Transcription
All right, previously I explained to you guys why I think wars, famines, pestilence, you know, pandemics, this kind of thing are generally not signs of Jesus's soon return. Generally speaking, doesn't mean they're never involved, never something to look at, but generally speaking, they're not signs. And so people are spazzing out a bit, often unnecessarily.
But one thing Jesus said is a sign to look for related to His coming, and that is in Mark 13:14. After saying those other things are not signs, Jesus says, "But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where it should not be, then let those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains." All that kind of thing. And He goes on to explain. We'll read this in just a moment. Here's just an intro to what we're getting into today.
What is the abomination of desolation that Jesus talks about? It's actually mentioned here. It's mentioned in Matthew. Something connected to it's mentioned in Luke. It's mentioned in Daniel. It's mentioned in an extra-biblical text called First Maccabees. That's an inter-testamental work. It's, um, yeah, it's a big question. And I'm not kidding when I tell you this, this is like one of the hardest verses in the entire Gospel of Mark, if not the entire New Testament. And that's not just my opinion. I'm just quoting. I read two commentaries that said that, "Hey man, this is like the hardest verse in the entire Gospel of Mark, perhaps the entire New Testament."
So you're going to join me on a journey today as we're going to try to think biblically about the abomination of desolation and ask, like, what is this thing? Um, and also we'll try to answer a little bit of the question, like, did it already happen, like in 70 AD? Or is it something I should look for in the future? Which doesn't necessarily mean it'll happen in my lifetime. It means it's not yet happened. It will happen in the future.
So we're going to go through lots of verses. We're going to look at the New Testament. We're going to look at the Old Testament. We're going to look at the history between the Testaments. And then we will compare different views. I'll offer you several views on how this might have been fulfilled in 70 AD, explain why I think those don't work, and then talk to you about a futurist view that I would, I would hold. Right, I'm a futurist here. I do think that we're pre-millennium. We're before the millennium, and this is going to happen before the millennium happens. So we're before this as well. So here we go.
Pardon me. Um, I'm going to be cautious though. While I do, I am convinced that my view is correct in this regard. I do hold these views somewhat loosely because I might change my mind, and I'm very open to that. Christians disagree on this issue. Not everything we believe is a necessary belief, right? In order for Christian to be true. So this is an in-house discussion. Let's have grace towards each other.
Here's my thoughts. What is the abomination of desolation? What is the sign Jesus said to watch for? If it's not earthquakes and famines, what is it? It's this thing. Let's look at it in detail. Here we go. Mark 13:14. This is part 53, I think, of the Mark series. Yeah, part 53. And we are in Mark 13, plotting verse by verse through the entire Gospel of Mark. You can join me. I deal with theology, apologetics, um, history, Greek stuff. We deal with all that kind of stuff, but in an accessible manner as we go each week through the Gospel of Mark. Although next week, we're not meeting. We're not going to be doing it next Monday, but, but the next week we will after that. So, yeah, normally we do.
All right, here we are. Verse 14. Let's just read through a section. Let's kind of get our heads wrapped around what Jesus is saying, and then we'll start to like, really dig deep to try to understand it. Well, but Jesus says, after saying what you, what you need to not worry about, um, then He says, "When you see the abomination of desolation standing where it should not be, let the reader understand." Then, "those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains." That's what you do when you see it. When you see this happening, run. Run from the mountain, especially if you're in Judea. This is like an Israel-focused kind of prophecy thing, right? In Judea, "the one who's on the housetop must not go down or go into or go in to get anything out of the house. And the one who's in the field must not turn back to get his coat. But woe to those who are pregnant and those who are nursing babies in those days," right? Because it's hard to flee when you're pregnant or nursing babies. "But pray that it may not happen in winter. For those days will be a time of tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the creation which God created until now, and never will, unless the Lord had shortened those days." An interesting phrase, I'll bring up again later. "No life would have been saved, but for the sake of the elect whom He chose, He shortened the days."
"Then if anyone says to you, 'Behold, here is the Christ,' or 'Behold, he is there,' do not believe him. For false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show signs and wonders in order to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. But take heed. Behold, I have told you everything in advance."
So here's the short version. Everything we just read, and we're going to go through this stuff in more detail. The short version is this: Hey, there's an abomination of desolation standing where it shouldn't be. What is that? Well, whenever you see that thing, run away from Israel, run away from Jerusalem, hide. If you're, if you're in the land of Judea, don't listen to people telling you about false Christs, about Jesus showing up. Not because when He comes, everyone's going to see it. So at no point are you looking for some secret return of Jesus. He's going to show up and everyone's going to know it. And, um, and yeah, your job is to, to hang on, to endure, to wait upon His coming, and to trust Him.
So what does it mean? Well, here's our first clue. Um, the phrase "abomination of desolation." It refers to the, uh, an idol of some kind. And we know this, or at least we have good reason to think this, because the phrase itself, "abomination," that phrase is used in the Old Testament in many, uh, instances, and it refers to an idol in those contexts. Like, you can say this is an idol of some kind. So the abomination is not just any old abomination. It's, it's some kind of idol, some object of worship other than God. That's what the abomination is. Now, because Jesus is also quoting the Old Testament, we'll find out here in a minute, quoting the book of Daniel, several verses in the book of Daniel that mention this, that even adds more strength to the idea that this is referring to an idol. So linguistically, it's some idol, and it causes desolation. Well, the term "desolation" is probably related to the temple, um, being spiritually desolate or physically desolate, right? So God departing from the temple, God's blessings not being there, a, a spiritual bad practice happening in the temple that makes it like unclean, that that could be a spiritual desolation. Or it could also be a physical desolation where the temple's destroyed. Now, because it's an idol that leads to the desolation, I'm thinking that it's the emphasis here is actually a spiritual desolation, not just a physical one, right? Because the idol, the abomination, that causes desolation.
So what about the phrase "standing where it ought not"? We read here in verse 14 of Mark 13. It's "standing where it should not be." So we get the idea, the abomination is like an idol of some kind, you know, related to the temple. Well, well, this is where we reinforce that "standing where it ought not" is a very enigmatic phrase in the Gospel of Mark. But we also see this in Matthew 24:15, which is a parallel passage. If you want to understand what's in Mark, you should definitely read Matthew 24 with it and Luke 21, because these are all three parallel passages, different ways of recording what Jesus said. You probably said a lot more than what's recorded in Matthew, Mark, or Luke, but we get different pieces of it in those passages. Therefore, He says in Matthew, "When you see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet." Well, now we add this phrase that it's Daniel. He is quoting Daniel, for sure, no doubt about it. "Standing in the holy place." Okay, now it's the holy place. It's not just where it ought not stand. So it's an idol of some kind that causes desolation. It's connected to what Daniel said. We'll get to that in a minute. And it is also in the holy place.
Now, what is the holy place to a Jew? Well, this has got to be some area of the temple where just the Jewish priests could go. This is like the holy place, right? Some part of the temple which had many different pieces, right? There was the Holy of Holies, right? That's where the Ark of the Covenant was. Then there was another inner chamber inside the structure of the building, and you know, that's a holy place for sure. Then outside that, there's a courtyard where only priests could go because that's where they would do sacrifices, that's where they would do the brazen altar and all that. So here's, here's the sacrifices. And, um, probably the phrase "holy place" refers to something sort of inside. You're getting inside the temple, most likely. But you're definitely not in the outer courts of the Gentiles where anybody can go. That is not where that would be. So it's an idol brought into the temple. Ah, now we're getting more details. Now we're getting more details.
