What a wonderful time here this morning. Daniel chapter seven. Returning to our series of studies through Daniel, if you’ll recall last time—it’s been separated by quite a number of weeks now—but the last time, we looked through Daniel chapter 7. We made our way through the entire chapter, surveying it, trying to give the interpretation and sketching out the prospect that is there in the prophecy of chapter 7.
What I plan for the next four Sundays now in February is to go back to Daniel 7 each week this month and select out of it one of the prominent themes that arise in this chapter. It’s an amazingly important chapter, its prospect is glorious, and it’s worth, I think, our time to go back and take the time with some of the individual themes. And we do that this morning now with the theme, God is King.
God Is King
Daniel chapter 7, I’ll take time to read through the entire chapter.
In the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel saw in a dream and visions of his head as he lay in his bed. Then he wrote down the dream and told the sum of the matter. Daniel declared, “I saw in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea. And four great beasts came up out of the sea, different from one another. The first was like a lion and had eagle’s wings. And I looked and its wings were plucked off and it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man. And the mind of a man was given to it. Behold, another beast, a second one, like a bear. It was raised up on one side. It had three ribs in its mouth between its teeth, and it was told, ‘Arise, devour much flesh.’
“And after this, I looked, and behold, another, like a leopard, with four wings of a bird on its back. And the beast had four heads, and dominion was given to it. After this, I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, terrifying and dreadful and exceedingly strong. It had great iron teeth, and it devoured and broke in pieces and stamped what was left with its feet. And it was different from all the other beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns. I considered the horns and behold, there came up among them another horn, a little one, before which three of the first horns were plucked up by the roots. And behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth speaking great things.
“And as I looked, thrones were placed and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His clothing was white as snow, the hair of his head like pure wool. His throne was fiery flames. Its wheels were burning fire. A stream of fire issued and came out from before him. A thousand thousands served him and 10,000 times 10,000 stood before him. The court sat in judgment and the books were opened. And I looked then because of the sound of the great words that the horn was speaking. And as I looked, the beast was killed and its body destroyed and given over to be burned with fire. As for the rest of the beast, their dominion was taken away, but their lives were prolonged for a season and a time.
“I saw in the night visions and behold at the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him and to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples and nations and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.
“As for me, Daniel, my spirit within me was anxious and the visions of my head alarmed me. I approached one of those who stood there and asked him the truth concerning this. So he told me and made known to me the interpretation of the things. ‘These four great beasts are four kings who shall arise out of the earth. But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever and ever.’
“Then I desired to know the truth about the fourth beast, which was different from all the rest, exceedingly terrifying with its teeth of iron, claws of bronze, which devoured and broken pieces and stamped what was left with his feet and about the ten horns that were on its head. And then the other horn that came up and before which three of them fell, the horn that had eyes and a mouth that spoke great things and that seemed greater than its companions. And as I looked, this horn made war with the saints and prevailed over them until the Ancient of Days came and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High. And the time came when the saints possessed the kingdom.
“Thus he said, ‘As for the fourth beast, there shall be a fourth kingdom on the earth, which shall be different from all the other kingdoms and it shall devour the whole earth and trample it down and break it to pieces. As for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings shall arise, and another shall arise after them, and he shall be different from the former ones, and shall put down three kings. He shall speak words against the Most High, and he shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and shall think to change the times and the law, and they shall be given into his hand for a time, times, and half a time. The court shall sit in judgment and his dominion shall be taken away to be consumed and destroyed to the end. And the kingdom and the dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High. Their kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom and all dominions shall serve and obey them.’
“Here’s the end of the matter. As for me, Daniel, my thoughts greatly alarmed me and my color changed, but I kept the matter in my heart.”
Let’s bow together for prayer. Our Father, we are grateful for this unusual and yet marvelous portion of your word. We ask that you’ll give us insight into it, help us to see this morning what you would have for us to learn of your greatness, that we may become more convinced and at peace because we understand that God is King. We pray in Jesus’ name.
Daniel chapter 7 is divided rather nicely into two sections: verses 1 to 14 and then verses 15 through 28. In verses 1 to 14 we have the vision that Daniel recounts that he received, and then in verses 15 to 28 we have the interpretation of the vision that he received. Now also in the interpretation we are given a few more details about the vision itself, but that is in general the flow of the passage. We have the vision in verses 1 to 14, and then the interpretation of the vision in verses 15 through 28.
