Matthew 24:9-31
“Then they will hand you over to be tortured and will put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of my name. Then many will fall away, and they will betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because of the increase of lawlessness, the love of many will grow cold. But anyone who endures to the end will be saved. And this good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the world, as a testimony to all the nations; and then the end will come. So when you see the desolating sacrilege standing in the holy place, as was spoken of by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand), then those in Judea must flee to the mountains; someone on the housetop must not go down to take what is in the house; someone in the field must not turn back to get a coat. Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath. For at that time there will be great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no one would be saved; but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short. Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look! Here is the Messiah!’ or ‘There he is!’—do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce great signs and omens, to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Take note, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you, ‘Look! He is in the wilderness,’ do not go out. If they say, ‘Look! He is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. “Immediately after the suffering of those days
the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light;
the stars will fall from heaven,
and the powers of heaven will be shaken.
Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see ‘the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven’ with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.”
Sometimes I experience apocalyptic literature a bit like bitter medicine: it may be good for you, but it’s better to take it in big gulps to get it over with. I think it may help, though, to keep in mind the primary purpose of apocalyptic literature: to comfort and encourage.
I know that may not always seem like the primary point – often , it feels like the point of such literature, with its vivid imagery and dour predictions, is to terrify, not comfort. There are two important things going in passages like this one, however, that are good to note. First, the intent of both the imagery and predictions is to help readers imagine that their immediate and particular struggles as part of the larger and cosmic struggle in the battle between good and evil. Hence, the challenges Matthew’s community faces as they are rejected by those around them are not isolated and meaningless but rather are part of the dramatic future Jesus foretells and indicators that God is at work enacting God’s will in the world.
Second, the hope is that readers will hear the promise that God has not forgotten them. And so Jesus concludes this section with the promise that the Son of Man is coming to gather his elect – that is, the community of believers who stay faithful to the message of the gospel. They are not alone, not forgotten, not abandoned, but rather are at the center of God’s attention and when God comes, God will come for them.
It is, as I said, an unusual and challenging form of literature. And yet the promises that our struggles are neither unnoticed nor meaningless and that God is coming for us was a powerful word to Matthew’s community and, perhaps, to our own.
Prayer: Dear God, let us always remember that you love us and will come for us in due and allow those promises to give us strength sufficient to the challenges of the day. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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