All the verses in the Old Testament, let's talk about Daniel now. And this is going to be, if you're, if you get confused today, I, I theorize it'll happen in the book of Daniel. I'm sorry about that. I can't cover, uh, all of it in today's study. I'm just going to kind of overview it, just to try to grab the meaning of this idea of the abomination of desolation. We've got a lot of verses to cover, so stick with me. If you feel it's a little fuzzy, it'll get more clear as we go. But, um, all the verses that mention the abomination of desolation in the book of Daniel are related. And in the Hebrew, and in the Septuagint, the Greek translation, they're using, we can put together what verse or verses say, plural, Jesus is referring to when He says, "spoken of through the prophet Daniel, this abomination of desolation." So let's survey through several of, several of those verses right now.
Daniel chapter 8, verse 13 is one of them. And it says, "Then I heard a holy one speaking, and another holy one said to that particular one who was speaking." So he's listening to a conversation happening amongst, like, spiritual beings. "How long will the vision about the regular sacrifice apply, while the transgression causes horror?" That phrase, "the transgression causes horror," is in the Greek the equivalent of the abomination of desolation. And although it's, it's the sin that causes desolation, but it connects to the other places in Daniel. So it's the same thing being spoken of with slightly different wording. And, um, he says, "so as to allow both the holy place and the host to be trampled." Okay, this, I literally have like paragraphs of notes on Daniel 8:13. I'm going to skip them because of the time. If you're interested in reading the book of Daniel, chapter 8 through chapter 12, you will know why it's complicated. Okay? There are sections of the Bible that are very easy to understand, and there are sections that are a little challenging. And then there's, like, you know, the last half of Daniel, which is a lot, a lot more difficult. It takes more time to comprehend it. You can get it, it just takes more time. At any rate, this is one of those passages. Okay? So it has to do with the sacrifice in the temple. So here we're talking about, uh, there's a vision related to sacrifice in the temple. Again, it's about an idol being placed, all that kind of thing.
Daniel 9:26 and 27 is the next time we see this show up. "Then after sixty-two weeks, oh, let me just tell you, I do have a teaching on Daniel 9. I didn't put it in the, in the, um, description, but I think I will after I finish teaching this. So Daniel 9 gives a wonderful and really impressive prophecy on the timing of when the Messiah shows up. And we're kind of jumping into the middle of that because now we're going to be looking at the stuff after the Messiah. So I've have a video teaching on the stuff that I'm sort of passing over quickly right here. "How after sixty-two weeks," these are weeks of years, yes, you can establish this very confidently, it's not like we're not playing games here, "and the Messiah will be cut off." That's Jesus. He's killed. "And have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary." That's the destruction of the temple in 70 AD, no doubt about it. "And its end will come with a flood. Even to the end, there will be war, desolations are determined." Then there's this, I would say, I would suggest that this is going to be a much more distant future thing. "And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week. But in the middle of the week," now the weeks are years here, so in the middle of this seven-year period, I'll show you why later, at least one of the reasons why, "but in the middle of the week, he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering." Okay, he's talking about the temple. There's a covenant related to the temple in Israel, and halfway through the seven-year covenant, the seven years, sort of like deal, the temple is no longer allowed to have sacrifices. Halfway through, three and a half years in, no more sacrifices. Then there's a three and a half year period. I would suggest this corresponds with Revelation, corresponds with several other places in the scripture about the Great Tribulation. "And on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction is, uh, decreed is poured out on the one who makes desolate." Okay, what is this talking about? Short version, "wing of abominations," I think is referring to the abomination of desolation. Like, as this comes, that's also going to be the moment when you, when you get revealed the one who makes desolate, which is some sort of bad guy that we'll also read about in Second Thessalonians in just a minute. So we're getting more puzzle pieces about the abomination of desolation. Then that person, this bad guy who's, who's bringing the abomination to the temple, he's then brought to complete destruction himself, ultimately, finally, after he brings a great deal. So there's a Great Tribulation. He brings a bunch of pain and suffering into the, especially the area of Jerusalem, and then he eventually is destroyed at the end of that three and a half year period.
Now let's look at Daniel 11:31. This is another location. "After a long, hundreds of years' worth of prophecy crammed into the most prophecy-packed chapter of the entire Bible." I do have a teaching on Daniel 11, right? I actually have a teaching going through and I stop at the point at which I'm sort of picking up now, where it sort of moves into future prophecy. "Daniel 11:31, 'Forces from him will arise, desecrate the sanctuary fortress,' that's the temple, 'and do away with the regular sacrifice, and they will set up the abomination of desolation.'" So we're seeing that all these threads are connected. If I could just, um, give you a few specific details now, right? There's Mika, who rarely joins us during our streams. Um, there she is. So, um, the, uh, the thing we're getting from Jesus is there's an abomination of desolation. Okay? It's some kind of idol that brings spiritual impurity or even physical destruction to the temple. I'm thinking spiritual impurity. You're supposed to watch for that. When you see it, you flee Jerusalem. Okay? That's good to know. It's also what was spoken of by Daniel. So when we go to Daniel, we get more details. There's a specific person that's connected to this idol. He's bringing this abomination to the temple. He does it in the middle of a seven-year, you know, treaty or covenant of some kind that he has with Israel. Three and a half years goes by, he cuts off sacrifices. From that point where he cuts off sacrifices in the temple, that's also when he sets up this abomination. So, in other words, the sacrifices are now to his idol. He's sacrificing to his idol. The temple has been repurposed for the worship of this bad guy character that's coming. And some would say he already came in 70 AD. I'll explain why I think that doesn't work in, in 10 minutes or something. And pardon. So we get all these details, right? Um, there's also a focus on the desecration of the sanctuary in Daniel 11:31, not just the destruction of the sanctuary. So what I'm going to theorize is right here from Daniel, if your fulfillment of the abomination of desolation is basically just the destruction of the sanctuary, that doesn't really seem to fit the description here of a, of an abomination. The three and a half years of this desecration time of the sanctuary, which is different than the abomination being a destruction.
All right, Daniel 12:11. We got one more verse in Daniel that relates to this. And it says here in Daniel 12:11, "From that time, from the time that the regular sacrifice is abolished," that would be halfway through the week for seven years, "and the abomination of desolation is set up," right? So these things seem to happen, in my mind, at the same time. The ending of temple sacrifice, which if I'm a futurist, as I am, means there's going to have to be a new temple in Israel, right? Unless it's the temple in the first century, you might see a fulfillment there, and I'll talk about that in a second. And then they'll have to stop sacrifices. At the same time, there is this false, bad sacrifice that happens, given to some sort of abomination, some idol. And there will be then 1290 days. "How blessed is he who keeps waiting and attains to the 1335 days," which is approximately three and a half years. Okay, we're looking at about that length of time.
