When will the end come?

What the Bible says

The last question the disciples put to the risen Jesus was about time: will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He answered:

It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority.

Acts 1:7

He had said the same on the Mount of Olives:

No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

Matt 24:36

That is Scripture's baseline: the Bible does not permit us to find out the date. What, then, are the signs for? When the disciples asked, "what will be the sign of Your coming and of the end of the age?" (Matt 24:3), Jesus began with a warning.

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. These things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains.

Matt 24:6-8

Wars, famines and earthquakes are not proof that the end has come: "the end is still to come," and they are only "the beginning of birth pains." Jesus warned that many would come in his name, claiming to be the Christ (Matt 24:5), and Paul asks the Thessalonians "not to be easily disconcerted or alarmed" by claims that the day of the Lord has already come (2 Thess 2:2).

Signs point a direction, not a date. "This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come" (Matt 24:14). The signs are not meant to terrify: "stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near" (Luke 21:28).

How should those who do not know the time live? Jesus teaches:

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day on which your Lord will come.

Matt 24:42

Peter says "the Day of the Lord will come like a thief" (2 Pet 3:10), so it cannot be predicted. Paul agrees: "Now about the times and seasons, brothers, we do not need to write to you" (1 Thess 5:1). Believers are "sons of the light and sons of the day," so they should stay awake and sober (1 Thess 5:5-6). "God has not appointed us to suffer wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thess 5:9).

The church's witness

The church long ago received this silence as wisdom. Jerome explains why Jesus withheld the time: "Wherein He shews that Himself knows, but that it was not expedient for the Apostles to know, that being in uncertainty of the coming of their Judge, they should live every day as though they were to be judged that day" Jerome. Not knowing is a kindness that keeps us awake each day.

Augustine, writing to a fellow bishop, pressed the point further. If the Gospel says no one knows the day and hour, allowing that the decade can be known is no better, as though it were possible "to fix or assign it to some seven, ten, or a hundred, or some number of years more or less" Augustine.

On Acts 1, Matthew Henry calls the disciples' question "a caution to his church in all ages, to take heed of a desire of forbidden knowledge" Matthew Henry. On "keep watch" he writes, "We know we have but a little time to live, we cannot know that we have a long time to live" Matthew Henry. Every life can end at any hour.

Christians read Matthew 24 in different ways. The disciples asked about the temple's fall and the end together, so some hold that much of the discourse was fulfilled in AD 70, some that most of it concerns the end still to come, and some that AD 70 foreshadowed the last day. All agree that signs cannot give the time, Christ will come, and we must stay awake. For the order of events after his coming, see What are the rapture and the millennium?.

Church history is full of failed predictions. In the second century followers of Montanus expected the new Jerusalem to descend on a village in Asia Minor. Even Luther thought the last day was not far off. In the 1840s in America many believed a preacher's calculations, waited for a set day and were bitterly disappointed. In Korea in the autumn of 1992 some believers expected a rapture on a given day, some settled their jobs and property for it, and the day passed without event. No one who set a date has yet been right, and each time many were hurt.

In the original languages

"Times or seasons" in Acts 1:7 translates two Greek words. Chronos (χρόνος) is passing time, clock and calendar time; kairos (καιρός) is the right moment, the point God appoints. Jesus says the Father fixed both by his own authority.

Another word is grēgoreō (γρηγορέω), "to keep watch," literally to stay awake. It is the word in Matthew 24:42. Gregory the Great takes it to mean "to keep the eyes open, and looking out for the true light, to do and to observe that which one believes" Gregory. It is not gazing at the sky and counting, but keeping the work entrusted to us.

Eschatos (ἔσχατος) means "last." John writes, "it is the last hour" (1 John 2:18), and the New Testament holds that the last days began with Christ's coming. So "last days" names our own time between his first and second comings, not only the far future.

Common objections

"The wars, quakes and disasters of today are signs. If Jesus gave signs, we should read them." Jesus said, "when you see all these things, you will know that He is near, right at the door" (Matt 24:33), so he does not tell us to ignore signs. But in the same passage he called them "the beginning of birth pains" and said "the end is still to come." Wars, famines and earthquakes have marked every generation, and each has had reason to think its own time the last. The right way to read signs is to stay alert to nearness, not to calculate a day; over-reading them becomes the deception Jesus warned of.

"Date predictions keep failing, so the whole idea of an end is false." A failed human calculation does not make Jesus' promise false. Since he said no one knows, a date prophecy actually stands against his word. What failed was the calculation, not the promise, and a promise not yet fulfilled is not thereby false. See Will Jesus come again?.

"If the end cannot be known, there is no point preparing, or planning for the future." Scripture says otherwise. Jesus calls blessed the servant who is found doing his work when the master returns (Matt 24:45-47). Not knowing the time is not a reason to drop the work but a reason to do it well now. Loving neighbours, sharing the gospel and caring for the world remain until the end.

Going further

Not knowing when the end comes can cause anxiety, but the Bible turns it into freedom. We need not calculate dates or read signs to frighten others. Our task is to live faithfully today. If someone names a date and tries to scare you, remember that Jesus said no one knows; that person has stepped over Scripture's baseline.

You might ask yourself: do I spend more time on curiosity about the end or on being ready for it? When I hear words that stoke fear, what do I use to judge them?

To read further, see Will Jesus come again?, What are the rapture and the millennium? and Has Bible prophecy been fulfilled?. Reading 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 slowly is a good start.