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Home , Matthew 24

“DOOMSDAY PREPARATION” (Matthew 24:15-28)

One of the fastest growing movements in recent years are the preppers – those who are actively preparing in advance for a catastrophic disaster to hit the planet. And with all the events of 2020, preppers are saying, “We told you so.” Unlike many who were scrambling to make sure we had food and toilet paper when the pandemic hit, they already had stockpiled all that they needed. Maybe preppers aren’t so crazy after all. All that’s happened in 2020 has brought an increased awareness that any number of disasters – whether it’s a virus, wildfires, riots, economic collapse, or world war – can bring about our doom.

This leads us to an interesting question: Should Christians be preppers? Should we be making preparations in the event of some future calamity. The answer, according to the is “yes,” but not in the way you might think. Storing up a few extra cans of beans and some jugs of water isn’t a bad idea, but our main preparation is spiritual.

In Matthew 24-25 tells us in some detail what the future of the world holds. He tells us not to scare us, but to prepare us. The future has a very happy ending, with Jesus returning to earth and ushering in the golden era of the kingdom, but right before His coming the world will experience the greatest period of distress and tribulation it’s ever known. The reason Jesus tells us these things is so that we will be spiritually prepared and anchored for the final days to come.

Matthew 24-25 is a long sermon given by Jesus – known as the because Jesus speaks these words on the Mt. of Olives overlooking – and His words come in response to two questions the disciples ask Him in verse 1-2. Jesus had just told them in chapter 23 that the great temple in Jerusalem would be destroyed, and no doubt troubled by these words, the disciples ask, “When will this will happen?” This question is followed by another question: “What are the signs of your coming and the end of the age?” In their minds the destruction of the temple is tied to Jesus’ , and the end of this present age.

One of the difficult aspects of Matthew 24 is whether Jesus is answering their first question or their second question. Are the prophesies of this chapter talking about the events that will lead up to the destruction of the temple in AD 70 – which means that all these prophesies have already been fulfilled – or is Jesus talking about things still in the future that will happen prior to Jesus’ Second Coming? The answer is probably both. Jesus is using the destruction of the temple – in the near future – just 40 years later – as a foreshadowing of what will take place in the far future leading up to Jesus’ coming. Since Jesus obviously did not return in AD 70, we know that there are prophesies in this passage that have yet to be fulfilled.

With this in mind, verses 4-28 of chapter 24 describe the events leading up to and during what is known in the Bible as the Tribulation. What’s that? If you want to know more details, you can watch the last two weeks of the 101 class on our church website or Facebook page, but the Tribulation is a seven-year period of time to come in the future in which God will judge the world for its sin and rebellion. He will also use this time to prepare the nation of Israel to receive their king and enter into their long-waited kingdom. Before that glorious day comes, Israel will experience intense persecution – and just when it looks like Israel will be crushed by the nations of the world, Jesus will return and fulfill His promise of the kingdom.

In verses 4-14, which we looked at last week, Jesus gives several signs that will both precede the Tribulation and intensify during the Tribulation – signs such as wars and rumors of war, earthquakes and famines, and the persecution of Christians. All of this leads up to the mid-point of the Tribulation – 3 ½ years into it – when a single event causes all hell to break loose during the final 3 ½ years of the Tribulation.

Verses 15-21… “So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes desolation,’ spoken of through the —let the reader understand—then let those who are in 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. How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath. For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.”

Jesus says, when you see this event – the “abomination that causes desolation,” run for the hills – get out because things are going to get really bad. The prophet Daniel first spoke of the abomination of desolation. Daniel, you’ll remember, was in his youth when he and his nation were carried off into captivity to Babylon. In Babylon Daniel receives various dreams and visions from God, and in Daniel 9, we find Daniel in prayer and fasting. He had read the words of the prophet regarding Israel’s exile in Babylon, and he is troubled.

Jeremiah 25:11 says, “This whole country will become a desolate wasteland, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” Why was the land of Israel desolate for seventy years? Because in the book of Leviticus God commanded Israel to give the land a Sabbath rest – every seven years they were not to work the land or plant anything. It was a reminder that the land belonged to God, and it needed rest. But over time the Israelites disregarded God’s command, and in their greed and disobedience, they worked the land, trying to squeeze everything they could out of it.

And here’s what is amazing… their disobedience went on for 490 years. They failed to give the land a Sabbath rest 70 times, and 70 times 7 years is 490. This is a perfect example of reaping what you sow. And God says, “70 times you didn’t give the land a rest while you were living it in, so I’m giving you 70 years in captivity so that the land can rest with you are gone.”

So back to Daniel 9… During Daniel’s time of prayer and fasting, God sends the to give Daniel a vision of Israel’s future, which just so happens to include another 70 sevens – or 490 years. Let me read Daniel 9:25-27 and then we’ll back up and explain it…

“Know and understand this: From the time the word goes out to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven ‘sevens,’ and sixty-two ‘sevens.’ It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble. After the sixty-two ‘sevens,’ the Anointed One will be put to death and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed. He will confirm a covenant with many for one ‘seven.’ In the middle of the ‘seven’ he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And at the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.”

