<p>24:21&nbsp;<i>For then</i>- Mk., &ldquo;in those days&rdquo;. Mk. 13:19 speaks of how &quot;in those days&quot; those in Judaea should flee to the mountains; &quot;for&nbsp;<i>in those days</i>&nbsp;shall be affliction, such as was not from the beginning of creation... neither shall be (referring to Dan. 12:1 concerning our last days)... except that the Lord had shortened&nbsp;<i>those days</i>...&nbsp;<i>in those days</i>, after that tribulation...&nbsp;<i>then</i>&nbsp;shall they see the son of man coming&quot;. Surely &ldquo;in those days&quot; shouts for a continuous application to the same &quot;days&quot; - the days of the second coming, the days during which the obedient &lsquo;flee&rsquo; (and I have suggested that may be in response to the Angelic invitation to go meet the returning Lord Jesus). At best, &quot;those days&quot; can have a primary reference to the events of AD70, but the&nbsp;<i>main</i>&nbsp;fulfilment of the whole prophecy must be in the last days. This point seems impossible to answer by those who disallow any reference to the second coming.</p><p><i>Shall be great tribulation</i>- The LXX uses this same word for &ldquo;tribulation&rdquo; in several passages pregnant with latter day significance:&nbsp;<br />&ldquo;The day of my Jacob&rsquo;s&nbsp;<i>distress</i>&rdquo; at the hands of Esau (Gen. 35:3)<br />&ldquo;The&nbsp;<i>anguish</i>&nbsp;of his Joseph&rsquo;s soul&rdquo; at the hands of his half brethren and the Ishmaelites (Gen. 42:21)<br />&ldquo;I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and&nbsp;<i>troubles&nbsp;</i>shall befall them; so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not among us?&rdquo; (Dt. 31:17)- a passage in the Song of Moses regarding Israel&rsquo;s latter day tribulations.&nbsp;<br />&ldquo;Thus saith Hezekiah, This day is a day of&nbsp;<i>trouble</i>, and of rebuke, and blasphemy&rdquo; (2 Kings 19:3)&rdquo;- Sennacherib&rsquo;s Assyrian invasion at this time was a clear prototype for the latter day invasion described in Ezekiel 38 and elsewhere.&nbsp;<br />&ldquo;The time of Jacob&rsquo;s&nbsp;<i>trouble</i>&rdquo; from which he will be delivered (Jer. 30:7)<br />The &ldquo;day of trouble&rdquo; in Hezekiah&rsquo;s time, when Jerusalem again was surrounded by armies (Is. 37:3), and saved by a visible &lsquo;coming&rsquo; of the Lord against the Assyrian confederacy.</p><p>&ldquo;There shall be a time of&nbsp;<i>trouble</i>, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book&rdquo; (Dan. 12:1). This time of trouble is specifically for Israel in the last days. This verse would appear to be in the Lord&rsquo;s mind at this time. The same Hebrew phrase for &ldquo;day of trouble&rdquo; is repeatedly used about the traumas of Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonian and Assyrian invaders (Is. 33:2; 37:3; 65:16; Jer. 4:31; 6:24; 14:8; 15:11; 16:19; 30:7; Obadiah 12,14; Zeph. 1:15). These historical situations were clearly intended to be understood as precursors of the final tribulation of Jerusalem, again at the hands of the neighbouring nations. The time of &ldquo;trouble&rdquo; <i>tsarah</i> in Dan. 12:1 is literally &lsquo;the time of the enemy / adversary&rsquo;, and the same word is used of the time (Esther 4:14) of the enemy and adversary <i>tsar</i> in Esther 7:4,6, when again the Jews were threatened with destruction at the hand of the Agagite / Gog of Haman.</p><p><i>Since the beginning of the world</i>- Mk. 13:19 &ldquo;From the beginning of creation&rdquo;. But the allusion is to Dan. 12:1, &ldquo;Since there was a nation&rdquo;, and the context suggests the idea is &lsquo;Since&nbsp;<i>Israel</i>&nbsp;were ever a nation&rsquo;. The &ldquo;world&rdquo; in view may therefore be the Jewish world, and &ldquo;creation&rdquo; is being used as Judaism sometimes used the term, to refer to the creation of the nation at Sinai. The use of the phrase &ldquo;the beginning of creation&rdquo; rather than just &ldquo;creation&rdquo; would suggest that the creation of the world in view was an ongoing process, which is a beautiful insight into the nature of God&rsquo;s natural and spiritual work with the world of believers, with Israel, and even with the natural creation.</p><p><i>Until now, no, nor ever shall be</i>- surely only applicable to the last days, the time of Jacob&rsquo;s trouble predicted in Jeremiah. Clearly the main fulfilment cannot be limited to AD70. The threat to &ldquo;all flesh&rdquo; in :22 likewise cannot be seriously applied to the situation of AD70. The language of Lk. 21:28 is also impossible to apply to AD70: &ldquo;But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near&rdquo;. The allusion is obviously to Dan. 12:1: &ldquo;A time of trouble such as never was&rdquo;. I have shown in the digression &lsquo;Conditional Prophecy in Daniel&rsquo; that this particular prophecy had various possible fulfilments; and in harmony with that history, it could have been fulfilled in AD70, that was the intention, but the preconditions were not all fulfilled, and therefore its ultimate fulfilment was delayed until the final &lsquo;last days&rsquo;. The &ldquo;time of trouble&rdquo; in Dan. 12:1 is after Michael &lsquo;stands up&rsquo;, after the visible manifestation either of the Lord Jesus personally, or the Angel Michael who represented Him in the court of Heaven. The &ldquo;time of trouble&rdquo; is therefore in the very last days, perhaps literally days, the &ldquo;then&rdquo; of this verse 21 in Matthew 24, the time when the faithful have already dropped their jackets and left their homes to go to meet the Lord. It is inappropriate, therefore, to describe our present times&nbsp;<i>before</i>&nbsp;that period as &ldquo;the time of trouble such that never was&rdquo;. And it may be that Dan. 12:1 specifically refers to this unprecedented time of trouble as being for&nbsp;<i>Israel</i>- trouble such as never was since they were a nation.</p>