Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction:

If you have your bibles let me invite you to open with me to the book of Mark chapter 13.

We turn to what is the largest block of Jesus teaching in the gospel of Mark.

In each gospel, the author includes what is a kind of final discourse before the events of Jesus’ death, and resurrection.

In these final sections of teaching,

Jesus prepares his disciples for what is to come after he dies, resurrects, and ascends back to the Father.

In this case, Jesus speaks to what life will be like for the Christian in the last days… the days between his ascension into heaven and his return to Earth.

Mark 13 includes prophecy that was to be fulfilled in the more immediate future, and prophecy that is not to be completely fulfilled until the very end of the story.

The trouble, however, is discerning which parts are for the immediate historical fulfillment and which parts are for the further away fulfillment at the end of the world, when Jesus will return again.

For this reason, Mark 13 has been the subject of a lot of debate.

It is easily the most difficult chapter in the gospel of Mark to interpret.

I had originally planned to do all of Mark chapter 13 in just two sermons…, but upon a deeper dive this week I think it will be best that we slow down a little bit and consider what Jesus is preparing his disciples for…, and by extension what he is preparing us for.

So we are going to begin by reading verses 1-13 this morning and then we will pray for understanding…, then we will give our attention to just verses 1-4 this week.…

and then 5-13 next week.

So lets read the word of God.

Lets Pray

Everything from Mark chapter 11 through the end of Mark chapter 12 happened within the temple.

If you remember back to a couple months ago in our study of Mark 11….

Jesus has already told us that he is headed to the cross.

Jesus came to die on a cross for the sins of man… and three times he predicted exactly how it would happen…

It would be the religious elite in the temple who would reject him, beat him, and push for his crucifixion.

This is the plan.

When Jesus gets to Jerusalem… he heads straight for the temple.

And he was appalled by what he saw there.

The sanhedrin was the collective leadership in the temple.

It was a group made up of different sub-groupings of the religious council.

They were parading themselves around receding the praise of men.… all the while they were getting rich off of the worshippers.

Money exchange tables were positioned throughout the courts of the gentiles so that money was exchanged for a special temple coin, and animals for sacrifice could be bought.

The whole system was rigged to take advantage of the people for the benefit of people who said that they were servants of God. .

In Mark 11, Jesus flips the tables of the money changers in the temple…

He begins to drive them out and he declares judgment over the temple with these words, “my house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations, but you have made it a den of robbers”

That scene caused no little commotion, and in the chapters that followed Jesus was confronted by all three sub-groups of religious leaders in the temple.

the remainder of chapters 11 and 12 describe for us several confrontations between Jesus and the scribes, pharissees, and sadducees within the temple.

With each confrontation, the religious were shown to be foolish, and Jesus was shown to be the one who spoke the very words of God with the authority of God.

Now Mark chapter 13:1 signals a change in scenery.

Jesus and the disciples come out of the temple.

And as they leave, one of the disciples makes what would have been a fairly appropriate passing comment.

If you were not here for our introduction to the Jerusalem temple, let me set the stage for you so you understand the disciple’s comment.

The temple in Jerusalem was THE place in Judaism where the presence of God was manifested among his people.

It was the center of worship of the one true God.

It was where Jews from all over the ancient world would pilgrimage to worship, to pray, to learn, to make sacrifices.

And its physical construction was meant to point to the magnitude of the one true God.

These are historical facts about a real historical place.

The circumference of the temple court was nearly a mile.

The thirty-five acre enclosure could accomadate twelve football fields and according to Josephus the Jewish historian, the blocks of stone used in construction were up to sixty feet in length and weighed up to a million pounds.

The stones used to build the temple mount exceeded the size of any other temple in the ancient world.

the little group of disciples walking with Jesus out of the temple would have been overwhelmed by its magnitude....

thus the passing comment,

“Teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings.”

Their comment was totally understandable...

But Jesus’ response was incomprehensible to them...

This is a declaration of judgment on the temple.

Its something that Jesus actually alluded to at the beginning of this whole section on the temple.

Remember the fig tree episode upon Jesus’ first visit to the temple In Mark 11.

In Mark 11, Jesus came upon a fig tree that appeared to have fruit, but upon closer examination was actually a fruitless tree.

Jesus verbally cursed the tree, and said that it would never bear fruit again.

Then Jesus visited the temple… where he discovered it to be beautiful upon the outside, yet spiritually fruitless on the inside.

When Jesus leaves the temple, the disciples see the fig tree which he had verbally cursed And the tree had withered away to the roots.

It was a living parable.

It was a sign to the power of the authoritative words of Jesus.

When Jesus declares judgment over something… its going to happen.

When Jesus says something will happen… His very words have the power to make it so.

Now here, a couple chapters later….

we have Jesus very clearly declaring judgment over one of the largest and most magnificent structure in the ancient world.

“There will not be left one stone upon another that will not be thrown down”

Its not the first time, that judgment on the temple was predicted in Israel’s history.

Even at the temples inauguration in 1 Kings, the possibility of its destruction was made clear.

Here the Lord’s word to Israel in 1 Kings.

1 Kings 9:6–8 (ESV)

6 But if you turn aside from following me, you or your children, and do not keep my commandments and my statutes that I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them, 7 then I will cut off Israel from the land that I have given them, and the house that I have consecrated for my name I will cast out of my sight, and Israel will become a proverb and a byword among all peoples.

8 And this house will become a heap of ruins...

Later, when Israel did turn their backs on God… the prophet Jeremiah warned of impending destruction throughout his ministry.

The prophet Ezekiel sees a vision of God’s presence literally departing from Israel’s midst.

In his vision, God stands up from the mercy seat in the temple… and then he walks out the door.

The vision was meant signify that God’s presence was departing, and the coming judgment was imminent.

After this rejection of God in Israel’s history… the temple was destroyed by Babylon, and was later rebuilt…

Now again… Israel is rejecting God… this time by they are rejecting God specifically by their rejection of Jesus.

Jesus actually leaves the temple in the same way that the presence of God left the temple in Ezekiel’s vision.

They exit the temple and head to the Mt.

Of Olives on the east side of the city and they look back at the temple.

To an avid Old Testament reader… the scene sounds familiar.

The glory of the Lord has once again departed the temple…

and destruction has once again been declared over the temple because they have rejected the one true God…, namely God in the flesh… Jesus of Nazareth.

And as they stand on the Mt. of Olives gazing back at the temple doomed for destruction… the disciples ask Jesus a question.

The disciples recognize that with the destruction of the temple comes a terrible judgment on the whole region.

In fact, they probably assume, that the destruction of the temple also means the end of the world as they know it.

Surely the destruction of the temple would mean the inauguration of the Last Day… the day of judgment on the world and all of God’s enemies.

This is a big deal… and the disciples want to know WHEN it will happen.

They get caught up on what so many get caught up on… WHEN is this gonna happen?

But they don’t ask WHY is this going to happen….

nor do they ask… WHAT shall we be doing in the mean time?

Jesus doesn’t answer the when in this text.… in fact he discourages any attempt to try to figure out the when.

Jesus emphasizes the what to expect in the mean time?

That’s what we are going to talk about next week…

but before we get there….,

I think we should pause and ask the question that the disciples do not ask.

We should ask the question “Why?”

“Why” is it so significant that the temple be utterly destroyed?

Mark, obviously understands the event to be significant.

He has structured three chapters of his gospel around the events in the temple beginning with Jesus’ indictment of the temple…, then ending with Jesus’ final sentencing of the temple.