All right, that being all stated, we can now look at an event in history before we go to the New Testament. We'll look at an event in history because when Jesus said "abomination of desolation," not only did the contemporaries who were listening to Him immediately think of Daniel, at least the Jews and those who know the scripture, maybe not some other random person, but those who know the Old Testament, they would be like, "Yeah, Daniel." They also thought about a thing that had happened about, about 200 years before Jesus, right? Before He's teaching, about 200 years prior, in about 167 BC, right? Or BCE, whatever you prefer, I really don't care. And right about then, there was this event that they actually called the abomination of desolation, and they saw this as being connected to what Daniel talked about, even though it doesn't really fulfill what Daniel talked about, but they saw it as connected to what Daniel talked about. So let's look at that.
Um, here's what you need to know, and this could get hairy fast. So I'm trying to, as a teacher, you try to think of the things you don't need to say in order to get, in fact, you just work harder getting things out of your content than putting things in because it just gets, especially in a subject like today, can get complicated. But in around 167, in the 160s, 170s, 160s, we have the rise of this guy, Antiochus Epiphanes. He's basically a really bad guy. He's a Greek ruler, and he's a really bad dude, and he hates the Jews, like he despises the Jews. And we get information from him from a not biblical book, right, called First Maccabees. First Maccabees, it's not biblical. It doesn't mean it's like bad, it's just not scripture. And I'm not going to get in that debate today. If you want to, you can look up somewhere where I've taught on the Apocrypha if you're interested. But First Maccabees 1:54 says the following. Listen to this when it describes what this guy Antiochus did in the temple. It says, "On the fifteenth day of Chislev, on the 145th year," that's 167 BC, "they built an abomination of desolation on the altar." And in the cities around Judah, they built altars.
So here's what you need to know. This is not just coincidental. This is literally the only historical occurrence of the phrase "abomination of desolation" outside the Bible. This is the only time it occurs there up until the time of Christ. Obviously, people talked about it afterwards, but, but between Old and New Testament, this is the only occurrence of the phrase. They, they saw what Antiochus Epiphanes did as connected to what Daniel was talking about. They called it an abomination of desolation.
So what did he do? What did it look like? Antiochus Epiphanes hated the Jews. He took over Jerusalem. He fortified the city of David there, and he then just started trying to eradicate the Jewish religion. So Antiochus forbids sacrifices. He actually stopped them from being able to sacrifice in the temple or anywhere. He forbade feast days. He forbade feast days. You could not observe feast days. He forbade circumcision. And if you did circumcise your kids, you were put to death under his orders. Not that the Jews exactly yielded all to this, but many did. They also put up altars to Zeus all over the place and required Jews to bow down to altars to Zeus. But what really was the straw that broke the camel's back is when Antiochus Epiphanes went to the temple in Jerusalem, and there on the bronze altar, where they had the fire, right, on the bronze altar, he put on top of that an altar to Zeus, and then he sacrificed a pig. Which, if you understand the kosherness and the appropriateness of sacrifices, this is the most offensive thing. So they sacrificed a pig on the altar to Zeus, trying to repurpose the temple, even renaming the temple the Temple of Zeus. That's a pretty big deal. This is what triggers the Maccabean revolt, right? Where Judas Maccabeus and his family, they lead a revolt against, against Antiochus Epiphanes, and they overthrow their oppressors and they have like a hundred years of self-rule. It's like the only time of self-rule that the Jews have had since before Nebuchadnezzar, you know, in history. Even in the first century, they're being ruled by the Romans. It's not self-rule. So, um, up until that point, anyway.
Now, the, um, the thing is, in the mind of Jesus's listeners, right? Jesus is not saying that thing in AD 167. That, that thing, or BC, that thing was not the fulfillment of Daniel. He's not saying that because He says that what Daniel spoke of is still to happen. And I take that at very just face value. What Daniel's talked about is still to happen. You can watch for it. But in the mind of Jesus's listeners, they're thinking that the abomination of desolation does look something like that. We'll put it that way. So you get an idea that it does feel that way. And when you look at the things in Daniel about, you know, a particular person making a covenant, um, cutting off sacrifice in the temple, making an offer of some idol to himself, it's an abomination that causes desolation. And then the process the Jews went through to get the temple running again, they felt that it was spiritually unclean, desolate in a sense. They actually cleansed the temple through for several days through a really interesting process that has led to what is now called the celebration of Hanukkah. The yearly celebration of Hanukkah is just the commemoration of them getting the temple back and cleansing it after this event in 167. So that's pretty interesting. Pretty interesting.
Now let's add another piece to our puzzle so we can understand this well. And I have one more major passage I want to cover in the New Testament after this. I'm going to then go through several preterist interpretations of how this all can be put together. I'll explain why I think they fall short, and I'll offer my futurist interpretation, and then explain at least one challenge to that. But of course, I'm going to make my view look good because I think it's true. Like, what am I supposed to do? But I'll try to be honest about everything.
So 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, verse 1. This is where Paul seems to talk about the same situation, the abomination of desolation, and, and all the stuff around it. It harmonizes really well with what Daniel said and what Jesus said, and it seems to give us even more details. So I would find it really hard to argue that this isn't the abomination of desolation that that Paul's talking about. But let's read what he says in Second, Second Thessalonians 2, verses 1 through 9. I'll even give you a preterist interpretation of this afterwards, by the way. Preterist, for those who weren't around last week, is the people who think that large, most of prophecy has already been fulfilled, and it happened by like 70 AD. At least that's a typical preterist view.
Second Thessalonians 2:1, it says, "Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together with Him." Okay, listen, this is the topic. Jesus' coming and us being gathered together with Him. That's the issue at hand. "He says that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed, either by spirit, a spirit, or a message, or a letter as if from us to the effect that the day of the Lord has come." At least when Paul's writing in the 50s AD, Second Thessalonians, this is not something that has happened yet. "Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first." See, He gives a list of things that have to happen first. One is the apostasy, "and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship." And now listen to this, "so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God."
Now, if this is the same person and the same situation as Jesus talks about in Mark 13, Luke 21, and Matthew 24, and if this is the same situation that Daniel talks about, then that means that the idol, the abomination, is actually going to be a self-idol of some kind. He's worshipping himself. He's presenting himself to be worshipped. Now, that connects to Revelation really well, doesn't it? Right? Because the beast, he's, he's going to present, uh, the second beast will present an image of the first beast. That's an image of him. The God is the first beast, is this Antichrist character, and he wants to be worshipped, and you have to worship him or else you, on pain of death. So that's very interesting. It all seems to harmonize well. "So that he takes his seat," right? He declares himself as God. "Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? And you know that what restrains him now?" You know what restrains him now? They did. We all debate about what on earth is restraining him now. Um, "so that in his time he will be revealed. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. Then the lawless one will be revealed." That would be that big bad guy. He'll be revealed, "whom the Lord will slay." And that's his future. The Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming. So not only does he do these things, but then Jesus kills him when He returns. That's a simple understanding of this passage, though some would try to complicate it too much. "That is the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders." So there's like supernatural things going on around this guy. "And with all deception of wickedness for those who perish because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they may, all may be judged who do not believe the truth but took pleasure in wickedness."