And we saw last time the key to understanding it is in verse 17: “These four great beasts are four kings that shall arise out of the earth.” And so he sees these awful beasts arising. We have first the lion with wings on its back, and then we have the bear that’s raised up on one side with three ribs in its mouth. Then we have the leopard with four heads. And then we have, as if that’s not frightening enough, a frightening beast that’s not given a specific likeness, but it’s a nondescript beast. It’s terrifying, he says, dreadful, exceedingly strong, great iron teeth, and it just destroyed everything in its way.
And then in verse 17, he tells us these beasts are four kings that shall arise in the earth. So clearly we see here a succession of kingdoms that will arise. We saw then last time that the first beast was a lion with eagle’s wings that portrays for us the kingdom of Babylon with Nebuchadnezzar as king and now Belshazzar is king. The business of giving—of it being lifted up from the ground, made to stand on two feet, and the mind of a man was given to it, its wings plucked off—is this picture of Daniel chapter 4, when Nebuchadnezzar lost his mind for a while and was put out to pasture until he learned that God is God.
So we have, first of all, the lion, and that is Babylon. The second beast was a bear, and that is the kingdom of Medo-Persia. Raised up on one side, it is the Persian dominance of the Medo-Persian Empire, and the three ribs in its mouth are the kingdoms that it had devoured on its way to prominence. And then we saw the third beast was the leopard with four heads with wings on its back. Feet don’t even touch the ground. This is portraying the next kingdom in order, and that is the kingdom of Greece with its rapid success to power and its “not even touching the ground” kind of speed in advancing the rule under Alexander the Great.
And then the fourth kingdom, this nondescript beast, is the kingdom of Rome. And we have this succession that is the same that we see in Daniel chapter 2 as well, and that is Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. And then out of this fourth kingdom arise more kingdoms, these ten horns, and out of that arises another little horn that arises, overthrows some of them, but then judgment comes and the Ancient of Days sits in judgment and the beast is killed, destroyed, and given over to be burned. And then more details of that are filled in for us in the latter half of the chapter.
As I mentioned earlier, we’re going to spend the next four Sundays looking at four prominent themes that arise here in Daniel chapter 7. We’ve already worked our way through, but now let’s go back and take them.
The God Who Is King
The first theme that we’ll look at is the God who is King. The second will be the little horn who opposes the people of God. We’ll look at that, Lord willing, next week. The third theme that we’ll look at here is the theme of the Son of Man. And then the fourth theme that is prominent in the chapter is the theme of the Kingdom of God.
So first of all now, the God who is King. This is clearly the imagery that we have here involved in verses 9 and following with this judgment scene where God the King sits in judgment over the nations and executes his own will. The nations are raging, but God is on his throne. He is still ruling over them, and when he says their time is up, he brings them into judgment. This forms, by the way, the background for what we find when we get to Revelation chapters 4 and 5, where we have God seated on his throne with a multitude of thrones around him, being served and being praised by all of those other authorities, giving praise to God who reigns over them all. This is the background for that. And we have here the imagery of God as King.
God as King. I think that’s a concept that’s just a little bit, at least, difficult for us to appreciate. We don’t have kings. We have a president. Our nation was formed on the thesis: we don’t have a king. We don’t want a king. “No sovereigns here” is one of the slogans of early America. We have no sovereign here. And when the American government was set up, we were set up to have three different branches of government. And if the president is the figurehead of the nation—and he is in a very important way and a very important and powerful man—there are still two other branches of government to keep him in check. And also there’s the will of the American people. And if we don’t like him, we can impeach him. We can vote him out at the next election. And then we can limit his terms to two terms now as well.
That’s an American president. And very many American presidents have been frustrated that they’re not able to carry out their will because of the checks and balances in the Congress and both houses and because the will of the American people is not where they are. And we’ve had many, many frustrated presidents.
That is not kingship. In a kingship, the king is sovereign. He rules over all. And that is the imagery that is used not just here, but throughout the Bible, of God as King. He’s not accountable to anyone outside himself. He rules over all, and not only does his own will, but he does only his own will and is never frustrated by anyone, and no one can ever frustrate his will. We call this divine sovereignty.
