Hard Conversations

Yesterday we read about what may have been the hardest day of ministry Jesus ever had. He had a series of conversations with the Sadducees and Pharisees with mixed results. The Sadducees asked questions and enjoyed Jesus’ responses. One of them seemed to be close to understanding how to enter the Kingdom of God, which pleased Jesus.

But when he tried to engage the Pharisees in a discussion about the divinity of the Messiah, they didn’t respond. Jesus really wanted to give them the good news about himself, but they were mostly watching for a way to accuse him of a crime worthy of death.

Jesus finally confronted the Pharisees.

He began by warning his disciples about them in Matthew 23:1-12, then he turned to the Pharisees and launched into a series of accusations against them in Matthew 23:13-36. Remarkably, he didn’t bring up their plots against him; instead he passionately accused them of power abuse, hypocrisy, and hidden sins against the people they professed to lead.

“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Truly I tell you, all this will come on this generation.” Matthew 23:33

All of this was still on Jesus’ mind as he headed back to the Mount of Olives at the end of a very long day.

The Glory of the Temple

“As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!’

‘Do you see all these great buildings?’ replied Jesus. ‘Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.’” Mark 13:1-2

King Solomon built the first temple in 957 BC and the Babylonians completely destroyed it in 586 BC. King Cyrus of Persia sent Zerubbabel to Jerusalem to build the second temple around 530 BC. It was a smaller project, without all of the courtyards and gold furnishings, because it was too cost prohibitive to recreate what Solomon had built.

Around 20 BC Herod the Great initiated a major remodel of the temple, expanding its precincts with a great retaining wall and carving into the hill behind it. He refurbished the temple structure and added magnificent courtyards. The pure gold ornamentation on the doors, pillars and edge of the roof dazzled the eyes, especially when viewed at sunrise from the Mount of Olives.

Archeologists have excavated some of the stones used in Herod’s project and they are so huge that it’s a mystery how they were ever quarried and moved into place. These were the stones Jesus’ disciples remarked upon as they left the temple. It must have been a shock to hear Jesus say that everything they were looking at was going to be torn to pieces, with no stone left on top of another.

The Disciples’ Question

Jesus and his disciples crossed the Kidron Valley and sat down on the Mount of Olives facing the temple.

“Peter, James, John and Andrew asked him privately, ‘Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?’” Mark 13:3-4

Jesus answered their question with some dire predictions about what lay ahead. Like many prophecies, what Jesus said applied to more than one time frame.

The destruction of the temple took place less than forty years after Jesus predicted it in AD 70. The Romans were battling a Jewish revolt when, after a long siege of Jerusalem, they entered the city and destroyed the temple. It has never been rebuilt, nor can it be, because the entire top of the mountain on which it must stand is now occupied by a Muslim shrine and mosque.

So part of Jesus’ prophecies in Mark 13, Matthew 24, and Luke 21 have already been fulfilled, but what about the rest?

Prophecies Fulfilled – and Waiting to be Fulfilled

It’s hard to read the things Jesus prophesied in these passages. The list includes wars and rumors of wars, conflicts between nations, earthquakes, famines, arrests and floggings, court trials, family members betraying each other, and hatred directed at the followers of Jesus.

Besides that, Jesus said false reports would fly that he had returned and some people would actually claim to be him. For the followers of Jesus who longed for his return, this one was especially hard.

“Jesus said to them, ‘Watch out that no one deceives you.’” Mark 13:5

He had already told his disciples that when he returned his coming would be so spectacular that no one would miss it.

In the past two thousand years Jesus’ followers have suffered all of the things he predicted. Today there are countries where people who choose Christ face imprisonment, torture or death. Some cultures regard a family member who converts to Christ as dead to them, and some will go as far as to “honor kill” them.

There are many places in the world where people dismiss Christians, or hate them outright, and people have to think carefully before identifying with Jesus publicly. They may lose their jobs, their homes or their lives.

So these prophecies have been fulfilled, are being fulfilled, and will continue to be fulfilled until Christ returns.

The Abomination of Desolation

The abomination of desolation referred to a desecration of the temple so horrific God’s people wouldn’t go near it. The Greek ruler Antiochus Epiphanes performed an abomination at temple by setting up a statue of Zeus there, sacrificing swine on the altar and putting a brothel in the temple courts in 215 BC. The Jewish people were appalled and forsook the temple leaving it desolate.

Another abomination of desolation took place in the disciples’ lifetime when the Romans destroyed the temple in AD 70. Jesus warned his disciples to watch for signs of the approaching destruction and flee for their lives.

The great historian of the church, Eusebius, recorded that when the Romans invaded Jerusalem, the Christians did flee – to a town called Pella in the foothills east of the Jordan River – and that escape helped keep the early church alive. It also helped disperse believers to other places, carrying the Gospel.

The Apostles John and Paul describe an abomination of desolation that is yet to come. It’s associated with the Anti-Christ, a world leader who will go to war with God. People will be forced to worship the image of the Anti-Christ, also called the Beast. Those who refuse to be part of this abomination will suffer great tribulations.

Everyone wants to know when this terrible time will come, but Jesus said that even he didn’t know the day or time it will happen.

Have Courage

The disciples who heard these prophecies probably shook in their sandals and, sadly, because of opposition to the Gospel many of them suffered and died in the years that followed. In 2 Corinthians 11:21-33 the Apostle Paul listed the things he personally suffered before he, too, eventually lost his life some years later.

Jesus had always told those who followed him that they had to be prepared to lay down their lives for the Gospel. He reminded them that he was going to lay down his life for the world very soon.

Suffering and death were frightening prospects, but as Peter said when Jesus asked if he was going to stop following him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” John 6:68-69

And late in his life, the Apostle Paul said this about following Jesus:

“Yet every advantage that I had gained I considered lost for Christ’s sake. Yes, and I look upon everything as loss compared with the overwhelming gain of knowing Jesus Christ my Lord. For his sake I did in actual fact suffer the loss of everything, but I considered it useless rubbish compared with being able to win Christ.

“For now my place is in him, and I am not dependent upon any of the self-achieved righteousness of the Law. God has given me that genuine righteousness which comes from faith in Christ. How changed are my ambitions! Now I long to know Christ and the power shown by his resurrection: now I long to share his sufferings, even to die as he died, so that I may perhaps attain as he did, the resurrection from the dead.” Philippians 3:7-11 – J. B. Phillips Translation

Jesus promised abundant life, and eternal life, but he never promised his followers an easy life.