The Sean McDowell Show - Was Jesus a Failed Prophet? (w/ Darrell Bock)

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

Did Jesus say he would return during the time of his followers but fail to do so? This question has bothered me for awhile, and I finally decided to do a deep-dive by talking with one of the leading NT scholars in the world: Dr. Darrell Bock. We discuss various approaches to this challenge and his favored view. Darrell L. Bock is professor of New Testament at Dallas Theological Seminary and will give us some insight into this claim. READ: Jesus according to Scripture: Restoring the Portrait from the Gospels by Darrell L. Bock (https://a.co/d/8fs5vs1) *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [SMDCERTDISC] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://twitter.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: @sean_mcdowell Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org

Was Jesus a failed prophet? Did he falsely claim to return in the lifetime of his followers? Because this is one of the most common critiques made against Jesus. I invited New Testament scholar, author, and professor, Daryl Bach, to come on the show and help unpack these passages for us and give his perspective. Daryl, thanks so much for coming on and talking about this with me. Oh, Sean, it's great to be with you as always, and it's great to talk from across the country. Well, when I decided to cover this on my channel, which I have not before, you were the first person who came to mind. I thought, I've got to get Darrell on. It's a frightening thought, Sean. I appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks for saying that. But I'm hoping you can just help us make sense of this seeming false prophecy as many claim. But before we jump in, just a couple of questions to help frame this. Whenever I hear kind of an objection to, say, the Christian faith, I always try to place how central this or peripheral is this. So to me, if I hear there's a contradiction in the Bible, that's not unimportant and has questions for, say, inerrancy, but not necessarily the resurrection. I don't think in general a contradiction would be fatal to the Christian faith, although it would be problematic. What would you say is at stake with Jesus potentially making a false prophecy here? Well, this is obviously an important challenge. And let's just start off by saying not all differences equal contradictions.

Sometimes what people do is they'll point out a difference, they'll immediately jump to the conclusion it's a contradiction, and in that then dismiss the point that the Bible is making. There's, as we'll find out as we go through this discussion, there's a lot to be discussed in the passages that are being mentioned, which do indicate kind of at least the appearance of a difference between what Jesus seems to be saying and what's taken place. And so that creates the tension that's being raised here. But that's just a word of caution that we have to think through the claim of a contradiction and work through it before we actually have established that we have a contradiction. So that's the first point really to be making. And then the second point to make just as a way in is to say

that when we think about the way the Bible presents Jesus as a whole, it is that he is in the midst of a career that entails two comings. There's part one and part two, if you want to think about it that way. His ministry on the earth. Of course, there's his current ministry in heaven from the standpoint of faith. And then there's the idea that he's going to return and finish what he started. So we're actually in the middle of the journey as opposed to being in a position to assess everything that this person claimed about himself and what he was going to be doing.

That's just an important qualification. Nonetheless, the issue is important because the claim of the Christian faith is that Jesus is not only a human figure who gives religious insight, he's far more than that. He is the Christ, and he is actually, and I'm going to have some fun here, the Son of God, which is going to put that in all caps and and as such um he there's a claim about his understanding that is pretty comprehensive and so if he makes a mistake that certainly impinges on that claim of the christian faith and so as a result this is an important conversation good stuff it seems to clearly say in deuteronomy that if you make a false prophecy, you are a false prophet.

And in a sense, that is what is potentially at stake here with Jesus. And just to add, and we aren't even talking about divinity in raising that text. So we've got two levels of challenge here. One, the claim about Jesus being the Son of God, and then secondly, slightly down the rung of religious vocation, does he even qualify as a prophet? Well, if he's not a prophet, he's certainly not God. Okay, so we'll just start there. Well said, that's great. Now, I'm really curious in your experience, because you've addressed this scholarly and on a popular level, you write in both lanes. How big and central has this question been either for you and in scholarship? How would you place

it compared to other questions? It's had a place in scholarship. Albert Schweitzer's view of Jesus was formed by this objection to some degree. He thought that Jesus had made an error about his return. And Albert Schweitzer is one of the major figures in the historical Jesus discussion, dates back to the latter part, well, the early part of the 20th century, and was responsible for the end of what was called the first quest of the early part of the 20th century and was the responsible for the end of what it was called the first quest for the historical Jesus so major major figure in New Testament studies and the shadow of that conversation in some senses has never gone away so so it is an important part

of the scholarly discussion about Jesus and it tends not to show up as much in popular discussion as it does actually in the more academic areas where people are paying attention to, you know, anything and everything Jesus said or has claimed to have said. Oh, good. Yeah. Good distinction. Well, let's jump into these passages. And there's really, there's kind of two core sets of passages that this is typically tied to. One is in Mark 9, and the parallel passage is in Matthew 16. And then when we get to the Olivet Discourse, you have Matthew, Mark, and Luke make an additional statement. So let's take the first one, and most scholars would make the case, this is beyond here, that Mark is the first gospel that was written. So that debate aside, let's just jump into Mark. Yeah, I'm comfortable with that assertion, so we can go on that premise. Fair enough. So here's this passage. It's in Mark 9.1, and then I'll go back and I'll give some of the verses leading before it and the context. But in it has come with power. Now, the passages leading up to this beforehand, of course, the end of Mark chapter eight,

Jesus does predict his death and resurrection. Of course, he predicts his death and resurrection in eight, nine, and 10. But then he gives some of this stark teaching where he talks about, you got to pick up your cross and follow him. If you want to gain your life, you've got to lose it. What does it forfeit someone to gain the whole world? And yet, what does it benefit someone to gain the whole world and forfeit their soul? And then of course,

he says starkly, this is verse 38, for whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation. So he refers to this adulterous and sinful generation. Of him will the son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his father with the holy angels. That's some of the teaching leading up to this. And then Jesus says, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power. Now, the following teaching is on the transfiguration, which is interesting. Make sense of this passage in Mark 9 for us, if you will. Okay, so I'll make a couple of observations. The first is the use of the term generation, which is being used in an ethical sense, as opposed to a, in a generic sense, as opposed to giving a time period.

