Matthew 24

³² “From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts t 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. ³⁵ Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. ³⁶ “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. ³⁷ For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸ For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, ³⁹ and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰ Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. ⁴¹ Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. ⁴² Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. ⁴³ But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴ Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. ⁴⁵ “Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? ⁴⁶ Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. ⁴⁷ Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. ⁴⁸ But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed,’ ⁴⁹ and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, ⁵⁰ the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know ⁵¹ and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Earlier, I provided a list of those who claimed, falsely, to be Jesus. One can also easily find long lists of dates that were equally falsely said to be the end of the world. Britannica.com has provided some of the more interesting of these bad predictions. Consider:

Johannes Stöffler, a respected German mathematician and astrologer, predicted that a great flood would cover the world on February 25, 1524, when all of the known planets would be in alignment under Pisces, a water sign. Hundreds of pamphlets announcing the coming flood were issued and set in motion a general panic; Count von Iggleheim, a German nobleman, went so far as to build a three-story ark. Though there was light rain on the day of the predicted flood, no actual flooding materialized.

Next, a more modern example that you might have heard of.

…Harold Camping has publicly predicted the end of the world as many as 12 times based his interpretations of biblical numerology. In 1992, he published a book, ominously titled 1994?, which predicted the end of the world sometime around that year. Perhaps his most high-profile prediction was for May 21, 2011, a date that he calculated to be exactly 7,000 years after the Biblical flood. When that date passed without incident, he declared his math to be off and pushed back the end of the world to October 21, 2011.

The strangest of all has to be this:

In 1806, a domesticated hen in Leeds, England, appeared to lay eggs inscribed with the message “Christ is coming.” Great numbers of people reportedly visited the hen and began to despair of the coming Judgment Day. It was soon discovered, however, that the eggs were not in fact prophetic messages but the work of their owner, who had been writing on the eggs in corrosive ink and reinserting them into the poor hen’s body.[1]

On and on it goes! You would think we would have learned by now: We cannot guess the day and time of the return of Jesus! But that does not mean we do not know anything. Let us hear what Jesus says about how we should think of these things and what we should be doing as we await His return.

We have enough information about the end times to be discerning.

We begin with perhaps the most controversial aspect of Jesus’ words. Namely, what does He mean by “this generation will not pass away until all these things take place”?

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. ³⁵ Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

Some (like the church father John Chrysostom) have pointed to more general usages of the word “generation” in scripture, like that found in Psalm 24, to show that there is some flexibility in how we understand the word.

³ Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? ⁴ He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. ⁵ He will receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. ⁶ Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob.

Others, like George Leo Haydock, see in “this generation” a possible immediate fulfillment and a possible ultimatefulfillment with each fulfillment having a different meaning for “generation.”

This generation; i.e. the nation of the Jews shall not cease to exist, until all these things shall be accomplished: thus we see the nation of the Jews still continue, and will certainly continue to the end of the world…If it be to be understood of the destruction of Jerusalem, the sense may be, this race of men now living; if of the last day of judgment, this generation of the faithful, saith Theophylactus, shall be continued: i.e. the Church of Christ, to the end of the world…By generation, our Saviour does not mean the people that were in existence at that time, but the faithful of his Church; thus says the psalmist: this is the generation of them that seek the Lord. (Psalm xxiii [sic], ver. 6.)…[2]

Others, like Frank Stagg, says that “this generation” must refer to the generation to which Jesus spoke, but that “[v]erse 36 may supply the solution, for Jesus denied that he knew the time of the end, declaring only the fact of its approach.”[3]

I believe that Haydock is making an important point and one that must be kept in mind: prophecy often has an immediate fulfillment and a future, fuller fulfillment. There is a sense in which the destruction of the temple in 70 AD offers an immediate fulfillment, a fulfillment within the lifespans of “this generation.” Yet, it must be recognized that the Lord has clearly not come in the full, eschatological sense to which this text and so many others refer. What is more, while Stagg’s suggestion does not necessarily solve the apparent issue, it is an important qualifier and nuance: after saying that “this generation” (v.34) would not pass away before these things happen, Jesus says that not even He knows “that day and hour” (v.36). And this would seem to work with a two-stage fulfillment. Jesus knew of the fulfillment that would come in 70 AD (see His knowledge of this in Mark 13:1–2) but He did not know the day of the final, eschatological fulfillment.

