EXTRA IMPORTANT TODAY —> (remember, these are unedited/draft show notes, not a transcript — listening is always better…and if you listen AND follow along below, you’ll see why)
Focus Question:
What’s the big deal about 70AD?
Intro:
Imagine you’re up on a mountain looking toward the horizon, and you see several mountain peaks in the distance stretching in front of you. Some of you may really have to use your imagination, but here in my corner of the world it’s pretty easy…you’re at the lodge on Mount Hood and, looking south, you can see at least four other mountains in the Cascade Range.
As you look out across the distance, however, what you can’t necessarily tell very well is the distance between them. You can tell one is farther away, but at some point you don’t really know the second and third are 50 miles apart or 150 miles apart.
That, my friends, is an analogy that theologians use when thinking about future-looking prophecy. And journey in reading the Bible together is going to have some of that mountains-in-the-distance both today and in the next few days.
NEW TESTAMENT SEGMENT:
As we get to our NT segment, like yesterday we’re going to start with a history lesson that relates today’s focus question — What’s the big deal about 70AD? The short answer is that that’s the year the temple we’re about to hear about fell. As we often do, however, there’s another important aspect that relates to your confidence as a Christian, and we’ll get to that in our Bottom Line segment.
But as we get into Mark 13, remember this context. This is not the temple Solomon built about approximately 900 years before Jesus…this is the one rebuilt by Ezra approximately 400 years later when the Israelites returned from Babylonian exile. And this one is not even just one building…it’s a complex covering a 1/6 of ancient Jerusalem. To give you some dimensions, one porch or walkway was a nearly 1/4 mile long and had 160 columns. “The massive stones the disciple mentioned were huge white stones, some of them measuring twenty-five by eight by twelve feet and weighing more than one hundred tons.”(1)
Passage: Mark 13
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses: 37
Words: ~783
OLD TESTAMENT SEGMENT:
Our OT segment today is familiar, but sometimes it can be too familiar. So listen closely, because tomorrow we’ll be reading one of the most important chapters in all the Bible with regard to prophecy, and there’s a connection we’ll make tomorrow.
Passage: Daniel 6
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses: 28
Words: ~880
Wisdom SEGMENT:
Passage: Proverbs 10:29-11:2
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses: 6
Words: ~95
The bottom line:
What’s the big deal about 70AD? 70AD is the year the whole kaboodle, and I mean the whole temple enchilada, came to a halt. There are several reasons this is important to you as a Christian. First, a little backstory.
It was in 66AD that a Roman general, short on cash and long on hate for the Jews, raided the temple for silver. The Jews revolted, and he sent in troops and massacred about 3600 of them. Fast forward through more revolt and war (and I’m leaving out a lot), Jerusalem got separated from the rest of the nation and was under siege, and people started dying of starvation and plague. When the Romans finally broke through, the temple was the site of the last stand. It’s 70AD. The Jews were crushed, marking the end of Israel as a state, and the temple is burned and razed to the ground, thus ending what historians call the Second Temple period.(2)
And here’s (a little bit of) what it means for you — and it has to do with confidence in your Bible.
The date is reeeeally well documented. Historians use 70AD as a marker for dating other historical events, including the date of New Testament documents. For instance, Luke was a super-careful and accurate historian, but the book of Acts ends abruptly without mentioning the fall of Jerusalem or the temple.
Christians scattered. Or more accurately, the continued scattering. Multiple books of the NT, you’ll recall, were written to scattered Christians. This not only spread Christianity quickly, but it produced a plethora of documents which scholars compare to reconstruct the originals. We’ve talked about it elsewhere, but its why you hear me over and over talk about the reliability of NT documents from a historical perspective.
In the little narrative above, the Jews were pissed at the Christians for how they did (or didn’t) help in defending the temple. So as Jews tried to replicate the sacrificial system elsewhere so as to preserve Judaism’s practices, Christians were forbidden from synagogues. This not only accented Christian distinction from Judaism, but now completely exploded the inclusion of Gentiles (which, as we know, was God’s plan all along).
So, why is this important to you? Reality. Our faith in the person, work, and teaching of Jesus isn’t fluff, it happens to be rooted in history like no other religion on the planet. The temple fell just like Jesus said it would, and Christianity is now clearly inclusive of what we call the Old Testament or original covenant, but is now utterly clear that the Messiah came ushering in the new covenant promised hundreds and hundreds of years earlier.
I love you. Amen? Amen!
ForTheHope is a daily audio Bible + apologetics podcast and blog. We’ve got a passion for just keepin’ it real, having conversations like normal people, and living out the love of Jesus better every single day.
Roger Courville, CSP is a globally-recognized expert in digitally-extended communication and connection, an award-winning speaker, award-winning author, and a passionately bad guitarist. Follow him on Twitter -- @RogerCourville and @JoinForTheHope – or his blog: www.forthehope.org.
Sources and resources:
(1) Bruce Barton et al., Life Application New Testament Commentary (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale, 2001), 207.
(2) “A.D. 70 Titus Destroys Jerusalem,” Christianity Today, https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/issues/issue-28/ad-70-titus-destroys-jerusalem.html, accessed November 22, 2020.