Matthew 24:9

Matthew 24:9

In Matthew chapter 24 the disciples asked Jesus two questions. They asked Him when would be the destruction of the temple, and they asked Him what would be the sign of His coming and of the end of the age. In His answer Jesus begins by telling the disciples in Matthew 24:4-14 what are the characteristics of the current age. Evidently, Jesus thought that there is no sense in explaining the end of the age, if you do not understand the age that you are in. If you want to know the future, then you need to understand the characteristics of the current age; because as long as this age lasts, certain types of events will repeat themselves.

In our last Bible study we looked at the characteristics of this age that Jesus mentioned up through verse 8. They were:

1. False christs who will deceive many.

2. Wars and rumors of wars.

3. Famines.

4. Earthquakes in divers places.

In Matthew 24: 9-14 Jesus mentions other characteristics of this age. He said in verse 9, “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and you shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.” Jesus said that the persecution of His servants is one of the characteristics of this age. If you do what God wants you to do, and if you say what God wants you to say; you will be persecuted because of it. “They that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” About 20 years ago I heard a Russian Christian woman speak about her experiences in Russia as a believer, and some of the persecutions that she and others endured at the hands of the communists. She was very insistent upon pointing out the fact that even though believers in America may not always suffer persecution in the ways that believers in Russia once did; there will still be persecution. If you do not suffer persecution, then you are not living godly in Christ Jesus.

Anyone who is a true believer in Jesus, and who truly appreciates the death that Jesus suffered for them so that they could be forgiven of their sins and live eternally in heaven; will be more than willing to suffer persecution in this life for the sake of the cause of Christ. If Jesus is your Savior, you will never do worse than deny Him before the wicked and selfish people of this world. When Peter was weak, he warmed his hands over the fires of the wicked while they scorned and judged Jesus. Later he wept tears of remorse, when he realized how much of a coward he had been.

It takes a person of bravery and resolve to serve the Lord in this world. Find the courage to say the name of the Lord in a sincere way in the presence of the people of this world, and you will be hated for sure at times. But the day will come when you will thank God that He gave you the courage because Jesus said, “he that confesses me before men, I will confess before my Father who is in heaven.”

In Matthew 24:10 Jesus said, “And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.” The word that is translated “offended” in this verse means “to make to stumble or to fall”. Many shall be made to stumble because when faced with the choice of naming the name of Jesus and being hated, or denying Jesus and being accepted; far too many will choose the latter. Jesus said the same thing in the parable of the sower about those who fall away from faith because of persecution. He said in Matthew 13:20-21, “But he that received the seed into stoney places, the same is he that hears the word, and with joy receives it; yet he does not have root in himself, and endures only for a while: because when tribulation or persecution arise because of the word, by and by he is offended.”

Be careful. When you suffer persecution, don’t allow it to cause you to stumble in your faith or in your resolve to live for Christ. Jesus said that one of the characteristics of the age in which we live is that many will stumble because of persecution.

The reason that persecution is so certain is because there are so many people who do not believe and who do not have the Spirit of God within them. These same people who persecute the believers in Jesus are people who betray one another and who hate one another. If someone is capable of betraying you, then obviously he is a person that cannot be trusted. Someone who is filled with hatred is obviously a person who has failed at the most important commandment, which is love. Jesus said that the greatest commandment is to love God; and the second is like it, which is to love your neighbor.

Persecution, betrayal, and hatred: This does not paint a very pretty picture of mankind. It does not paint a very pretty picture of the people who live around us. They are like that because they need Jesus. He is a miracle-worker; and one of His greatest miracles is the change that can take place in the heart of someone who goes from darkness to the light of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

In Matthew 24:11 Jesus said, “And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.” In verse 5 Jesus said that there would be false christs, and now He says that there will also be false prophets in this age in which we live. In other words, there will be people who will claim to be teachers of the truth about God, but what they say will be false. There are two important things needed to avoid being deceived by false teachers. The first thing is to make sure that you know the One who is true (the Lord Jesus Christ). Jesus said, “you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” The second thing is to make sure that you continue to search the scriptures. One reason that people fall into error is that they get out of God’s Word. They stop seeking, and they think that they already have the answers. It is better to be like the Christians of the city of Berea, who searched the scriptures daily to see if those things were true.

In Matthew 24:12 Jesus said, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” The greatest commandment is to love; to love God and to love your neighbor. Therefore, if someone’s love becomes cold; if their love for God or their love for their neighbor becomes cold, then one of the worst things that can happen to them has already happened. It’s a serious thing if your love for God becomes cold. Jesus said to the believers in the city of Ephesus in Rev. 2:4, “I have somewhat against you, because you have left your first love.”

And if you do not love your fellow man, or if you do not care about the souls of the lost people around you, then perhaps what has happened to you is what Jesus said would happen to many people in the age in which we live. He said that the love of many shall wax cold.

This is a great teaching that Jesus gave us. It is a warning for each of us to watch our own hearts, and to be careful about what influence the world may be having on us. Another translation of this verse would be, “And because of the increase of lawlessness, the love of many shall become cold.” When Jesus said that people would be characterized as living without law, He was probably talking about a moral law.

