Matt. xxiv., Mark xiii., Luke xxi.-In Matthew xxiv. 3, we find the apostles, doubtless as the result of their Master's previous teaching, associating together three events as likely to happen at one and the same time, the destruction of the temple, a return of Christ to judgment, and not the end of the world, but (as may be seen from the margin of the Revised Bible) the end of the age, that is, of the Jewish dispensation. (See Appendix B, on "The End of the Age," page 192.) "As He sat on the mount of Olives) the disciples came unto Him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of Thy coming ? and of the consummation of the age" ? That the three questions contained in this verse were practically but one, is clearly shewn by the fact that our Lord responds not with three answers, but with only one. In the long discourse that, follows there is not the faintest hint of the need of any "double interpretation". Jesus says not a word about the end of the world, but simply describes beforehand events that were to precede and accompany the siege and destruction of Jerusalem. He also declared that not merely a part but the whole of the things of which He spoke would receive an exhaustive fulfilment within the lifetime of His earthly contemporaries.

For the truth of the greater part of these predictions we have independent historical evidence. Josephus and others record the occurrence, in the last days of the Jewish dispensation, of wars and famines, of earthquakes and physical convulsions, of cruel persecutions and terrible suffering. That the predictions concerning a great falling away from the faith,(1) the rise of antichrists, and the universal diffusion of the gospel throughout the then known world, were realised before the destruction of Jerusalem, we have proofs within the New Testament itself.The 1st epistle of John, written in the 'last hour' of the Jewish dispensation (ch. ii. 18 Revised Bible) announces the appearance of many antichrists, speaks of a great apostasy from the faith (ii. 19), and declares that already many false prophets have gone out into the world (iv. 1). This also exactly agrees with the account given in Rev. ii and iii, of the degenerate condition of the seven churches of Asia,(2) afflicted as they were by evil practices and pernicious teaching.

(1) In the parable of the Sower (Matt. xiii.), our Lord taught that only a small minority of His disciples would bring forth fruit to perfection.

Compare Luke xviii. 8: 11 "When the Son of man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth" ?

(2) The Apocalypse, as we know from internal evidence (Behold He cometh, i. 7; Behold I come quickly, iii. 11 and xxii. 7, 12; Behold I come as a thief, xvi. 15; Surely I come quickly, xxii. 20) was written at a time (probably 67 A.D.) when the Lord's coming was immediately at hand.

With regard to the wide diffusion of the gospel, predicted in Matt. xxiv. 14, as one of the signs that would accompany 'the end,' it is to be remembered that before the discovery of America and Australia the word "world" had a far narrower meaning than at, present, and that 1800 years ago it, meant, simply the Roman Empire. It was only in this sense, for example, that the emperor Augustus could cause a census of "all the world" to be taken (Luke ii. 1). We have also evidence that this was the meaning belonging to the word in New Testament times from the fact that in the lifetime of the apostles the gospel had already penetrated through the whole world, "had. been preached in all creation under heaven" (Col. i. 6, 23), and made known to all nations (Rom. xvi. 26). Christ had Said to them: "Ye Shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all, Judea and Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth" (Acts 1. 8). "And they went forth and preached everywhere" (Mark xvi. 20). "Their sound went out into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world" (Rom. X. 18).

We know from Luke xxi. 11, 25 that our Lord foretold that there would be "terrors and great signs from heaven" at this time, and "signs in sun and moon and stars." These predictions were fulfilled in the marvels recorded by Josephus as having been seen in the sky at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem.

"The miserable people did not attend nor give credit to the signs which were so evident, and did so plainly foretell their future desolation ; but like men infatuated, without either eyes to see or minds to consider, did not regard the denunciations that God made to them, Thus there was a star resembling a sword which stood over the city, and a comet, that continued a whole year. Thus also before the Jews' rebellion, when the people were come in great crowds to the feast of unleavened bread, on the eighth day of the month Nisan, and at the ninth hour of the night, so great a light shone round about the altar and the holy house, that it appeared to be bright day time ; which light lasted half an hour. A few days after that feast, a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared. I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals. For, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armour were seen running about among the clouds" (Wars vi. 5. 2).

The prophet Joel also bad said that in "the last days" of the Jewish dispensation (Acts ii. 17), before the day of the Lord came, that great and notable day, God would show wonders in the heaven above (Joel ii. 3 0). The prediction contained in Matt. xxiv. 29, Mark xiii. 24, 25, is somewhat different, implying, as it does, a total cessation of light and the coming of dense darkness either upon the whole earth or (what to those immediately concerned would be practically the same thing) to the consciousness of individual men. Striking parallels to these verses are found in Isaiah xiii. 10, 13; xxxiv. 4; where the prophet foretells the overthrow of the people of Babylon and Edom in the utter darkness of death,

"For the stars of heaven shall not give their light, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine "All the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll."

