He’s Coming.  Get Ready.
Luke 21: 5-36
John Loftness
December 14, 2008

Introduction

Humans were created to plan for the future—to pursue good and avoid evil based on what they can discern is coming.

Yet we have no control over the future.

Big Point of the Passage: We can’t control the future, but we can prepare for the coming of the one who does.

Jesus is preparing his disciples for the dramatic events that will follow over the next ten weeks, beginning with his betrayal, arrest, trial and execution.

This chapter follows the pattern of the Old Testament prophets—events near and far are telescoped together.  It can be hard to tell whether the prophet is speaking of a soon-to-happen event or one far off.

This passage speaks of a near event—the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem and a far event—the return of Jesus.

The Destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem (5-24)

Temple History:
• Begun by Solomon 930 BC
• Destroyed by the Babylonians 586 BC (after 150 years of prophetic warnings that this was coming)
• Rebuilt 515 BC and surviving Persian, Greek and Roman control of Israel.
Herod the Great begins a vast expansion and remodeling program beginning 19 BC and eventually lasting 80 years.  The building was immense, decorated in gold and silver. Roman historian Tacitus called it “immensely opulent.”

Given its central place in Jewish worship, its longevity and magnificence, the disciples must have been shocked by Jesus’ prediction of verse 5.  So their question is natural.

Verses 8-9—what will not be a sign of this destruction.

Verses 10-18—what will precede these apocalyptic events.  Yet this passage seems to telescope both events into one.

Verse 19—for the disciple: endurance is key.

Verses 20-24—instructions for disciples when they see armies begin to lay siege to Jerusalem.  His words find exact fulfillment 40 years later.

• Jewish wars, AD 66-70 end in the leveling of the city and the Temple.
• Josephus, a Pharisee, becomes a Jewish general in the war.  Romans spare him and he lives to write about his experiences.
• Bible scholar DA Carson summarizes the effects of the Roman reduction of the city: “The savagery, slaughter, disease, and famine (mothers eating their own children) were monstrous.  …There have been greater numbers of deaths—six million in the Nazi death camps, mostly Jews, and an estimated twenty million under Stalin—but never so high a percentage of a great city’s population so thoroughly and painfully exterminated and enslaved as during the Fall of Jerusalem.”  (Commentary on Matthew, in Expositor’s Bible Commentary, p. 501)
• Church historian Eusebius records how when the Roman armies were moving to take Jerusalem, the Christians in the city fled to Pella because of Jesus’ prophecy.

What we can learn from these historic events?

1. Jesus knows the future.  His prediction was dead on in its fulfillment.
2. Jesus’ followers will go through the same calamities that the rest of the world has and will, and unlike the rest of the world, we will be persecuted for our belief in Jesus—some even killed for our belief.
3. Yet Jesus promises that if we endure through dark days, “not a hair of our heads will perish.”  For we will be saved from God’s judgment to a resurrected eternal life.

The Coming of the Son of Man (25-28)

You have to ask yourself, if Jesus could predict what happened to Jerusalem in AD 70 accurately, what must I think about the predictions of the events prior to his return?
How to prepare (29-36)

Verses 29-32—know the signs.  Know that just as his words about Jerusalem did not pass away but were completely fulfilled, so will his words about the end.

Verses 34-35—watch yourself—of you will miss the signs and therefore miss benefiting from his return:

• “Hearts weighed down.”  The idea is an insensitive heart.  Your heart is so weighed down with your self that you do not desire his return, nor do you look for it.  You do not live for Jesus, you live for yourself.  And so, as you gaze at your navel, you can’t look up.
• “dissipation”—a word that refers to the effects of intoxication.  It’s what happens to a drunk—both the disorientation and lack of awareness of your surroundings as well as the stupor that comes from a hangover.  You are so buzzed by your pleasures that you are scattered, insensitive to what is going on spiritually—unable to recognize that Jesus is coming.
• “drunkenness”
• “Cares of this life”—you are so caught up in earning money or getting married or buying a house, or your academics or your music and media and sports, that you are distracted from seeing Jesus.

Verse 36—Stay awake (36)  READ

• Look for him.  That’s why you are staying awake.
• Pray for strength.
• The call of a Christian is to live aware of reality.  To live aware that there is a God in control of history, that he is holy and expects his subjects to be like him.  The most important things going on in this world right now are not an unprecedented presidential election, or a worldwide financial meltdown, or wars and threats of war, or global warming.  The most important thing is that Jesus is coming back to the earth.  You’ve got to look for him, to pray for strength to endure the persecution and the events that precede his return.

Because the ultimate goal is that on that great and decisive day you will be able to stand before him as verse 36 says.  You will only be able to stand if your sins are forgiven and you stand clothed in his righteousness and not your own.  And you can only have your sins forgiven if you believe that the death that he died, he died in your place—the undeserving dying for the judgment you deserve.  That’s the only way you will stand on that great day.

He’s Coming.  Get Ready.