The Terminal Generation

I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.
–Matt 24:34

A Bible Study by Jack Kelley

“I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (Matt 24:34-35).

As you probably know, Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have written a non-fiction book called “Are We Living In The End Times?” in response to the many questions they’ve received from folks who’ve read their “Left Behind” series. Their goal is to provide insights into Biblical prophecy that will help readers conclude that the correct answer to the question raised in their book’s title is a resounding YES.

As I was reading the book the other night I came across a point that I think bears a closer look. This point addresses the length of a Biblical generation and is significant due to the popular (mis)interpretation of Matt 24:34 referenced above. Many folks take this verse to mean that the generation the Lord is referring to is the one being born about the time the signs He’s been describing start to appear. Nothing wrong with that, but then they assume that all the signs will appear and the Lord will return within the time span of one generation.

What’s a Generation?

This “one generation” idea has Biblical precedence since all the major prophecies pointing to the first coming were fulfilled within the generation in which the Lord was born. So right away everyone starts speculating on the length of a Biblical generation and that’s where the trouble starts. First of all the terms generation and life span are not equivalent, and yet some people go to the verses defining life span (Psalm 90:10) to determine the length of a generation.

Similarly, when the Israelites refused to go into the Promised Land for fear of the Amorites the Lord condemned all the adults except for Caleb and Joshua to death. He said they’d wander in the desert one year for every day the 12 spies were in the land and during that time all the adults age 20 and over would die. The spies were in the land for 40 days so the term of punishment was set at 40 years. During that 40-year period, the Israelites conducted an average of 85 funerals each DAY to remind them of their failure to obey until all the adults had died (Num. 14). This event led us to speculate that the length of a generation is 40 years when in fact the Lord had really limited the life span of those adult Israelites to coincide with the term of the punishment.

Then there’s the passage in Genesis where the Lord tells Abraham that his descendants would spend 400 years in Egypt as slaves before coming out with great wealth. And then “in the 4th generation your descendants will come back here (Canaan) for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure” (Gen. 15:13-16). This passage appears to equate 400 years with 4 generations, making a generation 100 years long, but careful study reveals this is not the case. The numbers 400 and 4 refer to two different things. True, the Israelites were in Egypt for about 400 years, but after they left, the generation that finally crossed the Jordan with Joshua was the 4th from Moses. (read )

This mystery unravels with a simple trip to the dictionary, where the length of a generation is defined as “the average interval of time between the birth of parents and the birth of their offspring.” These days no one would wait till age 40 to begin having children, but in Biblical times that was sometimes the case. And of course the key to the definition lies in the word average, so we know we’re dealing with generalities here. But is it possible to attach even such a fuzzy time frame as this to Matt 24:34?

There are three spans of time laid out in Matthew’s gospel that can help define the average length of time in a Biblical generation. I’m talking about the genealogy of Jesus, divided into 3 groups of 14 generations each; one from Abraham to David, one from David to the Babylonian exile, and one from the Exile to the Messiah (Matt 1:17). The first one (Abraham to David) is subject to interpretation, but the second and third are clearer. According to the NIV study notes David was born in 1040 BC and Jesus was born no later than 4BC. 28 generations between 1040 BC and 4 BC makes the average length of those generations 37 years.

So What’s The Point?

But all this, while interesting, may be irrelevant because Matt 24:34 simply says that the generation being born when the sign fulfillment begins would still be alive at the Lord’s return. We’ve just assumed that meant all the signs would be fulfilled within 40 years or so. The dictionary also defines a generation as a group of individuals born and living at about the same time and this may be the most appropriate definition to use in interpreting Matt 24:34.

The verse doesn’t say that no subsequent generations would be born, nor does it say that all the signs would be fulfilled before the birth of the next generation, but rather within the lifetimes of those who are born about the time the fulfillment begins. And since He’s talking about conditions at the end of the age, we should look at the current length of an average life as well as Biblical revelation to get an idea of the time involved.

When’s He Coming?

In any countdown to the 2nd coming the year 1948 is viewed as the obvious starting point, but in Daniel’s 70 weeks prophecy the countdown to the 1st coming began with the rebuilding of Jerusalem, not the re-gathering of the nation (Daniel 9:24-27). If history repeats itself we should probably consider using 1967, the year Jerusalem became a Jewish city again instead of 1948, the year the nation was reborn. But the biggest mistake we’ve made by far (myself included) is adding only 40 years to whatever date we choose when in fact a better number is probably 70 or 80. That would still put the 2nd coming somewhere within the next 20 to 50 years maximum and the rapture no less than 7-10 years earlier, within most of our lifetimes. Keep in mind that the rapture and 2nd coming are only related to the extent that one must precede the other. The Rapture of the church is a secret event that could literally happen any moment now, while there are still several other major events that must occur before the 2nd coming.

It’s provocative to note that whether it’s a secular or Bible based viewpoint, the most popular estimate for the end of the age is somewhere within the first quarter of this new century. But the real kicker in the Matthew passage we began with is verse 35. “Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (Matt 24:35). This is as strong a commitment as you’ll find anywhere in Scripture. The Lord will return as promised, and soon. Even Heaven and Earth, two things we think of as absolutely permanent, are not as permanent as His promise. You can almost hear the footsteps of the Messiah.