One of the best descriptions of divine sovereignty that I have read was in a little book on the attributes of God by A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy. It’s a wonderful little book in many ways. He has a little chapter in there on the doctrine of divine sovereignty. A. W. Tozer was a minister in the Christian Missionary Alliance, which was officially an Arminian denomination. They’re getting a little bit broader today; they’re allowing Calvinists within them. But in Tozer’s day, it was not so. So it’s a little bit surprising that I would say that one of the best descriptions of divine sovereignty that I’ve read was from A. W. Tozer, but it’s true—but only for half the chapter.
Half of the chapter, he defines divine sovereignty in a just marvelous way. In the last half of the chapter, he completely undoes it with some of his explanations of how it works out. But in that first half of the chapter, he says that divine sovereignty consists essentially of three attributes of God.
One, his omniscience. There is no datum of information unknown to God. If there were anything, any small speck of information unknown to God, his rule would break down at that point. Number two, his omnipotence. That God is all-powerful. That there’s no modicum of power outside of God’s immediate control. He knows all that is. He is powerful over all that is. And if he weren’t, his rule would break down at that point. And then the third constituent element of God’s sovereignty, Tozer says, is God’s freedom. His omniscience, his omnipotence, and his freedom. He is free to do whatever he wills, whenever he wills, with whomever he wills, and however he wills. He’s free. He’s not pressured. He’s not forced. He’s King. He’s sovereign. He does as he pleases.
All that, of course, is exactly the presentation of God that we find in the scriptures. What we find in the scriptures is not a God of the pantheists where God is identified with the created order and just more or less part of it. Or he’s not a deist who is somehow the God who got it all in order and created it all but sits aloof over it all, transcendent in such a way that he really makes no difference in the affairs of life. But the theistic portrait of God that we find in the scriptures is that God is both transcendent over the world and he is immanent in the world, controlling every aspect of it according to his own will.
And we see that in the narrative of scripture over and over again. It was Warfield that first tuned me into this. It was just fascinating to read through the scriptures and to see how this concept of divine sovereignty is just everywhere in the narrative of scripture. So much so that to say “God” is to say “sovereignty.” And so, for example, in the general flow of scripture, in the narrative of scripture, you’ll find things like not “it rained,” but you’ll see “God sent the rain.” Or not just “there was a famine,” but “God sent a famine.” Or not just that a woman was not able to have a child, but “God closed the womb.” Or if she was able to have children, “God opened the womb.”
And you find expressions like that throughout the narrative of scripture so often that if you weren’t careful, you could think that God doesn’t work through second causes, which he does. But that sense of God in control of all that is in his creation permeates the scriptures. So that if we did not have those culminating verses in the Bible about divine sovereignty that we have, we would still be forced to the same conclusion. Now we do have those culminating verses. God works all things according to the purpose of his own will. And verses like that just wrap up in a crisp statement that God is King over everything. But we find that just pervasively through the scriptures, and the biblical writers generally give that to us in the narratives and then again in some culminating statements as well.
And as we have seen here through the book of Daniel, that has been Daniel’s grand theme throughout. You might remember—and I’m going to take a few minutes here to go back through what we have seen so far in Daniel just to see how this has been his theme. For those of you who were not here, it’ll help you catch up. And for those of you who were here, I hope it’ll be a reminder. But let’s look again to see how Daniel expounds on this theme and refers to it over and again, and not only refers to it, but that it is his central guiding conviction throughout what he writes.
In chapter one, we have basically the setup for the book of Daniel. So we don’t have a lot of the theme of divine sovereignty here, except for the fact that here in Daniel 1, we are told that the children of Israel were carried into exile in captivity into Babylon, and we’re given the situation of these prominent individuals from Israel that are serving in the court of the king: Daniel and his three friends. All of that is the setup for us. But notice how all of that is set up again in chapter 1 and verse 2: “And the Lord gave Jehoiakim, king of Judah, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar.” The Lord gave him. It wasn’t just a political accident. It wasn’t just that Nebuchadnezzar had great military strength and Israel couldn’t withstand. But God gave Israel over into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar. It was his doing. We’ll find later, especially in the book of Daniel, it is to deal with their transgressions and so on. But make no mistake about it, this was not an accident of history. This is God’s doing that Israel is now in Babylon in exile. That’s a setup from verse 2, virtually the first statement of the prophecy.
We come to chapter 2, and that is the whole theme of chapter 2. We have Nebuchadnezzar’s great dream. You remember this metallic image: the head of gold, the chest and arms of silver, and then the bronze midsection, and the iron legs, and the feet with iron mixed with clay. And then you have this great boulder cut out of the side of the mountain coming down and crashing the image and grinding it to powder. These four successive kingdoms—the gold, silver, bronze, and the iron—we have again Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, and out of that growing other kings. And then this boulder comes out of the side of the mountain, cut without human hands, crushes the image, and this is the kingdom of God then that grows to fill the whole earth.
And the whole theme of Daniel chapter 2, and the theme of Daniel itself, is summed up for us in chapter 2, verse 20. Daniel answered and said, “Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding.” Here’s the theme of Daniel. God removes kings—you’re out. He sets up kings—you for now. Now you’re out, and I’ll give it to the next. And whatever degree of might, wisdom, or power that any ruler ever has is because the Lord has given it to him for this time. It is God ruling over all of it. That’s the thrust of Daniel chapter two.
And as we’ll see then, it’s the thrust of the rest of the book. You’ll see it comes up again later in chapter 2, verses 28 and following, where Daniel says to Nebuchadnezzar in so many words that this foretelling the future as he has, and telling the dream like he has, is possible only because there’s a God in heaven who wrote the whole script for the whole thing and he has told me about it.
And then if you want to look down at verse 37, notice: “You, O King, the King of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, and the might, and the glory, and into whose hands He has given whoever, wherever they dwell, the children of men, the beasts of the field.” Notice that, that Nebuchadnezzar is this great and powerful king, and Daniel acknowledges that. Make no mistake, you are this great and powerful king because the God of heaven has given you that power to rule for this time. We find the same thing in verses 44 and 45, that in God’s time, he’ll be done with all other kingdoms and he’ll just set up his own kingdom. That is to say, he removes kings and he sets up kings. And then we have the climax of the passage, chapter 2, verse 47, where Nebuchadnezzar himself confesses that God is the God of gods and the King of kings.
Oh, you can’t miss it. Well, you can’t miss it, but it doesn’t mean you like it. And so we get to chapter 3, and Nebuchadnezzar doesn’t like it. And he builds his own image, and it’s a whole image of gold. He’s not just the gold head; he’s the whole thing. And there’s not going to be another kingdom that surpasses me. And I’m going to build this image, this great image of gold. And at the right moment when the music sounds, everyone’s going to bow. And if you don’t bow, you’ll burn.
And notice what has made the focus of the whole episode in chapter 3, verse 15: “If you don’t do this, now if you’re ready, when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, the trigon, the harp, the bagpipe, and every kind of music, to fall down and worship the image that I have made, well and good. But if you do not, you shall immediately be cast into a burning, fiery furnace, and here it is: And who is the God who will deliver you out of my hand?” That is made the point of contact, the point of interest in the passage: a battle of the gods, the battle of God, the God of Israel against mighty King Nebuchadnezzar. And of course, we know how that turns out. And we find in verse 29, we find Nebuchadnezzar making that confession again: “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and has delivered his servants who trusted him.” So there is another God above even Nebuchadnezzar himself. And here this God is sovereign even over the natural elements like fire.
All right then, remember we were in Chapter 4. I said this just might be titled “A Tale of Two Sovereignties.” Well, you might title it that, but you’d have to follow it up: “A Tale of Two Sovereignties—No, Make That Just One.” Because that’s the thrust of Daniel chapter 4. When Daniel has this great tree dream that was cut down, and it’s just a strangest dream, and he calls in the men to interpret it for him. Daniel, of course, is the one who does, and he learns from it all. And in fact, Daniel 4 is even set up that way, where at the very beginning in chapter 4, verses 1, 2, and 3, Nebuchadnezzar himself gives his confession of faith in this God, just as the episode at the end of the chapter made him conclude, but here he states it up front. Let me show you: “It seemed good to me,” verse 2, “to show you the signs and wonders that the Most High God has done for me. How great are his signs, how mighty his wonders, and here’s the statement: His kingdom, his rules, His everlasting kingdom and his dominion endures from generation to generation.”
So we have the setup. God is King over all and he will be forever. And then we have this recurring refrain through chapter four that we saw. Verse 17: “The Most High rules and the kingdom of men gives it to whomever he will.” Verse 25: “The Most High rules.” Verse 32: the same. Verse 24: “The decree of the Most High has come upon my king.” Well, it happened to the king just as God said it would. He was put out to pasture for a while. He learned a little bit, at least, to be humble. He learned that God ruled over all, and he comes out of it all in verses 34 and 35, making that confession: “In the end of days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted my eyes to heaven, and my reason returned to me, and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored him who lives forever. Why? Because his dominion is an everlasting dominion, his kingdom endures from generation to generation. And all the inhabitants of the earth are counted as nothing. And he does according to his will among the hosts of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. And none can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What have you done?'”
