End Times Proofs 3

Proof 3 – Rebuilding the Temple

“But when you shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it should not, (let him that reads understand,) then let them that are in Judea flee to the mountains”.

Paraphrased from Mark 13:14.

The “abomination of desolation” Christ mentions here means the setting up of a false idol, or even a person, to worship instead of God in the Holy of Holies of the rebuilt Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem. But this never occurred after Christ’s sacrifice. In fact, a strange violation of the Jewish Temple in the Holy of Holies happened at Jesus’ death. At the very instant that Jesus gave up His spirit, the large heavy tapestry that hung between the general temple area and the Holy of Holies, in which a Priest of Levi was the only one permitted, tore. The symbolism of this act was to indicate that we no longer needed a priest to be our mediator between God and Man – we now had a permanent advocate in Jesus Christ. But that tapestry tearing also would have made the temple and the Holy of Holies temporarily unclean until the tapestry was remade and remanufactured and restored and the temple had been ritually cleansed afterwards. The Holy of Holies was never supposed to have been seen by people. Only the High Priest was allowed to go into the Holy of Holies. It was considered not just sacred ground, but dangerous to go into the Holy of Holies unprepared. The tapestry that normally hangs between the people’s part of the temple and the Holy of Holies is very richly embroidered and would take quite some time to remake and replace. There are no indications that any animal sacrifices were made in the temple after Jesus’ death, probably because the act of the tapestry tearing would have made the temple temporarily unclean. Of course, the death of Christ, the perfect sacrifice, made animal sacrifices unnecessary. The Jews rejected Christ as their Lord and Savior and would have wanted to continue their usual animal sacrifices. But that would have been impossible after the tearing of the cloth that hid the Holy of Holies from prying eyes. The temple was now unclean and needed to be cleansed before sacrifices could be resumed. Jesus told His Apostles that Herod’s temple would soon be totally destroyed. The invading army of Titus torched and destroyed the Second Temple in 70 AD. No known violation of the Holy of Holies occurred at that time. There is a record of an abomination set up many years before Christ, but here, Christ seems to be speaking of a future event. What temple was Jesus talking about? I believe that it will be a third temple, still to be built. Israel is even now making plans to rebuild the temple a third time. New temple accessories have already been manufactured. New temple acolytes are being trained. A search for a pure red heifer to sacrifice for cleansing the temple is already going on. There is a worldwide search for clues to the location of the lost Ark of the Covenant. Israel makes no secret of the fact that they want to rebuild the Temple of Solomon. It is this future temple that Jesus is talking about. Eventually, there will be a move by Israel to rebuild the temple on the original site. Recent archaeological evidence says that the Islamic temple known as the Dome of the Rock would not have to be demolished in order to rebuild the Jewish temple. Only a small well on the property would have to be removed. Then the animal sacrifices will eventually resume. This last, unfulfilled, prophecy is one of the only events remaining that needs to occur before the rapture and the Second Coming of Christ.