The passage speaks of the end times, or the falling away, where many people proffessing faith will be drawn to false teachers and prophets. Those who fall away will seperate themselves from the Life that is Christ. To seperate ones-self from Life, leaves one without it (a carcass) The vultures, (the demons and their followers) are waiting for those who fall away, to pick them off and take away even the little they had and replace it with untruth. These carcasses will eventualy turn on the brethren and persecute them. At last that is the way it comes to me, others may have different understandings.
I've another way of taking it. My understanding is that Matthew 24:1-28 is all looking forward to a single incident - the destruction of Jerusalem and descration of the Temple, which happened in AD70.
In Jesus phrase, there's a carcass -- something dead -- and vultures circling.
Could it be that Jesus is saying that the Temple worship is dead. It had become utterly corrupt, with a self-serving priesthood and with a grasp on power that oppressed the weakest. Jesus had overtuned the tables in the temple only a matter of days before.
And the vultures are the inevitable signs of judgement: false messiahs, wars, famine, persecution, and the sacking of Jerusalem and dessecration of the temple.
I like both these two comments brothers, Hekuran I feel is spot on, the destruction of Jerusalem and descration of the Temple, which happened in AD70. But we need to read more than one verse and see here it is referring to the Tribulation period also.
Matthew 24:15-31 (NKJV)
15 "Therefore when you see the
'abomination of desolation,' spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place" (whoever reads, let him understand),
16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.
17 Let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house.
18 And let him who is in the field not go back to get his clothes.
19 But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!
20 And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath.
21 For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened.
23 Then if anyone says to you, 'Look, here
is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe
it.
24 For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
25 See, I have told you beforehand.
26 Therefore if they say to you, 'Look, He is in the desert!' do not go out;
or 'Look,
He is in the inner rooms!' do not believe
it.
27 For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.
28 For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.
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.
30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
31 And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
Revelation 19:17-21 (NKJV)
17 Then I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the birds that fly in the midst of heaven, "Come and gather together for the supper of the great God,
18 that you may eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them, and the flesh of all
people, free and slave, both small and great."
19 And I saw the beast, the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army.
20 Then the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who worked signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were cast alive into the lake of fire burning with brimstone.
21 And the rest were killed with the sword which proceeded from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse. And all the birds were filled with their flesh.
Armageddon and the Second coming of Christ
Ezekiel 39:11-16 (NKJV)
11 "It will come to pass in that day
that I will give Gog a burial place there in Israel, the valley of those who pass by east of the sea; and it will obstruct travelers, because there they will bury Gog and all his multitude. Therefore they will call
it the Valley of Hamon Gog.
12
For seven months the house of Israel will be burying them, in order to cleanse the land.
13 Indeed all the people of the land will be burying, and they will gain renown for it on the day that I am glorified," says the Lord GOD.
14 They will set apart men regularly employed, with the help of a search party, to pass through the land and bury those bodies remaining on the ground, in order to cleanse it. At the end of seven months they will make a search.
15 The search party will pass through the land; and
when anyone sees a man's bone, he shall set up a marker by it, till the buriers have buried it in the Valley of Hamon Gog.
16
The name of
the city
will also
be Hamonah. Thus they shall cleanse the land." '
Everything God created has a reason, I often used to wonder why he created creatures like the vultures that would tear a creature apart to eat it.
Seven months to bury their dead!!!