Luke 21:20-24 Flee to the Mountains!
Format for Your Devotions
Instructions: Do not read my example devotion until you have completed your own devotional time in the scriptures. Reading my thoughts first may limit your own understanding. Let the Holy Spirit speak to you alone before looking to see what anyone else has to say, whether it is me, a Bible commentary, or a friend. Let God speak to you before you let another person speak to you. I have provided a format, but modify it to fit your needs. For example, I usually combine my application and prayer together talking to God about the application to my own life. You can go through this devotion process mentally, speaking out loud, or in writing as you wish. Don’t worry if you are not following this process exactly. Sometimes, I add extra information and sometimes I emphasize one part more than others. However, you should always think about what you learn about God from this passage.
Step 1: Pray–Ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance first of all and that God may reveal the lessons that He wants you to have that day. Request that God protect you from Satan’s distractions (and the devil will try to distract you whether it is pinching the baby or putting you to sleep). Ask to see God more clearly as you read and think about the passage.
Step 2: Read the passage–Read to get an overview of the information first. Then start looking at specific parts after the first reading. You may read a larger or smaller section than I have here because you do not have to follow my organization at all.
Step 3: Understand the passage–You can summarize, ask and answer your own questions about the passage, visualize the story, analyze the characters, and relate this passage to other scriptures and personal experiences.
Step 4: What does this reveal about God?–What do you learn about the Father, Son, and/or Holy Spirit from this passage?
Step 5: Apply this to your own life.
Step 6: Prayer
My Example Devotion: November 19, 2018 Luke 21:20-24
Note: In the devotion examples, I leave my questions and thought processes in the text because I am trying to demonstrate that a devotional time is a dialogue with God about what you are reading from His word. As such, any questions or ideas that you have should be explored by talking it out with God. These example devotions are not my attempts to teach you what the meaning of a particular scripture is. They are an attempt to teach you the process of devotions, which is a combination of prayer and Bible study where you explore ideas with God as you read His word.
“But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those who are inside the city depart, and let not those who are out in the country enter it, for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written. Alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress upon the earth and wrath against this people. They will fall by the edge of the sword and be led captive among all nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.
(Understanding the Text) Then Jesus looked just a little farther into the future and saw the destruction of Jerusalem. He gave a warning to those who would listen. He told them that when they saw Jerusalem surrounded by armies that they needed to get out and go into the mountains. He warned not just the inhabitants of Jerusalem, but also everyone in Judea to go into hiding. He told them that there were prophecies about what He told them. I wonder which ones? The SDA commentary says Daniel 9:24-25. “Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place. Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time. And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator” (Daniel 9:24-27).
Jesus warned the listeners that they would be persecuted as Jews, and the ones that survived would be taken away from Judea as captives, and Jerusalem would be devastated and under the control of the Gentiles. What does it mean “until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled?” The SDA commentary says that this means that the Jewish time was finished and that it was now time for the Gentiles to be given the choice to be part of God’s chosen people, but the explanation provided did not satisfy me. Of course, Guzik has some weird evangelical gobbledygook prophetic interpretation. I will have to look somewhere else.
I have heard this prophecy many times and know that it was fulfilled in the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. There are some that speculate that Josephus surrendered to the Romans right away and was saved because he knew of this prophecy. I have been told that the Christians remembered the prophecy and ran away and so were saved. Guzik confirms this. “However, Christians in Jerusalem knew what Jesus had said and they obeyed Him, fleeing across the Jordan River to a city named Pella. No Christians perished in the fall of Jerusalem.” “But 1.1 million Jews were killed; and another 97,000 were taken captive in one of the worst calamities ever to strike the Jewish people. Jesus warned them to avoid it. “When the Romans were done with Jerusalem in 70 a.d., not a single Jew was left alive in the city. The Romans eventually renamed the city Aelia Capitolina, and for many years would not allow a Jew to even enter what was formerly known as Jerusalem, except on one day a year – the anniversary of the fall of the city and the destruction of the temple, when Jews were invited to come and mourn bitterly.”
“for these are days of vengeance” The SDA commentary says that this refers to the curses for disobedience.
(Interesting sidenote) One way that scholars can prove an earlier date for the gospels is that there is no indication of knowledge of the overthrow of Jerusalem in the four gospels, but instead there are other indications of Jerusalem as it existed before the destruction. Thus, the four gospels had to have been written before 70 A.D.
(Revelation of God / Application / Prayer) My application for myself is that God gives warning before some disasters and lets me know that He will be with me. Terrible events may occur, but God has promised that in the end, I will have a place with Him. He will keep me in His heart until it is time to awaken me to life everlasting. My other application is that Jesus never promised soft, easy times here in this age. He actually promised the opposite-murder, natural disasters, betrayal, war, destruction, hurt. I know You did not promise easy times, but I get so discouraged, fearful, and exhausted in dealing with the trials of this life. Give me the hope to see beyond the present circumstances, the faith to trust you even when I am in pain, and the love to treat others as You would even when they hurt me or act callously towards others.