Chapter 24

¹And Jesus left the Temple and was going away, when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to the Temple buildings. ²But he answered,

“Do you see all this? I tell you, not one stone will be left here upon another but shall be torn down.”

³As he was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came up to him by themselves, and said to him,

“Tell us when this is to happen, and what will be the sign of your coming, and of the close of the age.”

⁴Jesus answered,

“Take care that no one misleads you about this. ⁵For many will come under my name, and say, ‘I am the Christ,’ and many will be misled by them. ⁶You will hear of wars and rumors of war; do not let yourselves be alarmed. They have to come, but that is not the end. ⁷For nation will rise in arms against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes here and there. ⁸All this is only the beginning of the sufferings. ⁹Then they will hand you over to persecution and they will put you to death, and you will be hated by all the heathen because you bear my name. ¹⁰Then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. ¹¹Many false prophets will appear, and many will be misled by them, ¹²and because of the increase of wickedness, most men’s love will grow cold. ¹³But he who holds out to the end will be saved. ¹⁴And this good news of the kingdom will be preached all over the world, to testify to all the heathen, and then the end will come.

¹⁵“So when you see the dreadful desecration, of which the prophet Daniel spoke, set up in the Holy Place”—the reader must take note of this— ¹⁶“then those who are in Judea must fly to the hills; ¹⁷a man on the roof of his house must not go down to get things out of it, ¹⁸and a man in the field must not turn back to get his coat. ¹⁹But alas for women who are with child at that time or who have babies! ²⁰And pray that you may not have to fly in winter or on the Sabbath, ²¹for there will be greater misery then than there has ever been from the beginning of creation until now, or ever will be again. ²²If those days had not been cut short, nobody would have escaped, but for the sake of God’s people those days will be cut short.

²³“If anyone says to you at that time, ‘Look! here is the Christ!’ or ‘There he is!’ do not believe it, ²⁴for false Christs and false prophets will appear, and they will show great signs and wonders to mislead God’s chosen people if they can. ²⁵Here I have told you beforehand. ²⁶So if they say to you, ‘There he is, in the desert!’ do not go out there; ‘Here he is, in a room in here!’ do not believe it. ²⁷For just as the lightning starts in the east and flashes to the west, so the coming of the Son of Man will be. ²⁸Wherever there is a dead body, the vultures will flock.

²⁹“But immediately after the misery of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not shed its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the forces of the sky will shake. ³⁰Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will lament when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, in all his power and splendor. ³¹And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet-call, and they will gather his chosen people from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

³²“Let the fig tree teach you the lesson. As soon as its branches grow soft and put forth leaves, you know that summer is coming. ³³So when you see all these things, you must know that he is just at the door. ³⁴I tell you, these things will all happen before the present age passes away. ³⁵Earth and sky will pass away but my words will never pass away. ³⁶But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the Father. ³⁷For just as it was in the time of Noah, it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸For just as in those days before the flood people were eating and drinking, marrying and being married, until the very day Noah entered the ark, ³⁹and knew nothing about it until the flood came and destroyed them all, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. ⁴¹Two women will be grinding with the handmill; one will be taken and one left. ⁴²So you must be on the watch, for you do not know on what day your Master is coming. ⁴³But you may be sure of this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the watch, and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴Therefore you must be ready too, for the Son of Man is coming at a time when you do not expect him.

⁴⁵“Who then will be the faithful, thoughtful slave whom his master put in charge of his household, to give the members of it their supplies at the proper time? ⁴⁶Blessed is that slave if his master when he returns finds him doing it. ⁴⁷I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his property. ⁴⁸But if he is a bad slave and says to himself, ‘My master is going to stay a long time,’ ⁴⁹and begins to beat the other slaves, and eats and drinks with drunkards, ⁵⁰that slave’s master will come back some day when he does not expect him, and at some time of which he does not know ⁵¹and will cut him in two, and put him with the hypocrites, to weep and gnash his teeth.