The Narrow Path Ministries

And the gospel must first be preached to all the nations. - Mark 13:10 NASB

I'm a pastor, and many years ago now, I preached Mark 13, kind of ironing out my eschatological interpretations of the passage while I went through it. I will say I knew beforehand I wasn't dispensationalist, and leaned partial preterist. What surprised me, is by the end of studying and preaching Mark 13, I felt nothing necessitated any end of the world interpretations about it. (I find information and Scripture about the end of the world in 1 Cor 15; 2 Peter 3 etc).

In my reading plan today I was brought to Mark 13, and verse 10 jumped out at me. The Gospel must be preached before what Jesus is describing can be fulfilled. If I take - as I do - He to be describing the fall of Jerusalem primarily, WHY must the Gospel be preached to all nations (as it seemingly was by the time of the war, Acts 2:5; Colossians 1:6 etc)?

Was there a significant hindrance to preach the Gospel after the war? While a command to preach the Gospel to all the nations leading up to 70AD is in place, it seems like also Jesus informed His Disciples even all Israel wouldn't be ministered to before the Judgment of 70AD happened (see Matt. 10:23).

So is Mark 13:10 simply a command to not be distracted by the coming Judgement, but to keep pushing the Gospel outward? Was that the only point of that?

Does my subtle confusion or question make any sense?

You could call Steve Gregg's show and ask that question. But, I don't know what his answer would be.

I'm just a dedicated student of scripture. But the problem occurs with the translation of ἔθνος which is often translated as gentiles. It also can mean tribes or similarly people distinguished by communities. It can me political divisions -- which might be called "nations." The use could be clarified in some cases when acting within a quote from the OT.
The point to remember in the gospels is that the direct audience of Jesus' words in the synoptic gospels are Jews. To them the ἔθνος most readily refers to tribes or the various political divisions of the land around them. This ties in with Matt 23 where it can be seen they reach the ἔθνος but not all the towns in those areas. Really it was the twelve apostles who had this mission and they could each miss one town in their region before the destruction of the Israel nation.
The reason that each town (in the general outreach) had to be visited is that they were both being warned of the judgment coming upon them but were also being advised of the wrath coming upon those who still did not repent and receive Christ (despite them obviously getting the gospel directly or hearing about it by word of mouth).
Jesus was sent for the sins of the Israel people and he came as the Prophet to warn them of that judgment. He also came as the one to remove ungodliness from Jacob. This would mean that the righteous could serve God without suffering for the judgments of the unrighteous. (Then the great thing for the rest of us, known as Christians, is that benefits of Christ were extended to people outside of the the tribes of Israel, as per Gen 22:17-18, especially 18 "and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”

remade wrote: ↑

Thu Jun 06, 2024 9:06 am

And the gospel must first be preached to all the nations. - Mark 13:10 NASB

The Gospel must be preached before what Jesus is describing can be fulfilled. If I take - as I do - He to be describing the fall of Jerusalem primarily, WHY must the Gospel be preached to all nations (as it seemingly was by the time of the war, Acts 2:5; Colossians 1:6 etc)?

The reason for the necessity of the gospel being preached to ALL nations before the AD 70 fall of Jerusalem was given by Paul on Mars Hill in Acts 17:30-31. Paul said that God "...now commandeth ALL men everywhere to repent: Because He hath appointed a day, in the which he is about to judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead."

It was the soon-coming judgment in AD 70 of ALL that were in the graves which Paul was warning those on Mars Hill about. It was also the very same "hour that is coming" in John 5:28-29, about which Jesus also warned the Jews, telling them not to marvel at this coming resurrection of ALL men, (which included those in Gentile nations). Even though Christ and His disciples were then raising some individuals from the dead one at a time only in the cities of Israel (Matt. 10:5-8), yet a day was coming in which ALL the dead would be raised - some to everlasting life, and some to destruction.

It may seem contradictory that Christ said the disciples themselves would not have gone through all the cities of Israel before He returned (Matt. 10:23), yet ALL the nations would hear the gospel before Christ returned (Mark 13:10). The answer to this seeming contradiction is that most - if not all - of the twelve Apostles were either imprisoned or slain afterward in the first century (as Christ had also predicted) and so would not personally have been able to present the gospel to all the cities in their own nation. Yet on the other hand, the Apostle Paul's ministry was blessed by God in bringing the gospel not only to those in Paul's own nation, but also to the pagan nations at large (the proof of which evangelization of all the nations is found in Colossians 1:6 & 23, Titus 2:11 and Revelation 14:6).

In addition, we cannot discount the first-century evangelistic work of the many bodily-resurrected Matthew 27:52-53 saints. These were the 144,000 "First-fruits", and the "multitude of captives" or the "gifts" which the resurrected and ascended Christ gave to men to serve in the early church. These "gifts" acted as apostles (not the original 12), evangelists, prophets, pastors, and teachers (Ephesians 4:8-12). There was no limit to the ability of those bodily-resurrected saints to evangelize throughout the nations of the world in their glorified, immortal bodies. These were not susceptible to the natural infirmities or limitations of ordinary saints, and were impervious to harm or demonic oppression as they performed their evangelistic mission to all the nations in those days.

remade wrote: ↑

Thu Jun 06, 2024 9:06 am

And the gospel must first be preached to all the nations. - Mark 13:10 NASB

I'm a pastor, and many years ago now, I preached Mark 13, kind of ironing out my eschatological interpretations of the passage while I went through it. I will say I knew beforehand I wasn't dispensationalist, and leaned partial preterist. What surprised me, is by the end of studying and preaching Mark 13, I felt nothing necessitated any end of the world interpretations about it. (I find information and Scripture about the end of the world in 1 Cor 15; 2 Peter 3 etc).
...
So is Mark 13:10 simply a command to not be distracted by the coming Judgement, but to keep pushing the Gospel outward? Was that the only point of that?

Does my subtle confusion or question make any sense?

I was hoping that you would return and note if you found anything more or that the answer I gave presented a decent picture of the situation. It would be nice to have more discussion around here One point that I should have given more detail on is that ἔθνος appears in many places in the scriptures but gets translated to English as gentiles, nations, land and (possibly) tribes. Thus, even the word "nations" can refer to people groups (cities, etc) in the Levant ( Holy Land area). The same can happen with the idea of "world" -- which can refer to the inhabited world, as pointing to the Roman Empire, or sometimes to the globe (if you are not a flat earther).

As to reaching all nations, I emphasized the nations of the Levant in Mark 13:10 but would not have any reason to disregard that the nations within the Roman Empire were also reached. Yet, that might not be the dominant meaning here.

Paul gives more evidence in Romans 1:8 that the gospel truly had reached all the nations of the known world at that time (written around AD 60). "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world." The term for "world" here is "kosmos", which really indicates the all-inclusive nature of this evangelistic outreach. The Roman empire at the time was the central hub of all the nations of the known world, so if the faith of the Roman believers was as well-known as Paul said it was, that indicates total evangelistic coverage of the nations of the known world at that time.

I would say that the terms of Mark 13:10 really were fulfilled by the time Romans 1:8 was written around AD 60, prior to Christ's second coming bodily return in AD 70.