Luke 21:32 and the coming of the kingdom

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All Christians are still waiting for the Second Coming of Christ, where Jesus would come in glory as a King and a Judge in contrast with the "First Coming" about 2000 years ago, where He came in humility (baby in a manger) as God Incarnate (fully human being born of a woman) and as the Lamb of God / Suffering Servant (sacrifice for our sin as He was slaughtered on our behalf on the cross).

There is a concise answer to what "this generation will not pass away until all these things take place" refer to at gotquestions.org website, which describes 2 interpretations:

  • Future Generation: "this generation" means a future generation shortly before the end times events.

  • Double Fulfillment: some events (like the destruction of the temple in AD 70) has happened while other events connected to the end times events haven't.

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In John Calvin's view, Jesus is saying that before the current generation died out, great suffering and tribulation would come upon the church, which should therefore take warning and prepare, but also trust that it is part of God's plan, hence not to despair.

He is therefore also saying that Jesus was not indicating by this that he would soon return.

Here is an excerpt from John Calvin's commentary, as found here: https://biblehub.com/commentaries/calvin/luke/21.htm

  1. This generation shall not pass away. Though Christ employs a general expression, yet he does not extend the discourses to all the miseries which would befall the Church, but merely informs them, that before a single generation shall have been completed, they will learn by experience the truth of what he has said. For within fifty years the city was destroyed and the temple was razed, the whole country was reduced to a hideous desert, and the obstinacy of the world rose up against God. Nay more, their rage was inflamed to exterminate the doctrine of salvation, false teachers arose to corrupt the pure gospel by their impostures, religion sustained amazing shocks, and the whole company of the godly was miserably distressed. Now though the same evils were perpetrated in uninterrupted succession for many ages afterwards, yet what Christ said was true, that, before the close of a single generation, believers would feel in reality, and by undoubted experience, the truth of his prediction; for the apostles endured the same things which we see in the present day. [155] And yet it was not the design of Christ to promise to his followers that their calamities would be terminated within a short time, (for then he would have contradicted himself, having previously warned them that the end was not yet;) but, in order to encourage them to perseverance, he expressly foretold that those things related to their own age. The meaning therefore is: "This prophecy does not relate to evils that are distant, and which posterity will see after the lapse of many centuries, but which are now hanging over you, and ready to fall in one mass, so that there is no part of it which the present generation will not experience." So then, while our Lord heaps upon a, single generation every kind of calamities, he does not by any means exempt future ages from the same kind of sufferings, but only enjoins the disciples to be prepared for enduring them all with firmness.

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