I am taking great personal risk to stand up for the truth that will set people free. It would be much easier to continue traveling and speaking popular messages about the prophetic seer realm, but the Lord has directed me to take a stand in this arena. Although the hate mail from the close-minded is piling up in my inbox, I have heard from so many more voices of encouragement as people’s lives are being dramatically impacted by this book. I challenge you to give it a fair chance.

Your brother

Jonathan Welton

Foreword by

Introduction

Chapter 1: How Did We Get Here?

Chapter 2: The Rapture

Chapter 3: The Great Tribulation

Chapter 4: The End of the World

Chapter 5: Melting Elements

Chapter 6: The Antichrist

Chapter 7: The Israel of God

Chapter 8: The Kingdom Transition

Chapter 9: The Kingdom Now

Chapter 10: The Kingdom Advancing

Chapter 11: The Big Three

Appendix 1: A Word to Charismatics

Appendix 2: Statement of End-Time Beliefs

Appendix 3: Recommended Reading

Appendix 4: The Date of Authorship for the Book of Revelation

Endnotes

My parents both graduated from a Pentecostal Bible College in the early 1970s. They attended classes during the era of the Jesus People Movement, the Vietnam War, and the epically bestselling Late Great Planet Earth by Hal Lindsey. During those turbulent times, my parents met and married. After they had my two older siblings, I was born into their family in 1983. This was an era of much speculation and fear regarding the endtimes, which many believed had already begun. My parents had heard all the confusing and conflicting points of view regarding the endtimes, and instead of becoming obsessed with figuring it all out, they made a choice.

They determined to raise godly children who would raise godly grandchildren. They chose to think long-term and invest in their future and the future of their children. They didn’t have all the answers regarding a “perfect theology of the endtimes,” but they knew better than to buy into the hype. When their friends quit their jobs, bought boats, and racked up credit card debt “because the end of the world is around the corner and we won’t have to pay it back,” my parents called this irresponsible and unChristlike behavior.

Growing up, I never knew what my parents really thought about the “end of the world.” When I pressed them for an answer, they would say, “We are Pan-Millennial,” which was a humorous way of saying that it will all “pan out” in the end! This left me with a lot of questions in my teen years when the Left Behind series became a raging bestseller.

Since I was not force-fed a particular point of view by either my parents or my church while growing up, I had the full ability to think freely. I began to dig into studying the endtimes and very quickly realized that this study was going to be deep, complex, and scary.

It didn’t take long for me to become thoroughly confused. At that point, I felt the Holy Spirit speak to my heart. He said to me, “Jonathan, please set aside your study of the endtimes. It is not the right season for you to study this. If you will trust Me, I will guide you to a right understanding in the future, but now is not the time. Wait on Me to give you a green light.” So for the next two and half years, I chose to read nothing regarding the endtimes; I didn’t watch the Left Behind movies (sorry Kirk Cameron); I didn’t even read the Book of Revelation!

One day, as I was browsing a used book sale, I saw a book on the endtimes, and I heard the Holy Spirit say to me, “Buy that book; it is time to begin to reveal the truth to you.” It has now been over ten years since that day, and what the Holy Spirit has taught me about the endtimes has been some of the most wonderful revelation that I have received from His Word.

Plenty of books about the endtimes have been written based on personal visions or wild interpretations of Scripture. This is not one of those books. I have a Masters Degree in Biblical Studies. I am a student of Church History. I am not going to fill this book with subjective visions and fantasies regarding private interpretations of the endtimes. Enough of those books already exist, and the Holy Spirit had me avoid them for two and half years so that He could prepare my heart for what He wanted to show me.

Here are my starting points.

• Every part of the Gospel is simple, including the teaching regarding the endtimes. If something is too complex for the average person to grasp, then it is being taught wrongly.
• Our view of the future should not cause fear. No part of the Gospel (which literally means “good news”) ever causes fear.
• Our understanding of the endtimes determines how we live our lives and whether we plan long-term, build a legacy, prepare our children for a lifetime of service to the Lord, and so forth. A correct view of the endtimes will set us free from fear. It will cause us to have a renewed passion for Jesus rather than an obsession with the antichrist.

Since many of you did not grow up in “Pan-Millennial” households, it is possible that you have been force-fed a particular point of view for many years. I would ask you to lay down what you have heard all your life and consider opening your heart to hear a fresh understanding from the Holy Spirit. In trade, I as the author promise to write simply. I will choose not to use large theological terms. I will not waste your time; I will respect your time as my reader. I can promise you that I will not try to coerce you into agreement with me, but I will share with you what the Holy Spirit has shown me, and you can test all things and hold fast that which is good (see 1 Thess. 5:21).

Thank you for investing your time in this book; it will be worth it.

How Did We Get Here?

When I was in my early teens, my brother worked at a Christian bookstore. He would often bring home the latest Christian movie releases, and we would enjoy getting to watch them long before others could. I remember when Veggie Tales first came out; what an amazing new era that brought. Finally the Battle of Jericho included slushies! This was a huge step forward from the Superbook and McGee and Me videos I grew up with, but I digress.

I remember when my brother brought home the videocassette of The Thief in the Night. That was a bit much for a fourteen-year-old! For many years, I had one clip from the movie stuck in my memory. In this memory clip, a big guy who looked like Santa and was wearing overalls had a giant endtimes chart covered with dragons and beasts from Revelation. I recently re-watched the whole Thief in the Night movie series on YouTube (Santa, dragons, and all), and my memory wasn’t that far off.

Although it isn’t as common today, the endtimes chart used to be a standard way of communicating about the end of the world. Each pastor and teacher had his or her own views mapped out on personal charts. Most famous are the antique Clarence Larkin’s Charts (from the early 1900s).

In retrospect, I am very glad my family didn’t celebrate Christmas with the Santa Claus tradition; otherwise, I would have been thinking of the big guy from the endtimes movie coming down my chimney with his dragon and beast wall charts.

Years later, the Holy Spirit began to reveal the truth about the endtimes to me. Considering my weird background of a “Pan-Millenial” family and scary Christian movies, I wonder if He chuckled to Himself, knowing that He really had a piece of work on His hands!

I first began by studying the history of the many endtime views. To understand a belief system, it is very helpful to start by researching the history behind it.

I found that, throughout Church history, the majority of Bible teachers and theologians held to a similar view of the endtimes. Yet, in the last century, the western Church has fractured into teaching many differing views. Simply stated, from AD 30 to the 1500s, the majority of the Church had an optimistic view of the future—that the Kingdom of God was growing in the earth and would continue to do so until the final return of Christ.

The fragmentation of viewpoints began in the reformation of the 1500s. This eventually led to the modern Church believing in:

• The rapture
• A one-world “antichrist” ruler
• A seven-year global tribulation

Before the 1500s, none of these three points were understood the way that they are taught today. I came to understand that the modern understanding is based more on a tradition from the 1800s than from a historical and biblically orthodox view. As I will show, the Church fathers of the first 1500 years had a Biblical understanding that is very different than the modern understanding.

So where did the two roads diverge?

The Historical Development

The Reformation of the 1500s changed a lot of things, but unwittingly it eventually affected the end-time beliefs of much of the Church. In the early 1500s, Martin Luther railed against the Roman Catholic Church, and in his passion, he called her the Whore of Babylon and the Beast. To counter this, in 1585 a Jesuit priest by the name of Francisco Ribera published a 500-page work that placed Daniel 9:24-27, Matthew 24, and Revelation 4-19 in the distant future. This was the first thought of its kind, and it is the foundation of many modern end-time views.¹ The significance of this new interpretation is that, rather than seeing these passages as fulfilled, now Ribera was saying they were still future.

Historically speaking, Ribera’s new view did not gain momentum. In fact, his writing was lost until 1826, when Samuel Maitland, librarian to the Archbishop of Canterbury, rediscovered Ribera’s forgotten manuscript and published it for the sake of public interest and curiosity.

When the book resurfaced, a small group of ultra-conservatives, led by John Darby, began to take Ribera’s book seriously and came under the influence of this thinking. John Darby and his contemporary, Edward Irving, became extremely vocal about their new theology of the endtimes and began to attract many followers. Their most important follower was C.I. Scofield, who later published these concepts in his famed Scofield Reference Bible.

The Scofield Bible was the most popular of its time because it was one of the earliest Bibles to contain a full commentary. It quickly became a standard for seminary students of the time. This continued unchallenged until the 1948 Latter Rain movement, which disagreed with the Scofield Reference Bible’s claims that the spiritual gifts had ceased. The Pentecostals pushed back against these portions of the commentary, but still swallowed Ribera’s end-time teachings without realizing it.²

Then in 1961, Finis Dake published the Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible, which continued to promote the same Darbyism as the Scofield Bible, and the Ryrie and MacArthur Study Bibles have continued this tradition of Darbyism.

Thus we see that Martin Luther railed against the Roman Catholic Church, causing one priest to react by writing a new doctrine. This began the belief that certain prophecies have not yet been fulfilled!

The Timing of the New Doctrine

It is important to consider the timing of John Darby’s teaching ministry. During the 1830s, the Holy Spirit, through the Second Great Awakening, was stirring American churches to life with great fervor. At the same time, Satan was hard at work releasing distortions and false teachings into the earth. From the late 1700s to the late 1800s, a multitude of major false teachings were released into the Church. For example:

• Joseph Smith founded Mormonism in 1830 (in Palmyra, New York, a suburb of Rochester, New York, where Charles Finney was having his revival meetings at the same time).
• Charles Taze Russell founded the Jehovah’s Witnesses in the late 1870s.
• The Fox Sisters founded Spiritualism in 1848 (which later became the foundation of the New Age Movement).
• The first Unitarian church began in Boston in 1785.
• Mary Baker Eddy founded the cult named Christian Science in 1879 (which was a blending of Swedenborgism, Mesmerism, and Metaphysics).³

During this time period, John Nelson Darby also brought forth his new end-time teachings. Since C.I. Scofield published Darby’s beliefs in his Bible commentary notes, Darbyism has become the mainstream end-time teaching of many modern teachers. Yet many have never even considered where these beliefs have come from.

The Last One Hundred Years

After the Scofield Reference Bible was published in 1909, the earth went through a deeply traumatic season: World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II. By the time that this period of 40 years was over, pessimistic Scofield-ism had deeply rooted itself in American thinking.

Then in 1948, Israel regained its independent statehood, which caused many to say that Matthew 24:32-33 meant that when Israel became a state again the end was near.

Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door (Matthew 24:32-33).

In the next verse it says, “Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened” (Matt. 24:34). Since the Bible teaches that a generation is 40 years, this led to millions of Christians believing and teaching that the rapture would occur in 1988. This opened the door for Edgar Whisenant to sell 4.5 million copies of his book, 88 Reasons Why Jesus Will Return in 1988. Whisenant was quoted as saying, “Only if the Bible is in error am I wrong; and I say that to every preacher in town,” and “If there were a king in this country and I could gamble with my life, I would stake my life on Rosh Hashanah in 1988.”⁴

Whisenant’s predictions were taken seriously in some parts of the evangelical Christian community. As the great day approached, regular programming on the Christian Trinity Broadcast Network (TBN) was interrupted to provide special instructions on preparing for the rapture.⁵ When the predicted rapture failed to occur, Whisenant followed up with later books with predictions for various dates in 1989, 1993, 1994, and 1997.

At this point, some of the modern teachers have started to redefine what generation means. They say that the clock started at 1948, but since a forty-year generation is wrong, they are now saying a generation is seventy or even one hundred years.

In 1970, Hal Lindsey wrote The Late Great Planet Earth. He sold approximately 35 million copies and deeply affected a generation of pastors and leaders growing up in the Jesus People Movement of the early 1970s. The lasting fruit of this book has created a generation that believes more in Lindsey’s mythology than understanding what the Bible and history actually teach. In his book, Hal Lindsey concluded that, since the United States was not mentioned in Daniel or Revelation, the U.S. would not be a major player on the world scene when the Great Tribulation happened. Based on his interpretation of various biblical texts, he also presumed that the European Economic Community (now the European Union) would become what he termed the “United States of Europe.” This union would have ten members and would become, according to Lindsey, the revived Roman Empire, ruled by the antichrist, needed to fulfill Bible prophecy. Currently, the European Union has twenty-seven members.

Later, Hal Lindsey released another book titled The 1980s: Countdown to Armageddon, implying that the battle of Armageddon would happen soon. He even went so far as to say, “The decade of the 1980s could very well be the last decade of history as we know it,” and he suggested that the U.S. would be destroyed by a surprise Soviet attack. Not surprisingly, because of Lindsey’s adamant insistence that the 1980s would usher in the Great Tribulation, the book was quietly taken out of print in the early 1990s. Lindsey, however, would not give up. In the early 1990s, he published Planet Earth—2000 A.D., which warned Christians that they should not plan to still be living on earth by the year 2000.

Throughout his several books, Lindsey assumed that the Cold War would continue until the end and, in fact, play a significant part in the unfolding of end-time events. He even named Russia as the famous Gog of Revelation 20:8. Likewise, Lindsey believed the hippie culture of the 1960s and ’70s would become the dominate culture in the U.S., ultimately leading to the immorality and false religion “prophesied” to arise in the endtimes by various Bible passages.Clearly, none of these prophecies have come to pass, and many have been proven wrong due to the dates ascribed to them, yet Lindsey is still lauded by many Christians as a great modern prophet.

Then in 1995, the first of the mega-bestselling book series, Left Behind, was released. Due to the paranoia and fear regarding Y2K, Christians were primed for rapture fever. When all was said and done, Y2K was all hype, and 60 million copies of Left Behind had been sold (as well as three terrible feature length films that were similar in nature and theology to the Thief in the Night movie series of the 1970s).

Now we are in the new millennium, and it is high time that we begin to deeply question the modern end-time views. If a teacher has been proclaiming that the end of the world is coming soon for over forty years, we should stop paying attention. If a teacher has proclaimed over forty different people to be the antichrist, we should ignore him. The fact that these teachers wear suits and are on TV doesn’t make them any less wrong than the crazy guy on the street corner wearing a sandwich board sign that reads, “The end is near!” If a teacher was a paranoid alarmist regarding Y2K, we shouldn’t be concerned about that teacher’s other futuristic proclamations.

In summary, the teaching that Jesus’ words in Matthew 24, the prophecies of Daniel, and the Book of Revelation are all referring to future events is a new concept, which came as a reaction to the Reformation. It has become deeply imbedded in the American Evangelical community, but does not have the support of Church history or Scripture, as we shall see.

Judge Fruit

Jesus told us to judge the messages of various prophets by examining the fruit of their lives and the fruit of their prophetic words (see Matt. 7:15-20). So now that we see that this modern end-time teaching is a new phenomenon, we must also ask ourselves what fruit is coming from it.

Twelve Fruits That I Have Witnessed:

1. Love usually takes the back seat, while fear is emphasized. Sometimes the fear is covered over by a rapture escape or by divine protection from coming wrath.
2. All long-term thinking becomes limited. It becomes impossible to even prophesy beyond a few decades because of the supposed “any minute return” of Christ.
3. It creates a fear of technology because that new GPS, computer, smartphone, laptop, or whatever might be used as the “mark of the beast.”
4. It harbors a fear of politics because the antichrist could be right around the corner.
5. It breeds an anti-culture view to the point of irrelevancy. Yet, even the apostle Paul was able to quote from the popular culture of his own day (see Acts 17:28).
6. It discourages people from pushing forward in health, medicine, the environment, or technology because they reason, “Why would one work for the good of a world that is going to burn?”
7. It has created a bizarre form of Christian racism. Many have become pro-Israel to the point that no political thought is exercised. For example, if Israel were to mistreat her surrounding nations, many modern Christians would give them a free-pass because they are God’s “chosen people.” Christians have literally accepted a new form of pro-Israel and anti-Arab racism.  Also, it breeds a suspicion toward other countries, producing anti-Russian and anti-Chinese attitudes among many Christians. This Christian racism is rooted in a wrong understanding of the endtimes.
8. Hope is narrowed down to a rapture escape.
9. This end-time view is the seedbed of many cults and militias.
10. Many have turned to extended hours of fasting and prayer, to quick evangelism, and to looking for the rapture or the “signs of the times,” rather than studying and training for a lifetime of advancing the Kingdom.
11. This view doesn’t take the time texts of Scripture seriously or literally (for example, Matt. 23:36; 24:34).
12. It has birthed many silly conspiracies; it fits perfectly with those who believe in the Illuminati, the NWO, and other secret society theories.

Pascal’s Wager

The mathematician, physicist, and Catholic philosopher, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), proposed a wager. It has become known as Pascal’s Wager or Pascal’s Gambit. I will paraphrase: What if you chose to believe in God and live as if He exists? If you are right, then wonderful! But if you are wrong and you find out that you simply lived a healthy moral life, but were wrong about God, what have you lost?⁶

I would like to propose Welton’s Wager based on the same logic. What if you chose to believe optimistically about the endtimes, raise godly kids, plan long-term, reject thoughts of fear, and work as a member of the Bride making herself ready (see Rev. 19:7). Even if you are wrong and suddenly get raptured out, what have you lost? You will have been a good steward of what God put in your hands rather than sitting on your hands, burying your talents, and waiting for a rapture that may not come in your lifetime! If you spend your life in fear, trying to figure out dates and guess who the antichrist is, you will be held accountable for all that wasted living.

A final thought. Some say that having a fearful future motivates evangelism. Actually most non-Christians just think we are nuts and don’t want to join us. In fact, some famous atheists (for example Christopher Hitchens) are saying that Jesus was a false prophet because His prophecy didn’t happen in the first century (see Matt. 24:34)⁷ Even when some people do get saved out of fear for the future, this is not the Gospel of the Kingdom; Jesus never said to preach the endtimes. Many have been brought into Christianity through fear of hell, judgment, or rapture; they then have had to untangle their spiritual walk, for years to come, from the fear into which they were birthed.

It is time to change our thinking.

Chapter Points

• The belief in a future rapture, antichrist, and Great Tribulation are new ideas that arose from a reaction against the Reformation in the 1500s.
• John Darby reintroduced this view, and C.I Scofield popularized it in his Scofield Reference Bible in the early 1900s. Thus it became mainstream belief among evangelical and charismatic Christians.
• The appearance of many new cults in that same era and the worldwide negative impact of World War I, The Great Depression, and World War II firmly rooted a negative view of the end in much of the Christian community.
• End-time predictors such as Hal Lindsey and Edgar Whisenant sold millions of copies of predictive books that have been proven to be false prophecy, yet their teachings are still heeded by many Christians.
• This new end-time view consistently bears bad fruit in its adherents.
• It would be wiser to live with a long-term, optimistic view (and end up being wrong and suddenly raptured out) than to live with a rapture-focused, short-term view (and end up being wrong and ultimately be held accountable for not working to advance the Kingdom in your lifetime).

The Rapture

I used to be a counselor at an all-male Christian summer camp. The greatest prank of all time was the year when we raptured everyone! Well, not really, but that was the goal. As staffers, we had schemed and plotted that if the Camp Director ever left the campground long enough, the counselors would take the campers into the woods and stage an elaborate rapture prank.

When the Director returned to the camp, he would see random clothes littered about the soccer field, swimming trunks floating by themselves in the pool, a random camper sitting in the grass crying about how all his bunkmates had disappeared in the rapture, and so forth. Although this would have been epic, we never managed to pull it off during the six summers I was on staff. Every summer the idea would resurface, but it never came to fruition.

It was about this same time that I began studying the history of the modern view of the endtimes. I learned that the whole concept of the rapture, as it is commonly taught, cannot be found in Church history before the 1800s and that it comes from a few deeply misunderstood Scriptures.

The Rapture

As I discussed in the previous chapter, John Darby and C.I. Scofield spread their teachings through the Scofield Reference Bible. One of the main teachings was that of the rapture.

The concept of the rapture is that on any day in the future, Jesus will secretly snatch away His followers to Heaven. This will be followed by the antichrist rising and seizing rule of the entire planet. He will rule from a revived Roman Empire and sit on a throne inside a rebuilt temple in Jerusalem (some hold the view that the Rapture will happen halfway through the antichrist’s seven year rule). Then God will pour out His wrath upon the wicked in the earth, finally culminating in what will be called the battle of Armageddon. This is a general summary of what Darby taught. Essentially, none of these teachings were widely taught before the 1830s.

Rather than belabor my point about the short history of these teachings, in this chapter, I shall examine what the Bible says about the rapture. There are four main passages that are used to teach the rapture concept. I will examine them one at a time.

 Passage #1: 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18

Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 NIV).

The Thessalonian church was a church surviving under tremendous persecution. We see this in Paul’s encouragement to them: “Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring” (2 Thess. 1:4). Because of this persecution, many of their members had been put to death. This is the context into which Paul wrote the above passage. Paul did not hint in any way that a coming great tribulation, under the one-world ruler called the antichrist, must be avoided and that God would rapture Christians 2,000 years after he wrote this letter.  In fact, he made it clear that he was writing words of clarification and comfort, for his first-century readers, regarding what would happen to those who had died. This is the context of verse 13: “But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.”

In the next verses, we see that those who have died will be resurrected as Jesus was resurrected:

For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep (1 Thessalonians 4:14-15 NIV).

Paul continued to encourage his listeners not to despair about those who had died, saying that they would actually be resurrected and transformed even before the living are! “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise¹ first” (1 Thess. 4:16 NKJV).

Prior to the invention of the rapture doctrine in the 1830s, all published commentators interpreted First Thessalonians 4:13-18 as referring to the resurrection. For example, Matthew Henry’s commentary on this passage, written in 1721, says:

They shall be raised up from the dead, and awakened out of their sleep, for God will bring them with him, v 14. They then are with God, and are better where they are than when they were here; and when God comes he will bring them with him. The doctrine of the resurrection and the second coming of Christ is a great antidote against the fear of death and inordinate sorrow for the death of our Christian friends…²

Matthew Henry, along with nearly all other commentators prior to John Darby, saw the obvious intention of this passage as referring to the resurrection of the dead at the final coming of Christ, not to a secret rapture seven years prior to the resurrection.

This is the same resurrection that Paul spoke of in First Corinthians 15:51-54:

Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

First Thessalonians 4:17-18 are the two verses that are most quoted when speaking of the rapture concept:

Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words (NIV).

Yet, the context in this passage did not change. Paul was still comforting a first century church under persecution. He was still instructing them regarding their dead friends and relatives; he had not begun to explain a secret rapture 2,000 years in the future. It is clear that Paul was talking about the final resurrection and how we will all be caught up together with the Lord, which is followed by the books being opened and the final judgment.

The famous commentator Adam Clarke gives a clear summary to this passage to the Thessalonians:

The Lord himself—That is: Jesus Christ shall descend from heaven; shall descend in like manner as he was seen by his disciples to ascend, i.e. in his human form, but now infinitely more glorious; for thousands of thousands shall minister unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand shall stand before him; for the Son of man shall come on the throne of his glory: but who may abide the day of his coming, or stand when he appeareth?

With a shout—Or order, εν κελευσματι· and probably in these words: Arise, ye dead, and come to judgment; which order shall be repeated by the archangel, who shall accompany it with the sound of the trump of God, whose great and terrible blasts, like those on mount Sinai, sounding louder and louder, shall shake both the heavens and the earth!

Observe the order of this terribly glorious day:

1. Jesus, in all the dignity and splendor of his eternal majesty, shall descend from heaven to the mid region, what the apostle calls the air, somewhere within the earth’s atmosphere.

2. Then the κελευσμα, shout or order, shall be given for the dead to arise.

3. Next the archangel, as the herald of Christ, shall repeat the order, Arise, ye dead, and come to judgment!

4. When all the dead in Christ are raised, then the trumpet shall sound, as the signal for them all to flock together to the throne of Christ. It was by the sound of the trumpet that the solemn assemblies, under the law, were convoked; and to such convocations there appears to be here an allusion.

5. When the dead in Christ are raised, their vile bodies being made like unto his glorious body, then,

6. Those who are alive shall be changed, and made immortal.

7. These shall be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air.

8. We may suppose that the judgment will now be set, and the books opened, and the dead judged out of the things written in those books.

9. The eternal states of quick and dead being thus determined, then all who shall be found to have made a covenant with him by sacrifice, and to have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, shall be taken to his eternal glory, and be for ever with the Lord. What an inexpressibly terrific glory will then be exhibited! I forbear to call in here the descriptions, which men of a poetic turn have made of this terrible scene, because I cannot trust to their correctness; and it is a subject which we should speak of and contemplate as nearly as possible in the words of Scripture.³

From this examination, we can clearly see that there is no secret pre-tribulation rapture in First Thessalonians 4, but there is a clear presentation of the resurrection of the dead before the final judgment.

Passage #2: Matthew 24:40-41 

Then two men will be in the field: one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding at the mill: one will be taken and the other left (Matthew 24:40-41 NKJV).

This passage refers to the random killings perpetrated by the Romans at their siege of Jerusalem in AD 70. In fact, the entirety of Matthew 24 is about the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. First Jesus declared the destruction of the Temple (see Matt. 24:2-3). Then Jesus told them in AD 30 that within a generation (forty years) the destruction would come (see Matt. 24:34). I will address Matthew 24 further in a different chapter, but suffice it to say that this passage does not imply a secret rapture. Jesus was prophesying how the Roman soldiers would arbitrarily kill the Jews.

Passage #3: Revelation 4:1

After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, “Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this” (Revelation 4:1 NKJV). 

This verse is not a metaphor; it is a record. John was not telling his readers that they would be sucked up before the throne, but that he was! John was not speaking of the rapture. Many have said that John was speaking of the rapture because the Church is not mentioned anymore between Revelation 4 and 19. Yet this is not true because Christians are mentioned eleven times between Revelation 4 and 19 (see Rev. 5:8; 8:3-4; 11:18; 13:7,10; 14:12; 16:6; 17:6; 18:24; 19:8).

Passage #4: Revelation 12:5 

She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her Child was caught up to God and His throne (Revelation 12:5 NKJV). 

The context of this reference is the ascension of Christ, not the rapture of the Church. The word Child is capitalized because it refers to Christ. Also, He is the one who rules all nations with a rod of iron (see Ps. 110). He is the one who ascended to God and sits on His throne in Heaven. This is not a reference to a secret rapture of the Church.

Additional Thoughts

Since we have addressed all the passages that have been used to teach the rapture concept, I would like to approach this topic briefly from another angle. Consider this simple question: If we are all going to fly up into the sky to meet Jesus, do we all fly straight up? This would mean that people being raptured in China and people being raptured in the United States would be flying off of the planet in two different directions. That would seem like a problem. (Yes, I am speaking tongue-in-cheek.)

First Thessalonians 4:17 says that we will meet the Lord in the air. Where is the air? According to the Greek root word translated as “air,” this is a reference to the air that surrounds us on the earth. Many have taken this to mean that we will meet the Lord in the sky, but actually, there is less and less air the higher one goes. It makes more sense that we would meet Him here, in the atmosphere.

The Thessalonian passage also says that we will meet the Lord (see 1 Thess. 4:17), the Greek word translated as “meet” is used several times in the New Testament. It always has the meaning of welcoming someone. It never has the meaning of someone coming to snatch people away. We are going to be welcoming Jesus to earth when He returns.

Lastly, this passage speaks of being caught up (see 1 Thess. 4:17).  The Scripture teaches that Jesus has been resurrected and given His glorious body. This means that if I am “caught up,” it would be similar to what would happen if Jesus and I were in a footrace, He had run twenty miles, and I had only run two miles. If Jesus were to stop and wait for me, once I had run an additional eighteen miles, I would be “caught up.” Like the apostle John said, “…We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2). We have not been resurrected and given our glorious bodies yet; presently, there is a great disparity between Jesus and us; we must get “caught up!” Christ will be equally yoked to His Bride, the Church. 2 Cor. 6:14-16. When He appears, we will instantly be caught up to His likeness in the twinkling of an eye (see 1 Cor. 15:52).

Tying this all together, we see that when Jesus returns to earth, we shall meet (welcome) Him in the air (atmosphere) and be caught up (in His likeness) together.

Conclusion

Until Darbyism in the 1830s, the modern concept of the rapture was not taught, believed, or even conceived. Even after its advent, the rapture teaching didn’t gain major traction until the Scofield Bible came out in 1909. It then became so ingrained in Western thinking simply because it would be much nicer to be raptured than to live through another World War I, The Great Depression, and World War II. The rapture fever spread, not because it is biblical, but because it is enticing to those who desired an escape from the trauma of the early 1900s.

It is time to re-think and re-examine some of these long-held beliefs. Rejecting the rapture is a first step in the right direction.

Chapter Points

• The rapture doctrine is a new teaching that was popularized in the early 1900s.
• First Thessalonians 4:13-18 was written to a church in persecution, comforting them regarding what had happened to their martyred friends after death and telling them of the future resurrection of the dead at the final coming of Christ.
• Matthew 24:40-41 speaks of the random killings that happened at the hands of the Roman soldiers during their attack on Jerusalem leading up to its destruction in AD 70.
• Revelation 4:1 is a record of John’s actual experience, not a prophecy of coming events.
• Revelation 12:5 speaks of the ascension of Christ, not a rapture of the Church.

• The meaning of the original language in First Thessalonians 4:17 clearly shows that when Jesus returns to earth, we shall meet (welcome) Him in the air (atmosphere) and be caught up (in His likeness) together.

The Great Tribulation

Over the last few years of traveling and teaching in many churches, I have heard some amazing stories. I remember one lady telling me that she was not able to shower without wearing a towel because she didn’t want to be raptured while naked. Another told me that she wouldn’t travel on airplanes for missions and such because, if the antichrist suddenly arose, she might not be able to get back home to her husband.

Then there’s my friend who told me that she had nightmares for years about the scene in the Thief in the Night when the red balloon floats into the sky while people below are being beheaded by guillotines. Perhaps you have heard similar stories or experienced fears like these yourself. Clearly, the idea of a future seven-year, hell-on-earth type of Great Tribulation has created terror in the imaginations of Christians for the last two centuries.

The main passage that is used to paint this picture comes from the prophecy of Jesus in Matthew 24. Most scholars agree that the Book of Revelation is a parallel to the words of Jesus in Matthew 24, but because I am writing a simple introduction and because of lack of space, I will not be addressing Revelation in this book (I hope to have a further work in the future to specifically address the Book of Revelation). Matthew 24 is the passage that predicts earthquakes, famines, plagues, false teachers, and Jesus’ coming on the clouds.

However, as I studied Matthew 24, I discovered that, throughout church history, most Christians believed that the whole chapter of Matthew 24 occurred at the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD. In fact, many of the well-known Church leaders have taught this. Here are quotations from a few:

All this occurred in this manner in the second year of the reign of Vespasian [A.D. 70], according to the predictions of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. —Eusebius¹

Thousands and thousands of men of every age who together with women and children perished by the sword, by starvation, and by countless other forms of death…all this anyone who wishes can gather in precise detail from the pages of Josephus’s history. I must draw particular attention to his statement that the people who flocked together from all Judaea at the time of the Passover Feast and—to use his own words—were shut up in Jerusalem as if in a prison, totaled nearly three million. — Eusebius²

This was most punctually fulfilled: for after the temple was burned, Titus the Roman general, ordered the very foundations of it to be dug up; after which the ground on which it stood was ploughed by Turnus Rufus…this generation of men living shall not pass till all these things be done—The expression implies that a great part of that generation would be passed away, but not the whole. Just so it was; for the city and temple were destroyed thirty-nine or forty years after. —John Wesley³

You will preach everywhere …. Then he added, “This gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, as a testimony to all nations; and the end will come.” The sign of this final end time will be the downfall of Jerusalem. —John Chrysostom⁴

There was a sufficient interval for the full proclamation of the gospel by the apostles and evangelists of the early Christian Church, and for the gathering of those who recognized the crucified Christ as the true Messiah. Then came the awful end which the Saviour foresaw and foretold, and the prospect of which wrung from His lips and heart the sorrowful lament that followed his prophecy of the doom awaiting his guilty capital.

The destruction of Jerusalem was more terrible than anything that the world has ever witnessed, either before or since. Even Titus seemed to see in his cruel work the hand of an avenging God. Truly, the blood of the martyrs slain in Jerusalem was amply avenged when the whole city became a veritable Aceldama, or field of blood. —Charles Spurgeon⁵

Hence it appears plain enough that the foregoing verses [Matt. 24:1-34] are not to be understood of the last judgment, but, as we said, of the destruction of Jerusalem. There were some among the disciples (particularly John), who lived to see these things come to pass. (Endnote: John Lightfoot, A Commentary on the New Testament from the Talmud and Hebraica, 4 vols. (Oxford University Press, [1658-1674] 1859), 2:320.)

-John Lightfoot 1658)

And Verily I say unto you; and urge you to observe it, as absolutely necessary in order to understand what I have been saying, That this generation of men now living shall not pass away until all these things be fulfilled, for what I have foretold concerning the destruction of the Jewish state is so near at hand, that some of you shall live to see it accomplished with a dreadful exactness.

-Phillip Doddridge (1750) (Endnote: Phillip Doddridge, The Family Expositor; or, A Paraphrase and Version of the New Testament; with Critical Notes, and a Practical Improvement of each Section, 6 vols. (Charlestown, Mass.: Ethridge and Company, 1807), 1:377.)

It is to me a wonder how any man can refer part of the foregoing discourse [Matt. 24] to the destruction of Jerusalem, and part to the end of the world, or any other distant event, when it is said so positively here in the conclusion, All these things shall be fulfilled in this generation. –Thomas Newton (1755) (Endnote: Thomas Newton, Dissertations on the Prophecies, Which Have Remarkably Been Fulfilled, and at This Time Are Fulfilling in the World (London: J. F. Dove, 1754), 377.)

Christ informs them, that before a single generation shall have been completed, they will learn by experience the truth of what he has said. For within fifty years the city was destroyed and the temple was razed, the whole country was reduced to a hideous desert. —John Calvin⁶

The Fulfillment of Matthew 24

As an author, this is my fourth book. In all of my writing, I have never written anything like what I have in this chapter. I feel the need to literally warn you.

In this chapter, I will share with you the historical account of the fulfillment of Matthew 24 in the AD 70 destruction of Jerusalem. George Peter Holford wrote a small booklet in 1805 about the AD 70 destruction. It is incredibly graphic and heart-wrenching, but it is accurate to what actually took place. The first time I read Holford’s work, I publically had tears streaming down my face as I flew on an airplane.

While many fictional authors speculate at what the Great Tribulation is going to be like in the future, the truth is that the events of the AD 70 destruction of Jerusalem fulfilled the prophecy of the Great Tribulation and fortunately shall never be repeated. There is no future Great Tribulation. Yes, there will continue to be trials, tribulations, and persecutions, but the Great Tribulation or “the Time of Jacob’s Trouble,” as prophesied by Jesus, has already happened just as He said it would and within the generation timeframe that He declared (see Matt. 24:34).

Before you read this chapter, please stop reading and pray. Ask the Holy Spirit if you are ready to read the contents of this chapter. I also recommend not reading this chapter before you go to bed at night. If you are not ready to read to this chapter, please skip to the next chapter and know that the great church leaders, such as Charles Spurgeon, John Calvin, John Wesley, John Chrysostom, and Eusebius taught that there is no further, future Great Tribulation. This is the necessary presupposition for reading the remainder of the book.

The Context

In Matthew 23, Jesus unleashed the harshest of His recorded sayings. He declared a whole chapter’s worth of woes upon the religious leaders and denounced them publically. He ended by saying,

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. Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate (Matthew 23:35-38).

This was clearly stunning to Jesus’ disciples, who followed Him away from the Temple to ask Him follow-up questions.

Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. “Do you see all these things?” he asked. “Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. “Tell us,” they said, “when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” (Matthew 24:1-3)

Jesus declared that the Temple and its buildings would be destroyed, and the disciples, no doubt enthralled, asked Him to tell them “when will this happen?” Jesus replied with eight signs of the coming destruction:

1. False messiahs and false prophets (see Matt. 14:4- 5,11,23-26)
2. Wars and rumors of wars, nation rising against nation (see Matt. 24:6-7)
3. Famines (see Matt. 24:7)
4. Earthquakes (see Matt. 24:7)
5. Persecution of believers (see Matt. 24:9)
6. Falling away from the faith (see Matt. 24:10)
7. Love growing cold (see Matt. 24:12)
8. Gospel preached in the whole world (see Matt. 24:14)

We will examine each of these signs in depth in this chapter. In order to do that, I will share with you George Peter Holford’s booklet, The Destruction of Jerusalem. His work is drawn mostly from the earlier works of Josephus. I will supplement Holford’s writing with my own notes, set apart as: [Author’s notes:]

Last chance to skip this chapter….

The Destruction of Jerusalem

by George Peter Holford⁷

Such were the questions of the disciples, in answer to which our Lord gave them a particular account of the several important events that would precede, as well as of the prognostics that would announce the approaching desolations, including suitable directions for their conduct under the various trials to which they were to be exposed. He commences with a caution:  “Take heed that no man deceive you; for many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many” (Matt. 24:4-5).

The necessity for this friendly warning soon appeared. Within one year after our Lord’s ascension, Dositheus the Samaritan arose, who had the boldness to assert that he was the Messiah of whom Moses prophesied, while his disciple Simon Magus deluded multitudes into a belief that he, himself, was the “great power of God.”

About three years afterward, another Samaritan impostor appeared and declared that he would show the people the sacred utensils, said to have been deposited by Moses, in Mount Gerizim. Induced by an idea that the Messiah, their great deliverer, had now come, an armed multitude assembled under him, but Pilate speedily defeated them and slew their chief.

While Cuspius Fadus was procurator in Judea, another deceiver arose, whose name was Theudas. This man actually succeeded so far as to persuade a very great multitude to take their belongings and follow him to Jordan, assuring them that the river would divide at his command. Fadus, however, pursued them with a troop of horses and slay many of them, including the impostor himself, whose head was cut off and carried to Jerusalem.

Under the government of Felix, deceivers rose up daily in Judea and persuaded the people to follow them into the wilderness, assuring them that they should there behold conspicuous signs and wonders performed by the Almighty. Of these, Felix, from time to time, apprehended many and put them to death. About this period (AD 55), Felix the celebrated Egyptian impostor arose, who collected thirty thousand followers and persuaded them to accompany him to the Mount of Olives, telling them that from thence they should see the walls of Jerusalem fall down at his command—as a prelude to the capture of the Roman garrison and to their obtaining the sovereignty of the city. The Roman governor, however, apprehending this to be the beginning of revolt, immediately attacked them, slew four hundred of them, and dispersed the rest, but the Egyptian escaped.

In the time of Porcius Festus (AD 60), another distinguished impostor seduced the people by promising them deliverance from the Roman yoke if they would follow him into the wilderness. But Festus sent out an armed force, which speedily destroyed both the deceiver and his followers. In short, impostors to a divine commission continually and fatally deceived the people, at once both justifying the caution and fulfilling the prediction of our Lord.

If it be objected that none of these impostors, except Dositheus, assumed the name of Messiah, we reply, that the groveling expectations of the Jews was directed to a Messiah who should merely deliver them from the Roman yoke and “restore the kingdom to Jerusalem,” and such were the pretensions of these deceivers. This expectation, indeed, is the only true solution of these strange and reputed insurrections, which will naturally remind the reader of the following prophetic expressions of our Lord: “I am come in my Father’s name, and you receive me not; if another shall come in his own name, him you will receive.” “If they shall say unto you, ‘Behold he is in the desert!’ go not forth. They will show (or pretend to show) great signs and wonders.” [See Matthew 24:23-26.]

[Wars and Rumors of Wars]

Our Savior thus proceeded:

And ye shall hear of wars, and rumors of wars; see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet, for nation shall rise up against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences: all these are the beginnings of sorrows (Matthew 24:6-8; Luke 21:11).

“Wars and rumors of wars,” These commotions, like distant thunder, that forebodes the approaching storm, “At first heard solemn o’er the verge of heaven,” were so frequent from the death of our Lord until the destruction of Jerusalem that whole interval might, with propriety, be appealed to in illustration of this prophecy. One hundred and fifty of the copious pages of Josephus, which contain the history of this period, are everywhere stained with blood. To particularize a few instances: About three years after the death of Christ, a war broke out between Herod and Aretas, king of Arabia Petraea, in which the army of the former was cut off. This was “kingdom rising against kingdom.”

Wars are usually preceded by rumors. It may, therefore, appear absurd to attempt a distinct elucidation of this part of the prophecy; nevertheless, it ought not to be omitted that, about that time, the emperor Caligula, having ordered his statue to be placed in the Temple of Jerusalem, and the Jews having persisted to refuse him, the whole nation was so much alarmed by the mere apprehension of war that they neglected even to till their lands! The storm, however, blew over.

About this period, a great number of Jews, on account of a pestilence that raged at Babylon, removed from that city to Seleucia, where the Greeks and Syrians rose against them and destroyed of this devoted people more than five myriads! “The extent of this slaughter,” says Josephus, “had no parallel in any former period of their history.” Again, about five years after this dreadful massacre, there happened a severe contest between the Jews at Perea and the Philadelphians, regarding the limits of a city called Mia, and many of the Jews were slain. This was “nation rising up against nation.”

Four years afterward, under Cumanus, a Roman soldier offered an indignity to the Jews within the precincts of the Temple. This they violently resented, but upon the approach of the Romans in great force, their terror was so excessive and their flight so disorderly that not less than ten thousand Jews were trodden to death in the streets. This, again, was “nation rising up against nation.” Four years more had not elapsed before the Jews made war against the Samaritans and ravaged their country. The people of Samaria had murdered a Galilean, who was going up to Jerusalem to keep the Passover, and the Jews thus revenged it.

At Caesarea, the Jews had a sharp contention with the Syrians for the government of the city, and an appeal was made to who decreed it to the Syrians. This event laid the foundation of a most cruel and sanguinary contest between the two nations. The Jews, mortified by disappointment and inflamed by jealousy, rose against the Syrians, who successfully repelled them. In the city of Caesarea alone, upwards of twenty thousand Jews were slain. The flame, however, was not now quenched; it spread its destructive rage wherever the Jews and Syrians dwelt together in the same place: throughout every city, town, and village, mutual animosity and slaughter prevailed. At Damascus, Tyre, Ascalon, Gadara, and Scythopolis, the carnage was dreadful. At the first of these cities, ten thousand Jews were slain in one hour, and at Scythopolis, thirteen thousand treacherously in one night.

At Alexandria, the Jews, aggrieved by the oppressions of the Romans, rose against them. But the Romans, gaining the ascendancy, slew of that nation fifty thousand persons, sparing neither infants nor the aged. And after this, at the siege of Jopata, not less than forty thousand Jews perished.

While these destructive contests prevailed in the East, the western parts of the Roman Empire were rent by the fierce contentious of Galba, Otho, and Vertellis. Of which three emperors, it is remarkable that they all, together with Nero, their immediate predecessor, died a violent death within the short space of eighteen months. Finally, the whole nation of the Jews took up arms against the Romans, King Agrippa, etc. and provoked that dreadful war which, in a few years, deluged Judea in blood and laid its capital in ruins.

If it be here objected, that, because wars are events of frequent occurrence, it would be improper to refer to supernatural foresight in a successful prediction respecting them, I would here reply that much of this objection will be removed by considering the incompetency of even statesmen themselves in foretelling the condition, only for a few years, of the very nation whose affairs they administer. It is a well-known fact that the present minister of Great Britain, [at the time of authorship, 1805, the Prime Minister was William Pitt] on the very eve of the late long and destructive war with the French Republic, held out to this country a picture of fifteen successive years of peace.  Indeed, the points on which peace and war often depend baffle all calculations from present aspects, and a rumor of war that is so loud and so alarming as even to suspend the operations of farming may terminate, as we have just seen, into nothing but rumor.

Further, let it be considered that the wars to which this part of our Lord’s prophecy referred were to be of two kinds and that the events corresponded accordingly. They occurred within the period to which he had assigned them, and they fell with the most destructive severity on the Jews, to whom the prophecy at large chiefly related. Further, that the person who predicted them was not a statesman, but a carpenter’s son! On this subject, more in another place.

[Authors note: Jesus declared “wars and rumors of wars” during the Pax Romana, the “Roman Peace,” which was the only time in history when war had essentially ceased because the empire had conquered all of its enemies. At any other time in history, wars would have been a poor “sign of the times” because wars are always happening.]

[Earthquakes]

“And great earthquakes shall be in divers places.” Of these significant emblems of political commotion, there occurred several within the scene of this prophecy, and as our Savior predicted, they happened in divers places. In the reign of Claudius, there was one at Rome and another at Apamea in Syria, where many of the Jews resided. The earthquake at the latter place was so destructive that the emperor, in order to relieve the distresses of the inhabitants, remitted its tribute for five years. Both these earthquakes are recorded by Tacitus. There was one also, during the same reign, in Crete. This is mentioned by Philostratus in his Life of Apollonius, who also says that there were others “at Smyrna, Miletus, Chios, and Samos; in all which places Jews had settled.”

In the reign of Nero, there was an earthquake at Laodicea. Tacitus records this also. It is likewise mentioned by Eusebius and Orosius, who add that Hieropolis and Colose, as well as Laodicea, were overthrown by earthquakes. There was also one in Campania during this reign (of this both Tacitus and Seneca speak) and another at Rome in the reign of Galba, recorded by Suetonius. To all those may be added the earthquakes that happened on the dreadful night when the Idumeans were excluded from Jerusalem, a short time before the siege commenced. Josephus says, “A heavy storm burst on them during the night; violent winds arose, accompanied with the most excessive rains, with constant lightnings, most tremendous thunderings, and with dreadful roarings of earthquakes. It seemed as if the system of the world had been confounded for the destruction of mankind; and one might well conjecture that these were signs of no common events!”

[Authors note: There are many records regarding this time period having an incredible amount of earthquakes in the localized region. Theologian and author, J. Marcellus Kik wrote,

And as to earthquakes, many are mentioned by writers during a period just previous to 70 AD. There were earthquakes in Crete, Smyrna, Miletus, Chios, Samos, Laodicea, Hierapolis, Colosse, Campina, Rome, and Judea. It is interesting to note that the city of Pompeii was much damaged by an earthquake occurring on February 5, 63AD.⁸

Another Bible scholar, Henry Alford, wrote about the earthquakes of this period:

The principle earthquakes occurring between this prophecy and the destruction of Jerusalem [in 70AD] were, (1) a great earthquake in Crete, A.D. 46 or 47; (2) one at Rome on the day when Nero assumed manly toga, A.D. 51; (3) one at Apamea in Phrygia, mentioned by Tacitus, A.D. 53; (4) one at Laodicea in Phrygia, A.D. 60; (5) one in Capania.⁹

Commentator Edward Hayes Plumptre writes:

Perhaps no period in the world’s history has ever been so marked by these convulsions as that which intervenes between the Crucifixion and the destruction of Jerusalem.¹⁰

The famed philosopher Seneca also wrote of this phenomenon:

How often have cities in Asia, how often in Achaia, been laid low by a single shock of earthquake! How many towns in Syria, how many in Macedonia, have been swallowed up! How often has this kind of devastation laid Cyprus in ruins! How often has Paphos collapsed! Not infrequently are tidings brought to us of utter destruction of entire cities.¹¹

Many earthquakes are mentioned in the New Testament, including at Jesus death (see Matt. 27:51-52) and again at His resurrection (see Matt. 28:2). Earthquakes also happened when the building was shaken in Acts 4:31 and when Paul and Silas were freed from prison in Philippi (see Acts 16:26).]

[Famines]

Our Lord predicted “famines” also. Of these, the principal one was that which Agabus foretold would happen in the days of Claudius, as related in the Acts of the Apostles. It begun in the fourth year of his reign and was of long continuance. It extended through Greece and even into Italy, but was felt most severely in Judea and especially at Jerusalem, where many perished for want of bread. This famine is recorded by Josephus also, who relates that “an assaron of corn was sold for five drachmae” [about a week’s wages]. It is likewise noticed by Eusebius and Orosius. To alleviate this terrible calamity, Helena, queen of Adiabena, who was at that time in Jerusalem, ordered large supplies of grain to be sent from Alexandria, and Izates, her son, consigned vast sums to the governors of Jerusalem to be applied to the relief of the more indigent sufferers. The Gentile Christian converts residing in foreign countries also sent, at the instance of Saint Paul, liberal contributions to relieve the distresses of their Jewish brethren (see 1 Cor. 16:3).

Dion Cassius relates that there was likewise a famine in the first year of Claudius that prevailed at Rome and in other parts of Italy. And in the eleventh year of the same emperor, there was another famine mentioned by Eusebius. To these may be added the famines that afflicted the inhabitants of several of the cities of Galilee and Judea, which were besieged and taken previous to the destruction of Jerusalem, where the climax of national misery, arising from famine and every other cause, was so awfully completed.

[Authors note: The famine predicted by Agabus and discussed above is mentioned in the Book of Acts 11:28-30 and in First Corinthians 16:1-3.]

[Pestilences]

Our Savior adds “pestilences” (see Luke 21:11), likewise. Pestilence treads upon the heels of famine; it may, therefore, reasonably be presumed that this terrible scourge accompanied the famines, which have just been recounted above. History, however, particularly distinguishes two instances of this calamity that occurred before the commencement of the Jewish war. The first took place at Babylon about AD 40, and it raged so alarmingly that great multitudes of Jews fled from that city to Seleucia for safety, as has been hinted at already. The other happened at Rome in AD 65, and it carried off prodigious multitudes. Both Tacitus and Suetonius also record that similar calamities prevailed during this period in various parts of the Roman Empire.

After Jerusalem was surrounded by the army of Titus, pestilential diseases soon made their appearance there to aggravate the miseries and deepen the horrors of the siege. They were partly occasioned by the immense multitudes that were crowded together in the city, partly by the putrid emanations that arose from the unburied dead, and partly from the spread of famine.

[Heavenly Signs]

Our Lord proceeded, “And fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven” (Luke 21:11). Josephus has collected the chief of these portents together and introduces his account by a reflection on the strangeness of that infatuation that could induce his countrymen to give credit to impostors and unfounded reports, while they disregarded the divine admonitions that were confirmed, as he [Josephus] asserts they were, by the following extraordinary signs:

1. “A meteor, resembling a sword, hung over Jerusalem during one whole year.” This could not be a comet, for it was stationary, and was visible for twelve successive months. A sword too, though a fit emblem for destruction, but ill represents a comet.”
2. “At the subsequent feast of Pentecost, while the priests were going, by night, into the inner temple to perform their customary ministrations, they first felt, as they said, a shaking, accompanied by an indistinct murmuring, and afterwards voices as of a multitude, saying, in a distinct and earnest manner, ‘let us depart hence’.” This gradation will remind the reader of that awful transaction that the feast of Pentecost was principally instituted to commemorate.

2. “On the eighth of the month Zanthicus, (before the feast of unleavened bread) at the ninth hour of the night, there shone round about the altar, and the circumjacent buildings of the temple, a light equal to the brightness of the day, which continued for the space of half an hour.” This could not be the effect of lightning, nor of a vivid aurora borealis, for it was confined to a particular spot, and the light shone uninterrupted for thirty minutes.
3. “As the High Priest were leading a heifer to the altar to be sacrificed, she brought forth a lamb, in the midst of the temple.” Such is the strange account given by Josephus. Some may regard it as a “Grecian fable,” while others may discern in this prodigy a miraculous rebuke of Jewish infidelity and impiety, for rejecting the antitypical Lamb, who had offered Himself as an atonement “once for all” and who, by thus completely fulfilling their design, had virtually abrogated the Levitical sacrifices. However this may be, the circumstances of the prodigy are remarkable. It did not occur in an obscure part of the city, but in the Temple; it did not at an ordinary time, but at the Passover—the season of our Lord’s crucifixion—in the presence, not of the vulgar merely, but of the High Priests and their attendants, and when they were leading the sacrifice to the altar.
4. “About the sixth hour of the night, the eastern gate of the temple was seen to open without human assistance.” When the guards informed the Curator of this event, he sent men to assist them in shutting it, and with great difficulty they succeeded.  This gate, as has been observed already, was of solid brass and required twenty men to close it every evening. It could not have been opened by a “strong gust of wind,” or a “slight earthquake” for, as Josephus says, “It was secured by iron bolts and bars that were let down into a large threshold, consisting of one entire stone.”
5. “Soon after the feast of the Passover, in various parts of the country, before the setting of the sun, chariots and armed men were seen in the air, passing round about Jerusalem.”  Neither could this portentous spectacle be occasioned by the aurora borealis, for it occurred before the setting of the sun; nor could it have been merely the fancy of a few villagers, gazing at the heavens, for it was seen in various parts of the country.

First, a shaking was heard; this would naturally induce the priests to listen, An unintelligible murmur succeeds it; this would more powerfully arrest their attention, and while it was thus awakened , they heard, says Josephus, the voices, as of a multitude, distinctly pronouncing the words, “let us depart hence.”  And accordingly, before the period for celebrating this feast returned, the Jewish war had commenced, and in the space of three years afterward, Jerusalem was surrounded by the Roman army, the temple converted into a citadel, and its sacred courts streaming with the blood of human victims.

7. As the last and most fearful omen, Josephus relates that one Jesus, the son of Ananus, a rustic of the lower class, during the Feast of Tabernacles, suddenly exclaimed in the temple, “A voice from the east a voice from the west—a voice from the four winds—a voice against Jerusalem and the temple—a voice against bridegrooms and brides—a voice against the whole people!” These words he incessantly proclaimed aloud, both day and night, through all the streets of Jerusalem for seven years and five months together. He began at a time (AD 62) when the city was in a state of peace and was overflowing with prosperity, and he ceased amidst the horrors of the siege.

This disturber, having excited the attention of the magistracy, was brought before Albinus the Roman governor, who commanded that he should be scourged. But the severest stripes drew from him neither tears nor supplications. As he never thanked those who relieved him, so neither did he complain of the injustice of those who struck him. And no other answer could the governor obtain to his interrogatories, but his usual denunciation of “Woe, woe to Jerusalem!” which he still continued to proclaim through the city, but especially during the festivals, when his manner became more earnest and the tone of his voice louder. At length, on the commencement of the siege, he ascended the walls and, in a more powerful voice than ever, exclaimed, “Woe, woe to this city, this temple, and this people!” And then, with a presentment of his own death, added, “Woe, woe to myself!” He had scarcely uttered these words when a stone from one of the Roman engines killed him on the spot.

Such are the prodigies related by Josephus, and excepting the first, he places them in the year immediately preceding the Jewish war. Several of them are recorded also by Tacitus. Nevertheless, it ought to be observed that they are received by Christian writers cautiously and with various degrees of credit. Those, however, who are most skeptical and who resolve them into natural causes, allow the “superintendence of God to awaken his people by some of these means.” Whatever the fact, in this respect, it is clear that they correspond to our Lord’s prediction of “fearful sights and great signs from heaven” and ought to be deemed a sufficient answer to the objector who demands whether any such appearances are respectably recorded.

[Great Persecution]

The next prediction of our Lord related to the persecution of His disciples: “They shall lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, being brought before kings and rulers for my name’s sake;” (Luke 21:12)—“and they shall deliver you up to councils, and in the synagogues ye shall be beaten;” (Mark 13:9)—“and some of You shall they cause to be put to death” (Luke 21:16). In the very infancy of the Christian Church, these unmerited and unprovoked cruelties began to be inflicted.

