“Be on Your Guard” (Mark 13:14-23)

Jesus watched as twilight fell on Jerusalem. All who sat with Him on the Mount of Olives in the gathering darkness listened intently and looked with the eyes of their spirit as Jesus described what lay beyond the visible horizon. As the fine mist of night began to encircle them and they approached the last hours of the day, Jesus told them what to expect. He pulled back the filmy veil of time and pointed His followers to the end of one kingdom and to the time of His return.

“Be on guard; I have told you all things beforehand” (Mark 13:23). He had told them that there was a time of tribulation coming that had not been from the beginning of the creation that God created. His disciples listened intently, trying to understand, each one praying that they would recognize “the abomination of desolation standing where he ought not to be” (Mark 13:14).

The abomination of  desolation had been first prophesied by Daniel when Gabriel came to him in swift flight in the gathering dusk at the time of the evening sacrifice. Gabriel had come to give Daniel insight and understanding concerning his people and the holy city, to finish the transgression, and to put an end to sin. Gabriel spoke of seventy weeks that had been decreed for Daniel’s people. Gabriel had warned that the end would come with a flood, there would be war, and desolation and finally, “On the wings of abomination shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolate” (Daniel 9:27).

As the disciples watched the pale stars appear they remembered their history. Antiochus Epiphanes, a Syrian ruler, had desecrated the temple by building an altar in the courtyard to the Grecian god Zeus. He then sacrificed swine's flesh upon the altar. In His final desecration he set up a trade of prostitution in the temple chambers. The cold reality of what Jesus was telling them caused them to shiver. The kingdom of God would come, but with it would come a time of great tribulation.

“Let no man deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (2 Thessalonians 2:3,4). Today, in the twilight of time as I await the coming of Jesus, I hear again the warning of Jesus, “Be on your guard; I have told you all things beforehand” (Mark 13:23).


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