Um, so this is, this is the Second Thessalonians content. Let me give you some specific bullet points as you, you may even have that text open now to look at. This sounds a lot like the abomination of desolation that Jesus talked about. It even brings and harmonizes content from date, from Daniel and Revelation in a really interesting way. And this, to me, is one of the strengths. I'll talk about this later. The futurist perspective is that it allows these passages to harmonize in a very fitting way. There isn't, uh, a battle there, in my opinion. Others will probably disagree. Okay, so it's just my view. Um, it's not just a destruction of the temple, which 70 AD definitely, that happened, but it's not just that. It's a man who sets himself up to be worshipped in the temple as if he is God. He is the idol that's worshipped. He puts a stop to sacrifice. There's a three and a half year period that corresponds to Revelation and Daniel as well, that goes on. Um, very interesting. The man, um, oh, the passage, by the way, Second Thessalonians actually alludes to Daniel 11:36-37. So that's more strength that Paul's talking about the same stuff Jesus is, because they're both alluding to the same passage in the book of Daniel. "This man of sin will be directly destroyed by Jesus at His coming." Okay, that seems to rule out 70 AD to most of us. There is a preterist case for that. I just think that it's weak, to be honest. Um, then he also has signs and miracles, some kind of miraculous powers, this man of sin, according to Paul. And that also seems to rule out 70 AD. I don't see the signs and religious following that we had in 70 AD that corresponds to what Paul talks about. It does require a temple. And again, the futurist perspective, which this was seen as a burden years ago, it requires Israel to be a nation. It requires that they're in the land. It requires a temple to be in, in Jerusalem. All those things have to be taking place for the futurist, you know, to be right. But a lot of those things have happened in the past hundred years, and it's pretty impressive that it has. So, you know, do with that what you will. The temple's still not built, but there is a Temple Institute, and there are those who are pushing for it.
The preterist view seems to have two options with Second Thessalonians. One is they can say Second Thessalonians is, is something totally different than, than what Jesus talks about. And they could say that because it's hard to look at 70 AD and find fulfillment of all those details in Second Thessalonians about this man of sin and all these things. So they could just say that's a separate issue. I think that that is, uh, odd. Like, there's just so much correspondence. It seems strange.
Another view, and I'll quote here, Kenneth Gentry. You know, I, and I have to apologize to Kenneth Gentry, I called him, I think I called him Philip Gentry last week when I was just trying to remember real quick who his name, his name, but I did read his work. Like he was one of my sources for understanding preterism, and he's one of, like, the number one guys on pushing preterism nowadays, scholarly and all that good stuff. But here's his view of just part of 2nd Thessalonians, so you can understand a preterist interpretation. "The apostasy," 2nd Thessalonians talks about, there's going to be a falling away or apostasy. He says that word isn't about religious apostasy, it's about political rebellion. The word, he says, it can be used like that, and it's about basically Rome, the Roman people rebelling against their own leader, which ends up, um, ends up happening later on. And maybe about the, the Jews in particular being the ones who are rebelling. Like, there's a Jewish rebellion against Rome, and there is a Jewish rebellion in this Rome around 70 AD in the late 60s. So he could say that the man of sin in Second Thessalonians, he says, is Nero. You probably saw that coming if you saw last week's video on six different Christian views of the end times.
Now, the way Nero died, Nero died by suicide. He actually stabbed himself with a short sword. He killed himself because his people had rebelled against him, and his Praetorian Guard had betrayed him, and so he knew that they were going to, they were going to publicly kill him slowly and painfully to make an example out of the guy. And so he killed himself, right? So people say he was forced to commit suicide. Well, sort of. I mean, he chose that way instead of dying a worse way. So Nero's death is considered, and this is how Gentry put it. He says, "So Nero kills himself with a sword, right? Well, Jesus out of His mouth proceeds a sword in Revelation." And so maybe there's a connection there. And, and I'm like, that's a bit of a reach. And then he says that Jesus, then after Nero kills himself, he then comes in 70 AD. He returns in 70 AD in the cloud, not really to the earth, just in judgment. There's still a future second coming to the earth, but this is just him coming in judgment, not coming, not the second coming, you know, proper.
Here's the problem. Nero's death was in June of 68 AD, and according to Paul, Jesus will destroy that man with His coming, right? With His mouth, with His words, rather, at His coming, or His breath, excuse me, at His coming. And the temple was destroyed over two years later in 70 AD, which is when they would locate this coming of Jesus, which seems like a big stretch already. So what I'm going to suggest here is that the preterist view is like a reach upon with a reach and another reach and another reach. And I think what tends to happen is some preterists, they, they find there's some correspondence, they get excited about it, and then they feel like committed to that view. And so these reaches don't feel like reaches, uh, to them that much. To me, it feels like quite a reach. Yeah, there's other things in Second Thessalonians that don't make sense on preterism. Um, the signs and wonders, um, the second coming itself. It's like, wow, we sure have missed, missed this coming. This, they wouldn't call it a second coming, but it certainly is a coming of Jesus after His first coming, right? And so that just seems strange.
Now let's talk about preterist views of the abomination of desolation in particular, not just Second Thessalonians. I just thought it was interesting to cover some of that with you. What are the preterist views of the AFD, the abomination of desolation? Here are a number of them. I will give you the worst one first. The worst first is that in 40 AD, and I don't know that you would even find a preterist holding this view. I just think it's interesting to survey things. Um, this is more of like what some more liberal, like non-believing people might suggest. In 40 AD, the Emperor Caligula, Emperor Caligula, or Gaius, he ordered that a statue of himself should be put in the temple. Now that does, right? That does sound a lot like Daniel and Jesus. A statue, even, even 2nd Thessalonians, right? Because a statue of himself put in the temple and be worshipped. So they would be like, "Look, there's your abomination of desolation," and it's in 40 AD. Here's the problems. Number one, it never actually happened. He just ordered it to happen. It never took place. And one, one preterist would suggest, well, it's okay because the, the language there, "presenting himself as God in the temple," it only expresses desire. And I'm like, I don't know what game you're playing here. This does not seem true to me. Very skeptical of such an approach. Um, so it also occurs way too early. Jesus says that this abomination of desolation is a trigger so that people would flee Jerusalem and flee Judea and hide in the mountains. Well, it occurs 30 years before the armies of, of Rome are surrounding Jerusalem. So he's like, "Don't go back into the house, just flee off into the, into the, into the mountains." Because 30 years from now, and the abomination is literally just you hearing Caligula wanted an image of himself in the, in the temple, but it never happened. Like, how is that an abomination that causes any desolation? That anyway, it's the worst view, I told you.
Another view is that in 70 AD, this happened when Roman soldiers, right? They surrounded Jerusalem, they took Jerusalem, and they did actually go into the temple, into the temple courtyard as well. Now, in particular, we do have historical accounts. If you guys remember, I told you, preterists are very good, and this is not a complaint, this is, I'm impressed at how well they can find quotes from Josephus to support some of their points. It's actually impressive in a good way for their view. But they would say that, you know, we have these quotes from Josephus. I'll read in a second, that Roman soldiers carried standards or flags and images of Caesar, and they carried them into the temple, and there they offered sacrifices to them. Okay, well, that does sound kind of like the abomination of desolation. I mean, it really does. I'm not being sarcastic here. Sometimes people can't tell, and I'm joking. Well, I'm not joking. That sounds impressive. Um, this was, um, this is interesting. Um, before that, they would never allow the flags in the temple. They had tried years before, and the Jews were like, "We'd rather you kill us than bring those flags into the temple. We consider that sacrilege." And so they wouldn't, they didn't do it. It was only on this day that it happened. Okay, so that is pretty significant. But in 70 AD, this is what Josephus says about it, and it happens. Notice the timing. It's 70 AD. It happens when the temple's destroyed. Like on the day the temple's destroyed, this is when this abomination of desolation takes place. That's a problem with this view. But let me read to you the quote from Josephus. It's in his, uh, Jewish Wars, Book 6, and section 316, if you want to look it up. "And now the Romans, upon the flight of the seditious into the city, and upon the burning of the holy house itself, and of all the buildings round about it." So this is the house is already on fire. The temple's being destroyed. "They brought their ensigns into the temple, their signs, and set them over against its eastern gate." Not into, excuse me, he says "to the temple," not into. That's important. "And and set them over against its eastern gate, and there did they offer sacrifices to them." And there did they make Titus Imperator, which is to say, he's like a, he's like a ruler, he's like a leader of the, of the, of the military with the greatest acclamations of joy. So they offer sacrifices to these images that do include images of Caesar, like their various images they have. They had a different number of different images they carried. Could that be the abomination of desolation? I mean, it's an idol, effectively. It's like an idol. It's very similar to an idol, and it's sacrifices are being offered. That's a pretty big deal.