Our Lord and his forerunner, John the Baptist, had already been put to death. The apostles Peter and John were first imprisoned, and then, together with the other apostles, were scourged before the Jewish council. Stephen, after confounding the Sanhedrim with his irresistible eloquence, was stoned to death. Herod Agrippa “stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church,” beheaded James the brother of John, and again imprisoned Peter, designing to put him to death also.

Saint Paul pleaded before the Jewish council at Jerusalem and before Felix the Roman governor, who trembled on the judgment-seat, while the intrepid prisoner “reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come!” Two years afterward, he was brought before the tribunal of Festus (who had succeeded Felix in the government). King Agrippa the younger was present and, while the governor scoffed, ingenuously acknowledged the force of the apostle’s eloquence and, half-convinced, exclaimed, “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.” Lastly, he pleaded before the emperor Nero at Rome. He was also brought with Silas before the rulers at Philippi, where both of them were scourged and imprisoned. Paul was likewise imprisoned two years in Judea and afterward twice at Rome, each time for the space of two years. He was scourged by the Jews five times, thrice beaten with rods, and once stoned.

Paul himself, before his conversion, was also an instrument of fulfilling the predictions. Saint Luke relates of him that “he made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and hating men and women, committed them to prison; when they were put to death he gave his voice against them; he punished them oft in every synagogue, and, persecuted them even into strange cities”; and to this agree his own declarations (Acts 26:10-11; see Gal. 1:23).

At length, about two years before the Jewish war, the first general persecution commenced at the instigation of the emperor Nero, “who,” says Tacitus, “inflicted upon the Christians punishments exquisitely painful.” Multitudes suffered a cruel martyrdom amidst derision and insults, and among the rest, were the venerable apostles Saint Peter and Saint Paul.

Our Lord continues—“And ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake” (Matt. 24:9). The hatred from which the above-recited persecutions sprang was not provoked on the part of the Christians by a resistance to established authority or by any violations of law, but was the unavoidable consequence of their sustaining the name and imitating the character of their master. “It was a war,” says Tertullian, “against the very name; to be a Christian was of itself crime enough.” And to the same effect is that expression of Pliny in his letter to Trajan: “I asked them whether they were Christians; if they confessed it, I asked them a second and a third time, threatening them with punishment, and those who persevered I commanded to be led away to death.” It is added, “Of all nations.” Whatever animosity or dissensions might subsist between the Gentiles and the Jews on other points, they were at all times ready to unite and co-operate in the persecution of the humble followers of Him who came to be a light to the former and the glory of the latter.

[Cold Love]

“And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another” (Matt. 24:10). Concerning this fact, the following decisive testimony of Tacitus may suffice. Speaking of the persecutions of the Christians under Nero, to which we have just alluded, he adds, “Several were seized, who confessed, and by their discovery a great multitude of others were convicted and barbarously executed.”

[Author’s note: Matthew 24:10-12 may also be in reference to the many false teachings of the first century church, which caused many believers to step away from love of Christ into aberrant forms of the faith, such as the Gnostics, Judaizers, and Nicolatians.

As the scholar David Chilton wrote:

We generally think of the apostolic period as a time of tremendously explosive evangelism and Church growth, a “golden age” when astounding miracles took place every day. This common image is substantially correct, but it is flawed by one glaring omission. We tend to neglect the fact that the early Church was the scene of the most dramatic out-break of heresy in world history.

But the problem of heresy was not limited to any geographical or cultural area. It was widespread and became an increasing subject of apostolic counsel and pastoral oversight as the age progressed. Some heretics taught that the final Resurrection had already taken place (2 Timothy 2:18), while others claimed that resurrection was impossible (1 Cor. 15:12); some taught strange doctrines of asceticism and angel-worship (Col. 28, 18-23; 1 Tim. 4:1-3), while others advocated all kinds of immorality and rebellion in the name of “liberty” (2 Peter 2:1-3, 10-22; Jude 4, 8, 10-13, 16). Again and again the apostles found themselves issuing stern warnings against tolerating false teachers and “false apostles” (Romans 16:17-18; 2 Cor. 11:3-4, 12-15; Phil. 3:18-19; 1 Tim. 1:3-7; 2 Tim. 4:2-5), for these had been the cause of massive departures from the faith, and the extent of apostasy was increasing as the era progressed (1 Tim. 1:19-20, 6:20-21; 2 Tim. 2:16-18, 3:1-9, 13, 4:10, 14-16). One of the last letters of the New Testament, the Book of Hebrews, was written to an entire Christian community on the very brink of wholesale abandonment of Christianity. The Christian Church of the first generation was not only characterized faith and miracles; it was also characterized by increasing lawlessness, rebellion, and heresy from within the Christian community itself-just as Jesus had foretold in Matthew 24.¹²]

[Gospel Preached in the Whole World]

“And this Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world, for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end (i.e. of the Jewish dispensation) come” (Matt. 24:14). Of the fulfillment of this prediction of the epistles of Saint Paul—addressed to the Christians at Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Colosse, Thessalonica—and those of Peter—to such as resided in Pontus, Cappadocia, and Bithynia—are monuments now standing. For neither of these apostles were living when the Jewish war commenced. Saint Paul, too, in his epistle to the Romans, informs them that “their faith was spoken of throughout the world;” [Rom. 1:8] and in that to the Colossians he observes that the “Gospel had been preached to every creature under heaven.” [Col. 1:23] Clement, who was a fellow-laborer with the apostle, relates of him that “he taught the whole world righteousness, travelling from the East westward to the borders of the ocean.” Eusebius says that “the Apostles preached the Gospel in all the world, and that some of them passed beyond the bounds of the ocean, and visited the Britannic isles”; so says Theodoret also.

“It appears,” says Bishop Newton, “from the writers of the history of the church, that before the destruction of Jerusalem, the Gospel was not only preached in the Lesser Asia, and Greece, and Italy, the great theatres of action then in the world, but was likewise propagated as far northward as Scythia, as far southward as Ethiopia, as far eastward as Parthia and India, as far westward as Spain and Britain.” And Tacitus asserts that “the Christian religion, which arose in Judea, spread over many parts of the world, and extended to Rome itself, where the professors of it, as early as the time of Nero, amounted to a vast multitude,” insomuch that their numbers excited the jealousy of the government.

Thus completely was fulfilled a prediction contrary to every conclusion that could have been grounded on moral probability and to the accomplishment of which every kind of impediment was incessantly opposed. The reputed son of a carpenter instructs a few simple fishermen in a new dispensation destitute of worldly incentives, but full of self-denials, sacrifices, and sufferings, and he tells them that in about forty years it should spread over the entire world. It spreads accordingly, and in defiance of the bigotry of the Jews and the authority, power, and active opposition of the Gentiles, it is established, within that period, in all the countries into which it penetrates. Can anyone doubt that the prediction and its fulfillment were equally divine?

[Author’s note: The root word Oikoumene, used for “world” in this passage, actually means “inhabited or civilized world,” not world as in global planet earth. This is the same Greek word used in Luke 2:1: “Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth.”

The apostle Paul used this same word later to confirm four times that the Gospel had reached the whole civilized world as Jesus predicted (see Rom. 1:8; 10:18; Col 1:5-6,23). Jesus was saying that the gospel would be preached throughout the Roman Empire before He would come in judgment upon Jerusalem and the temple. This has been fulfilled, and it has no further fulfillment in our future. We are not waiting for every person to hear the Gospel so that the rapture can suddenly take place.] (Endnote 13)

[The Beginning of the War]

Such, briefly, is the account that history gives of the several events and signs that our Lord said would precede the destruction of the Holy City. No sooner were his predictions regarding the spread of the Gospel accomplished than a most unaccountable infatuation seized upon the whole Jewish nation so that they not only provoked, but seemed even to rush into the midst of those unparalleled calamities that, at length, totally overwhelmed them. In an essay of this sort, it is impossible to enter into a minute detail of the origin and progress of these evils, but such particulars as illustrate the fulfillment of the remaining part of the prophecy and justify the strong language used shall be presented to the reader.

From the conquest of their country by Pompey, about 60 BC, the Jews had, on several occasions, manifested a refractory spirit. But after Judas the Gaulonite and Sadduc the Pharisee taught them that submission to the Romans would pave the way to a state of abject slavery, this temper displayed itself with increasing malignity and violence. Rebellious tumults and insurrections became more frequent and alarming, and to these, the mercenary Florus, the Roman governor, contributed a great deal. At length, Eleazer, son of the High Priest, persuaded those who officiated in the temple to reject the sacrifices of foreigners and to no longer offer up prayers for them. Thus an insult was thrown upon Caesar, his sacrifice was rejected, and the foundation of the Roman war was laid.

The disturbances among the Jews still continuing, Cestius Gallus, president of Syria, marched an army into Judea in order to quell them, and his career was everywhere marked with blood and desolation. As he proceeded, he plundered and burned the beautiful city of Zabulon, Joppa, and all the villages that lay in his way. At Joppa, he killed 8,400 of the inhabitants. He laid waste the district of Narbatene and, sending an army into Galilee, killed there 2,000 of the seditious Jews. He then burned the city of Lydda, and after repulsing the Jews, who made a desperate attempt against him, he encamped at the distance of about one mile from Jerusalem. On the fourth day, he entered its gate and burned three divisions of the city. He may have, by its capture at that time, put an end to the war, but instead of pursuing his advantages, through the treacherous persuasions of his officers, he most unaccountably raised the siege and fled from the city with great haste.

The Jews, however, pursued him as far as Antipatris and, with little loss to themselves, slew nearly 6,000 men of his army. After this disaster had befallen Cestius, the wealthier Jews (says Josephus) forsook Jerusalem as men do a sinking ship. And it is with reason supposed that, on this occasion, many of the Christians, or converted Jews, who dwelled there—remembering the warnings or their divine Master, retired to Pella, a place beyond Jordan situated in a mountainous country (Matt. 16:22). There (according to Eusebius, who resided near the spot) they came from Jerusalem and settled before the war (under Vespasian) began. Other providential opportunities for escaping afterward occurred, of which, it is probable, those who were now left behind availed themselves. It is a striking act, one that cannot be contemplated by the pious mind without devout admiration, that history does not record that even one Christian perished in the siege of Jerusalem. Enduring to the end and faithful to their blessed master, they gave credit to his predictions and escaped the calamity. Thus were fulfilled the words of our Lord, “He that shall endure unto the end (i. e. of the scene of this prophecy) shall be saved” (Matt. 24:13) from the calamities that would overtake all those who continued obstinate in unbelief.

[Time to Flee (Matt. 24:15,21)]

Nero, having been informed of the defeat of Cestius, immediately appointed Vespasian, a man of tried valor, to lead the war against the Jews. He, assisted by his son, Titus, soon collected at Ptolemais an army of 60,000 men. From there, in the spring of AD 67, he marched into Judea, everywhere spreading the most cruel havoc and devastation—the Roman soldiers, on various occasions, sparing neither infants nor the aged. For fifteen months, Vespasian proceeded in this sanguinary career, during which period he reduced all the strong towns of Galilee and the chief of those in Judea, destroying at least 150,000 of the inhabitants.

Among the terrible calamities, which at this time happened to the Jews, those that befell them at Joppa, which had been rebuilt, deserve particular notice. Their frequent piracies had provoked the vengeance of Vespasian. The Jews fled before his army to their ships, but a tempest immediately arose and pursued those who had set out to sea, and it capsized them. The rest were dashed, vessel against vessel and against the rocks, in the most tremendous manner. In this way, many were drowned, some were crushed by the broken ships, others killed themselves, and those who reached the shore were slain by the merciless Romans. The sea for a long space was stained with blood; 4,200 dead bodies were strewn along the coast, and (dreadful to relate) not an individual survived to report this great calamity at Jerusalem. Such events were foretold by our Lord, when he said, “There shall be distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring” (Luke 21:25).

Vespasian, after proceeding as far as Jericho, returned to Caesarea in order to make preparation for his grand attempt against Jerusalem. While he was thus employed, he received intelligence of the death of Nero. Not knowing what the will of the future emperor might be, he prudently resolved to suspend, for the present, the execution of his design. Thus, the Almighty gave the Jews a second respite, which continued nearly two years. But they did not repent of their crimes; neither were they in the least degree repentant, but rather proceeded to acts of still greater enormity. The flame of civil dissension again burst out and with more dreadful fury.

In the heart of Jerusalem, two factions contended for the sovereignty and raged against each other with ruthless and destructive animosity. A division of one of these factions, having been excluded from the city (vide page 26), forcibly entered it during the night. Athirst for blood and inflamed by revenge, they spared neither age, sex, nor infancy, and the morning beheld 8,500 dead bodies lying in the streets of the holy city. They plundered every house, and having found the chief priests, Anaius and Jesus, they not only killed them, but also insulted their bodies by casting them forth unburied. They slaughtered the common people as unfeelingly as if they had been a herd of the vilest beasts. The nobles they first imprisoned and scourged, and when they could not by these means convince them to join their party, they bestowed death upon them as a favor. Of the higher classes, 12,000 perished in this manner. And no one dared to shed a tear or utter a groan openly through fear of a similar fate. Death, indeed, was the penalty of the lightest and heaviest accusations, and none escaped through the lowness of their rank or their poverty. Those who fled were intercepted and slain, and  their carcasses lay in heaps on all the public roads. Every symptom of pity seemed utterly extinguished and, with it, all respect for authority, both human and divine.

While Jerusalem was a prey to these ferocious and devouring factions, every part of Judea was scourged and laid waste by bands of robbers and murderers, who plundered the towns. In the case of resistance, they killed the inhabitants, not sparing either women or children. Simon, son of Gioras, the commander of one of these bands of 40,000, with some difficulty entered Jerusalem and gave birth to a third faction. Thus the flame of civil discord blazed out again, with still more destructive fury. The three factions, rendered frantic by drunkenness, rage, and desperation, trampling on heaps of slain people and fought against each other with brutal savageness and madness. Even those who brought sacrifices to the temple were murdered. The dead bodies of priests and worshippers, both natives and foreigners, were heaped together, and a lake of blood stagnated in the sacred courts.

John Levi of Gischala, who headed one of the factions, burnt storehouses full of provisions, and Simon, his great antagonist, who headed another of them, soon afterward followed his example. Thus they cut the very sinews of their own strength. At this critical and alarming conjuncture, intelligence arrived that the Roman army was approaching the city. The Jews were petrified with astonishment and fear; there was no time for counsel, no hope of pacification, no means of flight: all was wild disorder and perplexity. Nothing was to be heard but “the confused noise of the warrior,”—nothing to be seen but “garments rolled in blood,”—nothing to be expected from the Romans but signal and exemplary vengeance. A ceaseless cry of combatants was heard day and night, and yet the lamentations of mourners were still more dreadful. The consternation and terror that now prevailed induced many inhabitants to desire that a foreign foe might come, and effect their deliverance. Such was the horrible condition of the place when Titus and his army presented themselves and encamped before Jerusalem.

But, alas—he came not to deliver it from its miseries, but to fulfill the prediction and vindicate the benevolent warning of our Lord: “When ye see (he had said to his disciples) the abomination of desolation, spoken or by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place, and Jerusalem surrounded by armies (or camps) then let those who are in the midst of Jerusalem depart, and let not those who are in the country enter into her,” for “then know that the desolation thereof is nigh” (Matthew 24:15-16; Luke 21:20,1-11). These armies, we do not hesitate to affirm, were those of the Romans, who now filled the city.

From the time of the Babylonian captivity, idolatry had been held as an abomination by the Jews. This national aversion was manifested even against the images of the Roman gods and emperors, which the Roman armies carried in their standards. We see this, in an earlier time of peace, when Pilate, and afterward Vitellius, at the request of some eminent Jews, avoided marching their forces through Judea because of this very reason. The desolating disposition that now governed the Roman army, the history of the Jewish war, and especially the final demolition of the holy city presents an awful and signal example. Jerusalem was not captured merely, but with its celebrated temple laid in ruins.

[Author’s note: By comparing Matthew 24:15-16 with Luke 21:20, we can understand that the abomination that caused the desolation of Jerusalem was the 20,000 Roman soldiers that lay siege to the city. Fortunately, Jesus told His followers that when they saw this, they should flee for the mountains. They did this because they understood what Jesus had said.]

Lest, however, the army of Titus should not be sufficiently designated by this expression, our Lord adds, “Wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together” (Matt. 24:28 ASV). The Jewish state, indeed, at this time, was fitly compared to a carcass. The scepter of Judah—its civil and political authority, the life of its religion, and the glory of its temple—were departed. It was, in short, morally and judicially dead. The eagle whose ruling instinct is rapine and murder, fitly represented the fierce and sanguinary temper of the Romans, and perhaps, it might be intended to refer also to the principal image on their ensigns, which, however obnoxious to the Jews, were at length planted in the midst of the holy city and finally on the temple itself.

[Authors note: In other words, the emblem of the eagle was upon the Roman shields and banners; also, Jerusalem was pictured as a dead carcass. As the commentator Barnes wrote:

The words in this verse are proverbial. Vultures and eagles easily ascertain where dead bodies are, and hasten to devour them. So with the Roman army. Jerusalem is like a dead and putrid corpse. Its life is gone, and it is ready to be devoured. The Roman armies will find it out, as the vultures do a dead carcass, and will come around it to devour it.¹⁴]

The day on which Titus encompassed Jerusalem was the feast of the Passover, and it is worth noting that this was the anniversary of that memorable period in which the Jews crucified their Messiah! At this season, multitudes came up from all the surrounding country, and from distant parts, to keep the festival. How suitable and how kind, then, was the prophetic admonition of our Lord when he said, “Let not them that are in the countries enter into Jerusalem” (Luke 21:21).

[Author’s note:  George Peter Holford’s book does not address Matthew 24:15-18,20: “Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let no one on the housetop go down to take anything out of the house. Let no one in the field go back to get their cloak. Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath.” I am not sure why he skipped this section, but Jesus was giving very practical advice to His followers about how to stay alive during the AD 70 destruction. We can tell from this passage that Jesus was speaking of a local destruction (flee Judea) and a historical setting (not on a Sabbath). The natural tendency, upon seeing an approaching army, would have been to flee into Jerusalem for safety. Jesus told them to fight their natural instinct and flee the city.

Because of Jesus’ command to flee, His followers were protected. In fact, as George Peter Holford said six paragraphs previously, “…history does not record that even one Christian perished in the siege of Jerusalem.”

