Question:
Can you tell me the meaning of Matthew 24:34? When does that generation begin, and when does it end?
Answer:
If our inquirer carefully reads Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21, he will find that they all together give the discourse of our Lord about the destruction of Jerusalem and Christ’s coming at the end of the world. Much that is said concerning the destruction of Jerusalem is used as a type of the second coming of Christ. You will notice various signs are given of Christ’s coming. These signs begin with the darkening of the sun and the moon. Luke enlarges upon these and tells us there will be other signs. Christ our Lord, who saw the various events to take place, must have seen among the signs which He predicted all the different signs that would precede His coming.
We are not told that His coming is near when the sun was darkened; that was only the beginning. Redemption was drawing nigh to the world at that time, but when all the various signs took place, we would know that His coming was near, even at the doors. Then He tells us “this generation,” not the generation to which He was then speaking,— for of that generation He says, that no sign should be given it but the sign of Jonah the prophet (see Matthew 12:39; Luke 11:29),— but the generation which saw “all these things,” should not pass till all be accomplished. That would not necessarily mean the generation that saw these things with their physical eyes but saw them fulfilled in the light of the prophecy. That includes the last message to the world, the great threefold message of Revelation 14:6-14, the third message having begun in 1844. Since that time, that message has been going to the world, and the generation that gives that message shall not pass till the Lord shall come. That, in brief, is our understanding of this text. There will be, seemingly to all human understanding, a failure in God’s program, but our Lord Himself guards us against that and assures us that though heaven and earth may pass away, His Word shall not pass away.
