This is week 9 of our study through Daniel. We’ve learned about how Israel was taken into exile. Babylon came in and slaughtered innocent people, desecrated Israel’s temple, and took captive Israel’s best and brightest… hoping to mold them into their image, into their liking.
We’ve also learned about how God showed up for them despite being foreigners in a strange land … in the fiery furnace, in the lion’s den… we learned about how Daniel and his friends maintained their faithfulness in the face of being away from their people and their country and from all they knew.
Today… we wrap up our study of Daniel. We’ll be in Daniel chapters 7-12… that’s right… 7… through… 12. Daniel chapter 7, chapter 8, chapter 9, chapter 10, chapter 11, and chapter 12.
So, to kind of prime the pump… I wanted to find a way to get us in the shoes of Daniel and his friends. This morning, I wanted to do that by just asking a question… have you ever had a moment in your life when something felt totally foreign to you? Like you were a fish out of water? Like everything was entirely strange and weird and bizarre? Like a moment where you thought to yourself, “I do not belong here?”
My sister lived in California for several years and Rickie and I used to try to visit them every year or two. While we there we would typically go out to eat at least once… they lived in Santa Barbara, so it was a pretty fancy area… and if you haven’t noticed… I’m not a super fancy person… but the area being pretty ritzy, meant that all the surrounding restaurants were pretty ritzy, too… which means that when we would go out to eat, I wouldn’t have any idea what half the items on the menu actually were…
I looked up one of the restaurants and got a few examples, so you can see for yourself…
- AHI CEVICHE… TUNA PONZU…DUNGENESS CRAB COCKTAIL… SALT SPRING MUSSELS BASQUAISE… LURE CIOPPINO… TROUT ALMONDINE…
When I have to ask the waitress or waiter what everything is… I’ve got a problem. And then things got even worse… I ordered something, wasn’t sure what it was… and they bring it out and the portion looked like it wasn’t enough to feed a mouse.
When I go out to eat, I’m looking for the plate that will give me the most food, for the smallest amount of money. And when the food is expensive and it doesn’t even get close to satisfying my appetite… I’m not a fan.
I walked in and knew that I stuck out like a sore thumb. It’s kind of funny now… but I remember not really enjoying that experience a whole lot. I walked in hungry, and I then I walked out hungry, a little angry, and with a little less money in my pocket. In a space like that, I do NOT belong.
I imagine you all have had experiences like that. Maybe it was when you traveled to a new country for the first time and experienced a different culture. Maybe it was when a friend dragged you to church and promised you some lunch and you walked in feeling like, “Ugh. . . .” because were doing it begrudgingly just because a friend asked, and your past experiences with church people tells you that most of them are pretty weird. Maybe it was that first trip to the gym and you see Bob squatting like 1,000 pounds and Jeff in the mirror posing and you look down and you look out and you just are like, “What am I doing here? I do NOT belong!”
Those experiences are strange, they’re foreign, they’re weird… it might give us a little glimpse into how Israel felt being exiled in Babylon (only exponentially greater and way more severe). You see, by the time chapters 7-12 roll around, we meet Daniel and his friends who have been foreigners in a foreign land for decades… maybe more than 50 years at this point.
Can you imagine that? That’d be like you and me going into exile back in the 1970’s… I wasn’t even a blip on my parent’s radars at that point. Or if our exile started now, we would be in the 2070’s… Just think for a moment about all the things you find enjoyable and meaningful about your life… and imagine it all being snatched away….
- Coaching your kid to keep his eye on the ball? Poof.
- Celebrating Christmas and New Years with friends and family? No more.
- Binging junk on Netflix? Huh uh.
- Hunting? Not allowed.
- Broncos’ games? No más.
- Sermons from DaySpring Christian Church? Nope! (Oh, the horror!)
- 4th of July? Vacation? Your job? Gone. Gone. Gone!
