November 15, 2021
Please use the comment section on this page to share insights from today’s reading OR your own personal Bible reading.
Reading along with us in Luke? Here’s today’s reading:
Luke 21 (NIV)
The Widow’s Offering
1 As Jesus looked up, he saw the rich putting their gifts into the temple treasury. 2 He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins. 3“Truly I tell you,”he said, “this poor widow has put in more than all the others. 4 All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”........Continue Reading
Luke starts this chapter with the widow’s offering and how important that offering was to Jesus. Because she had given so sacrificially beyond her means those 2 coins were so precious to God.
Then we move into the labor pains of end times and how much we will see leading up to the time of Jesus’ return. The wars, destruction, the false prophets, and the persecution of believers.
But the chapter finishes with a reminder that He is returning and all of this will be a mere memory when He reigns victorious so we must be ready. Rather than focus on the troubles to come stay fixed on God.
“Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man.”
In the previous chapter, Jesus said that “He (God) is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive”. In this chapter, verse 36 reminds us to “Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of God.” Come Lord Jesus!
Luke 21
Luke 20&21
Luke 21
What an important lesson that it is not the amount of the offering that matters, but it’s relative value to the giver….the more sacrificial the more faith that is involved as well. And this widow gives the utmost….and as I remember one preacher say, and Jesus did not give it back!
And as the disciples marvel at the temple, Jesus makes it clear that there will be a time when it will be completely destroyed. And here in Luke, the disciples only ask about that event and it’s precursors as opposed to in Matthew they ask about His coming and the end of the age. So it seems to be appropriate here to associate the majority of Jesus comments to be about 70 AD, when the temple is destroyed, but it seems clear as well that He moves beyond that to talk about the future, especially when He references the end specifically. In fact right off the bat He puts the presence of false Christs as a precursor to the end. Wars and rumors of wars will also come before the end, but we can imagine that coming as well when the Romans were preparing to invade Jerusalem. Signs I the heavens and earthly calamities are also most often associated with the end.
When Jesus mentions being persecuted and brought before rulers and being thrown in prison, the closest reference would be the 1st century, but I imagine believers will face that in the end as well. Certainly when he talks about Jerusalem being surrounded, He is prophesying the event of 70 AD. It is this context that Jesus mentions the time of the gentiles needing to be fulfilled and that leads Him to talk about the end….cosmic events and Jesus coming in the clouds. But the most important points here are to be watchful and prepared and not let our faith waiver and becoming fearful and depressed. Because when these things come it is the sign that the end is near and Jesus will return and then heaven will be our home!
I think it is easy to intermingle multiple prophesies about what will occur in the end times. I think it is somewhat intentional as many OT prophesies have near and far fulfillments, such as Christ coming such as Psalm 22 being about Christ’s crucifixion and Isaiah where it talks about the government being on His shoulders. I think this is where we mix up the second coming of Christ to the earth with the rapture of His church, taking us up to Him. You can infer that they are not the same, because in one they are told to flee to the mountains, and in the other it says it will be as a thief, as lightning. We tend to take what Christ gave as “non-signs” as signs, wars, rumors of wars, persecution, earthquakes, etc are not signs of the end, but there are specific things that are. This makes me think that prior to the tribulation, we will be raptured up without notice, people marrying and given in marriage. During the tribulation, there is a set time line of events that could be calculated by the abomination that causes desolation that Jesus mentions in Matthew.