It is a historic fact that in the closing years of the Jewish age vast numbers both of Christians and of unbelieving Jews perished throughout the world. And if at the coming of the Lord in 70 A.D. all the most saintly of His followers that still survived, and all His worst enemies, suddenly died, Matt. xxiv. 29 will then describe the dense darkness which came on them in the moment of death through the closing up of their ordinary senses and powers of perception. That thirty years beforehand, Christ was cognisant of the events that would precede and accompany the siege and destruction of Jerusalem is proved by the historical evidence previously referred to. So closely indeed do His predictions correspond to the actual course of events, that some critics maintain that the discourse recorded in Matt. xxiv., Mark xiii., Luke xxi. is not prophecy at all, but must have been written after 70 A.D.This is an utterly untenable position. If the words of Matt. xxiv. 30 ("then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven........and they shall see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory ") were not really uttered by Jesus, but by writers of a later age, who did not know that the Second Advent had taken place, they would not have gratuitously attributed to Him a prediction which had apparently been falsified. But if we examine this eschatological discourse with care and candour, we shall find that our Lord's supernatural fore knowledge and the absolute trust worthiness of His statements on the subject may by it be firmly established to the reasonable satisfaction even of those who to begin with, may be sceptical as to His divinity.The known fulfillment of the mass of the predictions is a sure guarantee for the fulfillment of the whole. It is that we here contend for, and not for the belief that, apart from independent historical evidence of its accomplishment, every prediction recorded in the Bible, having reference to a time that is now past, was necessarily a true prediction.

The testimony of history demonstrates that the Lord Jesus clearly foresaw the events which would precede and accompany the siege and destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.

But His account of these events, given beforehand, is in at least one important respect fuller than any which we have elsewhere. Among the things which would then be certain to take place, He solemnly announces the appearing of the sign of the Son of man in the sky, and His own personal and visible coming on the clouds (Matt. xxiv. 30). Moreover He Illustrates the certainly of His Advent following at once the signs He had named, by reference to a common phenomenon, the budding of the fig tree, which always indicated that summer was immediately at hand. The marks of time throughout the chapter are clear and unmistakable "When ye" (some at least of those to whom He was speaking - The pronouns you and your cannot be used to the exclusion of the individuals immediately addressed.) "see the abomination of desolation" (v.15). " Then shall be great tribulation" (v. 21). " immediately after the tribulation of those days" (v. 29). "then shall appear the Sign of the Son of man in heaven, and then shall all the tribes of the earth (or land) mourn, and they Shall see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory" (v. 30).

"Even so, ye" (so me at least of those to whom He was speaking) also, when ye see all these things, know ye that He is nigh, even at the. doors" (v. 33). In verses 34 and 35, our Lord makes assurance doubly sure by adding verily I say unto you this generation shall not pass away till all these things be accomplished. Heaven, and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." This was Christ's answer to a question as to time : "When shall these things be" ? " He solemnly assured His apostles that the whole would be realised in the lifetime of some of them. The announcement must have been received with surprise, and perhaps with a measure of' incredulity, even by those to whom it was originally addressed. At that time there was apparently as little prospect, of the destruction of Jerusalem,and the, appearing of the Son of man " on the clouds of heaven," as there now is of the total destruction of London, and of the winding up of the world's history. But, by the words which He uses, Christ brings prominence the fact it is He Himself who is speaking ; and thereby He anticipates, and answers beforehand, the difficulty that some would find in believing the statement, and the ceaseless attempts that would be made, in subsequent ages, to evade and explain away the natural and common-sense meaning of His words.[1] We have no need to search in some remote corner of the dictionary for the signification of the phrase 'this generation' The meaning which Jesus Himself, and the evangelist Matthew who here reports what He said, attached to the words, may be readily gathered from Matt. xi. 16: "Whereunto shall I liken this generation ? " xii. 41: "The men of Nineveh shalt stand up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it " (Compare xii. 42). xii 45: Even so shall it be also unto this evil generation." xxiii.36 "Verily I say unto you, all these things (ie. all the righteous blood shed from Abel to Zechariah) shall come upon this generation" In each of these instances, the words in question denote our Lord's earthly contemporaries. The conviction that this is also the meaning to be attached to the phrase in Matt. xxiv. 34, is strength- (1) by the fact that elsewhere Christ seldom (if indeed ever) mentioned His Second Advent without assigning to it a very narrow limit of time; and (2) that, in this very discourse by the use of the words ye, you, your, then, immediately after, then, He had already limited the event to the lifetime of the apostles. To suggest that in Matt. xxiv. 34, the words 'this generation' mean 'the Jewish race,' or 'the Christian dispensation,' is to rob the passage of the urgency which it undoubtedly expresses; and to make it, as devoid of significance as if a prophet predicting the destruction of London and the burning of St. Paul's Cathedral were to add with great emphasis :-" The Anglo-Saxon race shall not pass out of existence until all this is accomplished!"

The exhortation given in Matt. xxiv. 42, 44, to the first believers, that they were to be earnest and prayerful in anticipation of their Master's return, derived its urgency , from the certainty of that return taking place in the lifetime of some of them, coupled with the uncertainty or the exact date. That generation was not, to pass till all those things were accomplislied. Yet the precise day and the precise hour no one knew; not even the angels of heaven, neither the Son, but the Father only (vv. 34, 36).

That Jesus Christ, whilst declaring His own ignorance of the exact day and hour when He would come back to judgment yet, repeatedly taught that, His return would be an event of the near future, and would take place at the close of the Jewish dispensation, and in the lifetime of some at least of His contemporaries, is also an inevitable inference from much that is recorded in other parts of the gospel narratives.

"At hand." -Mark i. 15, implies that the heavenly Kingdom, the coming of which is spoken of later on in Rev. xi.15 [2] and Rev. xii.10, [3] as having been realised, had not been set UP at the Messiah's birth and first entry into the world, but would follow at no very distant date. Like the Baptist and the apostles, Jesus began His public ministry by by declaring not that , the Kingdom of God" had now come, but that the time was fulfilled, and the Kingdom already at hand !

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