This is confirmed by other well-known commentaries. For example:

It is said that there is reason to believe that not one Christian perished in the destruction of that city, God having in various ways secured their escape, so that they fled to Pella, where they dwelt when the city was destroyed. —Albert Barnes¹⁴

...it is remarked by several interpreters, and which Josephus takes notice of with surprise, that Cestius Gallus having advanced with his army to Jerusalem, and besieged it, on a sudden without any cause, raised the siege, and withdrew his army, when the city might have been easily taken; by which means a signal was made, and an opportunity given to the Christians, to make their escape: which they accordingly did, and went over to Jordan, as Eusebius says, to a place called Pella; so that when Titus came a few months after, there was not a Christian in the city…  —John Gill¹⁶

I find this historical fact alone to be incredible proof that the first century believers knew that Jesus was speaking to them about AD 70.]

[Like Lightening (Matt. 24:27)]

Nevertheless, the city was at this time crowded with Jewish strangers and foreigners from all parts so that the whole nation may be considered as having been shut up in one prison prior to the execution of the Divine vengeance. According to Josephus, this event took place suddenly, thus, not only fulfilling the predictions of our Lord that these calamities should come like the swift-darting lightning “that cometh out of the east and shineth even unto the West,” and “as a snare on all of them (the Jews) who dwelt upon the face of the whole earth” (Matt. 24:27; Luke 21:35), but justifying, also, his friendly direction that those who fled from the place should use the utmost possible expedition.

[Woe to the Pregnant (Matt. 24:19)]

On the appearance of the Roman army, the factious Jews united and, rushing furiously out of the city, repulsed the tenth legion, which was with difficulty preserved. This event caused a short suspension of hostilities and, by opening the gates, gave an opportunity to those who were so disposed to make their escape. Before this they could not have attempted an escape without interruption because it would have caused suspicion that they wished to join the Romans.

This success inspired the Jews with confidence, and they resolved to defend their city to the very uttermost, but it did not prevent the renewal of their civil broils. The faction under Eleazer had dispersed and arranged themselves under the two other leaders, John Levi and Simon, and afterward ensued a scene of the most dreadful contention, plunder, and conflagration. The middle space of the city was burnt, and the wretched inhabitants were made the prize of the contending parties.

The Romans, at length, gained possession of two of the three walls that defended the city, and fear once more united the factions. This pause to their fury had, however, scarcely begun when famine made its ghastly appearance in the Jewish army. It had for some time been silently approaching, and many of the peaceful and the poor had already perished for want of necessaries. With this new calamity, strange to relate, the madness of the factions again returned, and the city presented a new picture of wretchedness. Impelled by the cravings of hunger, they snatched food out of each other’s hands, and many devoured grain unprepared.

Tortures were inflicted for the discovery of a handful of meal; women forced food from their husbands and children from their fathers and even mothers from their infants; while sucking children were wasting away in their arms, they scrupled not to take away the vital drops that sustained them! So justly did our Lord pronounce a woe on “them that should give suck in those days” (Matt. 24:19).  This dreadful scourge at length drove multitudes of the Jews out of the city into the enemy’s camp, where the Romans crucified them in such numbers that, as Josephus relates, space was wanted for the crosses, and crosses for the captives. When it was discovered that some of them had swallowed gold, the Arabs and Syrians, who were incorporated into the Roman army, impelled by avarice, with unexampled cruelty, ripped open two thousand of the deserters in one night.

Titus, touched by these calamities, in person entreated the Jews to surrender, but they answered him with reviling. Exasperated by their obstinacy and insolence, he resolved to surround the city by a circumvallation (a trench of 39 furlongs in circuit and strengthened with 13 towers), which with astonishing activity was effected by the soldiers in three days. Thus was fulfilled another of our Lord’s predictions, for he had said, while addressing this devoted city, “Thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round about, and keep thee in on every side” (Luke 19:43).

As no supplies whatever could now enter the walls, the famine rapidly extended itself and, increasing in horror, devoured whole families. The tops of houses and the recesses of the city were covered with the carcasses of women, children, and aged men. The young men appeared like specters in the places of public resort and fell down lifeless in the streets. The dead were too numerous to be interred, and many died while burying others. The public calamity was too great for lamentation. Silence and, as it were, a black and deadly night overspread the city.

But even such a scene could not awe the robbers; they spoiled the tombs and stripped the dead of their grave clothes with an unfeeling and wild laughter. They tried the edges of their swords on the carcasses and even on some that were yet breathing. Simon Goras chose this melancholy and awful period to manifest the deep malignity and cruelty of his nature in the execution of the Priest, Matthias, and his three sons, whom he caused to be condemned as favorers of the Romans. The father, in consideration of his having opened the city gates to Simon, begged that he might be executed previously to his children, but the unfeeling tyrant gave orders that he should be dispatched in the last place, and in his expiring moments, Simon insultingly asked him whether the Romans could then relieve him.

While the city was in this dismal situation, a Jew named Mannæus fled to Titus and informed him that from the beginning of the siege (the 14^th of April) to the first of July following, 115,880 dead bodies had been carried through one gate only, which he had guarded. This man had been appointed to pay the public allowance for carrying the bodies out, and was, therefore, obliged to register them. Soon after, several respectable individuals deserted to the Romans and assured Titus that the whole number of the poor who had been cast out at the different gates was not less than 600,000. The report of these calamities excited pity in the Romans and in a particular manner affected Titus, who, while surveying the immense number of dead bodies that were piled raised his hands toward Heaven and, appealing to the Almighty, solemnly protested that he had not been the cause of these deplorable calamities. Indeed, the Jews, by their unexampled wickedness, rebellion, and obstinacy, had brought it down upon their own heads.

After this, Josephus, in the name of Titus, earnestly exhorted John Levi and his adherents to surrender, but the insolent rebel returned nothing but reproaches and imprecations, declaring his firm persuasion that Jerusalem, as it was God’s own city, could never be taken. Thus he literally fulfilled the declaration of Micah that the Jews, in their extremity, notwithstanding their crimes, would presumptuously “lean upon the Lord, and say, ‘Is not the Lord among us? None evil can come upon us” (Micah 3:11).

Meanwhile the horrors of famine grew still more melancholy and afflictive. The Jews, for want of food, were at length compelled to eat their belts, their sandals, the skins of their shields, dried grass, and even the manure of oxen. In the depth or this horrible extremity, a Jewess of noble family, urged by the intolerable cravings of hunger, slew her infant child and prepared him for a meal. She had actually eaten one half thereof when the soldiers, allured by the smell of food, threatened her with instant death if she refused to reveal it. Intimidated by this menace, she immediately produced the remains of her son, which petrified them with horror. At the recital of this melancholy and affecting occurrence, the whole city stood aghast and poured forth their congratulations on those whom death had hurried away from such heartrending scenes.

Indeed, humanity at once shudders and sickens at the narration. Nor can any one of the least sensibility reflect upon the pitiable condition to which the female inhabitants of Jerusalem must have been reduced without experiencing the tenderest emotions of sympathy. Nor can he refrain from tears while he reads our Savior’s pathetic address to the women who “bewailed him” as he was led to Calvary, wherein he evidently refers to these very calamities: “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but for yourselves and for your children; for, behold, the days are coming in which they shall say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the breasts that never gave suck” (Luke 23:29).

[Authors note: Jesus death was horrible, but He wept for the women and children of Jerusalem. In comparison, He was saying that their deaths would be far worse!]

The above melancholy fact was also literally foretold by Moses: “The tender and delicate women among barbarian, (said he, addressing Israel) who would not venture to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil….toward her young one….which she shall bear,” and “eat for want of all things, secretly, in the siege and straitness wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates” (Deut. 28:56-57). This prediction was partially fulfilled, when Samaria, the capital of the revolted tribes, was besieged by Benhadad, and afterward at Jerusalem, previous to its capture by Nebuchadnezzar. But its exact and literal fulfillment, in relation to a lady of rank, who was delicately and voluptuously educated, was reserved for the period of which we are now speaking.

And it is important to note—as a circumstance that very greatly enhances the importance of this prophecy—that the history of the world does not record a parallel instance of unnatural barbarity ever occurring during the siege of any other place in any other age or nation whatsoever. Indeed, Josephus himself declared that, if there had not been many credible witnesses of the fact, he would not have recorded it, “because,” as he remarks, “such a shocking violation of nature never having been perpetuated by any Greek or barbarian,” the insertion of it might have diminished the credibility of his history.

While famine continued thus to spread its destructive rage through the city, the Romans, after many ineffectual attempts, at length succeeded in demolishing part of the inner wall, possessed themselves of the great tower of Antonia, and advanced toward the Temple, which Titus, in a council of war, had determined to preserve as an ornament to the empire and as a monument of his success. But the Almighty had determined otherwise. Now, in the revolution of ages, had arrived that fatal day (the 10th of August) emphatically called “a day of vengeance” (Luke 21:21), on which the Temple had formerly been destroyed by the king of Babylon.

[Authors note: In Luke 4:18-19, Jesus read a prophecy from Isaiah 61:1-2:

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners,to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God….

This is the passage as it appears in Isaiah, but when Jesus quoted it, He did not finish the passage. Jesus stopped mid-sentence. The portion in bold, Jesus excluded. Yet in Luke 21:21, Jesus declared the day of vengeance. Jesus started His ministry to the Jews in the favor of the Lord, but then after three and a half years, Jesus finished the prophecy by declaring that the day of vengeance was now coming.]

A Roman soldier, urged, as he declared, by a divine impulse, regardless of the command of Titus, climbed on the shoulders of another and threw a flaming brand into the golden window of the Temple, which instantly set the building on fire. The Jews, anxious above all things to save that sacred edifice in which they superstitiously trusted for security, with a dreadful outcry, rushed in to extinguish the flames. Titus also, hoping to extinguish the conflagration, hastened to the spot in his chariot, attended by his principal officers and legions. But in vain he waved his hand and raised his voice, commanding his soldiers to extinguish the fire; so great was the uproar and confusion that no attention was paid even to him. The Romans, willfully deaf, instead of extinguishing the flames spread them wider and wider.

Compelled by the fiercest impulses of rancor and revenge against the Jews, they rushed furiously upon them, slaying some with the sword, trampling others under their feet, or crushing them to death against the walls. Many, falling amongst the smoking ruins of the porches and galleries, were suffocated. The unarmed poor and even sick people were slaughtered without mercy. Of these unhappy people, numbers were left weltering in their gore. Multitudes of the dead and dying were heaped round about the altar, to which they had formerly fled for protection, while the steps that led from it into the outer court were literally deluged with their blood.

Finding it impossible to restrain the impetuosity and cruelty of his soldiers, the commander-in-chief proceeded, with some of his superior officers, to take a survey of those parts of the edifice that were still uninjured by the conflagration. It had not, at that time, reached the inner Temple, which Titus entered and viewed with silent admiration. Struck with the magnificence of its architecture and the beauty of its decorations, which even surpassed the report of fame concerning them, and perceiving that the sanctuary had not yet caught fire, he redoubled his efforts to stop the progress of the flames. He condescended even to entreat his soldiers to exert all their strength and activity for this purpose, and he appointed a centurion of the guards to punish them if they again disregarded him. But all was in vain.

The delirious rage of the soldiery knew no bounds. Eager for plunder and for slaughter, they alike ignored the solicitations and menaces of their general. Even while he was thus intent upon the preservation of the sanctuary, one of the soldiers was actually employed in setting fire to the doorposts, which caused the conflagration to become general. Titus and his officers were now compelled to retire, and none remained to check the fury of the soldiers or the flames. The Romans, exasperated to the highest pitch against the Jews, seized every person whom they could find and, without the least regard to sex, age, or quality, first plundered and then slew them. The old and the young, the common people and the priests, those who surrendered and those who resisted, were equally involved in this horrible and indiscriminate carnage.

Meanwhile, the Temple continued burning, until at length, vast as was its size, the flames completely enveloped the whole building. Thus the extent of the fire impressed the distant spectator with an idea that the whole city was now on fire. The tumult and disorder that ensued upon this event, it is impossible (says Josephus) for language to describe. The Roman legions made the most horrid outcries; the rebels, finding themselves exposed to the fury of both fire and sword, screamed dreadfully; while the unhappy people, who were pent up between the enemy and the flames, deplored their situation in the most pitiable complaints. Those on the hill and those in the city seemed mutually to return the groans of each other. Such as were expiring through famine, were revived by this hideous scene and seemed to acquire new spirits to deplore their misfortunes. The lamentations from the city were re-echoed from the adjacent mountains and places beyond Jordan. The flames, which enveloped the Temple, were so violent and impetuous that the lofty hill on which it stood appeared, even from its deep foundations, as one large body of fire.

[Authors note: The incineration of Jerusalem is the blazing furnace referenced in Matthew 13:42 about the wheat and tares (more about this in the next chapter). For now, it will suffice to notice the amount of consuming flames in Jerusalem during the destruction.]

The blood of the sufferers flowed in proportion to the rage of this destructive element, and the number of the slain exceeded all calculation. The ground could not be seen for the dead bodies, over which the Romans trampled in pursuit of the fugitives, while the crackling noise of the devouring flames mingled with the clamor of arms, the groans of the dying, and the shrieks of despair increased the tremendous horror of a scene to which the pages of history can furnish no parallel.

Among the tragic events that at this time occurred, the following is more particularly deserving of notice: A false prophet, pretending to be a divine commission, said that if the people would flee to the Temple, they should behold signs of their speedy deliverance. Accordingly, about six thousand people, chiefly women and children, assembled in a gallery that was yet standing, on the outside of the building. While they waited in anxious expectation of the promised miracle, the Romans, with the most wanton barbarity, set fire to the gallery. Multitudes, rendered frantic by their horrible situation, threw themselves from the gallery onto the ruins below and were killed by the fall. Meanwhile, awful to relate, the rest, without a single exception, perished in the flames. So necessary was our Lord’s second premonition not to give credit to “false prophets” who should pretend “to show great signs and wonders.”

The Temple now presented little more than a heap of ruins. The Roman army, as in triumph on the event, came and reared their ensigns against a fragment of the eastern gate, and with sacrifices of thanksgiving, they proclaimed the imperial majesty of Titus with every possible demonstration of joy.

Thus ended the glory and existence of the sacred and venerable Temple, which from its stupendous size, its massy solidity, and its astonishing strength, seemed formed to resist the most violent operations of human force and to stand, like the pyramids, amid the shocks of successive ages until the final dissolution of the globe.

For five days after the destruction of the Temple, the priests who had escaped sat, pining with hunger, on the top of one of its broken walls; at length they came down and humbly asked the pardon of Titus, which, however, he refused to grant them, saying that, “as the Temple, for the sake of which he would have spared them, was destroyed, it was but fit that its priests should perish also”—whereupon he commanded that they should be put to death.

The leaders of the factions, who were now pressed on all sides, begged a conference with Titus, who offered to spare their lives if they would lay down their arms. To this reasonable condition, however, they refused to comply. In response, Titus, exasperated by their obstinacy, resolved that he would hereafter grant no pardon to the insurgents and ordered a proclamation to be made to this effect. The Romans had now full license to ravage and destroy. Early the following morning, they set fire to the castle, the register office, the council chamber, and the palace of the queen Helena, and then they spread themselves throughout the city, slaughtering wherever they came and burning the dead bodies that were scattered over every street and on the floors of almost every house.

In the royal palace, where immense treasures were deposited, the seditious Jews murdered 8,400 of their own people and afterward plundered their property. Prodigious numbers of deserters, also, who had escaped from the tyrants and fled into the enemy’s camp, were slain.

The soldiers, however, at length, weary of killing and satiated with the blood that they had spilt, laid down their swords and sought to gratify avarice. For this purpose, they took the Jews, together with their wives and families, and publicly sold them, like cattle in a market. A very multitude were exposed to sale, while the purchasers were few in number. And now were fulfilled the words of Moses: “And ye shall be sold for bond-men and bond-women, and no man shall buy you” (Deut. 28:68).

The Romans, having become masters of the lower city, set it on fire. The Jews now fled to the higher, from whence, their pride and insolence yet unabated, they continued to exasperate their enemies and even appeared to view the burning of the town below them with tokens of pleasure. In a short time, however, the walls of the higher city were demolished by the Roman engines, and the Jews, lately so haughty and presumptuous, were now trembling and panic-struck, and they fell on their faces and deplored their own arrogance. Those who were in the towers, which were deemed impregnable to human force, were beyond measure afraid, and they strangely forsook the towers and sought refuge in caverns and subterraneous passages. In these dismal retreats, no less than 2,000 dead bodies were afterward found. Thus, as our Lord had predicted, did these miserable creatures, in effect, say “to the mountains, ‘Fall on us;’ and to the rocks, ‘Cover us’” (Luke 23:20).

Since the walls of the city were now completely in the possession of the Romans, they hoisted their colors upon the towers and burst forth into the most triumphant acclamations. After this, all annoyance from the Jews being at an end, the soldiers gave an unbridled license to their fury against the inhabitants. They first plundered and then set fire to the houses. They ranged through the streets with drawn swords in their hands, murdering every Jew whom they met, without distinction, till at length, the bodies of the dead choked up all the alleys and narrow passes while their blood literally flowed down the channels of the city in streams. As it drew toward evening, the soldiers exchanged the sword for the torch, and amidst the darkness of this awful night, they set fire to the remaining divisions of the place.

The vial of divine wrath, which had been so long pouring out upon this devoted city, was now emptying, and Jerusalem, once “a praise in all the earth” and the subject of a thousand prophecies, which was deprived of the staff of life, wrapped in flames, and bleeding on every side, finally sunk into utter ruin and desolation. (This memorable siege terminated on the 8^th day of September, AD 70. Its duration was nearly five months, the Romans having invested the city on the 14^th day of the preceding April.)

Before their final demolition, however, Titus took a survey of the city and its fortifications, and while contemplating their impregnable strength, he could not help ascribing his success to the Almighty himself. “Had not God himself (exclaimed he) aided out operations, and driven the Jews from their fortresses, it would have been absolutely impossible to have taken them; for what could men, and the force of engines, have done against such towers as these?” After this he commanded that the city should be razed to its foundations, excepting only the three lofty towers Hippocos, Phasael, and Mariamne, which he suffered to remain as evidences of its strength and as trophies of his victory. There was left standing, also, a small part of the western wall, as a rampart for a garrison, to keep the surrounding country in subjection.

Titus now gave orders that only those Jews who resisted should be slain, but the soldiers, equally void of pity and remorse, slew even the sick and the aged. The robbers and seditious were all punished with death. The tallest and most beautiful youths, together with several of the Jewish nobles, were reserved by Titus to grace his triumphal entry into Rome. After this selection, all above the age of seventeen were sent in chains into Egypt to be employed there as slaves or distributed throughout the empire to be sacrificed as gladiators in the amphitheaters; those who were under this age were exposed to sale.

During the time that these things were transacted, 11,000 Jews, guarded by one of the generals, named Fronto, were literally starved to death. This melancholy occurrence happened partly through the scarcity of provisions and partly through their own obstinacy and the negligence of the Romans.