And as if that is not enough, the closing doxology of the chapter, we have, in verse 37, a similar statement: “I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of Heaven.” Wonderful title. I think it’s the only time in Scripture, the King of Heaven, “for all his works are right and his ways are just.” God rules. He is sovereign over all and he rules in justice over all. And he’s able to humble anyone, even great King Nebuchadnezzar. So again, up front in chapter four, the recurring refrain through chapter four, and then the culmination of chapter four in that episode is the same: God is King, God rules over all.
Chapter five, the setup. Again, this is King Belshazzar, and the setup for this episode is Belshazzar strutting. Strutting like Nebuchadnezzar had done, only a bit worse. And there’s a direct challenge to God’s authority and God’s rule. And remember, he’s having this drunken party and they’re celebrating and he sends and has the golden vessels from the temple taken. These were golden vessels that had been taken from the temple in Jerusalem and put in the Babylonian temple to their gods. “Go get those for me.” And he gets them and fills them with wine and begins to drink. And it tells us in the text, praising the gods of Babylon. So here’s this direct challenge: the gods of Babylon against the God of Israel. And so God sends a handwritten message to Belshazzar and there’s this writing on the wall and he tells him in short, “Your time is up, you don’t measure up, and your kingdom is gone.” And that night, that very night, his kingdom was taken away and Darius the Mede received the kingdom.
Notice, by the way, how it’s even hinted at in the very last verse of chapter 5: “Darius the Mede received the kingdom.” From whom? We like to call these—Bible scholars teach us to say things that sound really cool sometimes—we call these divine passives. It’s the passive voice here, a passive idea here that he “received the kingdom.” From whom? Well, it’s not stated exactly. But you’re left to say that after this prophecy, he received the kingdom from God. God gave him the kingdom. We’ll see more of that as we go along. Well, that all in chapter 5 is to say, in the words of chapter 2, verse 21, God removes kings and he sets up kings. God rules. God is King.
And we came to chapter 6, Daniel in the lion’s den. Again, God’s rule is made the point at issue in verse 16. You’ll remember here that the king is not real happy about Daniel having to go to the lion’s den, but he’d issued this decree of the Medes and the Persians that can’t be revoked. And after he has to send him, the king commanded, Daniel was brought and cast into the den of lions and the king declared to Daniel, “May your God whom you serve continually deliver you.” So again, just like in chapter three, the question is: is Daniel’s God, is Israel’s God, God over the lions, God over the fire, God over Nebuchadnezzar? Can he save Daniel from the lions as well? And then of course we have in chapter six, verse 20, the king comes back, that’s the question at hand. The king declared to Daniel, “O Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you serve continually been able to deliver you from the lions?” And of course he was.
And then the verses 25 through 27, we have the stated takeaway from the episode. King Darius wrote to all the peoples, nations, and languages that dwell in all the earth: “Peace be multiplied to you. I make a decree that in all my royal dominion, people are to tremble in fear before the God of Daniel, because he is the living God, enduring forever. His kingdom shall never be destroyed. His kingdom shall be to the end. He delivers and rescues. He works signs and wonders in heaven and earth. He who has saved Daniel from the power of the lions.” So again in chapter 6, the theme becomes God who rules over all—in this case, even plotting schemes and wild beasts.
All of that then brings us to chapter 7. We find the same theme of God’s rule here as well. Notice we have it already in the setup in verse two. Daniel declared, “I saw in my vision by night and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea,” and then out of this great sea come these wild beasts who are kings that rule. Who stirred up the sea? The four winds of heaven. So even in the raging nations—this is very important—even the raging nations are there as a result of God’s sovereign rule. The winds of heaven have stirred up the sea and brought up these beasts.
And then we have a succession in chapter 7 of these that I mentioned, the divine passives. Notice them quickly. Verse 4: the lion’s wings were plucked. He was lifted up. He was made to stand like a man. A human mind was given to him. Verse 5: the bear was raised up and told to devour. Verse 6: the leopard had dominion given to it. Verse 8: this nondescript beast had its horns pulled up by the roots. Verse 11: the beast is killed and destroyed and given into the fire. And then in the following verse, verse 12, we have the climax of it all: dominion was taken away, and they were granted to live for an appointed time.