If that seemed hard to understand, imagine how Daniel felt. In his vision, Daniel sees 490 years divided into three parts. The first part, amounting to 7 sevens or 49 years, will be for the people of Israel to go back to the land from Babylon and rebuild the temple. After that happens, there will be another 62 sevens or 434 years go by, at which time the Anointed one will come to Jerusalem and be cut off. This prophecy, as we now know, was fulfilled the very day Jesus triumphantly entered into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and was crucified five days later on Good Friday.

But, if you’ve done your math, you might have noticed that there is one seven – or seven years – left in regards to Israel’s future. This is the future Tribulation period. At the beginning of the Tribulation a powerful ruler will come on the scene – who is the – and the first thing he will do is make a peace treaty with Israel. The antichrist will rise to power during a time of great economic and political turmoil. At this time, Israel’s enemies are going to become even more powerful, and as they do, they want to exert their power and put Israel on notice. So, tensions in the Middle East will reach a fevered pitch with Israel being the focal point, and more specifically – that little plot of land where the temple used to sit.

It’s in the midst of this turmoil that the antichrist will come on the scene, and he will be regarded as a respected leader and diplomatic genius. He will do the impossible and negotiate a peace treaty and the nations of the world. Part of that peace treaty allows Israel to rebuild the temple and resume sacrifices. This is a big deal.

Israel is right now preparing for this. In Jerusalem you can visit a place called the Temple Institute, where a group of Jewish leaders have on display a model of a new temple. They also have assembled everything needed for the temple, such as garments for the priests to wear, the furniture, and all the utensils for the sacrifices. They are getting ready – they’re just waiting for the right time, and that right time may very well come through the covenant made with the antichrist.

During the first half of the Tribulation, Israel is going to look to the antichrist as their great protector, but the antichrist is not who he appears to be. He is empowered by Satan, who is bent on destroying Israel. Halfway through the Tribulation the antichrist reveals his true colors when he breaks his peace treaty. Daniel 9:27 says… “He will confirm a covenant with many for one ‘seven.’ In the middle of the ‘seven’ he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And at the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.”

The one event that changes everything is the abomination of desolation. What is that? An abomination is a sacrilegious act or detestable practice so egregious that it causes the temple to be abandoned and left desolate. There are two examples of this happening in history. In Daniel chapter 11, Daniel prophesied that a king from the north would desecrate the temple with a sacrilegious act. Over 400 years later this prophecy was fulfilled by Syrian ruler Antiochus Epiphanes in 167 BC. He stormed the city of Jerusalem and massacred 80,000 men, women, and children.

He then entered the holy temple and erected a statue of the pagan Greek-god Zeus. If that weren’t bad enough, he then took a pig and sacrificed it on the sacred altar in honor of Zeus. If you wanted to offend Israel, nothing would be worse than sacrificing an unclean pig on the altar of God. Adding insult to injury, Antiochus forced the Jewish rabbis to eat of this unclean sacrifice. When rabbis refused to do so, he jammed pieces of pork down their throats until they choked to death. He burned several scrolls containing Moses’ laws and forbade the Jews to carry out their temple sacrifices. Jews who refused to submit to him were forced to flee to the mountains and caves. Many of them were persecuted and martyred.

This caused a Jewish man named Judas Maccabees to rise up and lead a revolt against the Syrians. They defeated a much larger army and captured the city of Jerusalem. Judas Maccabees removed all pagan altars, cleansed and rededicated the temple, and restored their sacrifices. This victory is still commemorated today in the annual festival of Hanukkah.

Another abomination of the temple occurred in AD 70 when the Roman army under General destroyed Jerusalem and desecrated the temple, ripping it apart stone by stone. The two events in history foreshadow a future desecration of the temple by the antichrist prior to Jesus’ Second Coming.

At the mid-point of the Tribulation, the antichrist breaks his treaty, and he establishes a new world religion by setting himself up as God in the temple. Paul talks about this in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4… “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. 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.”

When we come to Revelation 13, we see that there will be this living statue of himself put in the temple, and his associate, the , will force people to worship him or lose their life. This reminds us of Nebuchadnezzar, the King of Babylon, who built a golden statue of himself and demanded that everyone bow down to his image, including three young Jewish boys named Meshach, Shadrach, and Abednego. They refused and were thrown in to the fiery furnace, but can out unscathed. The antichrist is controlled and energized by Satan, and from the beginning, Satan has wanted the world to worship him. Halfway through the tribulation period, he will get his wish.

But not everyone will worship him. Israel will realize that their protector is actually their persecutor, and they will respond with great anger at the desecration of the temple. The antichrist will respond by letting the nations he has held back from attacking Israel to now go after them. In addition to this, the antichrist will force everyone to receive a mark on their right hand or their forehead in order to buy or sell. Anyone who refuses to worship him or receive the mark of will be killed.