Of the Jews destroyed during the siege, Josephus reckons not less than one million and one hundred thousand, to which must be added above 237,000 who perished in other places and innumerable multitudes who were swept away by famine and pestilence and of which no calculation could be made. Not less than 2,000 laid violent hands upon themselves. Of the captives, the whole was about 97,000. Of the two great leaders of the Jews, who had both been made prisoners, John Levi was doomed to a dungeon for life, while Simon, together with John Levi, in triumph at Rome was scourged, and Simon was put to death as a malefactor.

[Authors note: “If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened” (Matt. 24:22). We can see from the number above that if the slaughter had not been cut short, the Jews could have been completely annihilated.]

In executing the command of Titus regarding the demolition of Jerusalem, the Roman soldiers not only threw down the buildings, but even dug up their foundations. They so completely leveled the whole circuit of the city that a stranger would scarcely have known that it had ever been inhabited by human beings. Thus was this great city, which only five months before had been crowded with nearly two million people, who gloried in its impregnable strength, entirely depopulated and leveled to the ground. Thus also was our Lord’s prediction that her enemies should “lay her even with the ground,” and “should not leave in her one stone upon another” (Luke 19:44) most strikingly and fully accomplished!

This fact is confirmed by Eusebius, who asserts that he himself saw the city lying in ruins, and Josephus introduces Eleazer as exclaiming, “Where is our great city, which, it was believed, GOD inhabited? It is altogether rooted and torn up from its foundations, and the only monument of it that remains, is the camp of its destroyers pitched amidst its relics!”

Concerning the Temple, our Lord foretold particularly that, notwithstanding their wonderful dimensions, there should “not be left one stone upon another that should not be thrown down;” (Matt. 24:2). Accordingly, it is recorded, in the Talmud and by Maimonides that Terentius Rufus, captain of the army of Titus, absolutely ploughed up the foundations of the Temple with a ploughshare. Now, also, was literally fulfilled that prophecy of Micah—“Therefore shall Zion, for your sakes (i. e. for your wickedness,) be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the Lord’s house as the high places of the forest” (Micah 3:12).

[Authors note: “Today’s Western Wall (also called the Wailing Wall) in Jerusalem was never a part of the Temple that existed in Jesus’ day. It was a part of the parapet (protective fort-like wall) that King Herod had built around the Temple.”¹⁷]

Thus awfully complete and beyond example were the calamities which befell the Jewish nation and especially the city of Jerusalem. With what truth, then, did our Lord declare that there should “be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world, no, nor ever shall be!” (Matt. 24:21).

[Authors note: There is no such thing as two fulfillments to a given prophecy. That idea, although popular, is not biblical or sensible. If a prophecy is given, it has one fulfillment. To say it has two fulfillments just means that one interpretation was incorrect. Not only is double fulfillment not sensible, but also Jesus went out of His way to declare that Matthew 24 would only be fulfilled once (see Matt. 24:21). This removes the possibility of double fulfillment.

Jesus pointed out that this tribulation would be the worst that had ever happened and the worst that ever would happen, implying that time would continue after this event, not that this event would be at the end of time. Many have taught that this prophecy of Jesus would happen at the end of time, but that is inconsistent with Jesus saying that it this event would occur in the middle of the timeline, not at the end of human history!]

Such was the prediction, and the language in which Josephus declares its fulfillment is an exact counterpart to it: “If the misfortunes,” says he, “of all nations, from the beginning of the world, were compared with those which befell the Jews, they would appear far less in comparison.” And again he says, “No other city ever suffered such things, as no other generation, from the beginning of the world, was ever more fruitful in wickedness.” These were, indeed, “the days of vengeance,” that all things that are written (especially by Moses, Joel, and Daniel) might be fulfilled (Luke 21:2).

Nor were the calamities of this ill-fated nation even now ended. There were still other places to subdue, and our Lord had thus predicted, “wheresoever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered together” (Matt. 24:28). After the destruction of Jerusalem, 1,700 Jews who surrendered at Macherus were slain, and of fugitives, not less than 3,000 were killed in the wood of Jardes. Titus, having marched his army to Caesarea, there with great splendor celebrated the birthday of his brother, Domitian. And according to the barbarous manner of those times, he punished many Jews in honor of it. The number who were burned and who fell by fighting with wild beasts and in mutual combats exceeded 2,500.

At the siege of Massada, Eleazer, the Jewish commander, instigated the garrison to burn their stores and to destroy first the women and children and then themselves. Dreadful as it is to relate, this horrid design was executed. They were in number 960. Ten were chosen to perform the bloody work: The rest sat on the ground and, embracing their wives and children, stretched out their necks to the sword. One was afterward appointed to destroy the remaining nine and then himself. The survivor, when he had looked round to see that all were slain, set fire to the place and plugged his sword into his own bosom. Nevertheless, two women and five children successfully concealed themselves and witnessed the whole transaction. When the Romans advanced to the attack in the morning, one of the women gave them a distinct account of this melancholy affair and struck them with amazement at the contempt of death that had been displayed by the Jews.

After this event, if we exclude the transitory insurrection of the Sicarii under Jonathan, all opposition on the part of the Jews everywhere ceased. It was the submission of impotence and despair. The peace that ensued was the effect of the direst necessity. The rich territory of Judea was converted into a desolate waste. Everywhere ruin and desolation presented itself to the solitary passenger, and a melancholy and death-like silence reigned over the whole region. The mournful and desolate condition of Judea, at this time, is exactly described by the prophet Isaiah, in the following of his prophecies: “The cities were without inhabitant, and the houses without a man, and the land was utterly desolate, and the LORD had removed men far away, and there was a great forsaking in the midst of the land” (Isa. 6:11-12).

The catastrophe which has now been reviewed cannot but be deemed one of the most extraordinary that has happened since the foundation of the world. As it has pleased the Almighty to make it the subject of a very large proportion of the prophecies, both of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, so he has ordained that the particular events which accomplished them should be recorded with very remarkable precision and by a man most singularly preserved, qualified, and circumstanced for this purpose.

But with respect to this latter point, he shall speak for himself: “At first,” says Josephus, “I fought against the Romans, but was afterwards forced to be present in the Roman camp. At the time I surrendered, Vespasian and Titus kept me in bonds, but obliged me to attend them continually. Afterwards I was set at liberty, and accompanied Titus when he came from Alexandria to the siege of Jerusalem. During this time nothing was done that escaped my knowledge. What happened in the Roman camp I saw, and wrote down carefully. As to the information the deserters brought out of the city, I was the only man that understood it. Afterwards I got leisure at Rome; and when all my materials were prepared, I procured the help of one to assist me in writing Greek. Thus I composed the history of those transactions, and I appealed both to Titus and Vespasian for the truth of it; to which also Julius Archelaus, Herod, and king Agrippa, bore their testimony.”

All remark here is needless, but it should not be forgotten that Josephus was a Jew, obstinately attached to his religion, and that, although he has circumstantially related every remarkable event of that period, he seems studiously to have avoided such as had any reference to Jesus Christ, whose history he sums up in about twelve written lines. No one, therefore, can reasonably entertain a suspicion that the service he has rendered to Christianity, by his narrative of the transactions of the Jewish war, was at all the effect of design. The fidelity of Josephus as an historian is, indeed, universally admitted, and Scaliger even affirms that, not only in the affairs of the Jews, but in those of foreign nations also, he deserves more credit than all the Greek and Roman writers put together.

Nor is the peculiar character of Titus, the chief commander in this war, unworthy of our particular regard. Vespasian, his father, had risen out of obscurity and was elected emperor, contrary to his avowed inclination, about the commencement of the conflict. Thus the chief command devolved upon Titus, the most unlikely man throughout the Roman armies to become a scourge to Jerusalem. He was eminently distinguished for his great tenderness and humanity, which he displayed in a variety of instances during the siege. He repeatedly made pacific overtures to the Jews and deeply lamented the infatuation that rejected them. In short, he did everything that a military commander could do to spare them and to preserve their city and temple, but without effect. Thus was the will of God accomplished by Titus, although contrary to the wish of Titus, and God’s predicted interposition to punish his rebellious and apostate people, in this way, was rendered more conspicuously evident.

The history of the Jews, subsequently to the time of Josephus, still further corroborates the truth of our Savior’s prophecies concerning that oppressed and persecuted people. Into this inquiry, however, the limits of the present essay will not allow us to enter particularly. Our Lord foretold, generally, that they should “fall by the edge of the sword, and be led away captive into all nations; and that Jerusalem should be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles should be fulfilled” (Luke 21:24), and these predictions may be regarded as a faithful epitome of the circumstances of the Jews and also of their city, from the period in which it was delivered down even to our own times.

The Remainder of Matthew 24

For whatever reason, George Peter Holford’s book does not address the rest of Matthew 24 (verses 29-51). I will finish out this chapter by addressing the remaining verses.

Signs in the Sky

Immediately after the distress of those days: “the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken” (Matthew 24:29).

To the first century Jewish listeners, this was a figure of speech from the Old Testament. This apocalyptic language meant the destruction of a government or a city. Consider how Joseph dreamed of government as a sun, moon, and stars (see Gen. 37:9). There are multiple times in the Old Testament where cities received prophecies of their destruction that were described in the same terms, such as:

Egypt:

When I snuff you out, I will cover the heavens and darken their stars; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon will not give its light. All the shining lights in the heavens I will darken over you; I will bring darkness over your land, declares the Sovereign LORD (Ezekiel 32:7-8).

Edom:

All the stars in the sky will be dissolved and the heavens rolled up like a scroll; all the starry host will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like shriveled figs from the fig tree. My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; see, it descends in judgment on Edom, the people I have totally destroyed (Isaiah 34:4-5).

Babylon:

The stars of heaven and their constellations will not show their light. The rising sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light (Isaiah 13:10).

The LORD is slow to anger but great in power; the LORD will not leave the guilty unpunished. His way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet (Nahum 1:3).

“In that day,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight (Amos 8:9).

Also, Habakkuk chapter 3, which is about Babylon coming to destroy Israel, has much of the same sort of imagery.

So in Matthew 24:29, Jesus’ hearers would have known that He was speaking in Old Testament pictorial language about the destruction of Jerusalem, not the end of the world.

Coming on the Clouds

Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven. And then all the peoples of the earth [the tribes of the land] will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory (Matthew 24:30).

First, we must recognize that this passage does not refer to a global event. Where it says “earth,” the root word is ge, which means “land,” as in the land of Israel.¹⁸ This passage does not use the word kosmos, which would refer to the whole planet earth. That is why many translations use the phrase “tribes of the land” (inserted above) or, at the very least, include it in the footnotes.

Second, the phrase “coming on clouds of heaven,” would have triggered in the first century Jewish listener the Old Testament “cloud-comings” of God in judgment upon ancient historical people and nations (see Ps. 18:7-15; 104:3; Isa. 19:1; Joel 2:1-2; Zeph. 1:4,15). I will discuss the “cloud comings” more in the next chapter, but for now it is simply important to realize that when Jesus talks about the coming of the Son of Man, He is referring to a coming of judgment, not to His Final Return.

Third, the “sign of the son of man in heaven” is likely a reference to the sign we read about earlier from Josephus—the sword that hung in the sky for a year over Jerusalem before AD 70.

Gathering the Elect

And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other (Matthew 24:31).

David Chilton writes of this passage:

Finally, Jesus announced, the result of Jerusalem’s destruction will be Christ’s sending forth of His “angels” to gather the elect. Isn’t this the rapture? No. The word angels simply means messengers (cf. James 2:25), regardless of whether their origin is heavenly or earthly; it is the context which determines whether these are heavenly creatures being spoken of. The word often means preachers of the Gospel (see Matthew 11:10; Luke 7:24; 9:52; Revelation 1-3). In context, there is every reason to assume that Jesus is speaking of the worldwide evangelism and conversion of the nations, which will follow upon the destruction of Israel.¹⁹

After the destruction of the Temple and the Jewish religious system, God began to gather people into His Kingdom from the four corners of the earth. A great explanation of this is found in Victorious Eschatology.

To many people, this can speak only of the second coming of Christ at the end of history. But that is not what Jesus said it meant. Only three verses after this, He states, “this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.” Jesus said that this verse was descriptive of one of the things that would happen within the span of one generation.

How can we understand this? As Jesus sat down on His throne, all authority was given to Him in heaven and earth. Everything changed the moment Jesus came into His kingdom. The blowing of a trumpet meant to the Jews that a royal decree was going out. And what was that decree? It was time to release angels of God to go and gather His people from every nation. At the same time, the disciples of Jesus were commissioned to go and preach the gospel, making disciples of every nation. No longer was the Jewish nation the only people allowed within a covenant relationship with God [this occurred in Acts 10]. Jesus had become the Good Shepherd who was gathering His sheep from across the world.²⁰

The Fig Tree

Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door (Matthew 24:32-33).

This is a simple parable; in the same way that there are signs that summer is near, there would be obvious signs that the destruction of Jerusalem was upon them. The most obvious are the first eight signs. There is no deeper meaning about Israel being restored as a nation in this verse. Because Adam covered himself with fig leaves, the fig is typically a negative symbol. Jesus also had previously cursed the fig tree (see Mark 11:12-14).

This Generation

Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away (Matthew 24:34-35).

To the Jewish people, a generation is forty years. This is visible in the fact that a “generation” died in the wilderness during the forty-year journey (see Deut. 29:5). Therefore, Jesus was saying that this prophecy would happen before forty years had gone by. Jesus said this in AD 30, and the entirety of His Matthew 24 prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70.

No One Knows the Hour

But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man (Matthew 24:36-39).

There was no clearer picture of utter destruction than Noah’s flood to the Jewish mind. In the days of the flood, Noah declared a coming destruction, yet people carried on with normal life and ignored his warnings. They ignored him right to the last moment, when they were then destroyed. So it was in AD 70, when Jesus in His coming destroyed Jerusalem like the flood. As we discussed earlier, coming, as used throughout Matthew 24, indicates God coming in judgment, not the Final Return of Christ (more on this in the next chapter).

One Taken, One Left

Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left (Matthew 24:40-41).

As I discussed in the previous chapter on the rapture, these verses are in reference to the arbitrary way in which the Romans would seize upon and kill the Jews in AD 70.

Keep Watch

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.

Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. Truly I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, “My master is staying away a long time,” and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 24:42-51).

Verses 42-51 are a connected admonition to keep watch, be ready, and be expectant. It would have been a temptation for the Christians, over the course of forty years of waiting, to become complacent and even unbelieving that Jesus would be coming in judgment upon Jerusalem. In fact, we find in Second Peter 3:4 that there were even people mocking Jesus prophecy saying, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” Notice even in this remark that coming is in quotations because this was not in reference to Jesus’ final return, but was the Hebrew figure of speech regarding the judgment of God upon a city.

The servant in the story thought that the master (Jesus) was going to be gone a long time, but he was totally wrong and was caught by surprise. The fact is that Jesus has been gone a long time, but this parable illustrates how people during the period of time between AD 30 and AD 70 thought that Jesus’ coming to bring judgment was a long way off, and they were caught by surprise.

In Summary

I know that, for many of you, this has probably been completely new information. If you need to confirm the accuracy of what you just read, it is a matter of public record. By reading the works of the historians—Josephus, Eusebius, and Tacitus—as well as looking up a few Greek root words in Vine’s Expository Dictionary, you can confirm everything contained in this chapter.

Also, I recognize that what you just read was incredibly graphic and heart-wrenching. As I mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, the first time I read Holford’s work, I had tears streaming down my face while on an airplane. Although graphic, this portion of history is important to understand as a Christian.

David Chilton has written an excellent summary of this period:

Josephus has left us an eyewitness record of much of the horror of those years, and especially of the final days in Jerusalem. It was a time when “the day-time was spent in the shedding of blood, and the night in fear”; when it was “common to see cities filled with dead bodies”; when Jews panicked and began indiscriminately killing each other; when fathers tearfully slaughtered their entire families, in order to prevent them from receiving worse treatment from the Romans; when, in the midst of terrible famine, mothers killed, roasted, and ate their own children (cf. Deuteronomy 28:53); when the whole land “was all over filled with fire and blood”; when the lakes and seas turned red, dead bodies floating everywhere, littering the shores, bloating in the sun, rotting and splitting apart; when the Roman soldiers captured people attempting to escape and then crucified them—at the rate of 500 per day.²¹

Chapter Points

• In Matthew 24, Jesus prophesied the Great Tribulation, which happened in AD 70 during the destruction of Jerusalem.
• The events of AD 70 happened within the timeframe that Jesus gave—a generation, or forty years.
• Jesus gave eight signs that would precede the Great Tribulation, and all were fulfilled prior to AD 70.
• There is no future Great Tribulation. Jesus said that nothing so terrible had ever happened before or would ever happen again.

The End of the World

In Matthew 24, we found that the disciples asked Jesus three questions: “Tell us,” they said, “when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” (Matt. 24:3).

As we saw in the previous chapter, in Matthew 24 Jesus prophesied exactly what would take place in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in AD 70. But did Jesus answer the other two questions: “What is the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” Before we can understand the answers Jesus gave, we have to be sure that we understand all three questions.

Question #1: “When will this happen?”

This question is clearly in reference to what Jesus had just been saying about the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem being left desolate. Since we have already focused on this in the previous chapter, I will focus more on the second and third questions.

Question #2: “What is the sign of your coming?”

The automatic, almost knee-jerk reaction is to think that the disciples were asking about Jesus’ Second Coming. But if we step back and think for a moment, we will remember that the disciples had no idea that Jesus was about to die and be resurrected. It is unrealistic to think that they were asking Jesus about His Second Coming, which would be thousands of years away. They were still in shock about Jesus chewing out the Pharisees; they weren’t suddenly asking Jesus about His Second Coming, but about something else very similar and closely related to the first question.

After Jesus answered their first question in great detail, He responded about the sign of His “coming”:

And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth [literally, “tribes of the land”] will mourn, and they will see the SON OF MAN COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF THE SKY with power and great glory (Matthew 24:30 NASB).

