Matthew 24:36-51 The Two-Fold Question Answered

But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left. “Therefore be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will. Who then is the faithful and sensible slave whom his master put in charge of his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But if that evil slave says in his heart, ‘My master is not coming for a long time,’ and begins to beat his fellow slaves and eat and drink with drunkards; the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour which he does not know, and will cut him in pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

When shall these things be, that is, destruction of the temple and city? The remainder really constitutes a single question: “And what will be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world? (1) The character of the age – wars, international unrests, famines, pestilences, persecutions, and false Christ’s. This is not the description of a converted world. (2) The same answer applies in a specific way to the end of the age. All that has characterized the age gathers into awful intensity at the end. This introduces the great tribulation which runs its awful course of three and a half years, culminating in the battle at which time Christ becomes the Smiting Stone. The detail of the period is the abomination of the holy place, the warning to believing Jews who will then be in Judea, the great tribulation with its false Christ’s, the sudden smiting of world power, and the glorious appearing of the Lord, visible to all nations, and the regathering of Israel.

Daily Prayer: Father, what we need is strengthened faith. All of these signs have been with us for a while. We see them every day, and sometimes are become hardened to them. By faith, let us not drop our guard, because even now, Jesus is at the door. Let us be about His work of the Day of His return. Amen.