LENTEN BIBLE STUDY #19

CALAMITIES, TRIBULATION, & THE COMING OF THE SON OF MAN

4^TH Monday of Lent

Read Matthew 24:3-31.

If you knew your world was going to end tomorrow, what would you want to do today?  What would you want to say to your loved ones?  Should you go ahead and say these things today?

Notes on the text:

While many try to associate the events foretold in this passage with current events in the news, Catholic teaching tells us that only God knows when Jesus will return.  Therefore, instead of spending our time looking for an end of the entire world, we should focus on what we know is a certainty: the end of our own lives and the judgment of our own deeds.

Matthew’s church still expected Jesus to return at any moment.  Their theology is embodied in Matthew’s retelling of this discourse. 

Verse 15 refers to the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 CE.  Matthew borrows language from 1 Maccabees 1:54 and Daniel 12:11 which describe the earlier desecration of the Temple by the Greek ruler Antiochus IV Epiphanes in 167 BCE.

Verse 19: the journey would be particularly difficult for nursing mothers or pregnant women.

Verses 26-28: the Second Coming of the Messiah will not be in secret.