Keeping in mind that the disciples were not asking about Jesus’ Second Coming, thousands of years later, here is a much more sensible understanding of what they were truly asking. The Bible scholar David Chilton says regarding this passage:

In order to understand the meaning of Jesus’ expressions in this passage, we need to understand the Old Testament much more than most people do today. Jesus was speaking to an audience that was intimately familiar with the most obscure details of Old Testament literature. They had heard the Old Testament read and expounded countless time throughout their lives, and had memorized lengthy passages. Biblical imagery and forms of expression had formed their culture, environment, and vocabulary from earliest infancy, and this had been true for generations. The fact is that when Jesus spoke to His disciples about the fall of Jerusalem, He used prophetic vocabulary. There was a “language” of prophecy, instantly recognizable to those familiar with the Old Testament.¹

Knowing the Jewish culture, Jesus answered that they would see “the SON OF MAN COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF THE SKY with power and great glory” (Matt. 24:30). Throughout the Old Testament, when God was going to bring destruction upon a city or a nation, it was said that He would “come on clouds in the sky.” In the Jewish culture, the phrase “sign of your coming” had little to do with location and arrival. It was understood to mean, “to come in judgment upon a city or nation,” as we will see in the following verses.

Each of the following passages was fulfilled by the destruction of an Old Testament city or nation:

He parted the heavens and came down; dark clouds were under his feet. He mounted the cherubim and flew; he soared on the wings of the wind. He made darkness his covering, his canopy around him—the dark rain clouds of the sky. Out of the brightness of his presence clouds advanced, with hailstones and bolts of lightning (Psalm 18:9-12).

The LORD wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters. He makes the clouds his chariot and rides on the wings of the wind (Psalm 104:2-3).

A prophecy against Egypt: See, the LORD rides on a swift cloud and is coming to Egypt. The idols of Egypt tremble before him, and the hearts of the Egyptians melt with fear (Isaiah 19:1).

Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm on my holy hill. Let all who live in the land tremble, for the day of the LORD is coming. It is close at hand—a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness. Like dawn spreading across the mountains a large and mighty army comes, such as never was in ancient times nor ever will be in ages to come (Joel 2:1-2).

The great day of the LORD is near—near and coming quickly. The cry on the day of the LORD is bitter; the Mighty Warrior shouts his battle cry. That day will be a day of wrath—a day of distress and anguish, a day of trouble and ruin, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness (Zephaniah 1:14-15).

The LORD is slow to anger but great in power; the LORD will not leave the guilty unpunished. His way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet (Nahum 1:3).

Now that we have some of the Hebraic cultural context, we can understand that: 1) the disciples were asking about when Jesus would “come” in judgment upon Jerusalem, and 2) Jesus responded with many signs that would lead up to verse 30, where He would finally “come on clouds” and bring judgment.

Question #3: “What about the end of the age?”

As a modern reader, it is easy to jump to the conclusion that the disciples were now asking about the end of the world. Yet, there is no sensible explanation for why they would suddenly be over the shock of Jesus rebuking the Pharisees and declaring the destruction of the Temple. It just doesn’t make logical sense, in context, that they would be suddenly switching topics mid-sentence to ask about something completely unrelated. Therefore, it only fits that the disciples were still asking questions about their immediate thoughts. When they asked about the “end of the age,” they were not asking about the end of the world.

This is easily confirmed by looking at the original languages. In Greek, the word for “world” is kosmos, whereas the word for “age” is aion. The disciples asked Jesus about the end of the aion. They did not ask about the end of the kosmos.

So if they were not asking about the end of the world, what were they asking Jesus about? It is clear from the context that Jesus was going to come and bring destruction to Jerusalem and the Temple; therefore, if the Temple was destroyed, it would mean the end of sacrifice. No temple would mean no more sacrifice, which would mean no more priesthood and rituals. This would be the end of an age or, as we might say it, the end of an era. The disciples were asking when the end of the Age of Moses, which Jesus had just prophesied, would happen.

Throughout the New Testament, there is much written about the Age of Moses, which was about to come to an end, but there is very little said about the end of the whole world. Realizing that the Israelites had lived as the chosen people with exclusive access to God for approximately 4,000 years, we can understand that this was to be the single largest event to ever occur in national history. Also, it is interesting to note that Jesus was the only prophet prophesying that He was going to come on the clouds to destroy Jerusalem and that the Age of Moses was about to end. By comparison, all the false prophets were declaring that they had come to save Israel from the Roman rule.

Because many have taught that Jesus was talking about the end of the world, the understanding of many other verses has also been distorted. By realizing that the disciples were asking about the end of the Age of Moses, we can clearly understand many verses that are scattered throughout the New Testament. These verses are about the end of the Age of Moses and the destruction in AD 70; they are not about the end of the world. For example:

…You [the twelve] will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes (Matthew 10:23).

…You [the high priest] will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven (Matthew 26:64).

Now it is high time to awake out of sleep… the night is far spent, the day is at hand… (Romans 13:11-12).

…The form of this world is passing away (1 Corinthians 7:31 NASB).

On [us]… the ends of the ages have come (1 Corinthians 10:11 NASB).

…The Lord is at hand (Philippians 4:5 NKJV).

…The coming of the Lord is at hand….Behold, the Judge is standing at the door (James 5:8-9 NKJV).

The end of all things is at hand… (1 Peter 4:7 NKJV).

…It is the last hour… we know that it is the last hour (1 John 2:18 NKJV).

It is true that Jesus will return in bodily form to resurrect the dead and bring final judgment. Yet, most of the “end of the age” language used in the New Testament was in reference to the biggest thing ever in Jewish history—which was about to happen. The first century Jews were not focused on the end of the planet; that is a modern obsession that had almost no relevance to them.

The End of the Age

To prove this, let’s look at more passages that discuss the end of the age and, from them, glean the truth of what this phrase meant to first century Christians.

Jesus’ famous words in Matthew 28 are one of the most well-known passages about the end of the age: “teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20 NKJV). In this reference to the “end of the age,” Jesus was not saying that He would only be with them until AD 70. He specified that He would be with them always. But the disciples of the first century wouldn’t have been focused on whether Jesus would be with His followers 2,000 years later. They would have been more focused on whether He would be with them when the end of the age came because Jesus’ description in Matthew 24 of the way in which the end of the age would come was quite terrifying.

Another interesting and relevant quote from Jesus is found in Matthew 12.

Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come (Matthew 12:32).

This verse is fascinating because Jesus was speaking during the Age of Moses, saying that blaspheming the Holy Spirit would not be forgiven in the Age of Moses or in the coming age—the Kingdom Age in which we are currently living.

Jesus also told a parable about the end of the age that many have wrongly interpreted to be about the end of the world.

Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared. The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’ ‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ ‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn” (Matthew 13:24-30).

After Jesus shared this parable, His disciples were confused and asked Him to explain it to them. Now that we have the context, let’s examine Jesus’ explanation of the parable.

Then he left the crowd and went into the house. His disciples came to him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.” He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the evil one, and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. 

The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 13:36-42).

It is clear from the original manuscripts that the end of the age (aion) is in reference to the end of the Age of Moses, not the end of the planet Earth. Yet, with a surface reading of this passage, it is easy to come to the conclusion that it is about the final judgment.

If we look closer, though, we can see that the phrase blazing furnace is not a reference to any of the normal terms which refer to eternal punishment, such as:

• Gehenna
• Sheol
• Hades
• The Lake of Fire

None of the Greek wording in this passage points to the final judgment. This is not about Hell and the final judgment.

Jesus describes the blazing furnace as a place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. If this parable were about hell and the final judgment, Jesus would have used His more normal descriptions, which include everlasting punishment (such as in Matt. 18:8; 25:46; Jude 7; 2 Thess. 1:9). Rather, here Jesus simply describes the emotional pain involved. This creates a clear demarcation between the blazing furnace and the places of eternal punishment mentioned above. They are not the same.

It is more sensible to understand this passage in its historical context. During the AD 70 destruction, Jerusalem literally became as a great “blazing furnace” that incinerated the bodies of thousands upon thousands of both the living and the dead. Jerusalem was consumed with the sounds of weeping and the painful gnashing of teeth in anguish—as Holford’s book, quoted in the last chapter, so vividly described.

Clearly, if you were to put yourself in the mind of a first century Christian living in Israel, you would understand that you only have forty years to spread the Gospel before Jesus comes on clouds to destroy Jerusalem and you would have to flee to the mountains. You would use language in your letters speaking of it being the last hour and the latter times, and you would say things like, He is standing at the door, and the Lord is at hand and the day is about to come. We must choose to consciously stop taking what the New Testament authors meant for those living between AD 30 and AD 70 and applying it to our future.

Many false doctrines have been created by not reading the Bible according to its historical and cultural context. Two clear examples that we will look at next are the wrong expectations of an apostasy of the Church and coming false teachers.

Apostasy

One major false teaching that currently exists is the concept of a future “fallen apostate church.”  Some have even tried to force Church history into seven time periods and line them up with the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3. These individuals say that the modern Church is the church of Laodicea, which Jesus threatened to vomit out of His mouth. Not only is this concept deeply incorrect, but it also contradicts everything Jesus said about His Kingdom growing (see Matt. 13:31-33).

Here are some of the verses that are used to substantiate this teaching.

Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition (2 Thessalonians 2:3 KJV).

This verse has been used extensively in the last fifty years to claim that the majority of the Church is not actually walking with God. Those who teach this say that the true Church is merely a remnant of those who claim to be the Church. But it is an error to drag the Old Testament remnant idea into the New Testament, where it does not belong (I will discuss this more in a later chapter). So this verse should not be used to substantiate that false doctrine. Also, it is important to note that this verse is about a rebellious person called the man of sin, not about the Church falling apart. This verse is better understood in the NIV translation:

Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction (2 Thessalonians 2:3).

The rebellion occurred in the first century under John Levi, as we saw in the previous chapter. We are not looking for a future “falling away” to fulfill this passage. (For easy reference, his name, John Levi, has been put in bold in The Great Tribulation chapter.)

False Teachers

Similar to the idea of the apostate Church is the belief that there will be many false teachers before the return of Christ. This has created a great excuse for finger-pointing in the Body of Christ and empowers a suspicious and fearful attitude toward others. As you may guess, however, the verses that are used to support this teaching were, in fact, referring to the time leading up to AD 70, not to our own day. For example:

For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

The “sound doctrine” would have been that judgment was coming to Jerusalem, but the “itching ears” wanted to hear from false prophets and teachers that declared God’s protection from destruction. This provided a stage for a major rise in false prophets and teachers between AD 30 and AD 70. Now look at this verse:

Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons (1 Timothy 4:1 NKJV).

These latter times referred to by Paul were not 2,000 years later. This was in reference to the false teachers and false prophets of the first century (the same is true of Second Timothy 3). We must choose to interpret Scripture correctly and not pull verses out of their intended context to fit our personal agenda.

Here is another passage that many have misunderstood:

“The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “when I will send a famine through the land—not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD” (Amos 8:11).

This is not a New Testament prophecy. This was fulfilled by the 400 years between the end of the Old Testament and the start of the New Testament, where there is no recorded spoken word from God.

Now look at these two passages, the first from the apostle Paul and the second from Jesus:

I know that after I leave, [not 2,000 years later] savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them. So be on your guard! Remember that for three years I never stopped warning each of you night and day with tears (Act 20:29-31).

And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth? (Luke 18:7-8)

Will He keep putting them off? No, Jesus will not. He will see that they get justice quickly. Remember that the word comes is a reference to the first century destruction of Jerusalem, not to events 2,000 years later. This was perfectly fulfilled; they got justice and quickly!

Chapter Points

• There is no separation in the three questions that the disciples asked Jesus.
• There is no separation in the answers that Jesus gave His disciples.
• When the New Testament mentions the end of the age, it is referring to the end of the Age of Moses, not the end of the world.
• The idea of the seven churches of Revelation corresponding with seven periods in Church history has no foundation.
• The Kingdom of God is growing, and we are not looking for a future “falling away” of the Church.
• The passages that speak of false teachers, teachings, and prophets were all fulfilled in the first century. These have no prophetic significance for the modern day, although they have practical significance. We still need to use discernment regarding teaching and judge the fruit, but we are not looking for a future apostasy.

Melting Elements

For almost two decades, I believed that one day in the future the whole earth would be consumed by fire when Jesus returned. Considering that God had promised Noah that He wouldn’t use water to destroy the earth (see Gen. 9:11), I figured He would be able to destroy the earth with fire and still keep His promise to Noah. This was my understanding of Second Peter 3:5-7:

But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth [Ge] are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

Like many others, I had never looked very closely at the context of this passage and had simply arrived at my conclusion: Peter was describing God’s crafty way around His promise to Noah by destroying earth without using water. Now that I have studied this passage, it is humorous to look back at what I used to think. It makes me wonder sometimes how wrong I might still be in other areas I haven’t studied yet.

Awaiting His Coming

Here I would like to show you the context of Second Peter 3, starting with verse one.

Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking. I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Savior through your apostles (2 Peter 3:1-2).

In this letter, Peter is going to remind his readers about some specific words and commands given from (1) the Old Testament, (2) Jesus, and (3) the apostles. He hasn’t told us yet what He is referring to, but he will in the next verses.

Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation” (2 Peter 3:3-4).

Peter has now clarified that he is referring to Jesus’ promise that He would “come,” which as we learned previously, is a reference to the destruction of Jerusalem. The historical context of Peter’s writing is between AD 30 and AD 70. At that time, the Jews were bringing tremendous persecution upon the Christians. The Christians were clinging to the hope of Jesus’ words in Matthew 24 that judgment was about to come upon Jerusalem and the religious system. As we see in the above passage, the Christians were being mocked for believing that Jesus was actually coming to bring judgment upon the Temple.

But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth [Ge] are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly (2 Peter 3:5-7).

Peter is now responding to the mocker’s statements by showing how God has judged before and affirming that God will judge again.

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. (2 Peter 3:8)

If there is one passage that is abused more than almost any other, it is 2 Peter 3:8. Countless people have used this passage to make prophetic mathematics work in their wild end-time theories. Yet Peter was simply quoting from Psalm 90:4, he was not proposing a formula by which to figure out the end of the world. “For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.” Psalm 90:4

Peter is NOT saying that to God, time is nebulous or relative. Peter is quoting from a Psalm, which speaks of how time is of little value or importance to an infinite eternal God. Time is real to God, but not in the same way as it is for us.

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9).

In Matthew 24:34, Jesus said His words would come to pass within a generation. Here is a simple equation for the timeframe of his prophecy: AD 30 + forty-year generation = AD 70. Jesus could have come back in AD 50, midway through the prophesied generation, but He chose to wait until the last moment of His forty-year prophecy so that people would have more time to repent.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire… (2 Peter 3:10).

The phrase the elements will be destroyed is tremendously significant in understanding this whole chapter. Since it appears again in the passage, I will address this phrase further in a moment.

…and the earth… (2 Peter 3:10).

The word for “earth” used here in the Greek is ge, not kosmos. Ge is the word for “land,” whereas kosmos is the word for “the whole world.” This is not about the destruction of the planet earth (kosmos), but it is about the destruction of the land of Israel (ge).

…and everything done in it will be laid bare (2 Peter 3:10). 

Since the root-word ge is used, this verse is clearly saying, “everything done in it (in the land) will be laid bare.” This is exactly what took place at the AD 70 destruction. The sacrifices were stopped, the priesthood was killed, the Temple was destroyed, and the buildings were leveled to the ground. Jerusalem was laid bare.

Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming… (2 Peter 3:11-12). 

The question Peter poses to his readers is: “Considering that this great wrath is about to be poured out upon the religious system, how should one live?” Peter encourages his readers to live godly lives as they await and hasten the arrival of the Day of the Lord.  This is not an isolated reference; throughout the New Testament, we read that the first-century believers were eagerly awaiting the coming of the Lord (see 1 Cor. 1:6-8; Phil. 3:20; 1 Thess. 1:9-10).

One element of waiting for Jesus’ coming was hastening it, and Jesus instructed His disciples concerning how they were to hasten His arrival.  He told them that if they petitioned God for justice, God would certainly hear their prayers and avenge them quickly by means of the coming of the Son of Man.

And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:7-8)

The first century Church under persecution cried out to God day and night. This was a part of the hastening process.

The Elements

Peter continued his letter, saying:

…That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat (2 Peter 3:12). 

The Greek word Peter uses for “elements” is stoicheion.  This word appears only five other times in the New Testament (see Gal. 4:3, 9; Col. 2:8, 20; Heb. 5:12), and in each occurrence, it refers to the basic principles of the Mosaic Law.

In Galatians, Paul referred twice to these elements. First, he stated that the Jews had been under the elements of the world until the fullness of time had come; then, he asked his readers why they would want to return to these elements.

So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world (Galatians 4:3).

But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage? (Galatians 4:9 NKJV)

In context, these elements concerned rituals and observances of feast days (see Gal. 4:9-10). Thus, Paul was trying to keep his readers from coming under the principles of the Law again (see Gal. 5:1).

In Colossians, Paul also referred twice to these elements, warning his readers not to let anyone hold them captive to the elements of the world, for by accepting Christ, they had died to these elements; therefore, they did not need to submit to such things (see Col. 2:8,20-22).

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ (Colossians 2:8).

Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”?  These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings (Colossians 2:20-22).

As the context of this letter makes clear, Paul was encouraging his readers not to let anyone judge them for failing to observe feast days, festivals, and Sabbaths because those things merely foreshadowed the person and work of Christ (see Col. 2:16).  So again, we find that the elements of the world referred to the principles of Judaism—and Paul went on to remind his readers that these rules were destined to perish!

The writer of Hebrews also commented on these elements saying,

By this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary [stoicheion] truths [logion] of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food (Hebrews 5:12).

The Greek word the writer used for “truths” is logion, a word used elsewhere in the New Testament to refer to the Old Covenant (see Acts 7:38; Rom. 3:2).  In context, the author was expressing regret that he had to teach his Jewish readers how the basics of the Law foreshadowed the work of Christ in order to implore them to leave those principles for the sake of a new and better covenant (see Heb. 5:12-14; 6:1; 7:22; 10:1). The Apostle Peter was not talking about the destruction of the elements as in the elements of the periodic table. He was writing of the destruction of the elements of Judaism.

New Heaven and New Earth

In the next verse of Second Peter 3, Peter makes an important shift:

But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:13).

As you will remember, Peter started this chapter by saying, “I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Savior through your apostles” (2 Pet. 3:2). This is important because, in verses 3-12, Peter has been speaking of the prophecy from Jesus in Matthew 24.

Up until this point, Peter has not yet quoted from the holy prophets of old. In verse 13, Peter makes a departure from the words of the apostles (Paul and the destruction of the Jewish elements) and from the words of Jesus (about the destruction of the land). And Peter begins to quote from the holy prophets of old:

For, behold, I create new heavens, and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind (Isaiah 65:17 NASB).

“For as the new heavens and the new earth which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the LORD… (Isaiah 66:22 NKJV).

Like Peter and the holy prophets, we also are looking forward to the new heavens and the new earth (just as John also saw it in Revelation 21:1).

Peter then continues,

So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him. Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction (2 Peter 3:14-16).