And this fact points to a truth about our own knowledge of the end: We know enough to be discerning but not enough to arrogantly proclaim details beyond our knowledge. We have partial knowledge. Not having complete, exhaustive knowledge does not mean we are bound to ignorance and utter agnosticism on the question of the end. We can discern. This is the point of the fig tree illustration.

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.

But even here our discernment leads us to a knowledge that “he is near, at the very gates” without revealing to us the exact moment when the doors will be flung open.

So be watchful! Learn the lesson of the fig tree! Discern what is happening in the world. Hold fast to the belief in Christ’s return! But do not be arrogant. Do not say more than you can say.

We do not have enough information about the end to declare a date.

Specifically, the church must avoid, at all costs, any sort of pronouncement that this or that date will be the date when Jesus returns. How many times have we seen this happen, and always with the same result? Interspersed throughout Jesus’ further-developed picture of the end are repeated assertions that we cannot say with certainty when it will happen, just that it will happen.

³⁶ “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. ³⁷ For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸ For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, ³⁹ and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰ Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. ⁴¹ Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. ⁴² Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. ⁴³ But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴ Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

Yes, the picture is indeed developed further here. For one thing, the second coming of Christ will be like the coming of the flood in the days of Noah: some will be saved but others will be carried away into judgment. As an aside, it is unwise in the extreme to use verses 37–41 as evidence for a pre-tribulation rapture. In keeping with the image of Noah, those “swept away” are those who are being “swept away” to judgment. In keeping with Noah, those “left” are those who are saved. So, no, these verses are not the friends of a pre-tribulation rapture. But they do give us more information: those who mock the coming of Christ in judgment will find Him most unexpectedly at their doorsteps with most dire consequences to follow! And God’s children will be saved!

More than once, Christ proclaims that we cannot know the exact day and time of His return.

• “no one knows” (v.36)
• “you do not know” (v.42)
• “an hour you do not expect” (v.44)

Jesus even notes that if we knew we would prepare for that moment, like any good homeowner.

⁴³ But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into.

But the point is that word “if the master of the house had known…”. But we do not!

Resist not only the temptation to predict but also the temptation to believe those who do predict.

The posture of the church until the coming of Christ is to be one of expectant obedience.

What, then, is the posture of the church to be as we await the coming of Christ? Listen:

⁴⁵ “Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? ⁴⁶ Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. ⁴⁷ Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. ⁴⁸ But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed,’ ⁴⁹ and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, ⁵⁰ the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know ⁵¹ and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

This is a call to expectant obedience. The expectant, obedient Christian is:

• faithful
• wise
• blessed

We do not know when Jesus is returning, but this we do know: He should find His church obedient when He does return! He should find us being faithful servants.

The wicked neither know nor care, and judgment awaits.

The church does not know precisely when but does care deeply. Our task is to be faithful, to be true, to be found with our hands on the plow when Jesus returns!

John Chrysostom offered a wonderful observation so many years ago about why the Lord has not simply told us when he would return. He writes:

The reason he does not tell them when that day will come is that he wants them to be on the lookout, always to be ready. In effect, he says that he will come when they are not expecting it because he wants them to be prepared and virtuous in every aspect of life. What he means is something like this: If most people knew when they would die, they would exert themselves in that hour. But in order that they may exert themselves at all times, he does not specify either a general time or the particular time. He wants them vigilant in their readiness and to be always striving. For this reason, he also leaves the end of each person’s life uncertain.[4]

This is true. If we knew that Jesus would return on January 1, 2026, would not many say, “Well, I will do as I would like until December 31, 2025”? Would not even many in the church be tempted to laxity, to distraction, to a loss of zeal. One would hope, of course, that the result would be the opposite: that we would throw ourselves into the evangelization of the world and into personal holiness as we prepared for the day. But knowing human nature, is it not more than likely the opposite would happen for many?

But, in fact, we should live every day prepared for Him to return today! Every moment is the possible moment when Christ appears. Let us live accordingly! Let our King find us faithful! Let King Jesus find us faithful!

 

[1] https://www.britannica.com/list/10-failed-doomsday-predictions

[2] https://catenabible.com/mt/24

[3] Frank Stagg, “Matthew.” The Broadman Bible Commentary. Gen. ed., Clifton J. Allen. Vol.8 (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1969), p.221.

[4] Williams, D.H. Matthew. The Church’s Bible. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company, 2018), p.459.