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If you've ever destroyed an ant hill, you were no doubt surprised when you came back the next day to see it rebuilt. The toe of your boot was not the final end. Ants are indomitable hard working little creatures of God. They rebuild. Earthly devastations of nature, horrible as they are, are not the end. San Francisco was rebuilt, there are thriving villages in the shadow of Krakatau and Vesuvius, and yes, New Orleans will be re-built as well. But the end is coming. All the "little" temporary ends point to the final end of the age.

Jesus predicts the final advent and the last judgment. But in this morning's Gospel He more specifically was talking about the coming destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. When our Lord quoted the great prophet Daniel He is really just quoting Himself, for Daniel was given to speak the Word of God by the Very Word of God. As the Evangelist Saint John was given to write the Apocalypse in colorful picture language, containing many and varied images and representations, so too did Daniel speak in a way that needed to be interpreted by the clear words of the Christ.

But don't be smug and analytical. Don't be "dry" historians memorizing interesting but distant facts. The great "Abomination of Desolation" was not only the Roman Armies which destroyed the Holy of Holies, the pagan invaders who planted their idolatrous standards on sanctified ground wherein even sandaled feet should not have tread. But the enemy is not out there; the enemy is in here, in the sinful human heart. To be desolate is to be barren, dessert like; a wilderness of emptiness. Desolation is to be without the Lord. All non-believers are in a state of desolation whether they know it or not. The City of David was burned to the ground and the Temple of God was razed and made a desolation second to none. But even then, it was only an outward appearing sign of the real desolation of God's covenant people. The Jews had rejected the Lord, His prophets, His good Kings and His word for several thousand years. And at the last they had rejected the God/Man Jesus Christ. In 35 AD the non-believing Jews, (the Pharisees not the Romans) had crucified the Lord on the same hill outside Jerusalem's gates which the Roman siege machines and earthen works would be built up for the final attack on Jerusalem 35 years later.

It wasn't just that the idolatrous Roman legions were bad; the citizens of Jerusalem and of Judea were equally sinful. The Jews were every bit as unbelieving as their northern invaders.

It isn't just that the people back then were hard hearted; you are hard hearted. It isn't just that Muslims and other heathen are sinful today, murderous in thought if not in deed, you too are sinful and definitely murderous in thought. The enemy isn't out there; the enemy is in here. It is abominable for God's holy House to have jack-booted Legionaries carousing about and desecrating the place of Sacrifice with their Eagle banners and their Emperor images. It was also idolatrous for the Jews to buy, sell, and exchange currency in the Temple outer-courts. It was idolatrous for the Atlantic District president to pray with Sikhs, Unitarians, and Muslims. It is an abomination for you to worship country and government above the Lord. It is an abomination for you to spend more time studying, memorizing and knowing more about your politics or your sports than about the Lord's written Revelation. It is an abomination what we all are under the veneer of piety and pleasantness.

The answer to "us" abominations of desolation, is the Christ. We walk away from the Law, we refuse to do that which the heavenly Father commands; we still do. But the Christ came to do away with our desolation, our estrangement, and our prodigal natures. Jesus went to the desolation of the dessert for 40 long days and nights as He began publicly to keep all the commandments of God in your place. Jesus became the ultimate abomination when He allowed Himself to be nailed to the cross as a common criminal; when He permitted His perfect body to be covered in blood, spittle, dirt and sweat; when He deigned to become sin (your sin) so that you would never have to face the Father's wrath.

In the events during those terrible dark days of 70 AD, we are given another warning, another alert, to listen to and hear the Word of God. As Saint Paul reminds us all, "take heed lest you fall." There is definitely coming an infinitely greater tribulation than the one faced by the Judeans of the First Century. It will be the separation of the Goats from the Lord's Flock at the end of the Final Century...which could be this very day. But take heart fellow Saints, the greatest Tribulation has already occurred. The Lord Jesus has laid down His sweet life on the Cross. That was God's great banner and standard of wrath, of abomination against sin, against the desolation created by your trespasses. The final sacrifice is complete. The last battle has been fought by your Captain Jesus and won! Meet him now in victory and peace this very morning. He is not in the desert of your diversions or in the empty expanse of your works and efforts. He is not in the inner rooms of your pious prayer-life or inward purity. He is not even in the power and grandeur of nature...at least not "for you." He is here in His Word and in His Supper. For where the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together. Where the Body is there the Birds will congregate. Where the great leafy and fruit-filled Tree of Israel is planted by His Blood and Water, there is His One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

And yes, here you are, gathered together to eat and drink and live forever.

In the Name of The Father and of The Son + and of The Holy Ghost