Now, here's those are the pros. If you're like, "Hey, that's convincing. I'm convinced that's the abomination of desolation. It did happen in 70 AD." That's cool. I'm cool with you. We still hang out. But here's some reasons why you might not think that's the case. It's a sign to watch for, according to Jesus, so that you will then know that you have to, what, flee Jerusalem. If the sign occurs at the end of the whole war, at the end of the siege, months after the armies have surrounded and the siege has happened, and people have been dying and dying and dying and dying horribly, then you see the sign, the temple's burning, and this, and the sacrifice takes place, and now you're supposed to flee. This doesn't make a lot of sense of what Jesus said. We really need the abomination of desolation to happen years before, like three and a half years before, to be consistent with Revelation and Daniel. And it doesn't, it seems so. There's, there's one problem. Escape was impossible, and the war was over after this. The war was over. There wasn't more issues going on for three more years in that sense. Um, also, the, um, just the fact that in, in Daniel, it's in the middle of the week, and Jesus clearly refers to Daniel, that makes this hard. The seven-year period, this, the seven, the week is a heptad, it means seven. It's just means a set of seven. Some things, and their years also. And here's another weak spot you might not have noticed. If you just read Josephus, they brought him to the temple, said over against the eastern gate, and they offered sacrifices. This is not actually in the temple. It's not in what was called the holy place. That's pretty significant for this view. Um, the sign is the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place. And where they were offering, where they brought these flags was not the holy place, not in a formal sense. So they brought it up to the temple, which is a large court area, and this is called the Court of the Gentiles. Josephus says they set their banners over against the eastern gate, which is like, let's say it's like if you're looking for the Mount of Olives at the pictures of Jerusalem, right? The eastern gate is the gate that's closest to you. If you go into that gate and you set something there, that's in the Court of the Gentiles. Everybody can go there. Even marketplaces were happening there. They were selling and buying things there. And then beyond that, you have like the temple proper, where you go to the Court of the Women, and then you go beyond that, uh, the Court of the Man, and you have the area where the priests are making sacrifices, then you have the actual inside the building of the temple. And these things didn't happen in those locations. So that weakens this view. Although you're fine if you're a progressive premillennial person, like I am, and you think, "Hey, this is like a picture of what's to come, but it's not the full story," which is why it falls short. So you'll know to continue expecting things.
Now here's another interesting tidbit for you guys. If you, if you really like knowing all the things, Eusebius actually has a quote. Now Eusebius, okay, Josephus, I was quoting earlier. He, he lived in the first century and he was a Roman non-Christian historian who was Jewish, but he was also working for Rome. Now flash forward 300 years, and you have a guy named Eusebius, and he's a Christian, and he's a church historian. He's a historian writing history for the church. He's the earliest church history we have is from Eusebius. You could read it yourself. It's very interesting and, and strange, as often old material is strange. But Eusebius says the following about 70 AD. So he's 300 years removed, but he's saying it about the events of 70 AD and the destruction of the temple. He says, "But the people of the church in Jerusalem had been commanded by a revelation vouchsafed to approved men there before the war to leave the city and to dwell in a certain town of Perea called Pella." And when those that believed in Christ had come thither from Jerusalem, then, as if the royal city of the Jews and the whole land of Judea were entirely destitute of holy men, the judgment of God at length overtook those who had committed such outrages against Christ and His apostles, and totally destroyed that generation of impious men. So he speaks of it being God's judgment on Israel. But before it happened, they got some kind of prophetic warning, and they fled Jerusalem. That sounds kind of like Jesus is talking, right? Um, so the, the pro here is they're like, "Look, this is more confirmation that something was going on in the first century before the destruction of the temple that caused the people to prophetically flee Jerusalem, just like Jesus told them to." Against this are two points. One, um, Eusebius is our only source on this, and he's 300 years removed, and so that makes it a little tough to get details. We literally just have what he said. That, that whole quote, that's all the data we've got. Um, I said that's a side issue. Um, but
One of the issues is this: this is Pella, where he says they were told to flee. Isn't where Jesus told him to flee. He said, "Let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains." Pella is down 3,000 feet lower than Jerusalem, and it's not this like mountain area. You wouldn't consider Pella fleeing to the mountains. And so this has received no small ridicule, even from people like, um, N.T. Wright, who is a preterist, who says that you're basically, there's no logical sense in saying that Pella is fleeing to the mountains. It just doesn't make any sense.
Also, this is an odd way for Eusebius to refer to scripture. A second reason why I wouldn't hold this view: he, he doesn't seem to be talking about scripture. Eusebius knows about Mark, Matthew, Luke, John. He's got the whole Bible right now, okay? He's a fourth-century Christian. He's got all that stuff, and he just says they were warned. And I'll quote it: "They were warned, um, by a revelation vouchsafed to approved men there before the war." Meaning a certain group of people had this prophecy. But really, even early in the church, the New Testament, especially the Gospels and Paul's writings, were just flooding all over the place. They spread wide and fast. So this doesn't sound like he's talking about scripture. It's not the way you talk about it, and it refers to something as like a few people knew this, not everybody. You'd think he would just say, "warned by the words of Jesus" or something.
All right, here's a third option. A third preterist. Well, there's, I'll throw a fourth in real quick. Some say it was just Titus in 70 A.D. Titus himself walked into the temple. This is all we get from Josephus: is that Titus like walked into the temple and looked around. That's it. This is, this is the story we get about a Roman entering the temple. Now, Titus was in the future going to be a Caesar. This is, this is really stretching, okay? If you're preterists, please don't, please don't go with a different option. But they say Titus came into the temple, and Titus was, was going to be Caesar. So in a sense, he's Caesar, and since Caesar claimed to be God, just by being in the temple, he is the abomination of desolation proclaiming himself to be God.
Here's the problems with that view. All we know is Titus walked in and looked around. That's all Josephus says. And he saw the gold, and that it was magnificent before it all burned down. That's it. Titus, though, was not emperor. He was not Caesar at the time. There was no claim to be God on, in Titus, nor did he offer sacrifices to himself, nor did he tell other people to worship him or he would kill them or anything like that. None of those things happen. When Josephus talks about something, an event happening in the proclamation of who Titus is, he's just made like the general, right? He's like the imperator. That's it. There's no deification of the man going on. He became Caesar over 10 years later. So that's a bad one.
