Luke 21:5-12a — End Times - in 40 years and in X years

READ THIS: Luke 21:5-12a

5 Some of his disciples were remarking about how the temple was adorned with beautiful stones and with gifts dedicated to God. But Jesus said, 6 “As for what you see here, the time will come when not one stone will be left on another; every one of them will be thrown down.” 

7 “Teacher,” they asked, “when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are about to take place?” 

8 He replied: “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them. 9 When you hear of wars and uprisings, do not be frightened. These things must happen first, but the end will not come right away.” 

10 Then he said to them: “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. 11 There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven. 

12 “But before all this, they will seize you and persecute you.

WHAT’S THIS MEAN, ANYWAY?

If you've seen ruins of old buildings, you know that buildings can stand for hundreds and thousands of years. They might not be in the best shape, but they still have one stone on top of another. Jesus prophesies that not a single stone would be left standing. And he was right. About forty years after Jesus says this, the Romans completely ripped apart the temple, stone by stone, to remove the gems referenced in verse 5 and punish those who were rebelling at the time. 

From there, people interpret the verses differently. Some say Jesus switches to talking about the end times, others say that all the things Jesus lists out happened before the temple was destroyed. Others (like me and the commentary in the last section) say it's talking about ~both~

At heart though, the main takeaway from these verses for me today is that we need to know Jesus so that we don't get tricked when people claim to be Him and to know Him better than we do. If we don't know Jesus, we can be fooled by anyone, and we can accidentally start to follow someone that we were never meant to follow!

THINK ABOUT IT:

1. How can you know Jesus? Do you think you could be tricked/deceived into following someone who isn't Him?

 

2. Do you feel like Jesus knows you? Why? What's your part in that?

TRY THIS:

Dive deeper into what this passage might mean with this commentary from Enduring Word. It has some great comparisons to Matthew, and it goes over actual historical events that match what Jesus predicted before the destruction of the temple.