Many explanations have been given for Jesus’ words in Matthew 24. When Jesus was asked by His disciples when the things will happen that He spoke of, and when He would return, Jesus gave them a lengthy list of the signs of the end times: many will come in My name, wars and rumours of wars, nation rising against nation, famines, earthquakes, pestilence, false prophets and a great tribulation.
But the event that initiates the great tribulation, that will be more severe than any other one in the history of the world, is the abomination that makes desolate. Jesus said that immediately after the tribulation of that time, the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven and these people, who see this, will see Him coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. Jesus further endorsed this by saying that the generation that sees these things, will not pass until all these things take place.
This narrative poses a two questions. The first question is, how long is a generation? Genesis 2:4 reads as follows: “These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the heavens and the earth.” This is the starting point of generations in the Bible.
The gospel of Matthew records the generations from Abraham to David as fourteen generations, from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations, and from the deportation from Babylon to Christ, fourteen generations. This is a total of forty-two generations.
From the above demarcation of generations, it is clear that a generation does not refer to a certain number of years. Abraham was born 1960 BC. He was called out of Ur of the Chaldeans when he was seventy-five years old. From this time, 1885 BC, to the birth of David in 1040 BC, is eight hundred and forty-five years. From David to the Babylonian exile in 586 BC, is four hundred and fifty-four years. And from the exile to the birth of Christ in 4 BC, is 582 years.
If the time lapse between each of these demarcations is divided by fourteen, the length of the generations in years is different. The above equates to sixty years and three months, thirty-two-years and four months, and forty-one and a half years approximately.
A generation seems to rather speak of the characteristics that define a certain group of people at a certain time. The Bible speaks of a wicked generation, Matthew 12:39; a generation that do not know the Lord, Judges 2:10; a stubborn and rebellious generation, Psalm 78:8; a generation of the upright, Psalm 112:2; the generation of His wrath, Jeremiah 7:29; a perverse generation, Acts 2:40; and the generation that will not pass away until all these things take place, Matthew 24:32.
The generation that will not pass then, is identified by a certain qualities.
Jesus specifically told His disciples that the great tribulation would start when they saw the abomination that makes desolate. The second question is: what or who is this abomination? The word for abominable in Hebrew is shikkoots שִׁקּוּץ,and it means detestable. There are many things in the Old Testament are detestable, but the prophet Daniel associated the abomination that makes desolate, with the time that the regular burnt offering is taken away which will allow for the abomination to be set up. The purpose of the burnt offerings was for general atonement of sin and an expression of devotion to God. Jesus became the burnt offering for sin.
This leaves us to conclude that when Jesus is no longer the solution for atonement, it will constitute the abomination that makes desolate. Is this generation that generation?
How countries structure their policies around religious instruction, is the barometer of a generation’s standpoint on the importance of biblical values and more so, on the one event that changed the the history of the world.
Globally, the Bible is illegal in 52 countries of the world, Iran, Jordan, Egypt, and Niger to name a few.1 The full list is available on the website cited below. In addition to this, on the 2 June 2023, Utah banned the Bible for its “vulgarity and violence”.2 And in many countries religious instruction has been removed from schools. But it gets more intense. INTO are urging the Catholic church to remove the requirement for religious training for teachers who want to teach in Catholic schools.3
Locally, the South African government has published a paper on its National Policy on Religion and Education, and it states the following:
“Our policy for religion in education therefore is designed to support unity without uniformity, and diversity without divisiveness.” 4.
It also states that public schools cannot establish uniformity based on a single faith.
Freedom of religion or rather restriction of religion in the education of children, is part and parcel of the UDHR that was adopted 1948. Since then, most of the countries in the world has aligned the rights proposed in the document with their Constitutions.
Is this the last generation? The question can be answered in this manner: There has been wars and rumours of wars, the 1st and 2nd World Wars, being the first global wars, took place in the 20th century. Nation is rising against nation. The word “nation” in Greek is the word ethnos and refers to ethnic groups. Ethnic conflict is one of the major threats to international peace and security. Conflicts in the Balkans, Rwanda, Chechnya, Iraq, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Darfur, and Israel are among the many. 5.
Nearly 45 million people are at risk of starvation 6 and there has been a total of 9 790 earthquakes this year alone.7.
And 2019 saw the global Covid-19 pandemic.
A world devoid of the salvation message “salvation by grace through faith in Christ,” will certainly make the world desolate. And this is in progress.
Jesus said:
“As lighting comes from east, and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.”
References
1. https://lovepackages.org/bibles-dangerous-illegal-covert/
2. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65794363
3. https://www.rte.ie/news/2024/0403/1441483-into-religion/
4. https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201409/religion0.pdf
5. https://www. britannica.com/topic/ethnic-conflict
6. https://www.bing.com/search?q=famines+in+the+world
7. https://www.list of earthquakes in 2024 - Wikipedia