As Peter concluded his prophecy concerning the burning of the elements of the world, he declared that he was writing of the same things of which Paul wrote.  As we have seen, when Paul wrote concerning the elements of the world, he was referring to the basic principles of the Old Covenant.  Thus, our understanding that Peter was speaking of the passing of the elements of Judaism is further confirmed.

In Conclusion

We can learn two important points from this passage in Second Peter. First, we see that Peter was not speaking about the whole world being destroyed by fire. The word elements was, rather, a reference to the Mosaic Law. The Law was passing away. Second, by doing our research, we discover that not one verse in the New Testament predicts the destruction of the kosmos, of planet earth. When the New Testament speaks of the destruction of the world, it uses the root word ge, which means “land,” not globe. There is not one verse that predicts the destruction of the globe.

Chapter Points

• In Second Peter 3, Peter reminds his readers of the words of Jesus in Matthew, Paul’s teachings, and Old Testament prophecy—specifically in relation to the promised destruction of Jerusalem.
• Jesus came in judgment on Jerusalem at the end of the prophesied generation (forty years) to give people as much time as possible to repent.
• The word translated “earth” here is ge, meaning “land,” not the planet Earth. This prophecy is about the destruction of the land of Israel, not the whole world.
• Jesus said the early believers could “hasten” His coming by petitioning Him for justice.
• The phrase “the elements” refers to the Jewish Law, not to the periodic table elements, which is confirmed by many other New Testament passages.
• At the end of this passage, Peter refers to the prophets’ words about the new heaven and new earth—something that we are yet looking forward to.

The Antichrist

In my life, I have watched the meteoric rise of credit cards, cell phones, and the Internet. I have heard the preachers, authors, and bomb shelter-builders tell me that modern technology is paving the way for the antichrist to rule the world with his “mark of the beast” like in no other age. From radio frequency chips implanted under the skin to national identification numbers, there are a lot of concerns in the air.

In fact, I have heard these concerns for a long, long time. For a few years leading up to Y2K, I listened to my local Calvary Chapel radio station every day. Many of my friend’s parents stocked their basements with food and other supplies in preparation for the “grid” going down. I always thought that the best currency to stock up on for the coming apocalypse would be toilet paper, but nobody took my theory seriously. Now, over a decade later, my friend’s parents still have 55-gallon drums of wheat in their basement, which are finally expiring.

The idea that society is heading toward complete corruption and a one-world leader has been around a long time, and many dictators have tried to make this a reality. Yet it begs the question, what does the Bible say about this “antichrist?”

The idea of the antichrist, as it is commonly taught, comes primarily from a compilation of four different passages of Scripture. Therefore, in this chapter, I will examine these four passages of Scripture, and my intention is to show you that there is no future one-world ruler prophesied in the Bible.

Passage #1: 1 and 2 John

To begin, we must realize that the term antichrist does not appear in the Book of Revelation at all. A simple search of a Strong’s Concordance will reveal that the term antichrist is only used in four passages in the Bible, three times in First John and once in Second John.

To understand the term antichrist, we must first understand the context of John’s writings.¹ During the time of the first century Church, there was a cult system called Gnosticism. They taught that the spirit was good and the physical/emotional realms were evil, therefore Jesus could not have come to earth in an actual physical body.² They taught that Jesus came to earth only as an ethereal spirit being. This teaching is heretical because it negates the truth of Jesus shedding His human blood for the remission of sin. The Gnostics gained so many followers in the early Church (about a third of the first century Church) that John wrote his first epistle in response to their heresy.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ (1 John 1:1-3).

John was writing to prove, as an eyewitness, that Jesus was not an ethereal ghost, but a real physical person. John was the disciple who leaned his head upon Jesus’ chest, and he knew that Jesus was not merely a spirit. He even remarked in John 1:14, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” The apostle’s writings were very focused on those who had fallen into the first century Gnostic thinking. John went on, in his epistle, to say that those who claimed Jesus didn’t have a physical body were actually antichrist.

Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world (1 John 4:1-3).

Many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh, have gone out into the world. Any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist (2 John 1:7).

Any person who denies that Jesus came in the flesh, which is what the Gnostics of the first century were doing, is operating in the spirit of antichrist. The antichrist isn’t a person; it is a belief system, specifically, Gnosticism.

John further mentions the antichrist spirit as something that the early believers had already heard of:

Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that antichrist is coming… (1 John 2:18 NASB).

First, it is important to note that certain Bible translations have inserted a word that is not in the Greek manuscripts; this has led to much confusion. These translations capitalize the word antichrist in First John 2:18. The reason for the capitalization is because the translators inserted the word the before the word antichrist, thus making antichrist into a proper noun, which requires capitalization.

The early Church had heard that antichrist (false teaching) was coming, but they had not heard that the Antichrist (a one-world ruler) was coming. The insertion of the and the capitalization of Antichrist was added 1500 years later by the translators. As I noted in Chapter 1, Martin Luther and the Protestants wanted to be able to point the condemning finger at the Catholic church, and by making antichrist into a proper noun, they could easily identify her as being such.

With that understanding, we can discern the true meaning of John’s letter. John said that “as you have heard that antichrist is coming….” The important question is, when had the readers of John’s letter heard this message of an impending antichrist? Considering that the term antichrist refers to Gnosticism (false teachers), it makes sense that John would be referencing what Jesus warned in Matthew 24—the coming of false teachers. The Gnosticism that John addressed in First and Second John was the false teaching that Jesus predicted.

The verse continues, “…even now many antichrists have come…” (1 John 2:18). In other words, many false teachings had already come: Gnosticism, the Nicolatian heresy, and the Judiazers’ heresy (see Rev. 2:6,9,15; 3:9). John finishes this verse with, “This is how we know it is the last hour” (1 John 2:18). This again shows that John was referring to Jesus’ prediction in Matthew 24 that one sign of the coming destruction of Jerusalem would be false teachers. So the appearance of Gnostic heresy was a sign of it being the last hour before the destruction of Jerusalem.

John continued,

They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us (1 John 2:19).

The apostle John, writing before the AD 70 destruction, pointed to the fact that many had left the true Church and that this was proof that they were in the last hours of Jesus’ prophecy from Matthew 24 being fulfilled.

But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth. Who is the liar? It is whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a person is the antichrist—denying the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also (1 John 2:20-23).

John writes that those who deny that Jesus is the Christ are antichrist, which is a much broader definition than one individual being a future one-world ruler. Clearly, we can see that John was writing about Gnosticism in the first century Church. He never refers to a future one-world ruler possessed by satan himself. Antichrist does not refer to a one-world government ruler, but to ancient Gnosticism.

Let’s look at our next passage.

Passage #2: Daniel 9:24-27

Many modern end-times teachers use Daniel 9 to glean much of their information about the evil one-world government ruler that they believe is in our future. Yet there is no mention of an antichrist figure in Daniel 9. The commentaries written before the 1830s agree that this passage is about Jesus, not the antichrist. As the famous commentator Matthew Henry says of Daniel 9, “We have here the answer that was immediately sent to Daniel’s prayer, and it is a very memorable one, as it contains the most illustrious prediction of Christ and gospel-grace that is extant in all the Old Testament.”³

But for the sake of conjecture, supposing that we believe that Daniel 9 is about a satan-possessed antichrist figure, let’s look at what would need to happen in the future, according to Daniel 9. The requirements involved for this system to work are as follows:

• The Temple in Jerusalem must be rebuilt on the same exact spot as the current Dome of the Rock, which is currently a Muslim mosque.
• A functional priesthood must be reinstated.
• Animal sacrifice must be reinstituted in this rebuilt Temple.
• The prophecies regarding the “Anointed one” in Daniel 9 have to be drastically changed in order to fit the antichrist (instead of Christ).
• The antichrist must make a covenant with the whole world for three and a half years.
• The antichrist will enter the temple and sit down as God and end animal sacrifice.

It is clear from a simple reading of Daniel 9:24-27 and a basic understanding of history that this passage has been fulfilled by Christ. There is no antichrist in Daniel 9. I will address this passage in greater detail in a coming chapter.

Passage #3: 2 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter—asserting that the day of the Lord has already come (2 Thessalonians 2:1-2). 

In an earlier chapter, we have seen that the phrase, “the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,” is in reference to the destruction of Jerusalem. Also, we saw that the “gathering” mentioned here is a reference to the Christians fleeing Judea to the mountains and being gathered and protected by the Lord during the destruction of Jerusalem. From these starting points, next we will see that the Thessalonians apparently thought that the coming had already happened.

The fact that the Thessalonians could think such a thing proves that they were expecting a local event to occur in Jerusalem, not a global apocalypse. This letter to the Thessalonians was written in approximately AD 50, and Thessalonica is hundreds of miles from Jerusalem. We can see from this letter that they were under the impression that the coming of Christ had already happened, which means they thought Jerusalem had been destroyed. In response to this, Paul writes this:

Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction (2 Thessalonians 2:3).

The apostle Paul told the Thessalonians that the destruction of Jerusalem would not come until the rebellion had occurred and the leader of the rebellion, the “man of lawlessness,” was revealed. He then told them what types of things this rebel leader would do.

He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God (2 Thessalonians 2:4).

This is a clear indicator of who could and could not be the “man of sin.” For example, this would have to be a person who would have physically been able to stand in the Temple and proclaim himself God. This would require a person who was living before AD 70, when the temple was destroyed, because at no time since AD 70 has there been a Temple for the man of sin to stand in. Also, there is no New Testament verse, not even one, that predicts a rebuilt Jewish Temple. So the Temple had to be standing for the man of lawlessness to stand in it.

When we read in Chapter 3 about the destruction of Jerusalem, we met a few characters involved in that story. The main rebel who caused the destruction of Jerusalem was John Levi of Gischala. I believe that he clearly fits the description of the man of lawlessness in this passage.

The Jewish historian Josephus wrote of how John Levi was a selfish, unscrupulous man with persuasive powers who convinced many that he was sent by God to liberate them. Further, John Levi took over the Temple, set himself up in the Temple as the Jewish savior (as God), looted the vessels of the Temple for their gold, and caused the daily animal sacrifices to cease. He also plundered the people, even burning their storehouses of food and causing the great famine that starved tens of thousands to death, and he enlisted aid from the Idumeans, who killed 8,500 of the Jews, including the priests.

Even when the Roman General Titus pleaded that John Levi leave the Temple, so that it wouldn’t be destroyed in battle, John flatly refused. John Levi caused the Temple to be destroyed; without him, the Temple might have been spared, considering that it was one of the wonders of the ancient world.⁴

Paul goes on to explain more about the man of lawlessness:

Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? And now you know what is holding him back [Ananus], so that he may be revealed at the proper time. For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back [Ananus] will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way (2 Thessalonians 2:5-7).

John was not only a rebel leader, but also a false messiah. He claimed godhood by taking over the temple, and the only person who stood in his way was the Jewish Chief Priest, Ananus. Ananus had tremendous diplomatic skills and had been able to negotiate peace treaties with Rome many times before. Ananus was literally able to restrain the full-scale rebellion that John Levi was aiming to accomplish.⁵ That is why Paul referred to the one who restrained, who must be taken out of the way.

Even Josephus noted that once Ananus (the one who restrains) was killed, then the destruction of Jerusalem began:

I should not mistake if I said that the death of Ananus was the beginning of the destruction of the city, and that from this very day may be dated the overthrow of her wall, and the ruin of her affairs.⁶

As Josephus recorded, this happened exactly as the apostle Paul laid out for the Thessalonians:

And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming (2 Thessalonians 2:8). 

When the “coming of the Lord” occurred with the destruction of Jerusalem, John Levi was finally dealt with. He was the cause of the rebellion, which led to the attack by the Romans, which led to John burning all the storehouses of food and declaring that they didn’t need the food because he was God and would provide for them! Then he set up his militia in the Temple, murdered all the priests, and caused not only all of Jerusalem to be destroyed, but even the temple, which the Romans didn’t want to harm. John Levi was so evil it boggles the mind!

A Final Thought

When we think about this passage from the perspective of its original recipients, it does not make sense that Paul would have written a mysterious passage that would be of no value to his original readers and would have no value until 2,000 years in the future.

The “secret power of iniquity” was already in operation in the first century; this culminated in the AD 70 judgment of iniquity (see 2 Thess. 2:7). The “secret power of iniquity” hasn’t been in operation for 2,000 years waiting for our future. Instead, Paul was clearly talking about an evil person in the first century and another person who was restraining this evil. John Levi and Ananus fulfill this passage.

Passage #4: The Beast of Revelation 13 and 17

Revelation 13 speaks of the Beast, which the majority of Church history has taught represents the Roman Empire of the first century. Revelation 17 speaks of another beast, which Church history has taught represents the Roman Emperor Nero. I agree that these are both excellent and sensible explanations.

Revelation 17:10—The Emperor Nero

They are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; but when he does come, he must remain for only a little while (Revelation 17:10).

This passage, which is speaking of the line of rulers in Rome, tells us exactly how many rulers had already come, which one was currently in power, and that the next one would only last a short while. Take a look at how that perfectly fits with Nero and the Roman Empire of the first century. The rule of the first seven Roman Emperor’s are as follows:

1. Julius Caesar (49–44 BC)
2. Augustus (27 BC–AD 14)
3. Tiberius (AD 14–37)
4. Caligula (AD 37–41)
5. Claudius (AD 41–54)

“Five have fallen…”

6. Nero (AD 54–68)

“One is…”

7. Galba (June AD 68–January AD 69, a six month ruler-ship)

“the other has not yet come; but when he does come, he must remain for only a little while.”

Of the first seven kings of the Roman Empire, five had come (Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Gaius, and Claudius), one was now in power (Nero), and one had not yet come (Galba), but would only remain a little time (six months). The vast majority throughout Church history have understood that the beast in Revelation 17 is a reference to Nero.

Revelation 13:1-4—The Roman Empire

…And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had…seven heads….One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast. People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?” (Revelation 13:1-4).

We have just seen from Revelation 17 that Nero fits the timeline as the sixth of the seven heads and that Galba is the one to come that shall only remain a little while. I would propose that Rome was metaphorically wounded and faltering as an empire because of Nero. Nero was not only a psychopath who burned down one third of Rome and pinned the blame on the Christians and persecuted them brutally, but also, when Nero killed himself (in AD 68), the political climate of Rome changed dramatically. One of the major changes was that Nero was officially the last of the Julio-Claudian line of emperors; thus the line ended, and it would have seemed, symbolically, as if the head of the empire had been wounded to death.

Nero’s sudden death caused an event that has been historically called the “Year of the Four Emperors.” Because of tumult caused by his suicide, three short-lived emperors followed Nero. Many thought that the Roman Empire was about to die.⁷

Here is the timeline of AD 69, the “Year of the Four Emperors”:

Nero (AD 54–68)

Galba (AD 68–69)

Otho (AD 69)

Vitellius (AD 69)

Vespasian (AD 69–80)

Can you imagine if the United States had four presidents in office in a one-year period? This was a very painful year for Rome, and many thought that the beast of the Roman Empire had been wounded unto death. In fact, this was the most tumultuous time in Roman history since Mark Antony’s death in 30 BC, nearly 100 years earlier.

Yet, by what appeared to be a miraculous turn around, the Empire was revived under Vespasian and Titus. When they came into power, they established the Flavian dynasty of Caesars. Instead of the beast dying, it resurrected under Vespasian, and he ruled for a solid ten years.

Often this subject of the beast is connected in people’s minds with the infamous “mark of the beast” found in Revelation 13:16-17. This “mark of the beast” has been the cause of much fear, so I will address it here, even though I am not covering the entire Book of Revelation (for more on Revelation, see the recommended reading list in Appendix 1.) Regarding the “mark of the beast,” it is important to note that in the ancient cultures of Rome, the public market was the main source of trade and retail. For people to enter the public market, they had to pass through the main gate. It was required of all who entered the main gate to pay homage to the idol of the Emperor. Once homage was paid, ashes were placed on the hand or on the forehead of the individual, and then they were allowed to pass through the gates and buy and sell merchandise.⁸ This was taking the mark. The parallels between this and the “mark of the beast” are stunning, and they further confirm the reality that the beast was Nero and the Roman Empire.

Many ancient sources spoke of Nero as a beast, as R.C. Sproul shows in his book, The Last Days According to Jesus.

[Kenneth] Gentry gives a synopsis of Nero’s violence-studded life, including the murders of his own family members, the castration of a boy Nero “married,” and the brutal murder of his pregnant wife by kicking her to death. Bizarre behavior was noted by the historian Suetonius, who wrote that Nero even “devised a kind of game, in which, covered with the skin of some wild animal, he was let loose from a cage and attacked the private parts of men and women, who were bound to stakes.”

Nero began his reign as emperor in A.D. 54. His imperial persecution of the Christian community was launched in A.D. 64, the same year as the famous fire (which burned 1/3 of Rome) that many believe was set by Nero himself. It is often assumed that the persecution of Christians, whom Nero blamed for the fire, was a diversionary tactic to shift blame for his own actions to others. Nero committed suicide in A.D. 68, when he was but 31 years of age.

Since the beast’s appearance is one of the “things, which must shortly take place” (Rev. 1:1), Nero is at least a prima facie candidate for the role of the beast. As described by ancient historians, Nero is a singularly cruel and unrestrained man of evil. Many ancient writers cite the bestial character of Nero, and Gentry summarizes these references:

Tacitus…spoke of Nero’s “cruel nature” that “put to death so many innocent men.” Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder…described Nero as “the destroyer of the human race” and “the poison of the world.” Roman satirist Juvenal…speaks of “Nero’s cruel and bloody tyranny.” …Apollonius of Tyana…specifically mentions that Nero was called a “beast” : “In my travels, which have been wider than ever man yet accomplished, I have seen many many wild beasts of Arabia and India; but this beast, that is commonly called a Tyrant, I know not how many heads it has, nor if it be crooked of claw, and armed with horrible fangs…And of wild beasts you cannot say that they were ever known to eat their own mother, but Nero has gorged himself on this diet.”

(Page 186-187, RC Sproul)

The beast is not a coming antichrist or the man of lawlessness. The beast was Nero and the Roman Empire. It is amazing how perfectly the visions of John fit with what has taken place in the past!

Chapter Points

• The antichrist is not and never was a person; it is a spiritual system of false teaching, specifically Gnosticism.
• Jesus is the perfect and sensible fulfillment of Daniel 9; there is no antichrist in this passage.
• The man of lawlessness was a first century individual; the restrainer was another first century individual—specifically John Levi and the High Priest Ananus.
• The Beast of Revelation is the Roman Empire, especially under Nero Caesar.
• There is nothing in the Bible that points to a future one-world government ruler such as been popularized in the last century.