The difficulty of interpreting Mark 13 is not to be found in the big picture, but in interpreting the details. The disciples asked specific questions about a historical event. Jesus said the Temple would be destroyed, and the disciples asked “When will these things happen? What are the signs that indicate when these things?” (cf. Mark 13:4) and mixed into that question was an assumption that the Temple’s destruction was directly connected to “the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” (Matthew 24:3). Jesus’s prediction concerning the Temple came true in 70 AD when the Roman Emperor Vespasian sent Titus to decimate the rebellion and the city of Jerusalem. But did this event fulfill all of Jesus’s words? Answering this question will shape our expectations for the future, and should affect practically how we live for Christ in the present.