All right, here's your last option, if you're preterist, as far as I'm concerned, as your last option, is in the winter of 67 and 68 A.D. There was an event that some preterists call the abomination of desolation. Now, if you're not convinced by the other ones, maybe you would just, you need to hear from a preterist who gives a stronger case. That's possible. Maybe I just haven't given you a strong enough case. Um, I've tried to be fair. I've tried to present the strengths. I just think they're, you know, it's not strong. It's like that time I arm-wrestled, uh, inspiring philosophy. I was like, you know, you're strong, you're not strong enough. You know, a little my buddy Mike Jones. Um, so, uh, in the winter, and by the way, I think he's, he's kind of a preterist too, so I guess that's very appropriate.
In the winter of 67 and 68 A.D., here's the event that took place. There was a group called the Zealots in the first century. We kind of read about them because Simon was a Zealot, one of Jesus's disciples. He was a Zealot, and this seems to be he was part of the same group that eventually became very hostile and very guerrilla war kind of tactics, very guerrilla warfare. Like when, when the Roman armies came around Jerusalem, they like burned the food in the city to try to inspire the people to fight, which just made it an immediate famine and people just died. Like the Zealots were not, they're not great, at least not then. Um, so in the winter of 67, 68 A.D., the Zealots, they actually took over the temple. They did not like, um, Ananus and his, and Ananias, his son, and the other guys, the other leaders in the temple, and they kicked them out. They actually kicked out the high priest and they installed their own high priest in the temple. So they're Jews, but they're not like in the historical tradition of the high priest. They installed their own high priest, and they, and Josephus records this and talks about it like it's a mockery, like they're making a mockery of the priesthood. And so they install this high priest by casting lots. They literally roll dice and they're like, okay, you're the high priest. And this guy, whose name is Phannias, I'm just, I just thought you want to know, his name's Phannias. Poor guy, he's been the butt of jokes ever since. And, um, anyway, they installed him as the high priest. This guy doesn't even know how the sacrifices take place. I mean, he's not really a high priest, right? He doesn't even, so he has to, as he's going about the sacrifices, he has to have them telling him what to do step by step. People go, okay, do this, do that, do this. And so this is seen by some as an abomination of desolation.
Okay, I'm going to give you the cons in a second, but there's one more pro, and that would be that the, then there's, there's fighting that ensued. The high priests that were deposed, they stirred up the crowds of Jews. They started fighting against the Zealots, and according to Josephus, uh, the Zealots were fighting from the temple, right? And when they died, they would drag their their bodies and their injured bodies, whether they were bleeding or dead, and they would drag them into the temple area, and their blood would get all over the temple. But according to Josephus, whenever the other people died, if they were fighting and got injured or killed, they would drag their comrades away from the temple so as not to get their blood in the temple, or because blood, it has a sacrificial purity to it, and you just don't, you don't muddy what's going on in the temple. So they would say, look, they have a bad high priest, and they have the blood being offered like almost like a bad sacrifice. Okay, so it's abomination desolation.
Here is the pro. The best pro of this view: 67 and 68 A.D., at the winter, right? December, January, February, in that time. This is a great time for Jews to flee Jerusalem before, in the early, early 70 A.D., the armies of Rome come around. There is, however, some problems with that. Okay? Um, A, it doesn't look like the abomination of desolation. The abomination of desolation, when you add Daniel and Second Thessalonians, Revelation, Jesus, it looks like a person who's not Jewish. He's not offering bad sacrifices to the God of Israel. He's presenting himself as God. That's not at all what the Zealots did. It's just a very different thing. It doesn't involve Jerusalem being surrounded by armies. So in 67, 68, it's a good time because it's like before the destruction, right? You can still flee, but it's too early. It's like over a year before the armies of the, excuse me, it's two years before the armies show up. The armies didn't show up till 70 A.D. So that doesn't really fit the timeline. Um, they're fleeing way too early. Remember Jesus says, like, don't even leave the house, don't even go back inside, don't go get your coat, like just flee, okay? Well, that doesn't fit 67, 68 in the winter. It doesn't also, it's not followed by three and a half years of tribulation. 67, 68 A.D., we're talking about like two years and some change. There's not nearly enough time.
Now, one preterist, one preterist, just one, I'm not saying they all do. One preterist puts it this way. He goes, "Okay, 67-68, that doesn't give you three and a half years, but Jesus said, and I told you I'd come back to this in Mark 13, that unless the days were cut short, there nobody would be saved, but they would be cut short." So his theory is that while Daniel, Revelation, they seem to speak of this three and a half year period, but between the abomination and the final coming, yet, yet it's okay that time was cut short because Jesus said it would be cut short. And I'm sorry, I don't mean to smirk, like, you know, this is bad reasoning, right? Like you guys all know this is, this is bad. Like I know, I I prophesied that would happen, but I also said it would be cut short. So, ah, you know, and then later I prophesied again that it would be three and a half years in Revelation. And it's like, no, that makes no sense. So that's a real weakness of that view.
Now, if you're like me, if you're, you know, you believe in the already not yet, you you realize these things are similar on purpose, but they're different on purpose as well. It's because God wants you to know this has not yet happened. So let's talk about the futurist view. That's the preterist view. Let's talk about the futurist view. If you're a futurist like myself, then you may view it like this. Um, yes, Second Thessalonians, Mark 13, Luke 21, less Luke 21 in a different way. Luke 21, I'll come back to that, but mostly Mark 13 and Matthew 24, Daniel, Revelation, 2 Thessalonians 2, all this is talking about the same thing. That's one, you know, pillar you've got right there. They just give different details that help fill in all the information. So you'll be able to recognize what's going on, which is why we get the phrase, "Let the reader understand" in Mark and in Matthew. It's referring to Daniel. He's referring you to the other thing so you can get more details because he's just going to hint at it in Mark, hint at it in Matthew, and you need to get more information. And then 2nd Thessalonians also helps us out, as does Revelation.
Um, there's another thing here that's very interesting, and it's in Mark 13:14. And, um, this in the NASB is translated in a way that a lot of people would not agree with, but let me just point it out to you. It says, "But when you see the abomination of desolation standing where it should not be, then flee." Why does it say it? Well, this is actually interesting because in the Greek, this phrase "abomination of desolation," right? That is like an "it." This is like a neuter thing. It's an "it." It's not a "he," is not a "she." It's an "it." But this phrase "standing." "Standing" is, is not "standing" is masculine. Which is why here's the ESV: "When you see the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not to be." Now, the ESV translators say, "Hey, this isn't just a weird quirk. This isn't just a grammatical mistake in a manuscript. This isn't just a strange wording. This is deliberate. We're getting a thing, abomination of desolation, described as a person, he, standing where he ought not to be." That makes a lot of sense if you combine this with 2nd Thessalonians, because in 2nd Thessalonians 2, verses 3 and 4, back to the ASB for those who are trying to track what translation I'm using: "Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes himself and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as God."
