The Perils of Living in the End Times

Read Matthew 24:3-14

      Jesus’ “Olivet Discourse,” which includes today’s passage, is claimed as the basis for a great many differing eschatological (end-times) schemes.  This is as we might expect, since biblical predictive prophecy is always best understood by those who live to see prophecy’s fulfillment and those who live afterward (1 Peter 1:10-12). 

      Jesus doesn’t warn against the possibility of tribulation as much as he prepares us for its inevitability.  His warnings concerning the time before his return to the earth are mostly about the possible loss of faith, hope, and love.  False messiahs and false prophets will “lead many astray” from biblical faith (24:5,11). Hope will give way to “alarm” at the news of “wars and rumors of wars,” and “famines and earthquakes” (24:6-7).  But the crowning threat is the forsaking of love in the body of Christ, a forsaking brought on by the onset of significant persecution (24:9-10) and the increase of lawless living (24:12).  Many will lose faith, hope, and love, “but the one who endures to the end will be saved” (24:13). 

      It’s one thing to develop an eschatological scheme that attempts to accommodate all the biblical data – volumes have been devoted to doing just that.  It’s not an illegitimate exercise – Jesus faulted the Jewish religious leaders for failing to “interpret the signs of the times” (16:3) when Old Testament messianic prophecies were being fulfilled right before their eyes.  But regardless of anyone’s specific expectations of end-times events, Jesus’ concern and warning is personal and spiritual in character.  Guard your faith.  Do not be deceived.  Guard your hope.  Don’t let it be overwhelmed by avalanches of bad news.  And guard your love.  Don’t let the threat of persecution intimidate you into sharing the world’s hatred for Christ’s people.  If you are one of them, you’ll endure in faith, hope, and love to the end.