It's a certain kind of person and a certain kind of people that we're talking about. It is the wicked generation that's in the world, that has been in the world, that will continue to be in the world. That's the point that I'm making, as opposed to saying, oh, that's a group of people around a 40-year period. Okay, so that's the first observation to make that's in the context.

Okay, so can I stop for just a second before we go to the second one? When it says, whoever's ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, you're saying that refers not to the people in Jesus' time or some future time. This adulterous and sinful generation refers to those who reject Christ and live sinful lives ethically whenever that time period may be. Exactly correct. That's exactly what I'm saying. And so this is a generic reference as opposed to a time-specific reference. The generation talks about a kind of people who are ethically oriented in a certain kind of way.

That may be important when we get to the later passage because that's one of the ways that text has been read when you get to that later passage. And I'm simply noting here, that's precisely the kind of use that you're talking about. You're talking about the generation that is tied to and will be tied to the claims Jesus is making in front of the world about the gospel. And so that's going to be true whenever that message is preached. So that's the first point to make.

Okay, that's the first point. So maybe for the second one, would it be helpful if we just had a different translation here instead of, because the way at least modern English, we tend to read like Generation Z or the millennials, like we just read it through that lens. Would it be more helpful as just like words in, you know, adulterous and sinful people or something like that? Like how, do you have any suggestion of how it might? Yeah, yeah. I mean, when you do genealogy, all right, which you're talking about generations of people. Right. That's what a genealogy is. Here's the generation that comes through my family.

OK, it's the generate gender. It's the it's the generation of the generations. That's what a genealogy is. That's what you're talking about. Okay, got it. That's helpful. Now, I think what's hard is because it says in this adulterous and sinful generation. He's talking about this world.

He could say this world and say the same thing. Fair enough. Okay, so first point is well taken. That's helpful. Second point in this passage in Mark 9. I hope I remember it now. The second point is he says some of you will see this. Okay, so this is not a generic promise to everybody.

That's actually pretty important Because when the full kingdom comes and all of its fullness, no one's gonna miss it Okay, that's not gonna be a sum of you idea. That's gonna be an all of you idea So he's signaling he's signaling in the sum of you that there is a distinction among the twelve about who's gonna experience What it is that he's talking about and a few of them are going to experience it this is what sets up the idea that it is the Transfiguration that he's alluding to here quite directly because it only only a few of the disciples participated in that not all the twelve and it, the transfiguration itself, and this is the third point,

the transfiguration itself is a sneak preview of the glory of Jesus that comes with the kingdom. So they're getting a sneak preview of what is to come. If I can use an analogy, it's Jesus's teaser about the kingdom. All right, you know how you have, you know, I want you to see a movie and go out to the theater and buy tickets. I give you a little promo, a little teaser at the start to entice you, okay, to go see this movie.

So this is Jesus's enticement into what is to come and what's on the other side of his story, because he announced that he isn't just a figure of glory that he's going to suffer okay they weren't anticipating that at all in fact when Jesus made that proposal Peter made the suggestion maybe we ought to review eschatology 101 Jesus and make sure we've got this right and so and so the point that he's making at that point is to say I'm gonna suffer but on the other end of the suffering is going to come a time of glory. It's exactly how Isaiah 53 laid it out, what the career of Jesus was going to be, that there would be suffering. But after the suffering, there would be an exaltation of this suffering servant that would result in glory and shalom and reconciliation and all the things that God had promised and so you're getting a teaser some of them participate in it this is not the full arrival promise of the kingdom

because that would be that that would be something no one would miss there later on and in the discourse material it's gonna it's gonna be like lightning okay when lightning flashes in the midst of a it's going to be like lightning, okay? When lightning flashes in the midst of a storm, you don't miss it, okay? Boom, it comes suddenly, but you're definitely aware that it's there, both because of the light and the sound. So that's the way the kingdom will be when it arrives. I think a couple points make your point about being the transfiguration especially strong. Number one is right after the story is the story of transfiguration. Like that obviously follows.

And so Mark is just assuming his readers are going to pick up on this. And you're right when it says some of you standing here, if he's speaking to all his apostles earlier, I think he just takes his inner circle with him up to the transfiguration, and some of them see that. Now, maybe somebody would push back on the idea that you gave and say, okay, wait a minute. If this is a foretaste of the end, it's not his ultimate second return. It's actually a foretaste of his resurrection that's being referred to here, because he brings back Elijah, obviously, and Moses who had died and shows the apostles that death is not the end. And so he's given them a foretaste of his death and resurrection,

which he had earlier predicted right before the passage leading into this. Is that a possible interpretation? So I guess if that's the case, if I'm piecing this together correctly, then when he says, you'll see me coming in the glory of his father with the holy angels, some of you stand here will not taste death until the kingdom of God comes, that would be the resurrection of Jesus rather than the ultimate end times. And if that's right, it would seem to me showing this is not a false prophecy is either the transfiguration or the resurrection of Jesus. Seems either of those could potentially show that this isn't a false prophecy.

