Ezekiel’s use of “lightning” as a metaphor for the judgment and destruction of Jerusalem and the temple (Ezekiel 21:1-15), should help us to understand Jesus’ use of “lighting” in the context of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, at his “coming” (Mathew 24:2-3,27). The coming of the Lord would be manifested in a judgment (like lightning) that would begin in the east and shine (be fully revealed) in the west. In other words, the coming (parousia) of the Lord was his judgment-presence manifested through the Roman armies, which began in the “east”, at the household of God (1 Peter 4:17 Revelation 2-3), and culminated in the “west”, in Jerusalem, at the “house” of those who did “not obey the gospel of God”.
The Institute Of Fulfilled Eschatology