When the spirit of God comes to live within a person, as a result of the salvation that is in Jesus Christ; that person will become motivated to do what is right and to seek to do what is right. When they succeed, they will be happy, and when they fail, they will be sad, and will ask God to forgive them. That’s because the Holy Spirit is within them. But those who do not have God within their hearts; have no such motivation or desire to seek that which is good. They rejoice in iniquity and rejoice not in the truth. They disdain and refuse the moral law, to their own destruction. Paul said the same thing about the general direction of human civilization in Second Tim. 3:13 when he wrote, “But evil men and seducers shall become worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.”

When Jesus said, “because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold”, He was describing the way that temptation works. We all have an influence on those around us. If you have an attitude that you ought not to have, or if you are involved in something that ought not be; then you are probably also influencing others in ways that should not be. Sin is often passed from one person to another by their example. We are all social creatures and are sometimes influenced by those around us even when we are not aware of it. The goal should always be to avoid being influenced by others for evil, and instead to influence them for good.

Sin is like a disease in a society. Once certain sins or inadequacies become accepted, they influence a greater and greater number of people. Exposure to the sins of others will be an exposure to temptation, if you are not careful. If people around you are materialistic and selfish, if you are not careful, so will you be. If people around you are angry or violent, if you are not careful, so will you be. If people around you laugh at immorality or make excuses for dishonesty, if you are not careful, you will do the same things. Don’t be a follower of people; be a follower of Christ and of His word. Remember the warning that Jesus gave, “because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.”

Jesus painted us a picture of the age in which we live, and it was not a very flattering one. There will be a recurring of natural disasters. You might lose everything that you have with the next storm that blows in or the next shaking of the earth. But you will be better prepared for it, if it happens to you, if that which you treasure most is in heaven. Jesus told us about wars and rumors of wars, false christs and false prophets, hatred and an increase in iniquity or lawlessness. But the Lord was always positive and He wanted to leave us with a positive message at the end of this description of our age. And so He said in Matthew 24:13, “But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.”

This is not talking about spiritual salvation, but about being saved from a difficult trial or an unpleasant circumstance. No matter how bad things might one day get, they are only temporary. One of the best ways to get through a difficult time is to learn to endure it. All things pass. Even the worst of times will follow their course and will meet their end. If you learn to look at God and not people, and if you learn to trust in God and not your own view of things; then you will find the capability to endure any trial that the circumstances of life may bring your way. Paul wrote to Timothy and said; “endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”

For a believer, the worst of events can have the best of results if you endure the unpleasant circumstances through faith in the promises of God. Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” God’s word also says, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, and for those who are the called according to His purposes.”

In the preceding several verses that we have looked at in Matthew chapter 24, the Lord said quite a bit about the activity of the unsaved people in this age. Now He gives one verse about the activity of His followers in this age. Jesus said in Matthew 24:14, “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.”

The kingdoms of this world will ultimately fail, but not the kingdom of God. The word gospel means good news. In spite of all the bad news of all the things that can go wrong, there will always be good news also. And the best of the good news is the invitation that God gives to everyone to become a part of His eternal kingdom through Jesus Christ. Jesus said that the gospel would be preached: that means publicly proclaimed. He said that it would be preached in all the world: that means to all the inhabitants of the world. Everyone ought to hear at least once about God’s love and forgiveness that is in Jesus.

Jesus also said that the gospel of the kingdom would be preached to all nations. The word that is translated “nation” here is translated elsewhere as “gentiles”. It means group of people. It is the Greek word, ethnos; and from it we get our English word, “ethnic” or “ethnicity”. Jesus made it clear that all groups, all ethnic groups were to be welcomed into the kingdom of God. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female; but all are united as one in the eyes of God. If it is the will of God to view all ethnic groups equally, then it should also be the will of man.

This is only one of many examples in the teachings of Jesus where He makes it clear that the gospel is offered to all people, and that means all races. Too many church organizations in our country have members made up of only one race. All races should be welcome to any church.

The disciples had asked Jesus when would be the sign of his coming and of the end the age. One way that the Lord answered the question was to tell the disciples that certain things must happen before the end of the age. Jesus did not give them a date or a year or a time or a season, but He did tell them that certain things must happen before the end of the age will take place. And one of the things that must happen is that the gospel must be preached to all the nations of the world.

Jesus made the promise that He would return; and some may ask why has He waited so long? Has it not been almost 2,000 years? Seeing that He is not limited by time the way that we are, it has not been very long. A thousand years are to the Lord as a day, and a day as a thousand years. But the Lord did say that the end of the age would not come until the gospel has been preached to all the inhabited earth and to all nations.

Peter said that people would eventually mock the idea of the return of Christ because the Lord will not return when men think that He should have. Second Peter 3:3-4 says, “Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last day scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.”

But Peter gave the same answer that Jesus gave, as to why there might be a delay in the return of the Lord. He said in Second Peter 3:9, “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”

If the Lord ended the current age today and returned, many people would lose their opportunity of responding to the good news. Because of the immense love of God, they are given one more day to hear the good news, and to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

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