END TIMES

End Time Temple

Mat 24:15 : ... the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)

WARS &c CROSSHAIRS A TEMPLE? A TEMPLE! LINKS

X Y Axis When it comes to end times in the Bible, the passage that most people are familiar with is Matthew 24. In that chapter, just before his crucifixion and resurrection, Christ charts some of the events and conditions that will take place before his return. You know the drill: wars, famines, pestilence, and earthquakes. In fact, I vividly remember arguing about Christ's return, both against and for, using these same events.

Before I became a Christian, it was Against, and my argument went something like: “Sure, there are wars and earthquakes, but there have always been wars and earthquakes!”
After I became a Christian, it was For, and I embraced the very view that I once argued against: “Hey, look at all these wars and earthquakes!”

True enough for individuals who still take the Against position, events such as “wars” and “earthquakes” are pretty vague when it comes to recognizing the actual approach of Christ's second coming.

CROSSHAIRS
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But there are some verses, further down in Matthew 24, past the wars and earthquakes, that are very precise. I call them the “crosshairs” of the end times. It includes a line that arrives here in Matthew from Daniel. That line then intersects with another line from Thessalonians. It is a specific event that hasn't taken place yet, in a specific building that hasn't been built yet. But, when it does happen, no one will be able to miss it.

It is called the “Abomination of Desolation” —

Mat 24:15-16 : 15 When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:) 16 Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:

The parenthetical expression “whoso readeth let him understand” has always intrigued me. Is this Jesus encouraging the reading and understanding of Daniel? Or is it Matthew, the Gospel writer, either encouraging the understanding of Daniel or maybe the very words we've just read? Either way, we are told to make an effort to understand.

And no wonder. It is the pivotal event of the end times. It is literally the call to “Head for the hills!” (Mat 24:16). It is the event that will herald in (so to speak) the Great Tribulation —

Mat 24:21-22 : 21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. 22 And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.

Matthew 24:15 says the abomination of desolation will stand in the holy place. The “holy place” is the holy of holies, the inner sanctuary of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, a place visited only by the high priest and only once a year on the Day of Atonement.

The book of Daniel has at least three references to the event.

At the midpoint of the last seven-year period before Christ's return, the Seventieth Week of Daniel's seventy weeks, the “prince that shall come,” the Antichrist, will cause the Temple sacrifices to cease and will have an “abomination” set up that makes it “desolate” —

Dan 9:27 : ... and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate ...

In a later chapter in Daniel, in the middle of prophecies related to the military and political manuverings of the Antichrist during the Seventieth Week, the event is mentioned again —

Dan 11:31 : ... and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate.

And finally, at the end of the last chapter of Daniel, when the final days and timings are being foretold, the event is referred to once more —

Dan 12:11 : And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days.

These passages in Daniel clearly tie Daniel's end-time prophecies with the prophecies in Matthew. This is the first line, the line from Daniel to Matthew 24.

The second line comes from verses in Paul's second letter to the Thessalonians —

2Th 2:3-4 : 3 ... and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

It is the Antichrist again, the man of sin, the son of perdition. He will sit in the Temple declaring that he is God.

This is the second line to Matthew 24, intersecting with the line from Daniel.

There are echoes of the same event in Revelation 13, where the beast, the Antichrist, is exalted. All that dwell on earth are compeled to worship him. Those that don't receive his mark and worship him will face death.

A TEMPLE?
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Temple

Nowhere, in any of the Old Testament or New Testament prophecies concerning Christ's second coming, is there a specific prophecy that says “A new Temple will be built just before his return.”

But there it is, in Daniel, Matthew, and 2 Thessalonians, implied with the actions of the Antichrist in the sanctuary.

There is also the matter of Malachi —

Mal 3:1 : Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.

Forget your wars and earthquakes, you've got a Temple to argue with. And not just any Temple, but a fully-functioning Jewish Temple situated on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

A TEMPLE!
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Temple Crosshairs

As unlikely as a new Jewish Temple being built in Jerusalem may sound now, it is closer than you think.

When Israel captured the Temple Mount in June 1967 during the Six-Day War, many believing Christians, knowing the prophecies, recognized the significance of the event. In fact, one evangelical Christian, thinking that the removal of the Islamic holy sites on the Temple Mount would hasten the rebuilding of the Temple, went so far as to set the Al-Aqsa mosque on fire in 1969. Such actions are misguided. God is perfectly capable of working out the events in his own way and on his own schedule.

It is very likely that the way most believing Christians now imagine that events will unfold in the future, with the destruction of the Islamic holy sites and rebuilding of the Jewish Temple in their place, will not be quite how it happens. Maybe the original Temple site will be determined to be on a vacant area on the Temple Mount? Maybe, as part of a comprehensive peace agreement, the Jewish Temple will be rebuilt near the Islamic sites but not replace them? Maybe the Antichrist will have such acceptance among Muslims (who perhaps regard him as their Mahdi) that he will be able to broker this arrangement? Maybe. I don't know. The Bible doesn't say. I'm just confident that the situation will have a twist or two that can't be seen now but will be obvious when they happen.

This much is certain, though. There will be a Temple. And the Temple will be desecrated. You can bet on it.

LINKS
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The Stone — A poem about Jesus Christ and the rebuilding of the Temple.

The Temple Mount in Jerusalem — An extensive website on the location of the Jewish Temple.

Companion Bible Appendix 89 — The Visions of Daniel (Chs. 7-12) are Synchronous.

Companion Bible Appendix 155 — The Two Great Prophecies of “The End of the Age.”