As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!”
“Do you see all these great buildings?” replied Jesus. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”
As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John and Andrew asked him privately, “Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?”
Jesus said to them: “Watch out that no one deceives you. Many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and will deceive many. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.
“You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.
“Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.
“But in those days, following that distress, “‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’
“At that time people will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens.
“Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.
“But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.
“Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’” - Mark 13:1-13, 24-37
This passage reminds me of the other parables of the ten maidens and the basic import is the same: watch because Jesus will move and it will be on God's timetable and our job is to be productive and ready. There is a tension between the being productive and the being ready. Fall off on either side and you can either be so caught up in the pursuit of this world's goals or you can be so caught up in watching fortress like for the coming. We mustn't fall off on either side.
The disciples were in danger of considering the temple as the sign that it had already happened, so Jesus lets them know that the temple itself wasn't permanent or a good indicator. What are the indicators? Wars, persecution, false Messiahs. Looking back over 2,000+ years of history, I would say that we are in danger of falling off on the "world" side of the fence because there have been plenty of wars, plenty of persecutions, plenty of people offering salvation of one kind or another and we get "eschatology fatigue"
So sometimes we stop looking. We stop looking because we've stopped longing. We figure that we just need to do the best we can with what we've got and that distant return of Jesus, while acknowledged, fades in our consciousness. That lack of longing, that lack of desire for Jesus to come and fix the things, is the attitude that Jesus is warning against. So try to cultivate the longing. Translate the injustice and sorrow and incompleteness of this world into a desire for the kingdom come and me, to be prepared as its citizen.
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