Gospels Matthew 23-25
Setting the tone for Matt 24, Jesus said,
Mat 24:4 And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.
Several days ago, I saw a YouTube video where Justice Clarence Thomas said to a bunch of reporters, “I will resign from the Supreme Court when I do my job as poorly as you do.”
In Jesus’ warning 2,000 years ago, I believe he saw the velocity of information, its exponential increase, and deception riding the twin highways of Media and the Internet. In fact, this fulfills, in our day, the prophecy of:
Dan 12:4 “…many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.”
This indicates the growing rapid speed of information and its exponential increase beyond human abilities to discern truth.
Jesus then gives a wide brush stroke of WHAT will happen:
Mat 24:6 “And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
Mat 24:7 “For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.
Mat 24:8 “All these are the beginning of sorrows.
I think we could call this continuous war driven by our military industrial complex. Then he identifies the players in his prophecy:
Mat 24:11 “Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.
Mat 24:12 “And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.
Now comes the WHY:
Mat 24:14 “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.
In the turmoil of last days, that chaos and disorder provide a superb platform for proclaiming the truth.
Having set the stage with WHAT and WHY, Jesus now prophecies about the situation:
Mat 24:37 “But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
Mat 24:38 “For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,
We read the same thing in Luke 17: 26 – 27 then Doctor Luke writes:
Luk 17:28 “Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built;
Luk 17:29 “but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all.
Luk 17:30 “Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.
The days of Noah included Babel that became Babylon because after the flood, Noah lived another 300 years. Just after Noah died, we have the Sodom and Gomorrah episode, and Jesus included those cities in what the end times would be like. At one point in Genesis 19, we read:
Gen 19:4 Now before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both old and young, all the people from every quarter, surrounded the house.
Gen 19:5 And they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know them carnally.”
Even in ancient Sodom and Gomorrah, the LGBTQ agenda had moved to violence and violation… Against even angels of the Lord. In so many ways, we are there, and the velocity of information deceives and hides the evil that surrounds us.
In all that turmoil, with the sins of the days of Noah and of Sodom and Gomorrah quantifying the last days, perhaps our day, Jesus spoke this toward the end of the sermon on the mount:
Mat 25:34 “Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
Mat 25:35 ‘for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in;
Mat 25:36 ‘I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’
The truth is in God’s Word, and we are told in multiple places to protect the innocent, defend the defenseless, rescue the poor from wickedness, and serve the widow and the orphan. As that becomes harder in these days that are like the days of Noah and Sodom and Gomorrah, those who obey Jesus’ command to love God with all our hearts and compassionately love our neighbors as ourselves, will have a reward in eternity that transcends rumors of wars and all the rest.
Jay
Enjoying a Cigar on my ‘No Chew’ fasting day