And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other

Christ Pantocrator, 6th century, St. Catherine's Monastery, Sinai, Egypt

"Therefore when you see the 'abomination of desolation,' spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place" (whoever reads, let him understand), "then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.  Let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house. And let him who is in the field not go back to get his clothes.  But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!  And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath.  For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.  And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened.  Then if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe it.  For false Christ's and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.  See, I have told you beforehand.  Therefore if they say to you, 'Look, He is in the desert!' do not go out; or 'Look, He is in the inner rooms!' do not believe it.  For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.  For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.

"Immediately after the tribulation 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 the heavens 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 His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."

- Matthew 24:15-31

On Saturday we read that Jesus went out and departed from temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."  Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  And Jesus answered and said to them:  "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.  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.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.  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."

"Therefore when you see the 'abomination of desolation,' spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place" (whoever reads, let him understand), "then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.  Let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house. And let him who is in the field not go back to get his clothes."   My study bible tells us that Daniel's prophecy of the abomination of desolation (Daniel 9:27, 11:31, 12:11) was fulfilled in AD 70, when the Roman general Titus entered the Most Holy Place and had a statue of himself erected in the temple before having the temple destroyed.  It says that the Lord's phrase when you see indicates that many of the disciples would still be alive at that time.  The words whoever reads, let him understand are commonly understood to be inserted by Matthew into Christ's address as an encouragement to the early Christian flock, who may have witnessed this event.  It indicates direction to a Jewish flock (considered by many to be the audience addressed in Matthew's Gospel) familiar with the Old Testament scriptures and prophecies.

"But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!"  My study bible refers to this as an acknowledgement of the overwhelming pain a mother endures when seeing her children suffer.  It quotes St. John Chrysostom:  "Mothers are held by the tie of feeling for their children, but cannot save them.  How can one escape the bonds of nature?  How can she who nurses ever overlook the one she has borne?"

"And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath.  For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.  And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened."   The severity of winter weather or respect for the Sabbath would prevent many faithful from fleeing quickly in a time of desperation, my study bible says.  It also notes a spiritual interpretation given in patristic tradition, in which the Sabbath symbolizes idleness regarding virtue, and winter indicating fruitlessness with regard to charity.  In that understanding, a person who departs worldly life in such a spiritual state will suffer judgment.

"Then if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe it.  For false Christ's and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.  See, I have told you beforehand.  Therefore if they say to you, 'Look, He is in the desert!' do not go out; or 'Look, He is in the inner rooms!' do not believe it.  For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.  For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together."  These warnings emphasize Christ's admonition not to be deceived (see Saturday's reading, above).  He gives us a description of His return; it is an event that will be unmistakable to the whole world.  If there is any question or doubt, my study bible says, that in itself is evidence that He has not returned.  As Christ's return will shine from the east, my study bible explains, so historically Christians whenever possible have sought to worship facing eastward in symbolic hope and anticipation of His second and glorious coming.  This last saying is also found in Luke 17:37 (although the word for "body" is used, rather than "carcass").  My study bible explains that the body refers to Christ, while the eagles refer to the angels and the saints.   This understanding links Christ's sacrifice on the Cross with life in the Kingdom.

 "Immediately after the tribulation 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 the heavens will be shaken."  According to patristic commentary, the sun will not be destroyed, but rather darkened in relation to the glory of Christ.  In other words, the sun will appear to be dark by comparison when Christ returns in the fullness of His splendor, my study bible explains.  This light is similar to the light of Transfiguration, as described in Mark's Gospel where we read that "His clothes became shining, exceedingly white, like snow, such as no launderer on earth can whiten them" (Mark 9:3). 

"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." My study bible says that the sign of the Son of Man is the Cross, which will be revealed as the standard for Christ's impending judgment.  At His first coming, it explains, Christ came in humility and mortality.  But at His second coming, He will be revealed in power and great glory, His fully divine nature revealed. 

 "And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."   My study bible refers us to St. Paul's clear words on this subject, in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18.  It also cites the Didache,  the first century teaching document of the Church, which lists three signs marking the return of the Lord:  "the sign spread out in the heavens" -- that is, Christ and His hosts; "the sign of the trumpet," and "the resurrection of the dead."

The question of the time of the end, and of Jesus' second coming, is one that is simply quite beyond our grasp.  But nevertheless, we are given hints about it.  Perhaps the most significant thing we take away from Christ's warnings is what was noted by my study bible for yesterday's reading, that Jesus gives much greater emphasis on not being deceived, and on endurance in our faith, than making timetables or calculations of His return.  At any rate, it is important that we note it will be unmistakable, and known to all.  The horrible devastation that was to come to Jerusalem was not the end of life, and contained in Christ's warnings about wars and rumors of wars and the intense suffering that was to come is a message for all of the Church at all times:  that endurance and watchfulness have to be the keywords in our strength and in our faith.  There is nothing that should keep us from the Gospel, as it will endure through all things, no matter what horrors may befall it.  In the past century alone, the world has witnessed millions killed in genocide (including systematic genocide of Christians in the Ottoman Empire during World War I), governments established which were overtly hostile to the Gospel of Christ on both the "right" and the "left," and movements of all kinds intended to cast aspersions on spiritual or religious thinking in many ways.   We live in a time of great prosperity, with marketplaces open to proliferations of goods and services unimaginable a few decades ago.  The marketplace is now a worldwide phenomenon, and so the appeal of materialism works also as a kind of threat to the understanding that we are more than bodies, and that God is, indeed, "everywhere present and filling all things."  In some sense, our great struggle remains as it always was, against self-centeredness of all kinds.  In short, all kinds of struggles still face us for our faith and for the Gospel, and in that nothing has really changed.  We still live in the times of the "end" initiated by Christ.  In Jesus' description of the destruction of the temple and the horrific scenes of war and devastation, famine and crisis that would come upon Jerusalem, we find encapsulated a kind of history of the world as that which seeks perhaps to frighten us away from our faith, to disengage and to imagine that security is impossible with Christ and exists only within the realm of the truly selfish or corrupt, or at the very least an egregious use of power that would secure us in a world beset with terror.  And yet, our Gospel persists, and our hope remains, because the one true thing we can count on is the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, the place to which Jesus goes in order to prepare a place for us (John 14:1-4).   At best the faith we're offered is counterintuitive; how can the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross give us a sense of security and trust?  But what we take with us is His love and assurance, and that He offers us a better and greater life than the devastation we might see or even experience around us.  He offer us His way, a life trusting in the love of God, and following the teachings we're given, for a kind of security that surpasses all we see and experience, and brings into the world a foundation of beauty and truth, and of the choice which He offers us.  Jesus says repeatedly, "Whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it" (Matthew 10:39, 16:25, Mark 8:35, Luke 9:24, John 12:25).  Coupled closely with this saying is the question, "For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" (Matthew 16:26, Mark 8:36-37).  The terrible destruction to come in Jerusalem which Jesus describes in great detail (Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down; see yesterday's reading) is not meant to frighten us but rather to warn and even to assure us that through all things, He is present, and we have His promise that He will return.  In the description of the darkening of the sun and the moon, and the falling away of the stars, a modern mind might consider the notion of the end of time and the universe as we know it.  His coming is meant to be present with all the saints of all time, an entrance into a kingdom which is eternal.  Whatever it portends, Christ's words assure us that through all things, we are meant to persist and to endure, to be aware and not to be deceived, and to continue in our faith, which will survive all.  If we are to place our trust in the one thing necessary when all else falls away, we know what that is which transcends all things.  The psalm tells us, "When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up" (Psalm 27:10).  Let us remember whose birth into the world we are going to celebrate soon, the One who came to give us the word, the good news, who bears all things for us, and teaches us to be like Him.  For today's reading, let us contemplate the icon that surpassed and survived all things, even the Iconoclastic period, and its gift of  Christ who experienced and endured all, and is both human and divine.   Even when we find ourselves grappling with new forms of iconoclasm, let us remind ourselves that He calls always and through all things, to "Follow Me."