The chapter
Simply A poor widow drops two of the smallest coins into the temple treasury and Jesus says she has given more than anyone. Someone admires the building, and he says not one of its stones will be left standing. The rest of the chapter answers the obvious question, when, and it answers it by describing wars, arrests, a city surrounded by armies, and signs in the sky, while telling the disciples not to run after anyone who claims to know the date.
Context The two halves of the chapter are joined by one word. At 20:47 the scribes DEVOUR WIDOWS' HOUSES, and the first thing shown afterwards is a widow at verses 2 to 4 giving the temple ALL SHE HAD TO LIVE ON. The praise she receives is exact and it is not praise of the institution taking it. Four verses later the building it went into is described as rubble. This Gospel puts the three facts in a row and leaves the reader to hold them together.
Verses 1-6
Simply He watches rich people putting their offerings into the treasury and sees a poor widow put in two small coins. He says she has put in more than all of them, because they gave out of what they had spare and she gave everything she had to live on. Then people start admiring the temple's fine stonework and its gifts, and he says the day is coming when not one stone will be left on another.
Context Nothing in verses 1 to 4 is addressed to the widow, and nothing is said to her. The scene is observed, and the arithmetic is the point: the others gave from ABUNDANCE and she gave her LIVING, so the smaller sum is the larger gift. It is worth noticing what is not there. She is not told to keep the money, and she is not told she was right; the sentence measures what happened and stops. Verses 5 and 6 then remove any suggestion that the building deserved it, which is why the two scenes are next to each other rather than in separate chapters.
Verses 7-19
Simply They ask when it will happen and what the sign will be. He begins by warning them not to be led astray, because people will come using his name and saying the time is near. Wars and revolutions must happen first, and nations and kingdoms will fight, and there will be earthquakes, famines and plagues. But before all that, they will be arrested, handed over to synagogues and prisons, and brought before kings, and that will be their chance to speak. Families will betray them and some will be killed, and they should not rehearse a defence.
Context The question at verse 7 asks for a date and a sign, and the answer refuses the date twice, at verse 8 where people will claim the time is near, and at verse 9 where the end is NOT IMMEDIATELY. Verse 12 then puts the arrests BEFORE ALL THESE THINGS, so the sequence the disciples are given starts with their own trials rather than with cosmic events. Verse 14 repeats the instruction already given at 12:11 to 12, not to prepare an answer in advance; here the reason is stated differently, that he will give them a mouth and wisdom.
Verses 20-38
Simply When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, he says, its ruin is near: get out of the city, do not go in, because these are days when what was written comes true. It will be terrible for women who are pregnant or nursing. People will be killed and taken captive, and Jerusalem will be trampled by the Gentiles. Then there will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, the sea will roar, and people will faint with fear before they see the Son of Man come in a cloud. When it starts, he says, stand up straight. Learn from a fig tree: when it buds you know summer is near.
Context Verse 20 says something different from both of its parallels, and all three can be opened here. Mark 13:14 and Matthew 24:15 both have the reader watch for THE ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION SPOKEN OF BY DANIEL THE PROPHET, standing where it should not, and both add the aside let the reader understand. Verse 20 has no cipher and no aside: it says JERUSALEM SURROUNDED BY ARMIES. One is a scriptural sign that has to be decoded, the other is a military description that does not. What follows differs to match, since verse 24 describes captives taken into all the nations and a city trampled, where the other two go on to the days being shortened. This file reports the difference and stops there; what it implies about when each book was written is a historical question, and no document in this corpus settles it.