Matthew-094

 

Today, we continue our exposition in the Lord Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 23:31-24:3. Here he is speaking to the Pharisees:

Here we begin to see the Lord Jesus’ teaching leading us to the close of the present age, or the end times, or the last days. In theology, it is called eschatology. Eschatology is from the Greek word, eschatos which means last. So eschatology simply means the teaching con­cerning the last things, the things which will come as this age draws to a close.

I need to say that we must look at the things of eschatology with great care and with great accuracy because as you may know, there is a lot of sensationalism that tends to be exploited in this area. We do not propose to do this. We want to look soberly and accurately at what the Lord Jesus has to say concerning the last things. And just as his prophecy concerning Jerusalem was absolutely fulfilled right down to the last detail, so you can be sure that even as his prophecy concerning Israel and Jerusalem was fulfilled both in 70 A.D. and in 135 A.D., so also, all that he says subsequent to the destruction of Jerusalem will also be fulfilled without fail. As he says, “Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away.” So as we have systematically studied the teaching of the Lord Jesus all through these past five years, we now approach his teaching concerning the last things.

 

The end to this present, New Testament age, but not the end of the world

“The last things” imply that there is an end to this present age. Now distinguish one thing immediately: We are not talking about the end of the world; we are talking about the end of this age, this period of human history. The Scriptures speak very carefully as you see the words, “the close of the age” in Matthew 24:3. In human history, there are periods of time, what we can speak of as “epochs,” and we are speaking about the close of this present age, the close of the New Testament age. The Old Testament age is already closed.

This is not to be confused with “the end of the world,” if we can speak of it in those absolute terms. This is spoken of in Revelation 21:1 where it says there will be “a new heaven and a new earth”; and in 2 Peter 3:13 where the apostle Peter speaks of this world being dis­solved with fervent heat. That is still a long way further ahead. We have not yet reached the “millennium,” the thousand-year reign of Christ upon the earth, and these events concerning “the end of the world” is well after the thousand-year reign of Christ.

But this present age is coming to an end with the return of the Lord Jesus. He will come back this time in glory. The first time God sent Christ, it was in humility; he was born in a stable. He was sent as king incognito, that is, he came without revealing his identity. The second time when God sends Christ, his identity will be very plain. He will not come as king incognito but as the manifest king. So we are speaking about this New Testament age, this period of church history that is steadily coming to a close.

 

God’s holy love doesn’t allow wickedness to go beyond a certain measure

However, when we speak about an end, we must immediately ask the question: Why should we be speaking about an end at all? Why shouldn’t God just let mankind carry on and on? In fact, this doctrine of the end is very offensive to most people. They want to look far ahead. Why talk about the end? The Nazis dreamed of a thousand-year Reich, and Reich in German means a kingdom, an empire. Well, it did not last for many years, did it? Their dreams collapsed long before they even got to twenty or thirty years let alone a thousand years. So, does the dream of man collapse because God will send Christ to sit on the throne of judgment, and he will bring the age to a close? But why should God close the age? Why not just let mankind go on?

To understand that, we must look at a Scriptural teaching on what is called the “measure of wickedness.” And unless we understand this teaching of the “measure of wickedness,” we don’t have a grasp on the principle by which God deals with mankind and also how he deals with you and me. This is very important.

We will look at Matthew 23:32 to understand the meaning of this Scriptural doctrine of the measure of wickedness. What does “fill up then the measure of your fathers” mean? Unless you understand the Scriptural teaching on the measure of wickedness, you have no idea what the Lord Jesus is saying here. Time and again, there is this important principle of measure in Scripture. This means God will not allow wickedness to go beyond a certain measure. He will tolerate it up to that point, but it must stop and not go beyond that. That is putting the measure of wickedness very simply.

For example, when he deals with an individual, he will sometimes allow you to go so far and after that he will say, “This is enough.” And he will deal in judgment with that person according to his purpose. Sometimes, he will simply wipe out a person if that person is causing serious damage to the church in some way or other. We will look at this in a little more detail.

