrath of God will come against the sin of mankind.

Jesus then gives the sign of the second coming.

Mat 24:29

“But immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.”

Luk 21:25-27

“There will be signs in sun and moon and stars [darkness on earth; Mat 24:29], and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, 26 men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 27 Then they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN A CLOUD with power and great glory”

Darkness comes upon the earth, which was prophesied.

Joe 2:1-2

For the day of the Lord is coming;

Surely it is near,

2 A day of darkness and gloom,

A day of clouds and thick darkness.

But there is another distinctive feature in Luke’s account (vs. 28). This concerns us – “when these things begin to take place …”

Luk 21:28

But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."

If we use “begin” to go all the way back to the first signs He gave, the birth pangs, then it takes us all the way back to the historic destruction of Jerusalem and everything that follows (Tribulation).

“redemption” drawing near would be the redemption of our bodies.

Rom 8:22-25

For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. 23 And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. 24 For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.

If we take begin to mean when He started His prophetic answers to their questions, we find that it fits with what they experienced and their continued expectation of His return.

Tit 2:13 [before 70 AD]

looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,

1Th 1:10 [before 70 AD]

to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come.

“You see how in a little while the fruit of the trees come to maturity. Of a truth, soon and suddenly shall His will be accomplished, as the Scriptures also bear witness, saying ‘Speedily will He come, and will not tarry’; and ‘The Lord shall suddenly come to His temple, even the Holy One, for whom you look.’ [Clement, Epistle to the Corinthians ~95 AD]

The thrust of Clement’s letter to the Corinthians is that they were behaving in much the same way as Paul’s letters show us. Clement was using imminency in the same way as Paul to open their eyes to the truth of coming judgment and reward.

Luk 21:28

“But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

The words of our Lord in the Olivet Discourse lead to certain highly important conclusions in NT eschatology. First, the Kingdom will not arrive on earth until men have witnessed all the signs described by our Lord. But, second, believers may legitimately look for the “redemption” of their bodies at any time after the “beginning of these things.” Thus in Luke’s account of our Lord’s final prophetic discourse we have an intimation of what Paul would later develop: first, a rapture of believers; second, a period of world-wide tribulation, judgment, and the preparation of Israel; third, the glorious appearing of Messiah; and finally, the arrival of His kingdom.

The Lord and the epistles of the NT, a firm conviction is produced in all of us for the constant upward look for the Lord’s coming and the redemption of our bodies.

This truth has more implications than simply exiting a difficult world, both theologically and practically. Without this there could have been no blessed hope for the Church.

“The peculiar attitude of the Church: with loins girt for work, since the time was short, and the Lord might come at any moment; with her hands busy; her mind faithful; her bearing self-denying and devoted; her heart full of loving expectancy; her face upturned toward the sun what was so soon to rise; and her straining to catch the first notes of heaven’s song of triumph – all this would have been lost.” [Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus]