Coming of the King: Week 51

Matthew 24:29-51: The Return of the King

• 24:29 "sun shall be darkened ..." - literal and/or figurative? In Isaiah 13:9-22 there is the same language with a clear historical fulfillment, but also pointing to the Day of the Lord.
• 24:32 "fig tree" - literal and/or figurative? The parable makes perfect sense without reference to Israel as a figure of something that develops over time. But the fig tree is also a figure of Israel as a nation.
• 24:34 "this generation shall not pass" - "mostly fulfilled" in 70 AD, including the abomination of desolation (v15), the persecutions and judgments (v17-22), the false prophets (v23-26), and even signs in the heavens (v27-29) (although not the same signs). We can infer that when the final fulfillment comes, it will all happen within a generation.
• 24:36 "no man knows the day nor the hour" - the precise timing cannot be known - only the drawing near. I've found it quite a challenge to know when butternut squash is ripe. There are many signs as it draws near, but they still get picked green or rot on the vine.
• 24:39 "And they were oblivious" - Noah had been preaching for a generation and building an ark, and the ark was complete. It shouldn't have been a surprise, but it was. So it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
• 24:40 "taken" - in v39 the word is "taken away"/"removed". Here, the word is "brought near"/"put into office". This is not the rapture of pre-trib eschatology, which would have happened 7 years earlier. Dr McGee and Bible-studys.org say this refers to taking in judgement, as in only one survivor, based on juxtaposition to the example of the Flood - but the words for "taken" are totally different.
• 24:46 "Blessed is that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns." - this is the goal of the Christian life. To do only what we see our Father in Heaven doing.