 

“The measure of wickedness” will fill up as it did in the Old Testament

Let us consider this teaching of the measure of wickedness both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. The Lord Jesus’ teaching in this passage is “Fill up then the measure.” We want to understand the two words “fill” and “measure.” When the measure is filled up to that point, God puts a stop to it. His holiness and his love cannot tolerate this kind of wickedness any further.

You will find this already back in Genesis 6:11, 13 for example, when the earth was filled with violence before the days of the flood, and when the measure of wickedness was reached, God sent the flood and wiped out the whole generation of people upon the earth. He will not tolerate wickedness to go beyond that measure. I would like you to understand that we are dealing with the living God. This world is God’s world. We are his creatures. Whether we acknow­ledge it or not doesn’t make any difference, because he will see to it that wickedness will not go beyond a certain level. When it reaches that level, judgment will come on an individual as well as on a nation. As we just mentioned, the wickedness of Nazi Germany finally reached a stage that it must not be allowed to continue. When so many people were put in gas chambers, that was enough, and God obliterated that reign. But he will do so in a much more direct fashion as you will see.

This is the point of this passage. In Matthew 23:32, the Lord Jesus is saying to the Pharisees, “Fill up then the measure of your fathers.” He is saying to the religious Jews, “Your wickedness is now reaching the measure of wickedness of your fathers. When it reaches that, what happened to your fathers in the Old Testament will happen to you.” When the measure of wickedness of Israel reached a certain stage, God wiped out Israel. We must clearly grasp that this principle goes on in the Old Testament as well as into the New.

Take Genesis 15:16 for example, concerning the Amorites who were Canaanites, God said that until their measure of wickedness was complete, they were not yet destroyed. But when you get to Joshua, you will see that Joshua was given the order to wipe out the Amorites. By the time of Joshua, their wickedness had reached that limit. It was enough. God could stand it no more. So the order came to wipe out the Amorites.

We must understand that God is the God of holiness. God is love but he cannot tolerate wickedness. Wickedness and love cannot mix. If wickedness and love mixed together, love would no longer be love. It would be adultery, fornication, corruption. It will not be love in that self-giving way that does not exploit. Taking advantage of other people is the very character of sin. God will not allow that to continue.

So right through the Old Testament, we find the wickedness of their fathers, and what happened when the measure was filled? Jeremiah talks about this repeatedly, using virtually the same words “forsake,” “destroy,” that the Lord Jesus uses in Matthew 23:38. “Behold! Your house is forsaken and desolate.” He is warning the Jews that God has forsaken it, and he is about to wipe it out. And just as the disciples were admiring the temple at the beginning of Matthew 24, the Lord Jesus said, “Do you see that temple? It will be totally destroyed. Not one stone will be left on top of another in that magnificent structure.” The disciples gasped! It was so peaceful there. There was no war. Who will destroy this magnificent temple?! It took over 50 years to get that temple built. No expense was spared. Every detail was polished, decorated, beautified. You could see the temple from afar, shining like a beautiful jewel on Mount Zion! Surely, out of the sheer concern for art, if for no other reason, no one would want to destroy such a beautiful building! The Lord Jesus said, “It will be totally destroyed.” Of course, having the hindsight of history, we all know that is exactly what happened.

In fact, the Romans did not particularly intend to destroy the temple. In the final attack in A.D. 70, when Titus finally broke into Jerusalem and surrounded the temple area where the Jews made their last stand, he gave orders to his troops not to destroy the temple. It was not his intention to destroy it. He didn’t even know that the Lord Jesus had said those words, and he had no intention of fulfilling the Lord Jesus’ prophecy if he had known it. But in the fierceness of the battle, as they fought around the temple, one of the Roman soldiers threw his torch through the window of the sanctuary in fury, and the whole thing went up in flames, contrary to the orders of the Roman general, Titus. The whole temple was burnt to the ground with nothing left but ashes. So the Lord Jesus’ words came to pass.