And if there’s any doubt at all, verses 9 through 14, the whole scene there of judgment is, in a sense, rather anti-climactic. You’ve got these raging beasts. You’ve got this lion who’s wreaking havoc and doing all his will. And then you have this bear who’s doing the same. And then you’ve got this leopard doing the same. And then you’ve got this nondescript beast doing the same. You’ve got these kings rising out. All just seem to be unchecked until the Ancient of Days comes. And he sits in judgment and says, “You’re done.” And he was taken. He was killed, destroyed, and thrown in the fire. There’s no battle. There’s no struggle. There’s just—God comes, and that’s it. You’re done. It’s over.
Verses 21 and 22 summarize for us very well. And I love the way it says it; I’ve already mentioned it. “As I looked, this horn made war with the saints and prevailed over them until, until the Ancient of Days came and judgment was given for the saints.” The whole thrust of it is: they had their time appointed by God. God stirred up the seas for them to have that time. And when his appointed time was up for them, that was it. And they had their rule until the Ancient of Days came and said otherwise. And then, I think most significantly, verses 22 and then again in verses 26 and 27, the judgment scene where God not only destroys the beast, but the kingdom is given to the saints. Again in verses 26 and 27, the kingdom is given to the saints. God says, “Okay, you’ve had your time as I appointed. You’re done. And now the saints have the rule.”
All of that to say that the world’s great leaders are not autonomous. And all the great powers of the world and all of the great military powers of the world, they’re not autonomous. The United States, most powerful nation in the world—we hear that constantly, most powerful nation in the world—we better never think we’re autonomous. Think Russia, think China; all the major powers, they are not autonomous. They have power only as God has given it, and only until God takes it away.
And this is the grand theme of Daniel’s prophecy. It’s the theme of chapter 7. It’s a point that’s drawn out for us in chapter 7 in cartoon images. God has his way. The wicked may have their flash. They may have their moment in history. And in fact, verse 25, they may even wear out the saints for a time. But whatever power they have, it’s only a power that is given to them. And it’s only until God says that’s enough.
Well, there’s chapter 7 and there’s this theme of divine sovereignty in Daniel. Why is it important for us to know that? Why is it important, so important for Daniel that he makes the point and makes the point and makes the point and makes this in a sustained way throughout the prophecy? Why is it so important? Why do we need to understand that? Well, several areas I think here of important application for it.
One, of course, is in Daniel’s own setting. These are the Jewish exiles in Babylon. These are God’s own people. Or are they? Hasn’t God made some pretty significant promises for Israel? They haven’t been fulfilled. Is God, God after all? And if he is, is he more powerful than Nebuchadnezzar? Is he more powerful than Belshazzar? Is God really God over the Babylonian kingdom?
And we’re brought to see that Daniel and his fellow Jews were brought into exile, not just because of the might of King Nebuchadnezzar. They were brought into exile because of the might of the God who rules over King Nebuchadnezzar. God who is King has brought it about. And Daniel is certainly written to encourage the people of God to faithfulness. I’m certain that’s a major thrust in chapter 3. That’s a major thrust in chapter 6: the fiery furnace, the lion’s den. These are in great way intended to encourage the people of God to be faithful. And all that with a view to some greater trouble that is coming that we’ll see in chapters 8 and following. So it’s written to encourage the people of God to be faithful, but this is why we must be faithful: because God is still King. He still rules over all.
I would like to take the time—I can’t, but if you want to jot it down, look at Isaiah chapter 40—that marvelous chapter depicting God’s rule over all that is. That is Isaiah’s prophecy of this situation, looking ahead to the time of Babylonian exile to encourage the people of God that God is still the God who reigns over all, and all the nations before him are like a drop of a bucket, and all the inhabitants of the earth are like grasshoppers, and they are less than nothing before him.
Well, this was important then for Daniel’s own setting and to encourage the people of God that God is still King. It’s important for us to see it also. Let’s look at another dimension where it’s important for us to know that God is sovereign in national and international affairs.
