Anto9us said in post 34:
I make no bones about seeing some of Olivet Discourse as literal and some as figurative -- and that "sun blacking out, moon going out, stars falling from heaven" etc as language relating to the passing of the Mosaic "age"
Matthew 24:29 can refer to literal clouds blocking the literal light from the literal sun and moon. And it can refer to what we still today call "falling stars", i.e. meteors, but ones which will also be meteorites, i.e. ones which will pass through the clouds and will be seen before they land on the earth. So "heaven" in Matthew 24:29-31 can simply refer to the first heaven, i.e. the sky/atmosphere. And "the powers of the heavens" which will be shaken can refer to the literal fallen-angelic "powers" that currently rule the world from high above the earth (Ephesians 6:12, Ephesians 2:2).
Anto9us said in post 34:
I make no bones about seeing some of Olivet Discourse as literal and some as figurative -- and that "sun blacking out, moon going out, stars falling from heaven" etc as language relating to the passing of the Mosaic "age"
Regarding "the Mosaic 'age'", note that the time of the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law ended not at the destruction of the temple in 70 AD, but decades earlier, at the moment that Jesus died on the Cross (Matthew 27:50-51a) and abolished the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law (Ephesians 2:15-16, Colossians 2:14-17, Romans 7:6; 2 Corinthians 3:6-18, Hebrews 7:18-19), which was the same moment that he brought the New Covenant into effect (Matthew 26:28, Hebrews 9:15-17, Hebrews 10:19-20, Matthew 27:51a). So there was no transition period, no overlap at all (Hebrews 10:9b, Hebrews 7:12), between the time of the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law and the time of the New Covenant.
Also, while the apostles asked Jesus about the end of the age (Matthew 24:3), note that he didn't tell them that the end of
the age would occur at the destruction of the 2nd temple, or (as is sometimes claimed) before the future tribulation, or even at the end of the future tribulation, i.e. at his (post-tribulation) 2nd coming (Matthew 24:29-31), or when the end of the age would occur, just as Jesus didn't tell the apostles many other things during his ministry (John 16:12). It wouldn't be until much later that Jesus would show the apostle John, through the vision in the book of Revelation (given about 95 AD: Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5:30:3c), that the end of the age, when all the unsaved will be cast into the lake of fire (Matthew 13:40, Matthew 25:41, Revelation 20:15), won't occur until over 1,000 years after Jesus' (never fulfilled) 2nd coming (Revelation 19:7 to 20:15).
Anto9us said in post 34:
anybody see book of Revelation as "some literal - some figurative'??
Yes, but Revelation is (contrary to what is sometimes claimed) almost entirely literal, for it's unsealed (Revelation 22:10), meaning that it shouldn't be difficult for saved people of any time to understand it if they simply read it as it's written: chronologically and almost-entirely literally. The few parts of it that are symbolic are almost always explained afterward (e.g. Revelation 1:20, Revelation 17:9-12). And Revelation's few symbols not explained afterward (e.g. Revelation 13:2) are usually explained elsewhere in the Bible (e.g. Daniel 7:4-7,17).
Just as Jesus' 2nd coming in Revelation 19:7 to 20:3 will be fulfilled almost entirely literally, so the events of the preceding tribulation in Revelation chapters 6 to 18 will be fulfilled almost entirely literally. Also, the millennium in Revelation 20 will be literal, and will begin after Jesus' 2nd coming (Revelation 19:7 to 20:6, Zechariah 14:3-21), when he will reign on the earth with the bodily resurrected church for 1,000 years (Revelation 20:4-6, Revelation 5:10, Revelation 2:26-29, Psalms 66:3-4, Psalms 72:8-11). After that, the events of Revelation 20:7 to 22:5 will occur literally.