This word, “fill,” as the Lord Jesus uses in “fill up the measure” is also in Jeremiah 16:18, 19:4, and in Ezekiel 8:17. The same principle applies in Jeremiah 51:5, 6 where Jeremiah said that when the mea­sure of the wickedness of the Chaldeans, who were great enemies of Israel, has reached that appropriate stage, they will also be destroyed. In Ezekiel 28: (12-)16, the same principle applies against the great city of Tyre which still stands today.

 

God remains patient for wickedness to “fill’ in the New Testament

We can go on through Scripture right into the New Testament. Let me read to you 1Thessalonians 2:16 for example, and Paul speaks of those:

Notice, you have the same phrase, “fill up the measure of their sins.” And so we can go on in Scripture when we can see that God remains patient until that measure is filled. Sometimes, we are astonished at his patience, that he can stand so much for so long.

1 Peter 3:20 speaks of God’s patience in the days of Noah. God saw this wickedness multiplying and man’s behavior becoming corrupt and disgusting, but he did not immediately wipe them out but waited for the measure to fill up. He gave them a chance to repent, but finally, when that measure is reached, the flood came and they were destroyed.

We notice also in Matthew 24:6, the same principle is applied:

There will be wars and rumors of wars, everything will intensify, but stay calm because the end is not yet by that time. Why? You see the answer in verse 12,

Wickedness will still be allowed to multiply. So much wickedness will abound that men’s love for God and for one another grows cold.

Why is God so patient? He is still waiting to give every man a chance to repent. He gives you a chance to repent. On Judgment Day, no one will be able to say, “I didn’t have a chance.” If God reacted instantly the moment you do something evil, you will be wiped out instantly. If the moment someone steals, he is destroyed, he has no chance to repent. God is patient. He gives the world time to repent. And some would say he is simply too patient.

 

Don’t doubt God if you are at the receiving end of evil

Yet, Christians must grasp this point when they are the victims of evil, and become very impatient for the end to come. They feel that God is much too patient and doubt, “God, why don’t you do some­thing about it?” If someone hurts you, you want instant retribution – the sooner the better. If someone kidnapped your child, you would want judgment instantly: “What is God waiting for? Strike that person down!” If he dealt with us in this way, none of us would be around to repent. No, we must understand this very principle.

There were some people in Auschwitz and Dachau, where they murdered and gassed millions of people in the terrible German concentration camps. As you know, some people who managed to survive were virtually reduced to skeletons, while the others were simply destroyed. When the people heard the screams of those in the gas chambers, and of those being put through brutal, medical experiments, they wondered, “Why doesn’t God do something now? God, do something now! Do you hear the people screaming in there!” The Germans put them into these rooms and told them they were going to have a shower. In fact, carbon monoxide came out of what appeared to be shower heads. When people realized that they were being gassed to death, and seeing others collapsing on the ground, mothers began to clamber at the walls, desperate to escape; and screamed particularly for their babies they were holding in their arms, for their children who were collapsing. This is inhuman! It’s brutal beyond measure! And people thought, “Why doesn’t God do something now? God is too patient! He allowed this persecution to go on!” When we are at the receiving end, we think that God should act right away.

 

Many Christians in love with this world don’t welcome Jesus’ Coming

When we are not at the receiving end, we say, “Why should there be an end at all?” Some Christians don’t want to have an end. “We’d better not have an end. Let’s have the world go on! I like it as it is! I just bought my new car! If tomorrow is the end of the age, I’ll waste all my money because I don’t have the chance to enjoy it! I just bought my new house. I just installed my new air-conditioning. Is the end of the age at hand? There’s no time to enjoy life!”

I still remember talking with a Christian once about how near the end was, and his face got very long. And I said, “You don’t like the subject?” He said, “No.” I said, “What’s the matter?” He said, “Well, I’m looking forward to getting married! If the Lord Jesus comes, I won’t even get to my wedding day let alone build a nice home for my wife and have some nice children. You are talking about the end of the age spoiling all my nice plans.”