Agree, disagree? How would you respond to that? No, I agree. I mean, I think if it isn't the transfiguration, how how would you no i agree i mean i i think if it isn't the transfiguration it probably is an allusion to the resurrection and the appearances that came later which also had an element of glory in them and i also had a little additional element and that is jesus could just show up through a through a closed house you know with doors closed and locked etc you know he know, he could penetrate walls.

It's kind of a Star Trek appearance. And so, you know, so boom, whoa, where'd you come from? That kind of thing. So it is, but the key here is, the key here is the glory that they see. And the key also is in the voice the unique position that Jesus is put in vis-a-vis Moses and Elijah you know Peter's reaction to the Transfiguration is oh lord it's great that we should be here let's build a booth let's build a Hall of Fame one for Moses one for Elijah one for you voice

from heaven says no no no no no no, no, no, no, no. Those other two booze, you don't need them. You only need to listen to the son. And so it's the uniqueness of Jesus, both in what the heavenly voice says in testifying to him, reconfirming what the voice said at the baptism, that he's the servant son, but also at the same time,

the exhortation to listen to him from Deuteronomy, which makes Jesus a prophet like Moses, a leader, deliverer, prophet. That's what a prophet like Moses is. And as a leader, deliverer, prophet, they're supposed to listen to him because one of the things they're struggling with is, is the Messiah really going to die? How does that work? And so all of this is in play as this scene happens. And I tell people, whatever store Jesus went to to be dazzling white, okay, you're not going to meet that in your average mall. Jesus is clothed in a completely different way and is manifesting himself in a completely different way. And that's a picture and a symbol of the power and authority that he possesses as a transcendent being who also is incarnate and in the midst of that that's the message that is the foretaste of the kingdom of

god okay so this reference to some of them will see him is in one sense immediately fulfilled in the transfiguration. And I think in Mark's mind, the context makes that clear. It's also hinting at the coming of the power of the kingdom at the death and resurrection. That's maybe an additional kind of fulfillment. And especially though he shows his glory differently, like John 17, where he says, glorify me as I glorify you on the cross, we see the glory of Christ. But the mere fact that it says comes from the glory of his father with the holy angels is now pointing towards something additionally, even at the end times. In this context, would you say this is in some ways pointing to all three of those?

Oh, yeah. It's looking to this Jesus who you've been walking with and who you think, you know, was just a Jewish Galilean prophet slash Christ is a Jewish Galilean prophet slash Christ, son of God, okay? And they're struggling, even in Matthew's confession, when Peter is confessing that Jesus is the son of God, I don't think he quite yet gets son of God in its full sense, because son of God can also mean king, can be the Christ, because the Davidic king was seen as the vice-regent of God and his representative on earth.

I will be to him as a father, and he will be to me as a son. That's in the Davidic covenant. That's talking about his relationship to Solomon and those who follow after. So there's an ambiguity here that the Gospels are playing off of, and it's pushing people through what I'll call the glass ceiling of the difference between heaven and earth. And their people are realizing, so who is this mass marauder who's been sent to the

earth to be the Messiah? It sure doesn't look like he's doing things that just Messiahs do. I mean, he commands the winds and the waves and they obey him. He offers to forgive sins. Only God forgives sins. You know, he goes in, he go into the temple and the waves and they obey him he offers to forgive sins only God forgives sins you know he goes in he go into the temple and cleanse it who has the authority to do that he's even changes the liturgy of the Passover my goodness who can do that so so you know so you've got all these things that are pointing he claims to be Lord of the Sabbath. Whoa, that's the Lord's day. By the time you put this all together,

you realize he's pushing son of God, not in the kind of mundane sense that it had been understood in even reference to a great king, king of Israel, but also he is pushing it in its higher realms. And when you associate it with the angels in that heavenly context and placement and heavenly seating when you bring in Psalm 1 10 1 the Lord said to my lord sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet who gets to sit with God in heaven okay be a Jewish person and think through that question boom and you're getting son of God. I think this is not only a sufficient, but a good response to the claim of Mark 9, Matthew 16. The harder one is when we get to all of that discourse.

And this is the one let's unpack and see how we make sense of this one. Now, maybe before we jump into maybe a little bit more particular, we'll look at Mark 13, 30. And well, here's the verse, just so people know where we're going, where Jesus says, truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. Basically, word for word, Matthew 24, 34, and Luke 21, 32. Now, this is a very different time in Jesus' ministry than what we saw in Mark 9. It's at the Olivet Discourse. So what is the Olivet Discourse? What's the timing in Jesus' ministry?

Give us kind of the 30,000-foot view before we jump into the particulars here. Okay. Everybody take a deep breath fasten your seat belts because the olivet discourse is a challenge and it's a challenge because it's dealing with two time frames at the same time it's what we might call a pattern prophecy or what i like to call a mirror prophecy sometimes called typology i don't like that word so much because typology means all kinds of things to all kinds of people. But what I mean by pattern prophecy or mirror prophecy is something in the short term pictures also what the end is going to be like.

So I've got something in the near view that's going to be like what the far view is going to be. And there's a multiple fulfillment. There's a pattern to the way this is going to work. So example of a pattern fulfillment is the day of the Lord. The day of the Lord picture of judgment was built off of Joel and the locust plague and the destruction that came with the locust plague. That was the short term day of the Lord in Joel. But that became a figure for day of the Lord. Sorry to be using audio, but it really does help sometimes. This is the consum for day of the Lord's already be using audio, but it really does help sometimes This is the consummate day of the Lord in which the judgment the final judgment comes and often what happens in the mirror in? The pattern is what you have in the short term you also have in the long term, but oftentimes you get it with an escalation

in other words the scope of what is to come is greater than the scope of what you had. And actually, it's the fact that the short-term event falls short that tells you there could be more coming. So all that is built into the Olivet Discourse. He's going to talk about things that will happen in the disciples' lifetime. Things like persecution, things like being brought before Caesars and rulers and leaders and that kind of thing. The apostles are going to experience that part of it. Some of them will even see the destruction of the temple, which he alludes to, which took place in AD 70.

