Our study now enters the last of the Times of Israel. God’s spiritual kingdom, the new Israel, had been spreading rapidly throughout the world. Churches had been established in numerous cities. The Holy Spirit’s blessing and the risen Christ’s power had been manifested everywhere. It was clear that Christ was reigning as both king and
KINGDOM IN ALL THE WORLD
By the time that the New Testament scriptures were complete, and the miracles had ceased, the gospel had become known across the world in every nation. God’s kingdom, Israel, was no longer a worldly kingdom, but rather a spiritual kingdom. This kingdom of heaven, the new Israel, was spread throughout the world. It was a kingdom to which people of every nation belonged whether Jew or Gentile. The king of this wonderful kingdom is Jesus Christ, who reigns from heaven. The gospel of this kingdom includes the belief that Jesus Christ is coming again one day, at the end of the world to gather up his spiritual Israel, from among the living and the dead, to take its every citizen into heaven forever. And so it is true to say that, to the story of Israel,
Many, nevertheless, were blind to all this, and the Jews, especially in Jerusalem, generally just kept right on following the old way as if nothing had happened. They rejected their Christ and his sacrifice on the cross. They clung to their temple worship for forty years. But in AD70 it was suddenly taken from them by the Romans who besieged and destroyed their city and temple
The Times of Israel all had their purpose, but having fulfilled that purpose, each came to an end. The kingdom of God was always moving toward becoming an eternal kingdom in heaven. God did not preserve Jerusalem and its new temple from yet another destruction in AD70. Christ, having made one sacrifice for all sins, was now officiating in the true temple in the heavenly Jerusalem. The Jews should have recognised this, and abolished temple worship. Since they did not, God allowed their enemies to do it for them. More tragic even than the cruel destruction of their city and temple, was their own rejection and loss of the kingdom of heaven. How many people are still doing the same today, and putting themselves in the way of
The following list outlines Matthew 24. However, parallel passages in Luke and Mark are provided for reference should you wish to
The statements Jesus made about Jerusalem’s future* were a response to the questions of his disciples after he had predicted. the destruction of the temple. They had connected this with his predictions of his coming at the last day
The two events (the destruction of Jerusalem in AD70, and Christ’s second coming) are widely separated in time, but they are connected in principle. The first is an epitome and a microcosm of the second. The warnings about one are mostly appropriate to the other. This does not justify the preterist’s claim that they are one and the same event, but it does justify us identifying two events which the Lord has telescoped or woven together in
The main ideas in the prophecy are...
The destruction of Jerusalem took place in AD70 when Titus surrounded and attacked the city. To this day a relief on the Titus Arch in Rome portrays plunder being carried from the temple. Herod’s beautiful temple was razed to the ground and a million people cruelly lost their lives in Jerusalem’s fall. It was worse than the destruction which the Babylonians had inflicted
*Matthew 24 is mostly plain in its language, but does have figurative elements, especially verses 29-31 which bear similarities to passages among the old testament prophets