Some of Israel’s poets wrote about what that time in exile was like. Look at what they said:
- How deserted lies the city, once so full of people! How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations! She who was queen among the provinces has now become a slave. (Lamentations 1:1)
- My eyes fail from weeping, I am in torment within; my heart is poured out on the ground because my people are destroyed, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city. (Lamentations 2:11)
Or perhaps this from one of the Psalms which was written about this period of exile:
- By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!” (Psalm 137:1-3)
God’s people were hurting… and that’s an understatement! Anger, frustration, and hatred came oozing out of Israel. Hopelessness and futility set in. I mean sure, they had seen and had great moments of God’s presence and provision in their lives (fiery furnace, the interpretation of a few dreams, the lions’ den), but those moments of special grace and provision were few and far between over the course of 50 years! And now God’s people in exile are in a spiritual valley. They’re hanging by a thread. They’re looking around and seeing foreign nations with their foreign gods “winning” and they can’t help but wonder, “God, where are you?” 
And I begin here this morning, because I know that we all at some point wrestle with those same questions. Some of us are hanging by a thread and the “hope tank” is on Empty and we look out in the world and it feels like things at times are going to hell in a handbasket. Not to mention the everyday struggles we’ve got with family issues, or sickness, or work stuff, or a past that won’t stay in the past.
And with all that, it can feel like God’s losing or not in control or we’re on the wrong side of history or all the above. And so we all, myself included, wind up asking at one point or another, “God, are you going to come through for us?”
And it’s in that place that Daniel has three visions. I want to share with you these three visions of Daniel and then transition into showing how those three visions speak of two kingdoms and then ultimately how those two kingdoms lead to one hope. Three visions, two kingdoms, one hope. Ready? (instead of the surgeon general’s warning… here’s the Preacher general’s warning: it’s about to get weird.)
Vision #1 – in Daniel 7, here’s what we read:
In my vision at night I looked, and there before me were . . . four great beasts, each different from the others. . . . The first was like a lion. . . . And there before me was a second beast, which looked like a bear. It was raised up on one of its sides, and it had three ribs in its mouth between its teeth. . . . After that, I looked, and there before me was another beast, one that looked like a leopard. . . . After that, in my vision at night I looked, and there before me was a fourth beast—terrifying and frightening and very powerful. It had large iron teeth; it crushed and devoured its victims and trampled underfoot whatever was left. It was different from all the former beasts, and it had ten horns. (Daniel 7:2-7)
Um ok. Weirdest. Dream. Ever. To recap: essentially, we have four beasts that come out of the sea: a lion, a bear, a leopard, and then a fourth beast that’s just kind of crazy… whom I’ll just affectionately call “super mega beast.” So, lion, bear, leopard, and super mega beast. And they’re destroying, devouring, and decimating things.
When we keep on reading a bit further, we learn that the four beasts here are representative of four different kingdoms in history, similar to the vision in chapter 2: lion = Babylon, bear = Medes and Persians (the three ribs in his mouth may be the kingdoms they conquered), leopard = Greek Kingdoms, and super mega beast = Rome. And the super mega beast has a little horn which represents the authorities that persecute God’s saints and try to change the laws of God. So that’s vision #1.
Vision #2 (it’s just as weird as the first one…Daniel 8…
I looked up, and there before me was a ram with two horns, standing beside the canal, and the horns were long. One of the horns was longer than the other but grew up later. I watched the ram as it charged toward the west and the north and the south. No animal could stand against it, and none could rescue from its power. It did as it pleased and became great. As I was thinking about this, suddenly a goat with a prominent horn between its eyes came from the west, crossing the whole earth without touching the ground. It came toward the two-horned ram I had seen standing beside the canal and charged at it in great rage. (Daniel 8:3-6)
Ok, pause. Let’s make this fun. Let’s imagine this is a heavyweight fight on our hands. Two contenders. We have the Ram vs. the Goat. And right here, right now I want to see who’s got their money on who. Maybe a sort of announcer voice will help… “In the red corner, weighing in at about 250,000 troops strong, led by King Darius, and representing the ancient Medo-Persian empire is the RAM! “And in the blue corner, weighing in at about 50,000 troops strong, led by Alexander the Great, and representing the ancient empire of Greece is the GOAT!
“Alright, who ya got money on? All bets can be placed in the clear bins around the room. Don’t worry: we’ll be sure to divvy it up among the winners. How many of you are now in on the RAM? How many of you are in on the GOAT? Ok, let’s find out! Ding, ding, ding!”
Verse 7: “I saw it [the goat] attack the ram furiously, striking the ram and shattering its two horns. The ram was powerless to stand against it; the goat knocked it to the ground and trampled on it, and none could rescue the ram from its power.”