That's the short-term piece. But the long long term piece is the return of the Son of Man to establish his glory and to gather his elect and to gather his elect when you're gathering your elect you're gathering your elect for redemption and ultimately for judgment and vindication which is the core of the kingdom idea. The core of the kingdom of God idea in the Bible is the righteous will be vindicated, justice will be done, shalom will be established, and we will live in peace forever with God. That's the ultimate idea of where the kingdom of God is taking you, the rule of God is you and so uh so that's the background of the

discourse what triggers the discourse is an observation that jesus makes when the disciples are oohing and awing over the temple and and my analogy here is sorry to go long here a thirty thousand people we're on a journey okay um when i think of the temple I think of the Taj Mahal okay if you anyone ever gone and seen the Taj Mahal with its bright stones and that kind of thing it's an ooh or ah experience to see a building that's that magnificent set in a setting where just stands out so starkly Josephus described the temple as a white cap mountain in the midst of a desert, you know, so, so, and so they're marveling over this temple that is, that the grounds of which are being

expanded because, because Herod has put the people's taxes at work, and so, you know, there are construction signs all around saying, please, please absorb our construction, we're expanding the temple mounts, and, and they're impressed with what they see. saying, please, please absorb our construction. We're expanding the temple mounts. And they're impressed with what they see. Wow, this is a great program. Isn't this amazing? And Jesus just quashes that feeling by saying, there's going to be one day when one stone's not going to be on top of another. So you're looking at this magnificent building.

And then Jesus says, it may look pretty now but days are coming say it the Lord and so so you've got this description of what's going on and it's it's it's really off-putting a wonderful British expression by the way and it's off-putting and so so then they ask what's going to be the sign of these things and then there's an interesting difference between Mark and Luke and Matthew in the last question and what will be the sign when these things are going to happen that's Mark and Luke Matthew has what will be signs of your coming in the end of the age and And I tell people, Matthew has brought out the force of the question, but I'm actually not confident the disciples asked it exactly that way

because they hadn't put in their heads yet there is going to be a second coming. But that was the import of the question that they did ask. What are going to be the signs of these things? They immediately associate the fact that there's got to be something cataclysmic that is coming for this temple to be destroyed, and they're dead right. And so they ask the question, how are we going to know it's coming? Then Jesus goes into this long discourse, and he sets it up by going through a series of, there's going to be wars and rumors of wars.

There's going to be false messiahs. there's going to be false messiahs there's going to be chaos everywhere etc you're going to be hauled before people to testify don't worry about what you're going to say the spirit's going to guide you there's going to be an abomination of desolation in luke it's described as its abomination luke has in focus the city. Matthew and Mark have the focus of the destruction on the temple. And that happened in AD 70, so he's predicting that in the short term. But then he goes on to talk about portents in the sky and the Son of Man coming on the clouds to gather his elect. That's the Second Coming. And even though there are preterists who say well

it all happened in AD 70 I'm sitting here going the last time I checked there were no there was no cloud riding in AD 70 and so there was no gathering of the elect in AD 70 so I don't think preterism the idea that it's all fulfilled in the destruction of the temple and Jesus's reign from heaven does it now I don't think that's the temple and Jesus's reign from heaven does it now. I don't think that's the point. The point is, no, this is phase two of the program. When I come back to earth and really set things right in the context of all that, you get this verse about this generation is going to see all these things. And there are really two ways that

passage could be read. The first is, and I'm probably preempting where your next question is going, so I apologize, but I'm on a roll, so don't stop. Keep going. Okay. So there are two ways. One is to see it in the sense that I raised when we were in the previous passage, which is this generation will not pass away as a way of saying this is going to happen and judgment is going to come with it okay because it was an evil

adulterous generation that Jesus referred to earlier that's one way to read the text I'm not saying that is the way to read the text but it is a possible reading of the text and it certainly removes any contradiction in what Jesus is saying, because it's another way of saying, judge what's going to happen, and evil will be dealt with. You can be assured of that. That's what my return means. Okay? So it's pretty straightforward in the end, and quite a possible reading. The other reading goes, when it says all these things, is to say, in effect, the destruction of the temple is like a down payment on the whole plan and program.

Okay? So it's a pattern prophecy. The destruction of the temple represents the arrival of God's judgment and the showing of his authority. And so in the way in which the temple is destroyed in AD 70 is like the down payment and guarantee on the whole shooting match. Okay. When you see the temple destroyed, don't be shocked. This is what I told you is going to happen. And I am telling you now the program is off and running. And so, um, so that's the effect. Well, they see the destruction of the temple in AD 70.

Many of them do, not all of them, but many of them do. And that does happen within a generation. So you can take it in the traditional generation sense of about a 40-year period or so, or you can see it in this more ethical light. In either case, it's not a contradiction, okay? It actually is a prediction that is tied to the assurance that Jesus is going to come back and that justice will come and that he will bring it with the kingdom. And the fact that the temple is destroyed by God, the place where his Shekinah dwells,

shows that he is totally committed to this plan and it will happen. Darrell, this is great. In some ways, I could just say, game over, let's move on. But I want to take a step back and kind of unravel a few of these points to make sure people are tracking with us. This is really, really important stuff. So the context, as you start in Mark chapter 13, it says exactly like you point out, as he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, look, teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings. Oh man, what a building. This is fabulous. Oh man. Exactly. They're just in awe at this. And they add an exclamation point here in the english and then jesus says you

see these great buildings there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down his famous prediction that the temple would be destroyed the mic drop right which is why many people of course as you know date mark after this because they can't possibly fathom that he would have predicted this ahead of time uh that that you want me to go into that no hold hold off on that one i know we can come back we can come back to that so the the context here and then it says in verse three it says and as he sat on the mount of olives opposite the temple so they're able to look across and see the temple. And by the way, this is towards the end of the ministry of Jesus. So at the end of chapter 13, when 14 starts, it's now the plot to arrest him. So things are really heating up for people. Hence,

we get these kind of prophecies and predictions that are doomsday because we're at that pinnacle moment, so to speak. Now, it says Peter and James ask him privately, when will these things be? And then he launches into this, I don't know how many verses it is, but it goes from like verse six into like verse 30, abomination of desolation and earthquakes and all these terrible kinds of things. So I understand what you're saying is Jesus intends this to his original audience to answer their question about the temple, but is intentionally weaving in there's a dual later fulfillment that will happen. Do you, if that's correct, did his apostles have any sense of what he's talking about or given just how much they didn't figure stuff out until later, they probably had no idea right now either? All the apostles belong to the NFL upon further

review. Okay. All right. All right. They're're all players they're all players in the game and upon further review they get they get some of this i've already suggested matthew brought out the force of the question okay which probably wasn't worded that way originally i think mark and luke have the original wording but matthew's giving it this is really what they were asking they just didn't get it all at the time okay it's implied in what they were asking, and so I've made it explicit. This is what this ended up being about. And they were aware of it to the extent of if the temple is going to be destroyed by God, then something really big must be happening.

They have that much put together, but they haven't put together the first and second coming yet. And they probably aren't entirely able to. The thing about a pattern prophecy is it's given, and it's like, I don't know how to, okay, I'm going to use an illustration the younger generation's not going to get. Remember the old transparencies that we used to have that you used to layer on top of one another?

I do. You know, to show, yeah, it's young people, just look it up, all right? Okay, and you peel away. Well, this is a transparency prophecy. You've got two events laid on top of each other. They're looking very similar. You could look at them and say, oh, we're all talking about just the front end, but you don't realize you're talking about just the front end until you realize the front end didn't deliver everything that was promised. And so, yeah, I do think they probably did figure

it out later. I'm not sure they got it at the time. What they got at the time is they were supposed to keep watch. It was going to be a tough time. The temple, sorry, but it's not going to last forever. And then you need to keep watch because the rest of the promise, one day I will come back and I will do what I can. I will finish what I've started. Okay. So should we be reading this then saying what is, was fulfilled then and what is yet to be fulfilled with a perspective 2000 years later, looking back, that seems to be the lens through which we should understand. Okay. Before I get to your question, let me point out something Luke does that shows what's going on here. Because I think if I don't point this out, um, it, it will confuse, it won't confuse people, but it helps to show what's going on here. Because I think if I don't point this out, it won't confuse people, but it helps to show what's going on.

In Luke, when you get the initial question, he goes through an explanation of wars, rumors of wars, false prophets, cataclysms, all that stuff. And he goes on and he says, this is not the end. And then he says this, and he's the only gospel that says this at this point, in verse 12 of chapter 21, before all this. And then he goes through the persecution that the disciples are going to experience. So normally when you're telling a story and you're telling it in sequence you go from the start to the finish and you don't rewind okay Luke presents the first set of things and he says now hit the rewind button before that thing this is going

to happen all right so we're not moving forward in time we actually took a step back and reoriented ourselves towards the disciples and we talked about its desolation not the abomination of desol we talk about its desolation, not the abomination of desolation. The abomination of desolation is the destruction of the temple. Its desolation is the desolation of Jerusalem when it's overrun in AD 70. And so Luke is going back and working towards AD 70 in a way that talks about the near term. Luke is really focused on the near term fulfillment, whereas Mark and term. Luke is really focused on the near term fulfillment, whereas Mark and Matthew tend to be more focused on the ultimate fulfillment. And so you see these

time markers that help you make sense of the sequence that you're getting in all the gospels. Gotcha. Okay. That's helpful in terms of how we look at this chronologically. So you mentioned this earlier. Preterism is the idea that all these things were fulfilled with the destruction of the temple. And I know there's different versions of preterism, but if, and then I want you to expand on this. When Jesus is talking about this it's future to them but now it's passed to us because we're 70 years but not the abomination of not the ultimate abomination of desolation so okay so even within preterism you're saying there's some future things that have not yet been completed hopefully so because if this is the best we've got, we need a lot more, okay? And I'm not post-millennial that the church builds until the church gets to the point

where it fixes everything and Jesus just comes back and says, way to go, guys. That's not the way I think the Bible portrays Jesus' return. Jesus' return comes in the midst of a world in a mess, okay? And it's still in a mess, and it's still a mess for us, and it'll still be in a mess until He comes back. So that's the picture of the situation. The other thing that's going on here is that the only thing that's left to be fulfilled that Jesus talked about is his own return.

Okay, that's what's left. That's all that's left in what the Olivet Discourse has talked about. But we're going to replicate some of the things that we saw on the way to AD 70. Okay, so the fulfillment that we're talking about is not either or. Okay? It's both and. That's a point that needs to be.