God Is Sovereign in National and International Affairs
Well, that was chapter 1 and verse 2. God gave Jehoiakim into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar. That was chapter 2 as well. God removes kings and sets up kings. This is all His doing. Chapter 7, we have it drawn out for us in some graphic pictures that God gives dominance to this nation and then takes it away and gives it to another nation and then takes it away, gives it to another nation and takes it away. All of this we have God ruling over the kingdoms to bring about his own purpose.
And as I mentioned, this is the backdrop to Revelation chapters 4 and 5, which is a marvelous setting where we see God exalted in Revelation chapter four, ruling over all of the other rulers of the earth and all giving him praise. In chapter five, then giving the kingdom to the Lamb and he takes the scroll and starts undoing the seals and carrying out God’s purpose throughout history for his purpose of judgment and salvation. This is God carrying out his will over all of history. We have it with the Old Testament prophets, prophesying to the nations of their responsibility morally to this God. We need to see that God is God over the nations and God over all of the world.
Now this is a concept, as we saw in Sunday School, that is becoming more and more heretical in the world’s thinking. You can believe in God if you like, but don’t think that your God is my God. And God is reduced to the size of a pet. But we need to see in international affairs, whether we know what God is up to or not, we need to see that God is up to it.
I remember when the Iron Curtain fell. The Soviet Union is opening up. Many, many of us said, “I’ll bet God has some purposes for the gospel in the Soviet Union.” And sure enough, he has. America, as I mentioned—we hear it all the time—is the leading nation of the free world, the most powerful nation in the world. Daniel chapter 7, and any glance at history, must make us see that we cannot assume that America could never be displaced from that position. Any glance at history, and certainly the teaching of Daniel chapter 7, is that God removes kings and sets up others. This is all his doing. We must never think that we are autonomous. God will have his way.
Now that ties us very importantly to a related theme that we have to see, and that is that God is sovereign even in relation to opposition against the people of God and in relation to the advance of evil. Let me say it again: God is sovereign even over the opposition that comes against the people of God, and he is sovereign in the advance of evil in the world. And I think here I might just tweak a little bit the theme of Daniel. It is not simply “God is King,” but the theme of Daniel is “Despite appearances to the contrary, God is King.”
Well, that’s certainly the point in Daniel’s situation. The Jewish people in exile in Babylon. But whatever you say for the people of Israel, Babylon was worse. Well, so they thought at least. And certainly in Daniel chapter seven, we have the rise of these successive kings, and then the ten horns, and then this little horn, and all of it under the direction of God himself. And this little horn rising up with fierce opposition against the people of God, prevailing over the saints, it tells us in verse 22, wearing out the saints, verse 25, and all of it is in God’s purpose. God’s sovereign over the advance of evil.
The question that the exiles faced in Babylon was: what happened to Yahweh? Isn’t he the Creator? Doesn’t he rule over all? It doesn’t look like it. And yet, we’re reminded God gave Israel into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, and God removes kings and sets up kings. And in chapter 7 again, verse 2, God stirred up the seas that brought about these successive beasts. In fact, even in verse 25, which is stated for us, that he wears out the saints—but notice, it’s for a time, times, and a half a time, probably three and a half years. In other words, God is in such complete control of this advance of evil that he can state ahead of time the time frame of it all. God, sovereign, even in the advance of evil.
You might remember that the Lord Jesus himself appealed to this doctrine at his trial. Remember, he’s standing before Pilate. And he’s not answering the way Pilate would like him to answer, and he’s not conversing like he wanted. And finally, Pilate, a little bit frustrated, says, “Don’t you realize that I have power over life and death for you?” What an ironic statement. This petty Roman prefect out in the middle of nowhere, standing before the King of kings. “Don’t you know I have a power over life and death for you?” Remember Jesus’ response? “You would have no authority at all if it were not given you from heaven.” But there it is again. It was given him. The most evil event in the history of the world. God gave you that authority.
Again, despite appearances to the contrary, God is King. We’re over time already. I don’t have time to expand on this. I would love to explore this a little further with regard to what we talked about in Sunday school this morning with the shift from Christendom to the secular city, and the shift in our society from engraving scripture verses on our government buildings and stamping it on our currency, to outlawing it and removing it from our courthouses. Even the very idea of truth and standards for morals, all of that is considered evil itself today. And all of this has had just a profound impact on Christians and how we witness in the world.
