Matthew 24:14: Proclaiming the Gospel and His Return

“this gospel…will be proclaimed [to] the whole world…and then the end will come.”  Jesus, Matthew 24:14

It is our unspeakable privilege to be caught up with Him in the greatest movement in history — the ingathering of believers “from all tribes and languages and peoples and nations”...then the supremacy of Christ will be manifest to all.   (John Piper, Let the Nations Be Glad)

Here Jesus says one of the great verses, in my opinion, in all of the Olivet Discourse.    As western Christians today, we fervently snatch up any book, movie or ministry about the End Times, no matter how embarrassingly done or poor in its exegesis.   As a result, many well-meaning Christians do extreme and strange things.  We approach His return as a jigsaw puzzle to be solved, yet largely remain uninvolved in proclaiming Christ.  

Yes, scholarly effort is needed when reading the eschatology passages.  Yet one main point is plain to see:   “this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come,” (v. 14).   The Lord has pegged His return to the world-wide witness of the gospel.  

The “Left Behind” series has its place.  But if we truly hunger for the “Parousia” (the second coming of Christ), we must be willing to invest and even lay down our lives for the sake of the proclaiming Christ to the world.

When Christ speaks of “nations” (v.14), He is not speaking of a country or political entity such as Australia or Zimbabwe.  Rather the word here for nations is ethnos, meaning a people distinguished by the same language and culture, such as the 12 million Magyar people of central Europe spread across five countries or the 2.5 million Dhanger people who are a subset within the cultural mosaic of the vast Indian subcontinent. 

  

This meaning is reinforced in Revelation 7:9-10: “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude…from every nation [i.e., ethnos] from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb…crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’”  

John MacArthur believes that Matthew 24:14 is fulfilled in Revelation 14:6-7, “Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead, with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth to every nation and tribe and language and people.  And he said with a loud voice, ‘Fear God and give Him glory…’”  (However, other commentators, like William Lane Craig, find language like this in Revelation to be highly symbolic.) 

Reports are coming out of Muslim countries saying that many are coming to faith not through missionaries but because Jesus Christ has appeared to them in a dream.   A friend of mine has recently trained pastors in Iraq and said that of the 14 pastors he trained in one session, 8 of them had become Christians through dreams.

The point is this: the Lord does not need us to communicate Christ to the world.  He could use rocks as His witnesses if He so desired.  But He has made us His “ambassadors” (2 Corinthians 5:20).   This is a humbling charge; a great stewardship has been bestowed on us.  And I want God to use me; I want to be a sharp tool in His tool belt.    I am but a jar of clay (2 Corinthians 4:7); yet may He show His grace by using me as His witness.  

There is no greater pursuit than the pursuit of God; there is no greater cause than the cause of Christ.   What are you pursuing?  What is your cause?   Are we giving our lives to that which does not survive the grave?  Are we passively on the sidelines of world-wide gospel proclamation?  Or are we living for that AWESOME eternal moment when we, along with one from every nation, will stand before the throne praising the Lamb?