“And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple; and His disciples came to Him for to show Him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said unto them, See you not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down. And as He sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto Him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the world? And Jesus answered...” (Matthew 24:1-4)
He answered fully. His answer covers all the time from that time until His coming and the end of the world.
A number of important matters are touched, and others are quite fully considered. But the first of all things said in the Lord’s answer to the question of His disciples, is,
“...Take heed that no man deceive you.” (Matthew 24:4)
This, then, is the most important of all considerations in connection with the coming of the Lord and the end of the world.
This thought is repeated and emphasized by Paul, when he writes of the same subject:
“Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him, That you be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means.” (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3)
To be deceived with respect to the coming of the Lord and the end of the world is the worst possible deception; for to be so deceived is to be unprepared for that wonderful and all-decisive event, and so is to be taken unawares, and to be destroyed. For
“...the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden de struction comes upon them; and they shall not escape.” (1 Thessalonians 5:2-3)
“...for as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth.” (Luke 21:35)
To be deceived into thinking that the Lord is not coming when He is coming, is to be unprepared, and so taken unawares and destroyed.
To be deceived into thinking that He is coming when He is not coming, is only to be disappointed, and so by the deception and disappointment to be caused not to believe in His coming when He is really coming, and thus, also, to be not ready, and therefore to be taken unawares, and, as a consequence, destroyed.
And just because to be thus deceived involves the most fatal of all consequences, Jesus begins His instruction on this all-important question with that which is the most important of all considerations:
“Take heed that no man deceive you.”
Further, this is the most important of all instruction in connection with the subject, because in this very matter more ef fort is made to deceive than in any other. Jesus Himself says:
“For many shall come in My name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.” (Matthew 24:5)
And again,
“Many false prophets shall arise, and shall deceive many.” (Matthew 24:11)
And yet again,
There shall arise false christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. Behold, I have told you before. (Matthew 24:24-25)
Having taken such precaution as this, and having shown such care to guard all against being deceived, it must needs be that He would make the whole matter so plain that all may escape deception. This, indeed, He has done. He has done it so thoroughly that any one who will believe His Word, can entirely escape all deception as to His coming, whether as to the personality, the time, or the manner of His coming.
First, as to the personality and manner of His coming. Note again His word in verse 5:
“Many shall come in My name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.” (Matthew 24:5)
It is therefore perfectly plain that any one who comes any where, at any time, or in any manner, saying, “I am Christ,” is a deceiver; and no one is ever to believe any such representation.
Again He says,
If any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. (Matthew 24:25)
From this it is perfectly plain that whenever or wherever one person shall say to another,
“Christ is come here, or He has come there, come and see Him,”
that person is a deceiver, and, if he believes it himself, is himself deceived. And no person in the world is ever to be lieve that any such thing as that is the coming of the Lord.
Jesus further emphasizes this:
“Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, He is in the desert; go not forth; behold, He is in the secret chambers, be lieve it not.” (Matthew 24:26)
Surely, then, no one need ever be deceived in any of these ways as to the coming of the Lord; it is exceedingly easy to escape all deception in any of these ways. The way is made perfectly plain; the tests are all simple, and easily applied; and the word concerning them is brief and easily remembered. All that any one needs to do is simply to believe this simple word of Jesus.
Yet He does not stop even here. He goes on and states the case so clearly as absolutely to preclude any possibility of deception as to His coming, on the part of anybody who will pay any attention whatever to His word. He not only tells, as in the words already quoted, that any person coming and say ing, “I am Christ,” or saying, “Lo, He is here, in the secret chamber,” or, “Lo, He is there, in the desert,” is a deceiver, but He tells why all such ideas are deception. And here is the rea son:
“For as the lightning comes out of the east, and shines even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. As stated in another place,” (Matthew 24:26)
“For as the lightning, that lightens out of the one part under heaven, shines unto the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in His day.” (Luke 17:24)
That is a reason so simple, so easily remembered, and yet so conclusive, it annihilates every possibility of deception as to His coming on the part of anybody who has any disposi tion whatever to believe the Word of Jesus as to His own coming again to the world.
There is no possibility of any one counterfeiting His coming, and when that coming is in its brightness as the lightning that brilliantly lightens up the whole heavens and earth, there is neither chance nor need for one person to say to others, “Lo, here He is, or there.” It is even written,
“Behold, He comes with clouds; and every eye shall see Him.” (Revelation 1:7)
How, then, could it be possible to counterfeit it? and how can anybody be deceived with regard to it, who will but believe the Word?
A word farther as to the heavenly-shining brightness in which the Lord’s coming is displayed; the cause of this is not in some particular display that is made to grace the occasion; it is simply the nature of His coming itself. For He Himself comes in His own proper glory; He comes also in the glory of the Father, and with the holy angels.
Now of Jesus Himself in His glory it is written,
“His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace... ...and his countenance was as the sun shining in his strength.” (Revelation 1:14-16)
Of the Father it is written that He dwells in “the light which no man can approach unto”--a light so far above the brightness of the sun that in that day the sun shall be ashamed (Isaiah 24:23), and the city of God has no need of the sun to shine in it, for the glory of God lightens it, and the Lamb is the light thereof (Revelation 21:23).
This is the glory of the Father and of Christ, in which Jesus appears at His second coming.
Yet even this is not all; the holy angels come with Him. And of but one of these it is written that
“His countenance was like lightning, and His raiment was white as snow.” (Matthew 28:3)
This of only one; and yet when Jesus comes there come with Him of these “ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands,” “an innumerable company“--such a mighty host that the heavens are so filled with them and their glory that the whole seems like vast billows of clouds. The whole heavens are perfectly “wrapped in a blaze of boundless glory.”
And such as this is the coming of the Lord. This, and this only, is the manner of His coming.
Yet more. The accompaniments of that coming: