Preterists place precedence of the imminent time statements and plain statements above prophetic language.
That prophetic language conforms to imminent time statements and plain statements.
You, futurists, are vice versa, that imminent time statements and plain statements must conform to prophetic language.
But guess, the Old Testament is filled with prophetic language, the very same used in the Olivet Discourse and Revelation and they were never to be taken or received as literal. It is simply apocalyptic language. It expresses a deeper truth than literal fulfillment.
Jesus meant He what said. Period.
Here check out these charts that compared the Olivet Discourse with similar OT FULFILLED prophecies:
Prophetic Language of Matthew 24 Explained
Here is more from another source:
Matthew 24:28 "For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together."
The Jewish nation was a carcase, which was morally and judicially dead, and the Romans descended upon it and devoured it. This language is also seen in the judgment language of the Old Testament (Habakkuk 1:6-8, Isaiah 46:10-11, Jeremiah 7:33-34, Hosea 8:1).
The victories of the Romans were not confined to the city of Jerusalem, but like a flood, overran the whole land. Where ever the Jews are, there will Christ be taking vengeance upon them by the Romans. Josephus said, "There was no part of Judea, which did not partake of the calamities of the capital city. At Antioch, the Jews being falsely accused of a design to burn the city, many of them were burnt in the theater, and others were slain. The Romans pursued, and took, and slew them every where, as particularly at the siege of Machaerus; at the wood Jardes, where the Jews were surrounded, and none of them escaped, but, being not fewer than three thousand, were all slain ; and at Masada, where being closely besieged, and upon the point of being taken, they first murdered their wives and children, and then themselves to the number of nine hundred and sixty, to prevent their failing into the enemies' hands. Many were slain in Egypt, and their temple there was shut up: and in Cyrene the followers of Jonathan, a weaver, and author of new disturbances, were most of them slain; he himself was taken prisoner, and by his false accusation three thousand of the richest Jews were condemned and put to death." With this account, Josephus concludes his history of the Jewish war.
Albert Barnes says, "This verse is connected with the preceding by the word 'for,' implying that this is a reason for what is said there-that the Son of man would certainly come to destroy the city, and that he would come suddenly. The meaning is that he would come, by means of the Roman armies, as certainly, as suddenly, and as unexpectedly as whole flocks of vultures and eagles, though unseen before, see their prey at a great distance and suddenly gather in multitudes around it ... So keen is their vision as aptly to represent the Roman armies, though at an immense distance, spying, as it were, Jerusalem, a putrid carcass, and hastening in multitudes to destroy it" ( Commentary on Matthew 24:28).
John Broadus(1886) said, "Christ shall be revealed with a sudden vengeance; for when God shall cast off the city and people, grown ripe for destruction, like a carcase thrown out, the Roman soldiers, like eagles, shall straight fly to it with their eagles (ensigns) to tear and devour it."
Matthew 24:29 "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken."
Modern commentators generally understand this, and what follows, as the end of the world; but the words "immediately after the tribulation of those days," show, that he is not speaking of any distant event, but of something immediately following the tribulation just mentioned, and that must be the destruction of Jerusalem. The word "immediately" is the Greek word eutheos, it means directly, at once or soon, as soon as, forthwith, immediately, shortly, straightway. Notice carefully when this takes place -- immediately after the tribulation of those days. We have seen that the tribulation happened in 67-70 AD with the destruction of Jerusalem so what ever this verse is referring to, happened immediately afterward.
If you are not familiar with the apocalyptic language of the Old Testament, you will not understand what Christ is saying here. This language is common among the Old Testament prophets. This idea is seen clearly as we look at passages where mention is made of the destruction of a state and government using language which seems to set forth the end of the world.
In Isaiah 13:1, God is talking about the judgment that is to fall upon Babylon. The word "burden" is the Hebrew word massa, an utterance, chiefly a doom. This introduction sets the stage for the subject matter in this chapter, and if we forget this, our interpretations of Isaiah 13 can go just about anywhere our imagination wants to go. This is not an oracle against the universe or world but against the nation of Babylon.
Isaiah 13:6,9-13, "Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty. Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine. And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir. Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger."
In Isaiah 13:6, 9-13, he is speaking about the destruction of Babylon, but is sounds like world wide destruction. The terminology of a context cannot be expanded beyond the scope of the subject under discussion. The spectrum of language surely cannot go outside the land of Babylon. If you were a Babylonian and Babylon was destroyed, would it seem like the world was destroyed? Yes! Your world would be destroyed.
Isaiah 13:17 is an historical event that took place in 539 BC. When the Medes destroyed Babylon, the Babylonian world came to an end. This destruction is said, in verse 6, to be from the Almighty, and the Medes constitute the means that God uses to accomplish this task. This is apocalyptic language. This is the way the Bible discusses the fall of a nation. This is obviously figurative language. God did not intend for us to take this literally. If we take this literally, the world ended in 539 BC.
Isaiah 34:3-5, "Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree. For my sword shall be bathed in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment."
In Isaiah 34:3-5, we have a description of the fall of Edom, notice the language that is used. This is Biblical language to describe the fall of a nation. It should be clear that it is not to be taken literally. Let's look at other Old Testament use of this language.
Nahum 1:1-5, "The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite. God is jealous, and the LORD revengeth; the LORD revengeth, and is furious; the LORD will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies. The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the LORD hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet. He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and drieth up all the rivers: Bashan languisheth, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon languisheth. The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein."
