Bible Prophecy Under the Microscope-Episode 83
Gary responds to a Facebook video where an individual claims that the Gospel must be preached in the “whole world” before the end comes.
Many who read Matthew 24:14 conclude that there is no way the gospel could have been preached in the whole world before the destruction of the temple in AD 70. Our first commitment is to what the Bible says by letting its words explain what Jesus really meant. Remember Matthew 24:34: “This generation will not pass away until all these things take place.” One of the “all these things” is the gospel being “preached in the whole world … to all the nations.”
The word translated “world” in Matthew 24:14 is the Greek word oikoumenē rather than the more common word for “world” kosmos. This is the only time Matthew uses oikoumenē. It is best translated as “inhabited earth,” “known world,” or “political boundary” (my preferred rendering) and is sometimes translated as “Roman Empire” (e.g., Acts 11:28; 17:6), which is more of an interpretation than a translation. The same Greek word is used in Luke 2:1: “Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth” [oikoumenē]. Rome could only take a census of its subjects, those who lived within the political boundaries of the empire. This more accurate translation helps us understand that Jesus was saying the gospel of the kingdom (Acts 28:23, 31) would be preached throughout the Roman Empire (the known world) before judgment would be poured out on Jerusalem.
The reaction of the Jews to the preaching of the gospel by Paul in “a synagogue of the Jews” in Thessalonica led to violence and had an impact on “the world,” that is, the world of their day:
[T]he Jews, becoming jealous and taking along some wicked men from the market place, formed a mob and set the city in an uproar; and attacking the house of Jason, they were seeking to bring them out to the people. When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have upset the world have come here also; and Jason has welcomed them, and they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus” (Acts 17:5-7).
The Greek word translated “world” is oikoumenē. The New American Standard translation notes in the margin that it’s literally “inhabited earth” and references Matthew 24:14, where it’s translated “world” and Luke 2:1 where it’s translated “inhabited earth.” It’s unfortunate that while many modern translations translate oikoumenē in Luke 2:1 as “inhabited earth,” some still translate oikoumenē in Matthew 24:14 as “world.” The following explanation found in Appendix 129 of The Companion Bible offers a clear definition of oikoumenē as compared to kosmos: “[Oikoumenē] is used of the habitable world, as distinct from the kosmos…. Hence, it is used in a more limited and special sense of the Roman Empire, which was then dominant. See Luke 2.1; 4.5; 21.26.”
Wars and Rumors of Wars
A first-century interpretation of the Olivet Discourse was once common in commentaries and narrative-style books that describe the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70. There is also a history of skeptics who turn to Bible prophecy and claim Jesus was wrong about the timing of His coming at “the end of the age” and the signs associated with it. A mountain of scholarship shows that the prophecy given by Jesus was fulfilled in exacting detail when He said it would: before the generation of those to whom He was speaking passed away.
Buy NowGary responds to a Facebook video where an individual claims that the Gospel must be preached in the “whole world” before the end comes. This promise comes from Matthew 24:14 and is constrained by the timeframe of Matthew 24:34. Gary points out that the phrase doesn’t mean the entire world as we know it today, as well as several verses proving that the Gospel was preached “in all the world” before that first-century generation came to pass.
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