Apostasy and Its Effects on the Church (Matt. 24:1–28)

Don Carson: We have no reason to think that our relative freedoms will continue. We have every reason to think that they won’t. Short of the renewing grace of God and short of international revival, we have every expectation to think that, democracy or no democracy, the church will be persecuted again.

This text says that what is characteristic of this entire inter-advental age is opposition of the church of Jesus Christ. Nor is this text alone. You cannot read the last part of John 15 and the first part of John 16 without seeing that. You can’t read Paul (“Yea, all those who live godly lives in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution”) without seeing that.

B) Apostasy

Verse 10: “At that time …” Again, the same connecting word, which simply means during this period. “… many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.” I don’t intend to embark on a long discussion on apostasy, but perhaps I should say a few words.

I think the cardinal reason many people have difficulty in coming to grips with the biblical doctrine of apostasy lies in their error to come to grips with the biblical doctrine of conversion. If conversion is defined as that change of life brought about by repentance and faith that perseveres to the end, then it is quite understandable that there may be another kind of “conversion” that introduces some changes, some transformation, some tasting of the Spirit, and some tasting of grace that does not continue to the end.

That theme, I want to argue, is found everywhere in Scripture. Hebrews 3:14 tells us, “We are made partakers with Christ Jesus if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end.” The connection of tenses is remarkable. “We are made partakers with Christ Jesus if we continue to hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast until the end.”

Or, again, in 1 John 2:19, John excoriates some who went out from us in order that it might be perfectly obvious that they never were of us. That means, of course, that they had been baptized. They were members of the church. They were communicants. They were participating as full members of the church. “But in leaving us,” John says, “they proved that they never really were of us because if they had been of us, they would have remained with us.”

In other words, apostasy in the New Testament is turning away from a profession you have adopted, it is turning away from a stance, from a profession of faith, from an orientation of life, from a public commitment, from a self-identification that you once made, but in so turning away you identify that you cannot possibly be real, for the real perseveres, by definition.

Now the Lord Jesus himself insists that this entire inter-advental period will be characterized by a great deal of apostasy. You don’t have to read long in the history of the church to recognize that that has been a recurring theme. One generation rises up with blessing from the Lord and renewal, and the children (or the children’s children or the children’s children’s children) either encrust the doctrine with mere habit and spiritual turpitude or deviate in the doctrine with merely the veneer of piety until there is a shell of ecclesiastical conformity but no vitality.

So we hunger, again and again, for reformation and for revival. The whole history of the church could be set out as the history of apostasy. Is that not what Jesus predicted? It should not surprise us. “… many false prophets will appear and deceive many people.” We sometimes think that despite the warnings of Scripture, false prophets will somehow be very obvious to us.

We don’t think they will have tails with spears on the ends and ears that are a little warmer than some people’s, but, on the other hand, they will be so notoriously wicked, so obviously bad and deceptive that anybody with half a grain of spiritual acumen can spot them a mile off. However, the warnings against deception have to be taken very seriously. It must mean they are very tricky people to find out.

Nowhere does the Devil come to us in the guise of a false deceiver and say, “Go ahead, here’s a great big hunk of heresy. Believe it and damn your soul.” Rather, he comes to us saying, “This is the avant-garde approach. We want to retain the old doctrine, but this approach is novel, and it is more in tune with the keeping of this age. You ought to understand this insight.” It reminds me of the old preacher who said, “You say I am not with it. My friend, I do not doubt it. But when I see what I’m not with, I’d rather be without it.”

Or, conversely, let us be quite frank. The Devil may also come in people with a real love of traditionalism who don’t really understand the age they’re addressing at all, who are very interested in theoretical doctrine and sermonizing but forget that there are people out there. Somehow, again, the church can be taken away and led down a primrose path of intellectualism that is equally damning, and all for the sake of upholding pure doctrine.

“There are many false prophets, and they deceive many people. Indeed, because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold …” It is very interesting that it is not because of an increase of hate that the love of most will grow cold but because of an increase of wickedness. There is a connection between the affections of the heart and the moral rectitude of the people.

Where wickedness abounds and our tolerance levels of it are changed subtly by the mass media, by the things that bombard our senses, by our reading … day in and day out … we can become philosophical about evil instead of indignant. Then something happens to our love life in all of this as well. This kind of philosophical approach to evil, this kind of introspective analysis of our society is without passion.

It’s without indignation, and it’s without love. It’s merely right. “The love of many grows cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.” This age is characterized by apostasy, and the real church of Christ continues with perseverance and fidelity under it.

C) Worldwide preaching

Verse 14: “This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” How this “whole world” is to be taken is almost anybody’s guess. Some have argued that it must mean that every single solitary tribe has a Bible translation in their own tongue.

That’s possible, though not quite required by the text. Some have argued that it was already fulfilled in the book of Acts, where already some of Paul’s opposers say, “This is the man who is causing an uproar in the whole world,” which is slight hyperbole since there were many parts of the whole world that had not yet heard of Paul.

What it does mean, however, is that this entire inter-advental age is characterized by worldwide preaching of the gospel. Just as it’s characterized by opposition and persecution and by recurrent bouts of apostasy, it’s also characterized by worldwide preaching of the gospel. When the Lord determines that the worldwide preaching of the gospel has run its proper course, then the end will come.

D) False spiritual leaders with great credibility

Up until now I have merely alluded to these false spiritual leaders under the false prophets of verse 11, but they are discussed over and over. Verse 5: “For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many.” And verse 4: “Watch out that no one deceives you.” That is, in this respect.

Then again in verse 23: “At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect—if that were possible. See, I have told you ahead of time.”

Now I must say a word here about structure. I mentioned inclusio (inclusion) at the very beginning. There is an inclusion that I want to argue here. The first thing that Jesus mentions in verse 4 is false Christs. The last thing that he mentions to close off this section, in verses 23 to 28, is also to do with false Christs. We’ll see in a moment that verses 26 to 28 have to do with that too.

So in other words, you are dealing, therefore, with an entire age that is characterized by false Christs. We ought not to think that each false Christ claims to be the historical Jesus Christ. After all, Christ simply means the anointed one; that’s all. This age runs full of self-anointed people.

Occasionally, you get someone who claims to be the new Christ, or sometimes you get people heading up cults who act as if they have the authority of Christ, but not too often do you find people actually coming along and saying, “I am Jesus Christ.” However, you sure find a lot of people who see themselves as specially anointed by God.

Let me suggest a little bit of biblical theology to you in this respect. Under the old covenant, the Spirit of God came with special power and enduement on prophets, priests, kings and, occasionally, on special other designated leaders … Bezalel and one or two others, Levites under certain circumstances, and so forth.

In other words, the Spirit of God manifested himself primarily to the leaders of the people, and under that covenant, the leader is qualitatively set off as different from the ordinary person under the covenant. Therefore, even David, as long as Saul was on the throne, remembers, “Touch not my anointed, and do my messengers no harm.” Saul was the Lord’s anointed, and as long as he was king, David was not going to rebel against him. There was a qualitative difference bound up with those leaders.

Under the new covenant, things change. What do we read in the promise of Jeremiah 31:29 and following? There we read, “They no longer will teach every man his neighbor, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know me, from the least to the greatest.” We read again in Joel 2 that under the new covenant, the Spirit is poured out upon the young men and upon the young women, upon the maidservants and upon the menservants.

That, fulfilled on the day of Pentecost, indicates a new approach under the new covenant in which the Lord works by an interior covenant, if I may put it that way, so that there is no longer any qualitative difference between the leader and the led. None. That’s why there are so many passages in the New Testament that say, for example, as in 1 John 2, “You don’t have need of teachers because you all have this anointing.”

This does not mean, of course, that there is no need for any teacher under any circumstance because, after all, what do you think John is doing there but teaching? Of course, the New Testament says that there are roles for teachers in the church, but they are no longer roles marked out by the special enduement of the Spirit such that that person is qualitatively different from all others in the church. It is now a distinction of role. It is a distinction of assignment. It is a distinction of great gift. It is not a distinction of qualitative difference.

So when someone comes along who claims to be a prophet in a special sense that makes him qualitatively different from other teachers and claims authority, not only is he a potential deceiver but he’s under the wrong covenant. It misunderstands the gift of prophecy in the New Testament, which is qualitatively different from the gift of prophecy under the old.

Jesus says that there will be many deceivers during this age … prophets, anointed ones, Christs … who will deceive many. This is so important in his thinking that he makes it a kind of inclusio at the beginning and at the end of this whole period. Not only so, but world elect in verse 22 is a regular word for all of Christ’s redeemed people.

This becomes very important because I am about to argue that the division comes between verse 21 and verse 22. Most people read verses 15 to 22 together so that verse 22 (“If those days had not been cut short …”) refers to the those days of the abomination of desolation. I don’t believe it because the verse goes on to say, “If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive …” In Greek, it is pas sarx, which means no flesh: not simply no Jews, but nobody.

“… for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened.” That’s a regular expression for all of God’s redeemed people. In other words, I want to argue that verse 22 has now abandoned, already, the theme of the destruction of the temple in verses 15 to 21 and is reverting, now, to the entire period of the birth pains.

In other words, in this entire period of the birth pains, if those days (this entire inter-advental period) had not been cut short, no one would survive. Do you find it so difficult to believe that in this day of nuclear holocaust, with evil and the potential for destruction so fantastic on the world that unless these days are cut short, no flesh would survive? Is that so very hard to believe? It’s not just talking, in other words, about no flesh in Jerusalem, but no flesh. That’s a standard expression in the Greek tongue for nobody.

The elect is all of God’s people, not simply those who happen to still be stuck in Jerusalem. It’s never used so restrictively. Moreover, when we read “If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened” and then read in verse 29, “Immediately after the distress of those days …” we are to understand this distress of those days not to be those days to do with the destruction of the temple in AD 70 but those days of this entire period.

You see, if in verse 22, we have now reverted to discussing this entire inter-advental period, then the those days in verse 29 simply refers to that entire inter-advental period. Structure. Structure, gentlemen. It becomes extremely important to your interpretation of the text. This word distress or tribulation has already been used, by the Lord Jesus himself, in the first part of the chapter.

The word thlipsis occurs already in verse 9. “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me.” The same word distress is used there in the Greek text. It’s exactly the same word. After the distress of those days (verse 29), then the Son of Man returns.

In other words, verses 4 to 28 discuss the birth pangs of the Messiah from beginning to end, but verses 15 to 21 (right in the middle of that section) describe one particularly sharp birth pain: the fall of the temple in AD 70. I think that the indicators for this structure are there in the text. Now then, this means, therefore, that verse 22 and following refers to all the days of the tribulation and the distress, all the days of the inter-advental period.

This age of evangelism and of persecution, of hate and of war, of famines and of false prophets, has the potential for such fantastic destruction that no one would survive unless the Lord himself cut that period short and that for the sake of his church, for the sake of the elect. This is an extremely important passage, I think.

Verse 25 indicates the solemnity of the whole thing. We are warned on the solemn words of Jesus himself, “See, I have told you ahead of time,” in order that we should not be deceived. What is presupposed in these warnings is that simple-minded credulity can be as great an enemy of the Christian faith as hard-nosed skepticism.

Many people will listen to many prophets, and what is characteristic in Jesus’ warning is the warning against credulity, not against skepticism. I want to argue that this principle extends a little further in verses 26 and 28. “If, then, someone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the desert’ …” This Christ, this anointed one. “… do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms’ …”

That is, if anyone points and says, “Here is the great Savior. Here is the person with the inside track. Here is the person with such a special relationship with God, such an inside qualitative difference to his life, such an anointing from on high, that he is the one to rescue our generation. He’s the one to lead the church out of its dilemma. He’s the anointed one from God in our time and age,” don’t go and follow him. Don’t go out to the desert to see him. Don’t go into a private chamber to see him. It’s just not worth it.

For the next thing on the agenda is the return of the Son of Man so apocalyptically, so unqualifiedly, so openly, so indisputably that no one will have any doubt that he and he alone is the Savior of the world. I think that that is precisely what is meant by the reference to lightning. “As the lightning that comes from the east and flashes to the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” When he comes, lightning may originate in the east, but it lightens up the whole sky; everybody can see it. There’s no doubt.

I think that is also the import of the vultures in verse 28. There are several interpretations that are given, but I think the obvious one is probably correct. “Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.” That is to say, it will be as impossible for mankind to miss the parousia as for vultures to miss seeing carrion. Therefore, we should not delude ourselves into thinking that this leader or that leader has all the answers.

There is a broader application here. There is a whole philosophy percolating in various circles in evangelicalism today (in fact, several different philosophies) of how the church should view itself and world history and its mission at the moment, of what it should do to get on the inside track, on the right track. Let me give you some examples. There’s a powerful group out of Tyler, Texas, that has all the problems bound up with a certain Reformed economics.

There is another group associated with Ron Sider that has the whole thing nailed down in terms of a little more social and financial justice in the world. Then again, there’s a group associated with the lot of Reformed scholars, Calvin College and other places (Reformed in a larger sense) that want to the see the permeation of society by thinkers, by writers, and by the intelligentsia so that we grasp the levers of power in politics, in economics, and in the media so that, again, we can turn the nation around for Christ.

Then, of course, there’s the Anabaptist view. Then there are those that are more narrowly defined, theologically speaking. There are some who are convinced that if you just preach the five points you will have reformation and others who are equally convinced that if you just preach free will you’ll have reformation.

But what happens in these things is a kind of set agenda for renewal, usually associated with a philosophy which is, in turn, often associated with a few crucial names. If you’re in that inner ring of names, then, of course, all those in the inner ring pat each other on the back. You’re either on the inside or on the outside. It’s what C.S. Lewis called the inner ring syndrome. That’s a dilute form of the same revolting malady that Jesus warns us against.

What we ultimately need is a breadth of vision that believes all that God gives us in his Word but is not too quick to believe anything else, that tries carefully, thoughtfully, and humbly to see what we can learn of economics from Tyler, Texas, or from Ron Sider (and I think both have strong points and both have fatal weaknesses) and not to believe that any one of them constitutes a kind of revolutionizing key.

We can institute any kind of political system and any kind of economic system that we like in the whole world, and if we don’t have redeemed men it will fall apart in a generation. At the end of the day it’s the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom in the whole world that is to characterize the principal activity of the church.

E) The sharp birth pain

Verses 15 to 21. I will summarize these verses quickly. This “abomination that causes desolation” (I think that this the right rendering; I don’t think it means abomination that is characterized by desolation but an abomination that causes desolation) is an expression used four times in the book of Daniel.

I do not have time, now, to draw the connections between those and this one. Suffice it to say that Jesus himself sees a connection and, as a result, says, “Let the reader understand.” He means the reader of Daniel. He doesn’t mean the reader of Matthew since when he spoke, Matthew wasn’t written. Nor is it Matthew’s editorial comment put in. It is Jesus’ comment saying, “Let the reader of Daniel understand.”

“When the ‘abomination that causes desolation’ stands in the holy place,” he says, “then be warned.” The holy place normally refers to the temple, but I suspect that this is a more generic expression. In Mark 13:14 the expression is simply “standing where it ought not.” In Luke 21:20 it is, “When you see the armies surrounding Jerusalem, then flee.”

The point is that once the armies did begin to approach Jerusalem then the temple was desecrated in any case. The Zealots took over, murdered a couple of people, installed the false high priests and the like, and so the holy place was desecrated. “When you see these things going on,” Jesus says, “flee.”

There is fairly good … it’s not quite absolutely convincing, but fairly good … Christian conviction that the Christians in Jerusalem so took this warning to heart that when AD 66 began to arrive and the writing was on the wall, and finally, when the armies began to approach in AD 68, the Christians fled. They fled to Pella. They fled to the hill country of Jerusalem. They got out. The Christians left the city and abandoned it. The warning was taken, in other words.

How are you going to flee? It’s important to notice here that all of the descriptions fit the historical circumstances of ancient Jerusalem. This is a historically-specific passage. “Let no one that is on the roof of his house go down to take anything out of the house.” Many of the houses were flat, so you’d go up there in the cool of the day in order to catch the evening breezes.

When you hear the armies are approaching, don’t even bother going down; just jump from roof to roof. Keep on going over the wall and get out. It’s simply a way of speaking urgently. Or supposing you hear when you’re not inside the city. Supposing you’re outside in the field. Just get out. Don’t bother going back into the city, picking up your belongings, and hiring a moving van. Just keep on moving. Get out.

“Pray, then, that your flight will not take place in winter …” When passage of streams was much more difficult and the weather was much more hazardous. “… or on the Sabbath.” When many people would put barriers in your way, the gates would be closed, and it would be very difficult to buy food. “How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers!” The imagination is stunning.

“For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.” What does that mean? “Surely,” you would say, “there have been more Jews killed in this century than in that.” Stalin could bump off his 20 million. Even if Russia were to enter the state of Israel today, you couldn’t find more than about 2.2 million Jews. That’s all there are. What does this mean?

This is not hyperbolic. Let me suggest to you that in the first place, it’s a difficult passage under any interpretation, because if you understand this to be the great tribulation at the end of the age, regardless of the details of your eschatology, then it seems slightly inane for the text to say that there will never again after that time be such a serious tribulation, because after that time it’s only either (depending on your eschatology) the millennium or the new heaven and the new earth when, presumably, there will not be such a great distress again.

In that sense, this reference to “unequaled from the beginning—and never to be repeated again” becomes justification for the view that it’s referring to AD 70. Then isn’t it slightly hyperbolic? Well, perhaps not. The Warsaw Jews in World War II were just about wiped out, but a few thousand escaped.

Auschwitz was an abomination, but some few thousand did escape. Stalin was merciless, but millions of believers did escape. When the Romans closed on Jerusalem, no one escaped. The few who tried to and ran to Masada? They all died too. They either were caught and executed or they became slaves.

Josephus has terrifying descriptions of the famine so rife that mothers were boiling their children to eat them. They were eating their own defecation. I find it possible to believe that not in terms of magnitude but perhaps in terms of density and percentages (if I may speak in that term for so terrifying a catastrophe) there has not ever been a disaster so overwhelming, and there never will be again.

Nor does this mean that there is necessarily no tribulation at the end of the age either. It may be broader in its scope. For example, 1 John 2:18 can say, “Even as you heard that the antichrist is coming, so now there are many antichrists.” So there are many antichrists in our time too, but that still presupposes that the Antichrist is to come.

I think, brothers and sisters in Christ, we have confused the great tribulation with the end of the age, when there are two great tribulations. There is the great tribulation which, for its density and concentration, is now, thank God, behind us. Then there is a final outbreak of evil before the Lord returns at the end, which is simply not in view here because this passage is describing the inter-advental wickedness throughout the entire period.

Let me conclude. These final remarks simply try to draw one or two practical lessons from what has been said.

First, we must remember that it is normal in this age for the church to face reproach, some of it violent. If we are pastorally inclined, we will insist that our people expect it and suggest, even, that by the integrity of their life, they may well earn it. In any case, unless we see repentance and revival, we shall, in the West, experience it.

Secondly, this suffering is to go hand in hand with worldwide preaching. In other words, the promise of a certain opposition is never, ever in Scripture to be justification for a fearful sitting on your hands and waiting for the Lord to come back. It is precisely preaching in the teeth of opposition that characterizes the fervor of the church in Acts, with believers counting it a great source of joy that they are counted worthy to suffer for the sake of the name. We need to pray for more of the holy boldness for which the church sought the face of God in Acts 4.

Thirdly, the conjunction of these two themes … preaching the gospel worldwide and facing a certain amount of opposition and flak … spells out the death of triumphalism. Triumphalism is one of the endemic sins of our generation in the West, this constant effort for one-upmanship, this constant attempt to parade a Christian superior life that somehow floats above all of the vicissitudes of life, the turmoil and terrors of the soul, and the fears of emotional or material impoverishment or the like.

The modern view of the victorious Christian life of being a more-than-conqueror-type Christian somehow puts you above it all. In Paul’s day, it is rather living victoriously when you are “like sheep persecuted all day long and counted as worthy of the slaughter.” It is the conjunction of the two themes … bold preaching under opposition … that spells the death of triumphalism.

Finally, the values of the age to come must prevail in the church. This whole passage is now getting us ready for the description of the Lord’s return and for the long set of parables on the nature of our waiting (at the end of chapter 24 and all the way through chapter 25). Already, you can see that the values of the eschaton, the values of the end, are to be read back into our current period of persecution and suffering so that we face what we do today with our eyes wide open from the perspective of Christ’s return.

It’s possible, I suppose, for a church so to stress the heavenlies that they forget their earthly responsibilities. It is possible, but that has been an exceedingly rare thing in the history of the church. Indeed, when the church has been most aware of its spiritual opportunities and glories and privileges and strengths, it has been most motivated to act compassionately, with holy boldness and truthfulness and integrity in every sphere of human existence.

I don’t know how many biographies of Spurgeon that I’ve read, but I read Dallimore’s the other evening. I read it through, and was moved again with how the gospel openly, boldly, freely proclaimed can so transform a single church that it transforms all of society within its purview. We need that vision.