See, I have told you beforehand

 "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 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 christs 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

Yesterday we read that Jesus went out and departed from the 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 notes that the prophecy of Daniel 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.  Christ's phrase when you see tells us that many of the disciples themselves to whom He was speaking would still be alive and themselves see these events.  My study bible adds that the words whoever reads, let him understand are commonly understood to have been inserted by Matthew into Christ's address as an encouragement to his early Christian flock who possibly had witnessed this event.  All of Christ's language speaks to a total sense of urgency to flee at that time.

"But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!"  If we look at Jesus words given in Luke 23:27-31, we see an even more explicit address to the women of Jerusalem, and warning of the time to come.  My study bible comments on that passage in Luke that His blessing on the barren women is an acknowledgement of the overwhelming pain a mother endures seeing their children suffer (hence Christ's words of "woe" here in Matthew).  St. John Chrysostom comments:  "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. My study bible notes that the severity of winter weather or respect for the Sabbath would prevent many faithful from fleeing quickly in a time of desperation.  There is also a spiritual interpretation of these words given in tradition, where the Sabbath symbolizes idleness regarding virtue, and winter indicating fruitlessness regarding charity.  In this spiritual sense, the person who departs this life in such a spiritual state will suffer judgment.

"For then there will 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 christs 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 words continue to convey the deep sense of urgency Jesus imparts to His followers regarding the Siege of Jerusalem to come in their lifetimes.  And yet, they can also teach us about times of tribulation and the fullness of time for each of us.  Once again, as in yesterday's reading (above), He emphasizes that followers must not be deceived by rumors of false christs.  At the time of His return, the event will be unmistakable to the entire world.  IF there is any question or doubt, my study bible helpfully emphasizes, that alone is evidence that Christ has not returned.  As His return will shine from the east, so Orthodox and other Christians worship whenever possible facing eastward, in symbolic hope and anticipation of His second and glorious coming.  

"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. 

"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."  The sign of the Son of Man is the Cross, my study bible says, which will be revealed as the standard  for Christ's impending judgment.  At His first coming, Jesus came in humility and mortality, as His second coming, Christ will be revealed in 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."   My study bible refers us to St. Paul's words in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, as one of the clearest New Testament passages on the Second Coming of Christ.  It also notes that the first-century document, The Didache (which is the earliest teaching document known in the Church), lists three signs that will mark the return of Christ:  (1) "the sign spread out in the heavens" (which is Christ and His hosts); (2) "the sign of the trumpet"; and (3) "the resurrection of the dead."  For the righteous, it adds, the return of Christ (as in the words of St. Paul) is a comfort, not a threat.

So what do we make of these end times?  Jesus describes the horrible events that will unfold in Jerusalem, within the lifetimes of those who are His immediate listeners.  The Siege of Jerusalem would occur in AD 70, some forty years after these words are spoken.  Thanks to His warnings, the early Church survived this event, His followers heeding His words.  But there is an extra dimension to this prophecy that we don't often get to notice, and that is on Christ's emphasis that this is essentially a spiritual event that requires a spiritual response.  Indeed, one might point to Christ's entire ministry, couched in such "apocalyptic" times, in which people looked to the coming of a messiah for the deliverance from their political woes under the Romans, and a restoration of David's kingdom.  For Christ did not come preaching physical and nationalist deliverance.  Clearly, there were plenty of such figureheads who sought a nationalist response to the Roman occupation.  It is just possible that Christ's betrayal by Judas was even an attempt to force the issue, if we could pause to theorize along these lines for a moment.   The Siege of Jerusalem would finally come in response to such nationalist sentiment and uprising.  Clearly, however, Jesus did not come preaching a nationalist uprising, or portray Himself as a conquering king with a grand worldly empire to be restored to Israel.  He preached a different road, a different solution.  His salvation and deliverance were not political, but spiritual.  He preached a spiritual kingdom manifest among us and within us in the world, a kingdom which consisted of faith.  His kingdom was "not of this world" and yet remains in the world (John 18:36).  As the Messiah of this particular Kingdom into which we are each invited through faith, and as children by adoption, Jesus does not preach a physical deliverance from the Romans as the true faith or religious solution of Israel for salvation.  He preaches to us along entirely different lines, and instead offers us the Cross, which we also are to take up in our own lives.  What Jesus is saying here to the disciples is, in effect, that He is entirely aware of the destruction that is to come, and He is offering them a different sort of salvation, a plan for faith, even in the face of such horrors which are to come.  It is important that we know that He is entirely aware of the might of worldly powers, and yet offers a spiritual solution for deliverance and salvation.  From there we can, in turn, look at our own lives and the political events that surround us -- even chaos and pain -- and consider where our own solution lies.  Sometimes we may have the insight that there isn't really a political solution to all the problems we see in the world, and we might find that we must come to the conclusion that the real solution is, in fact, spiritual.  In a highly secularized world, and one which prizes and lauds the rewards of "progress" in a historical perspective, our temptation is to believe in a political solution for everything.  But sometimes those solutions just provide us with more problems, and are not solutions at all.  They don't provide us with salvation, but may give us plenty of "false christs" instead.  Our refuge as followers of Christ is in prayer and faith, and in following the commands of Christ, and so, enduring through all things.  This is the power that He asks us to come to, the power of the Cross, which will reveal to us the lessons we need to learn, the things we need to discard, and teaches us the ever-present need for remembering to whom we owe our first loyalty.  For if we forget His love, and if we forget His word, then we are "lost" indeed.  We have lost what really counts and the things that are most precious to us, after all.