The persecution of the church continues even into this day, et cetera. So I tell people the problem with preterism is if they said it this way, it would be true. And that is the destruction of the temple is the guarantee that Jesus is coming back. Okay. They said it that way. When you say fulfillment, you've said too much because you think there's nothing else left to happen.

But if you say it's the guarantee of what's going to come, okay, then you're saying, yeah, this is so certain, okay, it's going to happen, all right, even though it hasn't happened yet, okay? The preterist says it's so certain it's happened. And I'm going, well, sort of, okay? It's sort's sorta the case but we don't have the full deal yet and the full deal awaits the actual return and here's the irony Zechariah says that when the consummation comes it's gonna start from the Mount of Olives mmm he's gonna come back to the mount of olives okay so the very place where the discourse was uttered is the place where the consummation the consummation of the consummation

if i can say it that way is going to take place all right so the transfiguration uh we see this kind of immediate fulfillment so to speak that some of you will see the Son of Man come in his glory, but it's pointing to something. It's a kind of promise and seal of what's going to come at the death and resurrection of Jesus and the end times. Come to the movie theater and see the movie. See the trailer. I'm coming back.

I'll be back. So the same kind of thing is happening here in the sense that he's pointing towards something that will happen that has a partial kind of fulfillment and it's fulfilled later. So if those are parallel, then as we look at this passage here, when it says things like here of wars and rumors of wars. There were wars that could be laid out before the destruction of the temple between, say, 30 and 70. There's earthquakes that Josephus talks about. There's persecution that takes place. But those are also pointing towards signs of the end times that we should expect as well it's both of those so revelation which is probably

written in the 90s okay so after the destruction of the temple has just a touch of conflict present in the book there's a little bit of conflict in the present in the book of revelation that's yet to come. Fair enough. Okay. So as we keep going through this passage, let me see here as we get down to the end. So some of the things like referring to, I'm looking for the exact wording here, but all, you know, the gospel will be spread,

here it is, to kind of the ends of the earth, so to speak, and all people will hear. Is there a sense where you can say, like what they understood the world to be at that time, maybe to Spain and North Africa, they're not thinking of the world the way that we are. Paul seems to talk about in the 60s, you know, the gospel has gone to all places. We have Antichrist where it's in different languages. There you know, the gospel has gone to all places. We have Antichrist, where it's in different languages. There's a sense where this has begun and has partial fulfillment, but will have greater, fuller fulfillment before Christ comes back as well. Is it both and there? Well, yeah. Again, what you're talking about is the gospel is going out to all the nations,

okay? However you conceive of it. However you conceive of all the nations, the gospel is in the process of going out to all the nations. That's what Paul is saying when he says this in Colossians, the gospel is going out to the whole world, okay? It's out. It's been released, okay? It's like this, I guess I could say, it's like a bad image. It's like this nuclear cloud going across the earth. All right. That's going to cover the whole earth. And it's in the process of happening and it's going on and it will continue to go on until God brings it to an end with the return.

And so so that's that's the perspective of that language. And, yeah, they were probably thinking primarily Roman Empire, for lack of a better description, but the trajectory that they are affirming is the point. Not the specific locations in their minds, but the idea of the gospel is going out into all the world. We have gone from a gospel that used to be centered in jerusalem and focused on israel to a gospel that has now come to rome this is acts has now come to rome caesar's about to hear it it's going to go into all the world okay so let's go down to the passage now and just pull out what you said ahead of time. We have kind of historical backdrop. We have the prophecy fulfillment way that you're helping us look at this.

He says again, verse 30, because this is the verse that it linchpins on. We're in Mark, but also again, Luke 21, Matthew 24. He says, truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. So we're back to the same two possibilities. This generation, you're saying one option is we could take as ethically this adulterous

and sinful generation he refers to in Mark 9, and there will be sinful people and rebellious people until all these things take place, which presumably refers to the destruction of the temple and his ultimate coming back at the end. Judgment and vindication is coming to this generation. And the assumption is generation here means evil generation, like it did back in the earlier passage. Okay. So if that's the case, it's not really a super profound thing that he's saying

because we would expect there to be evil generations of people until Jesus comes back. Well, the profound thing is judgment is coming and it will deal with what needs to be dealt with. Okay, that is profound. Okay, that's really helpful. So not tied to who the generation is, but a promise that judgment is coming and the death and the destruction of the temple, which happens first, is the seal and promise of what will take place. And picture of the whole shooting match, yep.

Okay, so if you're right, that in itself removes the objection and it's saying that he's not referring to the people right in front of him right we'll see him come back at the end jesus didn't come back therefore he's a false prophet that would remove it in itself are there any weaknesses to that interpretations or reasons not to adopt it or is is it more just like, here's a possible way that removes the sting of- I think it has a real potential to be the way to understand the passage. The weakness is that it doesn't jump out at you that that's what's going on.

I mean, it's not the most normal use of the term. I'll say it that way. And so it's not the most normal use of the term I'll say it that way and so it's not the default you would drop into for the expression that's helpful that's great okay so second option let's move on to your second option again about how you make sense of this generation not passing away well then the case would be the generation that sees there are two ways to think about it. So I'm going to have two A and two B. Okay. All right. First way is the way I articulate it, which is the judgment, the package is so certain as indicated by the destruction of

the temple that when you see that you can know the whole shooting match is going to happen all these things are coming with it okay that's the and and this generation sees the thing that shows that this is what this involves and everything's coming with it okay that's one that's 2a 2b okay hang on i'm sorry i i'm not totally tracking with to a so okay so today says when you see the temple destroyed yep you you can know that everything that I have predicted is happening and we're in the game and the destruction of the temple is the guarantee that the judgment that that represents is going to be executed in fullness one day, all these things are going to happen. Okay, so if that's the case, this generation would be a temporal term.