If you harmonize Mark's use of the "he standing" when he's standing, and you know Paul's description in Second Thessalonians, you get a clear picture. It's a man proclaiming himself as God in the temple. That fits well with the future thing. It doesn't fit anywhere 70 A.D., but this is something I would look for in the future. Then what happens right after that? In Matthew, in Mark, in Luke, actually Luke, I'm going to come back to Luke again. Luke is the outlier here, and I'll explain why. But in Matthew and Mark, and in Second Thessalonians, the thing that happens after the abomination and then all this like craziness that happens follows immediately after it. The thing that ends it all, the stuff that happens, is the coming of Christ. And it's not just any coming of Christ, according to Second Thessalonians. It is the coming of our Lord and our gathering together with him. This is not Jesus coming in judgment. This is him coming for us and with us. And Paul talks elsewhere about how we'll be caught up and will be with the Lord, right? So this is, it's very hard to take this in some other way than the actual second coming of Christ. When this man of sin is destroyed, he's destroyed by Jesus at his coming.
If I'm scrolling around here, um, yeah, I'm going to find it for you. I read it earlier, but I want to find the verse for you, and I just space on where it is right now. Um, well, you know where it is. I don't want to spend all my time searching, scrolling through things. I'm probably looking right at it anyway. He's destroyed by Jesus at his coming. This is also true in Mark. This is also true in Matthew. So when you integrate this with other texts, it makes a lot of sense. And this is actually one of the pros I'll give for the futurist perspective on the abomination of desolation. One of the pros is it harmonizes so many different scriptures without you having to reach, in my opinion, you know, to make it work. You could just take it all in, build a picture, and say, that's what I'm waiting for. I don't know all the details, but I, but I know all these are some of the details we will see. I don't know how they all are going to fit together. Here's the dots. I don't know how they'll all connect, but I will have all the dots.
So here's an example. I'm going to just quote to you from a commentary that's surveying the the abomination of desolation and the end times, and it's quoting from all these different books, so you can just get the idea. This shouldn't impress you too much. It just gives you the idea of the harmony that happens, I think, on a futurist perspective, that is harder to achieve on a preterist view. This person is the end-time Antichrist: Daniel 7:23-26, 9:25-27; 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, 8-9; Revelation 13:1-10 and 14-15. He will make a covenant with the Jewish people at the beginning of the seven-year period preceding Christ's second coming: Daniel 9:27. The temple will be rebuilt and worship reestablished: Revelation 11:1. In the middle of this period, after three and a half years, the Antichrist will break his covenant, stop temple sacrifices, desecrate the temple: Daniel 9:27, and proclaim himself to be God: Matthew 24:15, 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and 4, Revelation 11:2. And I would add Mark 13 as well, because it's worth he standing in the holy place. This launches the terrible end-time event of events of the Great Tribulation: Revelation 6:8 through 9 and 16. Those who refuse to be identified with the Antichrist will suffer severe persecution and be forced to flee for refuge: Revelation 12:6, 13-17. And of course, this can correspond to Jesus telling them to flee when they see this happening. Many both Jews and Gentiles will be saved during this time: Revelation 7. But many will also be martyred: Revelation 6:9 through 11.
And my only point here is, I'm not, you shouldn't change your whole mind on your view here. What I'm suggesting is this: be aware of big picture harmonization of various texts of scripture without some of the oddities that come with preterism, saying that Jesus coming back and killing the man of sin with the breath of his mouth is Nero two years before this invisible coming of Christ that most of us missed, two years before kills himself with the sword, and that coming two years later is the fulfillment, like causing that, like that is it is what it is. All right, but here's a con. Here's, here's a, a thing that would go against my interpretation. Again, this, everything I'm doing is assuming the Bible is true, assuming the Bible's absolutely God's word. We're just talking about understanding it properly. So here's a view against my interpretation: it would be that Luke really doesn't follow the same pattern that I'm offering from Matthew and, um, Mark. It just looks different. In fact, it looks very much like AD 70.
So what I'm going to do right now is I'm going to read through Luke chapter 21, and we'll start in verse 10, and we're going to read a big section, and I'm going to point out a few things here. And I think that what, what's happening with Luke fits what I'm addicted to, which is the already but not yet understanding of these things, the partial fulfillment, total fulfillment. And in spoiler, I view Jesus's statements right in the Olivet Discourse in these Gospel passages we've been covering the past couple weeks. I view these as Jesus warning them of A, the 70 AD destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, and B, the future final battle that will take place at the end time. I, I think it's all of those things. I think that I shouldn't call it the final battle, but the tribulation and the second coming and the three and a half years and all that. I see Jesus is warning them about both things. And Luke leans a little bit more towards 70 AD, but still terminates in the future, not in 70 AD. So let me try to explain what I mean.
Luke 21:10: "Then he continued by saying to them, 'Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be great earthquakes and in various places plagues and famines, and there will be terrors and great signs from heaven. But before all these things, they will lay their hand on 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. It will lead to an opportunity for your testimony. So make up your minds not to prepare beforehand or defend yourself, for I will give you to defend yourself, for I will give you utterance and wisdom which none of your opponents will be able to resist or refute. But you will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death, and you'll be hated by all because of my name. Yet not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your lives.'" Okay, this is all the previous stuff, right? There's wars, all these things are going to happen. You're suffering, you're going to be going through difficult times. Persevere. Trust in me. He's like, you may be killed, but not a hair of your head will perish. This is a great encouragement to those who suffer for Christ. Whatever you lose as you suffer for Christ, you lost nothing, for all that, all that you have is preserved in heaven for you for eternity.
Verse 20: "Then here comes the prediction. Notice how it's different. But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then recognize that her desolation is near." Similar language, but very different. There's no abomination of desolation phrase here. Jerusalem surrounded by armies would be like early 70 AD, months before the events of, um, the destruction of the temple. This is, this would be the, this would actually be the time to flee in 70 AD, is if you see the army surrounding. The tendency back then is armies are surrounding, flee into the city, behind the walls. Jesus gives them instruction that would have them running away because her desolation is coming. So this sounds like 70 AD. Then those unlike Mark and Matthew, "then those who were in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those who are in the midst of the city must leave, and those who are in the country must not enter the city. Don't go back to the city because the days, these are the days of vengeance, so that all things which are written will be fulfilled." This is a phrase that doesn't mean all prophecy has to happen in those days. It just means everything that's written about those days has to happen in those days. "Woe to those who are pregnant and those who are nursing babies in those days, for there will be great distress upon the land and wrath to this people, and they will fall by the edge of the sword and will be led captive into all the nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled under by foot underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled."
So this is, this is he talks about many of the same things that will happen in the distant future because 70 AD is similar but not the same as that future thing. But there's some stuff he leaves out because in Luke, now who knows how long Jesus talked, how many things he said originally, but the way the Holy Spirit inspired them to write it, Luke seems to speak to me more of 70. Although here we're about to hit the shift. This is where the shift happens, right? It'll be the city will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. This is very different than what we get in Mark and Matthew. Mark and Matthew, it's like this destruction happens, there's tribulation and suffering, and then I'm going to return. That would be the future. But this, he's like, "Hey, you're going to fall, you're going to, they're going to be led away captive, and then Gentiles will run Jerusalem until what? The time of the Gentiles is fulfilled." You could argue that Gentiles are still trampling Jerusalem, trampling under foot, because you don't, you don't have total autonomy. You still have the city itself, the Dome of the Rock, the, the Temple Mount is still controlled by non-Jews. So, um, this is still the case if, if you take that view, then, and I'm going to suggest this time of the Gentiles has been 2,000 years so far. I would actually support this real quick. Let me go there with Romans 11:25. I think it's 11:25. Yeah, "For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery, so that you will not be wise in your own estimation, that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." I may be getting too complicated here. I'm sorry. Sometimes I can't tell because I've been talking so long. But here's the thing, um, Paul talks about a future time with this great revival of Israel, and he mentions it'll happen when, when the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And Jesus talks about the trampling of Jerusalem in the last passage until the time of the Gentiles is, um, is fulfilled. So we could be seeing that there's a great Jewish revival at the same time as what goes on in the tribulation period, and that would fit with at least my understanding of Romans, Revelation, and various other places.
