Mark 13:24-27
Introduction
In these verses Jesus is talking about His Second Coming. He will come back to the earth in power and glory to establish the Kingdom of Israel. This is what the Apostles were looking forward to. We see this in Acts 1:6 with the question they put to Jesus. Bear in mind that the Apostles put this question to Jesus after He had been teaching them about the kingdom for 40 days.
For all believers, whether Jew or Gentile, the coming kingdom is the culmination of all of our hopes.
Bear this in mind as we examine the passage in detail.
Verses 24 to 25
Notice how Jesus starts with the word ‘but’ in Verse 24. He is contrasting what He is about to say with what He said in Verse 22. In Verse 22 He gave a warning about false Christs and false prophets with their false signs and wonders.
But in Verse 24 and 25 Jesus provides us with some important true signs. Jesus gives us four signs in these two verses. They are the Sun being darkened, the Moon not giving its light, the stars falling from heaven and the powers in the heavens being shaken. These true signs have something in common. They are all cosmic disturbances or heavenly signs.
And the true signs occur after The Tribulation. We see this in Verse 24. In Matthew’s version of the Olivet Discourse, he adds the word ‘immediately’ to emphasise that there is no gap after The Tribulation. The true signs occur immediately after The Tribulation and the false signs occur during The Tribulation. The true signs also precede the Second Coming.
In the Bible these cosmic signs normally signify judgement or the future Day of the Lord. We see this in Joel chapters 2 and 3, Isaiah chapters 13 and 34 and Amos chapter 8 for instance.
The true signs in Verses 24 and 25 of our passage are to be taken literally. We see this in Hebrews 12:26-28. The writer to the Hebrews is clearly talking about created things. When the writer talks about shaking the earth, he is talking about the shaking of Mount Sinai in the Old Testament. Then when he talks about shaking the heavens he is talking about the Second Coming. Notice that the writer to the Hebrews tells us that when God shakes the created things, those things which cannot be shaken will remain.
So, what are the things that cannot be shaken? The answer is in Verse 28 of Hebrews 12. It is the faith of those who believe in Jesus and His kingdom that cannot be shake. So, when Jesus says in Verse 25 of the Olivet Discourse that the heavens will be shaken, all that will be left is the believer’s faith in the coming kingdom.
We can gain some further insight into what Jesus is talking about in Verses 24 and 25 of our passage by looking at a prophecy in Joel 3:9-15. In this passage, Joel is describing the Battle of Armageddon which occurs at the end of The Tribulation. In this battle, Jesus, along with the armies of heaven, fight and defeat all the nations led by the Antichrist who have gathered around Jerusalem. The Valley of Jehoshaphat is situated between Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives, east of the city. When this battle takes place, Joel tells us in Verse 15 that there will be cosmic disturbances. And this is what Jesus is talking about in Verses 24 and 25 of the Olivet Discourse.
Verses 26 to 27
In Verses 24 and 25 Jesus gave us the cosmic disturbances that will precede His Second Coming. And now Jesus gives us the most important sign of all with regard to His Second Coming; that He will come with great clouds. Remember that the Son of Man is one of the titles of Jesus. In Verse 26 Jesus is referencing Daniel 7:13. This is the way that Jesus will come back to the earth to set up His Messianic Kingdom.
When Jesus comes in the clouds will He come in the flesh or will it be just a spiritual coming? The answer is that He will come in the flesh. Because of the incarnation, Jesus will always have a body. And so, He will come in the flesh for all to see. This is confirmed in Acts 1:11. Jesus ascended bodily and He will come back bodily. He will not come secretly or unnoticed. See Revelation 1:7.
So, what are the clouds? They are clouds of glory. They are not meteorological clouds and they don’t have an allegorical meaning. They don’t represent angels, for instance.
Notice in Verse 27 how it says that Jesus will send out His angels to gather His elect from the four winds. The elect are Jewish and Gentile believers but especially Jewish believers. The emphasis on the Jews can be seen in the use of the words, “from the four winds”. One of the ways in which God punishes the Jews is to scatter Israel to the four winds. In other words, they are scattered among other nations. It happened during the Babylonian exile and it happened after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD. We see examples of this in Ezekiel 5:11-12 and Ezekiel 17:19-21.
However, the scattering to the four winds is for a limited period only. When the period of punishment is over, the Lord brings them home. We see examples of this in Zechariah 2:6 and Deuteronomy 30:4.
In Matthew’s version of the Olivet Discourse, we are told that Jesus will send forth His angels with a ‘Great Trumpet’. See Matthew 24:31. So, what is this ‘Great Trumpet’? The only other place where the words, ‘great trumpet’ can be found in the Bible is in Isaiah 27:12-13. This prophecy in Isaiah is about the restoration of Israel which will occur during the Day of the Lord. The Olivet Discourse is all about the Day of the Lord.
As I said at the beginning of this study, the passage we are looking at is all about Jesus coming back to the earth in power and glory to establish the Kingdom of Israel. Does this mean that the Kingdom of Israel is for the Jews only? No, it’s for Gentile believers as well. We know that the Kingdom of Israel is for Gentile believers as well as Jewish believers because, as Gentiles, we are grafted in to the natural olive tree when we are born again. We see this in Romans 11:15-17. In Romans 11:15-17, Paul is talking to Gentile believers. In Verse 17 he tells us that the wild olive tree is grafted in to the natural olive tree. The wild olive tree represents the Gentile believers and the natural olive tree represents Israel. When we are grafted in, we become partakers of the rich root of the natural olive tree. The rich root consists of the promises given by God to Abraham, Jacob and Isaac. We Gentiles receive or partake of the same promises and blessings given to Israel including the Messianic Kingdom or the Kingdom of Israel. This is how we know that Gentile believers are included in the Kingdom of Israel.
So, be encouraged brothers and sisters, for all of us who believe in Jesus, the coming kingdom is the culmination of all of our hopes.