Correct. Referring to those who are with him. And when it says will not pass away until all these things take place, that seems to be a little counterintuitive because all these things didn't. Okay, all right, go ahead. Okay, thus to be a little counterintuitive because all these things didn't. Okay. All right. Go ahead.

Okay. Thus to be. Will not pass away doesn't mean death in the way that we think about it, but means will not go off the scene of their accountability to God. Okay. Until all these things take place. In other words, we will not be done with the eternal fate of this generation. They will not pass away until this judgment comes, okay? Again, we're back to the same point. This judgment's happening, and justice is going to be established, evil is going to be dealt with, and it's game over. All right? Evil will not be done away with until all this takes place. And this generation, even the generation we're talking about, their story is not over until the judgment happens.

Okay. What do you make of the possibility that when he says truly i say to you this generation will not pass away until all these things take place now he's referring not to the generation in front of him but the generation he's been talking about that has experienced the wars has seen the famine this future generation okay that's to see that's to see i'll take it so okay that's to see and this is actually the way when i've written about this is the way i've written about it oh and the way i've tried to say it is we are talking about all these things except the thing that they all lead towards which is the actual second coming itself okay so when it says all these things it we're not talking about the return of the son of man that that that is what everything's leading towards okay but all these

things are everything that leads to that and that guarantees that all that's going to happen. It's the earlier view focused on the temple, only now we're not talking about the temple. We're talking about everything that Jesus just revealed, except for the second coming. This generation saw all those things. They saw everything but the second coming, if I can say it that way.

They experienced everything but the second coming. I can say it that way they experienced everything but the second coming you can read it that way and that's actually when I've written about it that's how I've written about this passage but I've actually changed my mind on this passage about three times in my lifetime okay and I may not be done yet so you know until the Lord takes me so you can read me you know dr. Bach said this, Dr. Bach said this. No, Dr. Bach said that. No, Dr. Bach said yes. Yes, he said all the above. So when I'm indicating to you, I'm not certain what the reading of the passage is, but I am certain there are readings that don't produce and are not reflective of the problem people raise about the passage

that i'm pretty confident of okay got it so you have more confidence that this is not a failed prophecy then you do exactly how to make sense of the passage correct self correct okay that's that's fair so oh this is a tricky one. I have so many more questions for you. Do you have any sense, and this might be outside of your lane, of how this passage was taken by some of the church fathers and throughout church history? Do they have 2A, 2B, 2C?

I don't know about that. What I do know is that when AD 70 was happening, starting in 66, okay, they left town, okay? They fleed to the hills, as some of the discourse material in the context of, you know, hope that it doesn't happen on the Sabbath, et cetera. Get out of Dodge. Don't go back and pick up anything. Get out. They got out of town. They left Jerusalem. They got out of Dodge.

They reacted as if perhaps this could be it. Okay? That's what happened in the earliest generation that was in Jerusalem. That I'm confident of. I'm not sure if I'm aware of the history of interpretation of the passage through the early fathers with enough confidence to be able to comment on it credibly. So I'll just pass. That's totally fair. That would be an interesting doctoral dissertation for somebody to analyze some of that and maybe make some insights about why interpretation shifted and what brought it on.

And that's another project for another day. How much did the early church, because we hear this a lot, that the apostles and Paul and the early church all expected Jesus to return within their lifetime, and then were just disillusioned when he didn't, and then went back and changed and adapted this message to kind of fit a Jesus who didn't return. Okay, so this is interesting. What I regard as one of the most challenging passages in Luke raises this dilemma and doesn't answer it. And then there's a passage in Acts later

that raises this dilemma and doesn't answer it. Okay, so let me tell you. The passage I have in mind is Luke 18. In Luke 18, we're talking about praying for the coming of justice in the kingdom of God in 18, one to eight. And the picture is used of a woman, a persistent widow, a woman who beats on the door of a woman a persistent widow a woman who

beats on the door of a judge saying give me justice give me justice give me justice and the picture is I'm gonna respond to her because she's gonna beat me black and blue because she keeps coming at me I like to joke my female staff doesn't like this joke but I like to joke we all know a woman like this who won't let it go okay so she won't let it go and finally she over what we're supposed to pray for the justice of God to come like that that's what that's what the parable is saying and it goes on to say this justice will come speedily and then here is the dilemma but will the Son of Man find faith when he returns and so uh and so what it's

introducing is it's going to come quick put quick in quotes it's going to come quick but it's going to be long enough that some people are going to be asking i don't think he's coming back and it sits there unresolved okay the tension is introduced and it's unresolved it's the neck the return of Jesus is the next big eschatological thing on the map that's why they thought could be any time okay eminence was something the New Testament taught but they don't know what time so here's the second pass second passage in Acts 1 in Acts 1 verses 6 and 7 the disciples asked this question Lord is this the time you're going to restore the kingdom Israel okay which is a nice way of asking is this it is the is the hit coming soon because we're storing

in the nothing about the 40 days that Jesus spent with The disciples talking about what was to come and what's ahead and how fulfilled the Old Testament Nothing disabuse them of that question that question was not wrong some Reformed interpreters argue that was a bad question. Jesus didn't say no All right. I spent 40 days with you trying to get you get this I'm gonna spend another 40 days with you because you missed it that's not his answer his answer is it's not for you to know the times in the season set by the father his answer is none of your business okay it's none of