Some Christians are much in love with this world. So it depends on how you look at it. You want to hang on to this life. Some are thinking: “I’m studying so hard and if the Lord Jesus comes by the end of this year, I don’t get a degree at the end of all my hard work? At least allow me to come to heaven with my B.Sc. or B.A. degree or whatever it is. I didn’t make it because Christ came first.” How worldly we are! The world takes such precedence in our thinking as though it matters in heaven whether you have some degree or not. What your attitude to this world is determines whether or not you wel­come the Lord Jesus’ Coming. I should think on the Day when the Lord Jesus comes, many worldly Christians will be very disappointed: “Why did you come so soon? I was just about to get married. And now you spoil all my plans.”

 

Principle: God does not act until his overall plan is complete

It was said that during the Nazi reign of terror, a rabbi in one of these concentration camps heard the people screaming and called on God to act: “Act now! Act now!” But when God did not seem to act immediately, he gave up his faith and concluded that God doesn’t exist. “If God doesn’t do it in my time, he doesn’t exist. If God doesn’t do it in my way, he doesn’t exist.” This person made a fatal mistake of not understanding the principle upon which God acts.

If God acted according to this rabbi, the world would have ended long ago. If God acted according to another rabbi who just bought his new car, the world would probably never end, at least not until his new car got worn out. God doesn’t act according to me or each particular individual, but according to his overall plan. He doesn’t act until that overall plan is complete. We must understand these things if we are going to correctly understand eschatology, the Lord Jesus’ teaching concerning the last things. I hope that you really understand the principle.

 

God will cut off every person who continues to sin

Furthermore, I should point out to you that this principle applies also to the individual. If you continue in sin even as a Christian, God’s patience is not limitless. He will give you warning, and he will discipline you and chastise you, but if you continue in sin, the time will come when he will just cut you off. He will! I know of the case of a pastor, who God just cut off because he conducted himself unbe­comingly. People prayed concerning him and he was dead before the week was out. We deal with the living God.

Let me read to you from Proverbs 29:1,

“Suddenly” is another important point concerning judgment. God is patient for a long time—“he is often reproved”—God gives you time to repent. Yet, if you keep on stiffening your neck, keep on resisting, then judgment will come suddenly and finally, and it’s over for you! When judgment comes, it will be swift and fast. See the same teaching found in Proverbs 6:15.

 

God had exiled Israel, and Jesus warned they will again be destroyed

Having understood this, let us return to our passage. This is exactly what was happening to Israel. Look at this passage again. And what does it say about being often reproved but stiffening their necks from Matthew 23:34 onwards?

Finally, being often reproved and having continuously stiffened their necks, they will be suddenly destroyed with no more healing.” Let us not test God’s patience.

Some Christians really frighten me. They test God’s patience beyond measure. They think they can keep on sinning and keep on saying sorry to God. There will be a time when God has had enough, and you will find God’s hand of discipline very heavy upon you. That is why the writer to the Hebrews 10:31 says, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” The same principle applied to the individual is also applied to the nations.

Let us look at 2 Chronicles 36:15-16 [NJB], and you will find the words almost the exact parallel to Matthew 23:

God sent his messengers, his prophets and they mocked them. And as it says in verse 15, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place, the temple in Jerusalem, he continued to send his messengers, even though they were mocked and killed. But when they continued stiffening their necks, when the measure of iniquity had been reached, God’s patience finally saw to it that his wrath arose and there was no more remedy. This is an important principle for every person to understand when you look at the last things. That is why there has to be an end. God will not indefinitely tolerate this kind of thing.

For this reason, the Lord Jesus warned the people of Israel three times in his ministry that they would be destroyed in Luke, but they did not take any notice. The first time is in Luke 13:34-35, which is the exact parallel to this passage; the second time in Luke 19:42-44; and the third time in Luke 21:20-24.

 

Many people regard this talk about the end as alarmist, unnecessary

The same thing is happening today. Many people would regard these things as “idle talk.” When the Lord Jesus warned the Jews that they would be destroyed, they certainly thought of this as idle talk. It was a period of relative economic stability. The Lord Jesus seemed to be alarmist. “‘Doomsday talk’! We are doing alright. What’s all this talk about the world’s coming to the end and Jerusalem being destroyed? All alarmist talk! Unnecessary!” Yet the Lord Jesus repeatedly warned them and they would not listen.