The subject of this judgment in Nahum 1:1-5 is Nineveh, not the physical world. This is the way God describes the fall of a nation. If this language describes the judgment of God on nations, why, when we come to the New Testament, do we make it be the destruction of the universe? It is only because we do not understand how the Bible uses this apocalyptic language.
Ezekiel speaks in the same manner of Egypt (Ezekiel 32:7-8): The prophet Daniel speaks, in the same manner, of the slaughter of the Jews by the little horn, the power of the Romans (Daniel 8:10). In the prophetic language, great commotions and revolutions upon earth are often represented by commotions and changes in the heavens. None of these things literally took place!
Milton Terry said, " From these quotations it is apparent that there is scarcely an expression employed in Matthew and Luke which has not been taken from the Old Testament Scriptures. Such apocalyptic forms of speech are not to be assumed to convey in the New Testament a meaning different from that which they bear in the Hebrew Scriptures. They are part and parcel of the genius of prophetic language."
Samuel Hinds (1829) said, "It requires but a slender acquaintance with the writings of the Old Testament prophets to enable us to observe the peculiarity. It is not only figurative, but the figures are of the boldest kind, involving analogies so remote, as in some instances to be scarcely discoverable. If revolutions in empires be the subject, the prophetic representation is filled with disturbance of the laws of the natural world, and the sun, moon, and stars, are exhibited in commotion. If a deliverer is promised to the Jews, the prophet expresses the promise by the rising of a star, and the like" (Hinds, pp. 209-210)
Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) said, "The figurative language of the prophets is taken from the analogy between the world natural and an empire or kingdom considered as a world politic. Accordingly, the world natural, consisting of heaven and earth, signifies the whole world politic, consisting of thrones and people, or so much of it as is considered in prophecy; and the things in that world signify the analogous things in this. For the heavens and the things therein signify thrones and dignities, and those who enjoy them: and the earth, with the things thereon, the inferior people; and the lowest parts of the earth, called Hades or Hell, the lowest or most miserable part of them. Great earthquakes, and the shaking of heaven and earth, are put for the shaking of kingdoms, so as to distract and overthrow them; the creating of a new heaven and earth, and the passing of an old one; or the beginning and end of a world, for the rise and ruin of a body politic signified thereby. The sun, for the whole species and race of kings, in the kingdoms of the world politic; the moon, for the body of common people considered as the king's wife; the starts, for subordinate princes and great men; or for bishops and rulers of the people of God, when the sun is Christ. Setting of the sun, moon, and stars; darkening the sun, turning the moon into blood, and falling of the stars, for the ceasing of a kingdom." (Observations on the Prophecies, Part i. chap. ii)
Dr. John Owen (1721) said, "Not to hold you too long upon what is so plain and evident, you may take it for a rule, that, in the denunciations of the judgments of God, through all the prophets, heaven, sun, moon, stars, and the like appearing beauties and glories of the spectacle heavens, are taken for governments, governors, dominions in political states, as Isa. 14:12-15; Jer 15:9, 51:25. Isaiah 13:13; Ps. 68:6; Joel 2:10; Rev. 8:12; Matt. 24:29; Luke 21:25; Isa 60:20; Obad. 4; Rev 8:13; 11:12; 20:11." (vol. 8, p. 255, in a sermon entitled Shaking and Translating of Heaven and Earth, preached on April 19, 1649)
James Stuart Russell (1878) said, "The symbols are, in fact, equivalent to those employed by our Lord when predicting the doom of Israel. 'Immediately after the tribulation of those days (the horrors of the siege of Jerusalem) shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken (Matt 24:29). Both passages refer to the same catastrophe and employ very similar figures; besides which we have the authority of our Lord for fixing the event and the period of which He speaks within the limits of the generation then in existence: that is to say, the reference can only be to the judgment of the Jewish nation and the abrogation of the Mosaic economy at the Parousia." (p. 289-290).
John Gill (1809) said, "Ver. 29. Immediately after the tribulation of those days, &c. That is, immediately after the distress the Jews would be in through the siege of Jerusalem, and the calamities attending it; just upon the destruction of that city, and the temple in it, with the whole nation of the Jews, shall the following things come to pass;...... and that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, will not answer to the word 'immediately', or show that that should be understood of two thousand years after: besides, all the following things were to be fulfilled before that present generation, in which Christ lived, passed away, #Mt 24:34 and therefore must be understood of things that should directly, and immediately take place upon, or at the destruction of the city and temple."
We see this apocalyptic language used all through the book of Revelation. I believe that the book of Revelation is an expanded version of the Olivet Discourse. Notice how John used apocalyptic language. Is Revelation 6:13-17 talking about the end of the world in our future? NO! John is dealing with Jerusalem's destruction in AD 70. Look at what Jesus said as he was on his way to be crucified (Luke 23:28-30): Jesus was telling the women of His day to weep for THEMSELVES because judgment was going to come upon THEM. In Revelation 6, during the great tribulation which happened in AD 67-70, we see them crying out for the mountains to fall on them, just as Jesus said they would. This language is picturing the response of sinful man to the awful judgment of God.
The biblical evidence is overwhelming, the Olivet Discourse, in its entirety, is speaking of the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. The only thing that would make us push any of these things into the future are our own presuppositions. In this vivid picturesque language Jesus is describing Jerusalem's destruction. In AD 70, the lights went out in Israel for good. When the tribulation was over, physical Israel ceased to exist. God's people were no longer distinguished by physical birth, but by spiritual birth alone. The Old Covenant was over, and the New Covenant fully instituted.