Then Jesus says, "And so far it's been trampled for almost 2,000 years. Then after that, at some point, there will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on earth dismay among the nations and perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, men fainting from fear and the expectation of things which are coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory." Okay, now this is talking, it's as though he jumps to post-tribulation moment here. But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads because your redemption is drawing near." He told them a parable. Okay, he gives me the parable about the fig tree and all that. Um, we will get in more into that detail in future weeks going through Mark 13. So I'm just going to say this: Luke does look different than Matthew and Mark, and I do think that if you have a futurist perspective, you've got to explain how Luke is different than Matthew and Mark. This is how I explain it. It's not necessarily how everybody would. I think it's the already not yet thing. I think Luke is emphasizing 70 AD more, but it still shows this, you know, potentially at least with this Gentiles trampling thing, this long delay before then finally even bigger, epic signs, signs and stars and sky and bigger stuff, and then the final coming of Christ. And then Matthew, Mark give us the more, more of the emphasis on the, um, the tribulation time in the future, not 70 AD. That's my view. If you feel that it's weak, you're totally entitled to it. I'd rather, you know, that that is potentially one of the weaker spots of my view. I just think it's true. I think it's accurate. Um, Luke to point this out, Luke never mentions the abomination of desolation. He only mentions armies. That feels like 70 AD. Doesn't the abomination of desolation? No. Luke doesn't mention the great tribulation associated with the destruction of Jerusalem. He just mentions fleeing and then the deporting of the, of the Jews and all that. He doesn't mention that. Luke shows a delay from the destruction of Jerusalem until the second coming, the time of the Gentiles. That delay is not mentioned in Matthew, Mark, because they're not focusing on 70 AD the way that Luke is. And Luke has clear sections that go like this: Jerusalem and Israel are judged. Then there's a time of the Gentiles where there's break and wait. Then there's international judgment. Notice his judgment statement language after the time of the Gentiles is international, all nations. And then there's the second coming. Well, that fits the idea that there's the tribulation right there when he's talking about the judgment of all people.
So in conclusion, we wrap this all up in a bow. Now that you know everything, we all know everything correctly, um, you either are a futurist or a preterist when it comes to these things. Even people who are idealist in Revelation, who are spiritualist in Revelation, they'll generally be preterist when it comes to the Gospels and Second Thessalonians. Even if they're idealists in other locations, they're going to be preterists here. And so you're going to be preterists or futurists, is what it will come down to in your view of these things. Either it happened in like 66, 67, 68, excuse me, or it happened in 70 AD, or it's going to happen sometime in the future. I think the already not yet thing makes the most sense. I think, and here's some reasons why: again, I think it harmonizes so many passages. I think it acknowledges the first century events as being connected, because it's hard to say this has no connection, but it also realizes that they fall short of a real fulfillment. And so that, I feel like it makes it a robust view because it can account for everything the preterist says, as well as the weaknesses of the preterist argument. So I went, and it seems to me the most honest about them falling short, about where these views fall short. It also explains confusion on the passage. You see why are Christians? Why do they see this is so difficult to understand? What does it mean? Where was it fulfilled? Well, it's because it hasn't been. This is why you have a hard time getting full agreement on it, because we're, we're guessing at what the real life fulfillment of something will be, which is always easier to see after it's happened. If you looked at the Old Testament teachings about Jesus, you could piece together something that would look similar to the to the coming of Christ, but it would be wrong in some ways. After Christ comes, everyone agrees because now you see the fulfillment. Someone went and they grabbed the pencil and they connected the dots for you, and now we all know it's a horse or whatever. Um, forgive my weird analogies, but yeah, the confusion makes sense on the futurist perspective with an already not yet element there.
All of the views we have, though, share the same hope, and all scripture is going to be fulfilled. That's for sure. This is my understanding on how that might happen. I, I think that the past fulfillment of scripture, the first coming of Christ, is what guarantees the second coming of Christ, and we should place our hope absolutely in that. Our task, though, either way, is this: whether whether this is some past event or some future event, whichever your perspective is, the admonition that we need to take into our hearts and apply is that you, as a Christian, have two major issues that you will struggle with in this life, that these prophecies are meant to warn you about. One of them is is is pleasures, is sin, um, laziness, lust, uh, abuse, substance abuse, all the things that get, get a hold of us, that we start to love the world and instead of the people in the world, we love them with the love of the Lord. We love the things in the world, the pleasures of the world. We, we fall to the problem of prosperity. The other issue is that we fall to the problem of pain, that we, that we yield to persecution, that we yield to public pressure not to just preach the gospel and tell people the truth that you need Jesus like you have sinned against God Almighty, and Jesus is the, and the only way for you to know forgiveness and grace. God has provided a way, but you must humble yourself and place your trust in Christ. You must turn from your ways and turn to him. And that this message becomes more and more offensive as people elevate biblical and Christian teachings to like, um, canceling offenses. And so these are the two commendations for us: watch out for the pleasures and sin of life, and watch out for the the oppression of peer pressure to keep us from being bold in our faith and confident in our presentation of the gospel to others.
Let's pray. Uh, Lord God, we thank you for your holy word and our joyous expectation at the coming of Christ. This life, in the end, will look like a blink, just a, a brief moment compared to eternity. And all we're probably going to care about is that we lived it for you. We pray that you'd show us how we can live for you. Help us see it. Help us see how to serve your kingdom, Lord. Help us to live lives, we pray, without any arrogance here. We just ask to live lives that, that aren't based on compromises of people we see around us, but are based upon the call to live for Christ, the call to live as a Christian, completely and totally for you. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right, y'all, thank you so much for joining. And we're going to continue going through Mark 13. There's going to be more future prophecy things. I'm going to be talking in, uh, two weeks. I'll be talking about more of the content here at the end of Jesus's prophecy with nature. What's this fig tree thing about? And we'll talk about some of the failed predictions that have happened in the past, and even within Calvary Chapel, because many non-Calvary Chapel people know this because it's all over Wikipedia and stuff like that. But Pastor Chuck Smith had made some predictions that failed, and it's an embarrassing moment for Calvary's. I don't think it's as bad as those people make it look, but I do think it's bad. Um, and I think it's something that I wish somebody from Calvary would talk about. Well, I'm from Calvary, so I'll talk about it. I actually got a copy of Chuck's, in his book, where he makes some of those, some of those predictions. So I think that those things are significant to talk about, um, understand and just put on the table and deal with in a mature way. That's all coming in the next couple weeks. I will also see you guys Friday if you join me for the live stream Q&A at 1 PM. I do that answering your questions as many as I can every Friday. Lord bless you and keep you. Make his face shine upon you and remind you that it is the joy of the Lord that gives you strength.