And we can see that the world is not clamoring for our approval, that’s for sure. It may not construct a metallic image and demand that we bow. It might not demand that we pray to the president. But it’s becoming more and more common that in this society of ours that used to be Christian, a Christian judge is no longer qualified to be a judge precisely because he’s a Christian. And the problem is we don’t wear the mark of the beast. We’ll see more of that in time to come. We don’t wear the mark of the beast in our forehead, in our hands. We don’t think the way the beast tells us to think. We don’t do what the beast tells us to do. And increasingly we become the bad guys.
And living in Babylon as we do, we need to know and we need to be continually reminded that God is King. Despite appearances to the contrary, God rules. We must never allow outward appearances to shape the way we think of God, or even allow the way we perceive the events themselves. And we deserve the reminding chapter after chapter after chapter in Daniel and throughout the Bible; we need the reminder over and again that God is King. And that brings us to another area of application that is extremely important as well, and that is God is sovereign in the advance of the gospel.
God Is Sovereign in the Advance of the Gospel
Daniel and his fellow Israelites were made to wonder whether God will keep these promises that he made to Israel. Is he able to? And in our own day, we lament to see the fall of Christian America. But when we see that, we should also be careful to remember, and maybe even with surprise, to see the advance of the gospel in places where the gospel was previously forbidden. We shouldn’t be too narrow in our focus, as though what we see in our own experience is indicative of what God does universally. God may bring about great revival. God may bring about a drought. And in either case, these things are in God’s hands. Times of revival, times of drought. In a given locality, it may differ, but God is carrying out his purpose.
A hundred years ago, right now, there’s a marvelous revival of the gospel in North Korea, would you believe? It’s been shut out now for decades. We wonder, what of the gospel is left? How are the people of God doing there? I remember in the 1960s, it was not uncommon at all in prayer meetings in the church to hear people offer up prayers for brothers and sisters in China. Mao was in charge and he’s outlawing the gospel and people of God are being persecuted; we’d hear stories of people smuggling Bibles into China and were praying for the advance of the gospel. Who would have thought in the 60s that we would see today the advance of the gospel in China that we’ve seen? In either case, God rules.
The Book of Acts—one of the marvelous things there is we not only see simply a historical study of the advance of the gospel in the first century, but we need to see it from heaven down. It’s like the curtain of heaven has been drawn back in the Book of Acts. And he’s saying, “You’re going to be witnesses for me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost parts of the earth.” Now let’s see it happen. And we watch the gospel go out from Jerusalem to the ends of the world. And Luke traces it out for us: the word of God grew and was multiplied. The word of God increased and was multiplied. The word of God grew. And every once in a while you have 3,000 souls were added and 3,000 souls were added. You see, and then you have this wonderful culminating statement in Acts chapter 13, verse 48: “As many as were ordained to eternal life believed.” God’s program is not one step behind. And with all of the persecution they ran into and all the opposition, God’s program is not one step behind schedule.
And then finally, one more area of application of this theme, and this again is just linked up, part of the theme of Daniel itself, and that is the final culmination of the kingdom of God.
The Final Culmination of the Kingdom of God
We might expand and say the theme of Daniel is God is King. We might expand it a bit to say God is King and his kingdom will prevail. And that certainly is the theme of Daniel chapter 7, where God brings all of the kingdoms of the world into judgment, rules over them, and gives the rule to the saints of God.
Now recall—and this is very important—that in this age where we are now, the kingdom is only inaugurated; it hasn’t been fully consummated. Christ has established the right to rule and he’s installed as King. He’s seated at the right hand of the Father. He reigns as King, but it’s only an inaugurated aspect of the kingdom. His rule is still being contested. There’s still revolt against it. We see plenty of all of that. But precisely because God is King, we may be sure that the Son of Man will rule over all the kingdoms of the earth and God will have his way to honor himself in all the course of history.
And so, Daniel says, people of God, don’t be discouraged; remain faithful. The Lord God has purposed to bring the whole world under his sway. And those who oppose him cannot, in the end, possibly succeed. And those who trust him cannot possibly fail to reign with him forever and forever. Amen.
Let’s pray. I’ve gone late. Let’s stand and be dismissed in prayer. Our Father, we are grateful that you are King and we praise you to know it. Our hearts rejoice to see these grand depictions of your rule over all of the earth. We praise you for your rule. We are grateful that you rule in our hearts and that you have made us yours. We pray with John, even so come Lord Jesus, bring this kingdom to its consummation. Until then we pray that you’ll keep us faithful. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.