I suspect that many people today regard all this talk about the end as alarmist, unnecessary, particularly for those of us in Canada. “Life is fine here. We are not complaining! So why do you want to talk about the end?” Whether you like to talk about it or not, my task is to tell you God’s plan. What you do with it is your business just as what the Jews did with the Lord Jesus’ warning was their business. But when it came, they realized that what he spoke was true although they realized it too late.

 

God’s judgment: Destruction

In Matthew 23:38, we have the word, “Behold, your house is forsa­ken and desolate,” the word “desolate” in Greek eremos is the same word for “desert.” That is where the word “desolate” comes from. It is like a desert. This fertile, bountiful land will be turned into a desert. If you are not careful, your own life will be turned into a desert by the judgments of God. Either God’s blessing brings abundance to your life, or it will bring desolation, ruin, destruction. That is the warning concerning those who do not repent.

This same word “desolate” appears also in Luke 21:20. This is an important verse too:

The Lord Jesus says to the people, “Many of you will live long enough to see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then you will know that I speak the truth to you. Then you will know its desolation has come near.”

This word “desolation,” is exactly the word that the prophet Jeremiah repeatedly used. In Jeremiah, in the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament, you will find this word occurs right through the book, for example, Jeremiah 4:7; 7:34; 22:5; 25:18; 44:6, 22. In other words, he is constantly warning Israel, “You will be turned into a desolation, a desert because of your disobedience to Yahweh. God is going to wipe you out. Do you understand my message?” They did not understand Jeremiah’s message. They said, “This kind of talk is nonsense! Everything is fine!”

Jeremiah was absolutely correct. In 586 B.C., the vast armies of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, advanced upon Jerusalem! That was a sight to behold, flashing in the sun, in gold and silver, bronze and steel. There was the magnificent army of Babylon advancing on Jerusalem. So they saw all Jerusalem surrounded by armies, and the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, razed Jerusalem to the ground, down to ashes! When Jeremiah talked, they said, “You’re alarmist! It’s all rubbish! Let’s not listen to this! Israel is doing fine.” We don’t like listening to warnings. Even as a child, we did not like to be warned. Unfortunately for Israel, the warning was true.

The Lord Jesus is using exactly the same word that Jeremiah used. “You will experience that desolation that your fathers experienced as you fill up the measure of your fathers. This same thing is going to happen to you. Do you understand?” But they didn’t understand. “How often I would have gathered you under my wings as the chicks are gathered by the hen but you wouldn’t. Therefore your house is left desolate.”

 

Israel has always been God’s spiritual barometer in the world

Finally, let us consider the framework of the Lord Jesus’ teaching of the last things. In these last verses of Matthew 23, the Lord Jesus gives us a kind of framework by which we can get an outline of the whole picture of things. The Jews are a kind of spiritual barometer for us. Israel has been God’s barometer in the world by which we can see how close to the end of things we are. It serves as this kind of barometer, and looking at the Middle East, we can see just how close to the point of boiling the situations are at this time.

We seem to be always sitting on the razor’s edge of war, if you like. We just don’t know what will happen, and are always taken by surprise. Suddenly, the Israeli jets have knocked out an atomic research station in Iraq. It is always full of surprises. Next morning you look at the newspapers, something has happened again! Everything is sudden! Suddenly, destruction comes! What do we know? Suddenly, Iraq may make a counter-attack on Israel, and the next thing is a full-scale war happening in the Middle East! I wonder if you can remember the Six-Day War. You get up one morning and discover the whole Middle East is in flames, and nearly dragging in all the super-powers! We never know when that will happen. So Israel serves as a spiritual barometer of just how close that measure is being filled up, how close the end is arriving.

 

The Lord Jesus teaches all Israel will be saved when he comes again

(1) Jesus predicts that he will be rejected by the Jewish nation.

As we look at this passage, there are four things we can speak about as the framework for the Lord Jesus’ teaching of the last things, and we can fit other details into that framework. The first thing is he prophesies and predicts that he will be rejected by the Jewish nation. That is still true now.

(2) The Jews will be forsaken by God during “the times of the Gentiles.”

The second thing he says is that as a result of this, the Jews will be forsaken by God for a period of time. This period of time is called “the times of the Gentiles” in Luke 21:24.

(3) During this period of time, the Jews will not see him.

Thirdly, during this time, they will not see him. That means to say that this time of being forsaken will be over when they see him again.

(4) They will repent; recognize he is their Messiah when they see him again.

And fourthly, there will come a time when they will turn back to him in repentance; there will be a change of heart. You see that in Matthew 23:39. “For I tell you, you will not see me again, until…” When will you see me again? “…until you say, ‘Baruch Haba Hashem Adonai.’” Those are the words in Hebrew translated as “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”

I remember when I was in Israel in my student days, I went into a Jewish church. It was a very rare thing to find a church of Jewish Christians. I always remember that these Hebrew words, Baruch Haba Hashem Adonai – “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” were written right across on the wall.

How are we to understand these words? They come from Psalm 118:26 – Blessed be he who comes in the name of the LORD. (The RSV has translated as, “who enters in the name of the LORD.”) We bless you from the house of the LORD. This psalm is part of what is known as the Hallel, and hallel means praise. So the word “hallelujah” means praise be to God. Psalm 118 is the closing passage of praise, the Hallel, which is sung during the killing of the Passover lamb at the Passover. Why? When the destroying angel came to destroy the people in Egypt, all those who had the blood of the lamb on their doorposts were protected from being destroyed. It is in remembrance of this that the Hallel is sung. This is very significant.

In other words, when we put this back into Matthew 23, the Lord Jesus is saying, “You will not see me again until you will sing the words of the Hallel, which you sing when the Passover lamb is being sacrificed, when you recognize I am the redemption for your sins.” As Paul says, Christ is the Passover. He is the redemption for our sins. His blood covers us. His blood cleanses us from sin. His blood protects us from the destruction of the destroying angel. So the Lord Jesus is saying, “You will not see me again until you recognize that I died for your sins. You will not see me again until you sing the Messianic words.” This whole psalm is a Messianic psalm. It is a psalm sung in anticipation of the Messiah. It is a psalm of salvation. Look at Psalm 118:21,

When God will send his Messiah to become our salvation, we can sing the words in verse 26a of this psalm,

Verse 22 is quoted many times in the New Testament:

Most importantly are the words: “Blessed be he who comes.” In fact, the Jews could speak of the Messiah simply by the words, “he who comes.” That was a name for the Messiah. Jesus is the Coming One; he will come again. In fact, he is spoken of in this way already in the New Testament many times. For example, in Matthew 3:11, 21:9; John 11:27 and so forth, the Messiah is called “the one who comes.”

When we return to Matthew 23:39, this point is quite clear:

“You will not see me again until you recognize me as your Savior, your Messiah, your King.”

These are the four basic stages that we find in the framework. This is the point that Paul speaks of in Romans 11:26 “when all Israel will be saved,” when there will be a change of heart, when the words of the prophet Ezekiel in Ezekiel 36:26 are realized:

There will be a change of heart, when Israel will turn from rejecting their Messiah on that Day in the future, when they will accept Jesus as their king.

 

Summary

We must close for today, and let me briefly summarize these very important points:

The fact that things are moving on towards the end today, is because God cannot tolerate an unlimited measure of sin, neither in the individual, nor in the nation, nor in the world. When evil reaches a certain point, God’s judgment will come swiftly. But until then, he remains patient and compassionate.

What is your condition at this time? How do you stand in relation to God? God has given you a lot of chance to repent, whether you are a Christian or a non-Christian. Are you testing his patience? Or are you living the kind of life that shows a willing spirit, a readiness to obey him and follow the Lord Jesus, so that you may have the joy of his salvation in Christ? Where is your position today?

Remember this: the words of Christ Jesus never fail. What he says will come to pass! I also know that when he says the end will come, it will come. We shall see in the next few weeks, as we continue to study his teaching, what are the things that will indicate that the measure is being filled up. Let us therefore be most responsive and open to his teaching.

Let us be quiet now in prayer.