Jesus says, “When all of this breaks loose, those living in Jerusalem and Judea need to flee – you need to get out as fast as you can. If you’re up on your rooftop… where people would go to enjoy a nice evening breeze… don’t even bother to go back down to your house and pack your bags. Go down the stairs on the side of your house and get out of town. If you’re out working in your field, don’t bother to go home and get basic necessities… just go.” It will be like a level 3 fire evacuation. Don’t try to save anything, just go.

It will be a terrible time for pregnant woman and nursing mothers will have difficulty getting away because they can’t move quickly. Those fleeing should pray that all this won’t happen in winter when travel is more difficult, or on the Sabbath when transportation shuts down.

Verse 21 says, “For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.” This indicates that Jesus is not just talking about the destruction of the temple in AD 70. There is a greater, more catastrophic event to come. Verse 22 says, “If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened.” This terrible time of tribulation will not go on and on – God has a timeline. If God did not have a stopping point, no one would survive. God will not abandon the elect – those who accept during the Tribulation – but at the appointed time He will return to earth and rescue them.

During such terrible times like this, the temptation is to grasp for answers, to seek a solution, and to get out from underneath the pressure. But in verses 23-28 Jesus tells the people going through the Tribulation to resist the voices that seek to pull you away from your loyalty to Christ and align yourself with falsehood and error. Earlier in the chapter Jesus gave several signs that will signal the end of the age, but now He repeats one sign that is most often mentioned in scripture – it’s mentioned by Jesus several times, it’s mentioned by Paul and Peter and John – is the sign of deception. Over and over the Bible says: See to it in the last days that you are not deceived.

Verses 23-26… “At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false messiahs and false will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you ahead of time. So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it.”

The people who have fled and are hiding out, are going to be vulnerable. They’ll be homeless and hungry and cold. They’re going to be looking for Jesus to return and rescue them. Satan knows this, and seeks to deceive them through false messiahs and false prophets. A false messiah is anyone who offers their way of salvation instead of the way of Jesus. A false prophet is anyone who teaches what is contrary to God’s Word.

They will come along and say, “He’s here… the messiah is over in the desert… or he’s down by the sea… or he’s hidden in some secret chamber. Come with us and we’ll take you to him.” Jesus says, “Don’t believe them. Don’t fall for their trap. They’re trying to lure you from your hiding spot and kill you.” Throughout history Satan has tried to destroy God’s chosen people, and in the last 3 ½ years of the Tribulation, he’ll unleash all his forces in one last effort to stamp them out.

Notice that the false messiahs and prophets use signs and wonders to try to deceive the elect. It’s natural to think that when you see signs and wonders and miracles, that they come from Jesus – but during this time Satan will empower false messiahs and prophets to perform what 2 Thessalonians calls “lying wonders.” They’re counterfeit miracles. They’re like Pharaoh’s magicians in Egypt that were able to duplicate Moses’ miracle. When Moses threw down his staff and it became a snake, Pharaoh’s magicians threw down their staff and it became a snake. When Moses turned the Nile River into blood, Pharaoh’s guys were able to do the same thing.

It’s a reminder to not automatically believe that a sign or wonder or miracle is of God. Jesus said that at the final judgment, there will be those who say, “Lord, Lord, did we not do miracles in your name? And the Lord will say, ‘I never knew you.’” They could do miracles, but they were counterfeit – they weren’t real.

John tells us that we are to “test the spirits to see if they are from God.” They say that FBI agents learn to detect counterfeit money by analyzing real money. They know the details of the real thing so well that they can spot counterfeit money with. In the same way, the key to not being deceived by false teaching is to know the truth of God revealed in the Bible.

So Jesus says, “Don’t be deceived. If someone says the Messiah is here, don’t believe them, because when the real Messiah comes, you’ll know it – it will be evident for all to see.” In verses 27-28 He says, “For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.” “My return will be something that no one can miss. It will be like a bolt of lightning flashing all the way across the sky in an instant. It will be sudden and visible for all to see.

Then He adds, “Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.” If you look up into the sky and see vultures circling the air, you know that there is something dead. So too, the coming of Christ will be unmistakable. Those in hiding will have no trouble identifying the arrival of the true Messiah.

No one knows the day or the hour of Christ’s coming or the Tribulation that will precede it. But every generation needs to be spiritually prepped because as the end of the time approaches, believers will experience increased tribulation. Many of our brothers and sisters around the world are experiencing persecution right now, and it will only grow worse for us in the days ahead. John says that the spirit of the antichrist is already in the world. In the last days, Satan will ramp up the pressure for us to bow down to him and the godless way of the world or face the consequences. Are you prepared? Are you willing to resist the temptation to cave to the pressure, to fall in line, and deny the Lord?

In the last days we must also prepare ourselves by being solidly grounded in the truth of God’s Word, because false messiahs and false prophets will relentlessly try to deceive and confuse God’s people, to make you doubt and question the basic truths of the faith. In time of tribulation, our feelings and emotions can overtake our beliefs. But the more we know God’s Word and the more we let it sink into our hearts, when hardships come, our rock-solid belief will steer our emotions and keep us anchored.

Doomsday is coming, but no matters what happens, one day Jesus will return give those who are His a glorious kingdom that will make all our tribulations pale in comparison.