your business it's in the father's timing it's none of your business the tension remain it's happening it's going to happen it's going to be certain it's set by the father in the meantime that's acts 1 8 okay everyone knows acts 1 8 in the meantime okay you're going to be given the holy spirit and you're to be my witnesses into all the world i've given you an assignment to be focused on more than when this is going to happen. And that's what I want you to do and to be. And that opens up the book of Acts with the assignment, our marching orders in the meantime. So I tell people, not only does that passage help you by saying there's this tension about when he's going to come back that the Bible does not answer other

than to say, God's got it. Okay? It's in his hands. He's got it. It's going to happen. And then the second thing that it says to us is, when I think about eschatology and trying to figure it out, I've been given an assignment that comes before that, and that is the mission of taking the gospel into the world. And that's not without precedent in the Old Testament that the day of the Lord could be tomorrow or a thousand years from right exactly that's the tension they lived in so the Bible ends with you know and and behold I am coming soon it's like wait a minute that's 2,000 years ago that tension was built at the beginning, so we shouldn't be surprised by that. I was thinking about this this morning, knowing that this is what we're going to be talking about.

And I'm sitting here thinking, 2,000 years in light of eternity. Short period of time or not, you make the call. Last question. I see this topic popping up somewhat frequently on, I see YouTube videos, social media videos, TikTok, whatever. In the scholarly world, as far as you know, is there a sense of like, these are plausible ways of making sense of this? Or is there still a lot of holdout of people just saying false prophet, false prophet, false prophet? Where are those discussions on a scholarly level?

I mean, obviously there are some people who agree with Schweitzer and who say Jesus missed it, and this shows he isn't who he claimed to be, and the New Testament has made too much of him. You know, that wing definitely exists in New Testament studies, and you interact with it. But then there are a lot of people who go, no, these other ways of reading the text make sense of what's going on in the text and give us a coherent way of understanding the way the New Testament understands itself. Because it's clear, well, I'll say it this way. It's clear that the early church, and

particularly the generation of the Apostolic Fathers up to the councils never read the text in such a way that they thought you know what this is all a bunch of hokum let me let me go back and let me go back and make make a point that I was going to make about about 80 70 and Jesus ability about about 80 70 and Jesus ability to predict 80 70 CH Dodd said this I think he's right he said you don't have to think about Jesus as being the Son of God and having omniscience to have him be able to predict that the temple would be

destroyed by Rome he just has to have a good prophetic sense so here's the pieces of that argument the argument was that in the Old Testament the Torah which is a major part of Jewish faith all right I mean the Pentateuch is pretty important right up there with you know at the top of the list it said if you are covenantally unfaithful I'm'm going to judge you through the nations. Okay? So that covenantal unfaithfulness was punishable, was a crime punishable by being overrun by the nations. Okay? It's part of the blessing and cursing section of Deuteronomy. So that exists. Jesus

deeply believed that Israel had missed her calling and was covenantally unfaithful by not recognizing that he was the Messiah. Subject to being overrun by the nation. In fact, in one sense they were already overrun. Rome was already there. Now ask yourself, if Rome is going to overtake and punish Israel as a sign of judgment, how would they do that? Well, they do it the way they always do it.

They put a city under siege, wait for it to fall, and then decimate it. Okay? Which is exactly what he was predicting. So all Jesus had to do was be a good observer of the contemporaries of Fox and CNN, and he would have been able to predict the destruction of the temple. Darrell, I've got so many more questions on this for you, but this is really helpful. Sounds like this is the kind of challenge that is never going to be fully settled in New Testament scholarship, because there's a lot of assumptions brought to bear on this,

interpretive assumptions, worldview assumptions. But it's also admittedly just one of those difficult passages, and those passages exist. But I think you give a very plausible explanation or multiple explanations that pull the sting away from Jesus being demonstrated as a false prophet. So really, really helpful. This is great. Super interesting. We'll have you back if you're willing to join us for sure to unpack some other questions. I'd ask those.

Anytime. You guys know I love Biola Talbot and what you guys are doing and what you represent. You're doing it on the left coast, which is also important. So anyway, so we're really, it's a pleasure always to interact with, really, you guys are such a sister institution to us and what we do. We're all connected at the hip, so be glad to do it.

Amen to that. And those of you watching, if there's other just objections like this about Jesus being a false prophet that we haven't dealt with on the channel, that we could go into some depth on, let me know what those are. And I'll take a look and see if this is an issue we can explore. Or if you're like, you know what, you spend an hour on this, but I want three to four hours with real depth. I'm not promising I'll do it, but comment below what would help you. And we'll take a look at it.

Before you click away, make sure you hit subscribe. We've got some other topics coming up on apologetics, cultural engagement, worldview. You won't want to miss that. And if you thought about studying apologetics, we would love to have you at Biola online and distance program. And we even have a certificate program below. Daryl, you guys do an awesome work at Dallas Theological Seminary and your podcast, The Table is Fantastic, is one of the podcasts that motivated Scott and I to start Think Biblically. So be encouraged, keep it up. We'll do this again soon. Love to do it. And I appreciate the mini plug and wish you all the best. And if you don't do apologetics at Talbot Biola, you can always do it. And I appreciate the mini plug and wish you all the best. And if you don't do

apologetics at Talbot Biola, you can always do it at Dallas. Boom. Do it. Two great options. Amen to that. I agree 100%.