Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Matthew 24 (10) - This Generation

Matthew 24:35 is one of the most “beaten up” texts in the New Testament. Jesus made an emphatic statement.

I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.
The confusion about this statement is strange, because Jesus words are precise and clear. Some things will happen. The things that will happen are described in the phrase “all these things”. In the Greek text this is “tauta panta”. This alludes back to Matthew 23:36 and the judgements described earlier in that chapter.
I tell you the truth, all these things (tauta panta) will come upon this generation.
The phrase is used again in Matthew 23:34.
Even so, when you see all these things (tauta panta), you know that it is near, right at the door.
Jesus description of the the traumatic events are marked off a the beginning and the end by the phrase all these things (tauta panta).

The expression also alludes to the original question asked by the disciples. They asked when the temple stones would be cast down and smashed.
Tell us when will this (tauta) happen?
Matt 24:4-33 describes what will happen in precise detail. Therefore, the passage is a description of the events leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem and the collapse of the temple.

Jesus also explained exactly when these things would happen. They would not happen immediately and some other events must happen first. However the events are quite close and would take place with in the lifetimes of most of his listeners. People should be prepared and ready to take the appropriate action to escape.

All this is quite straightforward.

Unfortunately, during the 1960s, Hal Lindsay and his mates decided that the fig tree is a reference to the state of Israel. They decided that a whole series of so-called end-time events would take place within a generation of 1948. This interpretation did not come out of Matthews gospel, but was read into it.

They determined a generation as 25 years and that Jesus would return in about 1973 (1948 +25). This was fine during the 1960s when the western world was unstable and 1973 was a far off. However, 1973 came and went without anything untoward happening. The so-called prophets did not admit they were wrong, but started to scramble for a way out.

I have watched with amusement as the length of a generation has expanded from 25 years to 40 years, and now to 51 years, and the starting point shifted from 1948 to 1967. I can imagine that Christians will soon be quoting Psalm 90:10 to prove that a generation is 70 or 80 years, Will Isaiah 65:20 be used to prove that a generation is 100 years long, in an attempt to avoid admitting that their shonky predictions are wrong.

I cannot understand why Christians refuse accept the straightforward meaning of Jesus's words. These things that he described in Matthew 24:4-34 would happen during the lifetime of people present when he was speaking. I cannot see any point in going through verbal gymnastics to squeeze out a different meaning.

The problem is that Christians want to push the passage into the future. I cannot see why that is so important, as there are plenty of other biblical passages that describe the future for us. We do not need this passage for the future, unless we a stuck a particular version of eschatology. It would be more honest to let that failed doctrine go.

2 comments:

Gene said...

Ron,

Setting aside end time stuff.

Do you agree or disagree that God works in Generations? That a generation is a measure for God?

What are the Genealogies all about then anyway.

Why the 10 generations from Adam to Noah.

Why the marking of Daniel?

I think we miss God if we ignore the clock of God in Generational time.

No matter how long of short you believe that to be. I'm convinced of the 51.4. Seems to work from scripture. And in our time.

So, ignore if you want. It's hard to tell time without a clock.

Jesus even warned of people who wouldn't see the times and seasons.

As far as a point of demarcation to clock from.... Israel. A divided Jerusalem could not have been the beginning clock.

Not to the end perhaps but to a change. A revealing.

I'm not picking times and dates, I'm just trying to be wise in observing the times and seasons like a Son of Issachar and like Jesus advised.

Ron McK said...

God uses generations, but not as a timing device.

He deals with different generations in different ways, not because he is capricious, but because different generations behave in different ways (Judges 2:10). Jesus considered that the generation he lived amongst to be a perverse generation.

Sometime a generation is treated more severely, because it has received greater blessing and revelation from God. That also applied to Jesus generation. I suspect that our generation is in this category, too.

I cannot see any evidence in the scriptures of God using generations as a timing device. There are almost no references to numbers of generations. Consequences of sin pass on to the third and fourth generation, but that will usually be personal, although and entire generation may sometimes participate in the same sin, and the consequence be experienced by subsequent generations.

The most common count of generations is the expression “one thousand generations”, which is used quite frequently in the scriptures (Psalm 105:8). Using 25 years for a generation to be conservative, this works out to be 25,000 years. I do not know of any Christians (except me) who believe that life on earth could last for another 200 centuries. I find it ironic that one reference to a “thousand years” (Rev 20:1-6) is taken literally and built into an enormous doctrine, but five separate references to a thousand generations are just ignored.

I think you should be careful about using a mathematical formula to translate generations into years. Firstly, people lived much longer in the time between Adam and Noah, so you have a whole lot of outliers distorting the mean. Secondly, the length of a generation is not that precise, so it is not easy to say when one ends and next begins. God could speak in years, if he wanted that level of precision. Third, the Holy Spirit loves to speak, using words. We do not need to not use the scriptures as a codebook, which we need to break, because we can hear his voice.