There you have it. Despite being vastly outnumbered, Alexander the Great was a great strategist. The Goat/Greece blasted the Ram/Medo-Persians to smithereens. That’s vision #2. Let’s move on to vision #3.
Vision #3 covers the last 3 chapters of Daniel – chapters 10, 11, and 12.
In these chapters, we see that Daniel again has a vision of Medo-Persia overtaken by Alexander the Great’s Greek empire. He then sees the dissolution of Alexander’s empire, which led to a bunch of “lesser” kings, which then led to two specific kings: one who Daniel calls the “King of the South” who is finally overtaken by the other who Daniel calls the “King of the North”—a king who, as the text says, “will do as he pleases. He will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will say unheard of things against the God of gods” (Daniel 11:36). And later we read that “reports from the east and the north will alarm him, and he will set out in a great rage to destroy and annihilate many” (Daniel 11:44).
So we have three visions, all with different animals representing these different kingdoms in history who wind up arrogantly trampling and stomping and devouring and decimating each other and innocent people all along the way.
2 Kingdoms
Which leads me to ask a question… so what? Well, all three visions point to the reality that there are ultimately two kingdoms at play:
- (1) there are the kingdoms of this world and
- (2) there is God’s kingdom.
Daniel and his friends are dealing with very real kingdoms (Babylon, the Medes, the Persians, Greeks, and Romans) invading very real space and hurting very real people in very real ways.
And these visions are given to a guy… a foreigner in a foreign land… you could maybe say that Daniel and Israel needed some hope! Day after day, week after week, season after season, year after year… Daniel has seen nations and kings setting themselves up as if they are gods and instead of ruling with justice and righteousness, they inaugurated evil and oppression. They set themselves up against God and in doing so have become beasts!
They’re lion-like, bear-like… animal-like… trampling and crushing things in their way. And Daniel is being shown that every kingdom of this world has that side to them. Babylon does. So do the Medes and the Persians. Greece does. Rome does. And the nations of today do this, too. God was revealing to Daniel and his friends… and to us… that He knows that kings and rulers and authorities and nations can certainly act beastly… they might vie for control and they might pridefully set themselves up as kings of the world… they might foolishly think of themselves as gods… and they might hurt a lot of people in the process.
God knows that. It’s not a surprise to Him. But what He also shows Daniel is that in acting like animals… they run themselves up against God’s kingdom. And if you’re running up against God’s kingdom, then God will deal with the foolish behavior and oppressive empires of this world. And I wonder if that was a message that Daniel, his friends, and all of Israel needed to hear.
Remember… 3 visions, 2 kingdoms, 1 hope… check this out…
1 Hope
In the case of vision #1… with the lion, the bear, the leopard, and the super-mega beast… here’s what we read in Daniel 7:9,11a: “As I looked, ‘thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat.” (Notice God isn’t shaking in his boots; He’s calm, cool, and collected.) “His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white like wool.” (He reigns with purity and righteousness.) “His throne was flaming with fire and its wheels were all ablaze.” (He rules with power.) “Then I continued to watch because of the boastful words the horn was speaking.” [speaking here of super-mega-beast]
And notice what Daniel says next: “I kept looking until the beast was slain and its body destroyed and thrown into the blazing fire. (The other beasts had been stripped of their authority but were allowed to live for a period of time.)” (Daniel 7:11b-12).
I love that line! Did you catch that?? The kingdoms of the world were stripped of their authority, destroyed, and thrown into the blazing fire. What about in vision #2?
In the case of vision #2 with the ram and the goat, we already know that the goat pins the ram, but what happens after is that is that the goat “will cause deceit to prosper, and he will consider himself superior. . . . He will destroy many and take his stand against the Prince of princes. Yet he will be destroyed, but not by human power” (Daniel 8:25).
Are you catching on? That world superpower was overtaken by another superpower… and he legislated immorality and lived in pride… and stood against the Prince of Princes… but he too is to be destroyed!!
And lastly, in the case of vision #3, with the King of the North, who we had read before is one who will do as he pleases, exalt and magnify himself, set out in a great rage, and destroy and annihilate many—what’s his lot in life?
“He will pitch his royal tents between the seas at the beautiful holy mountain. Yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him” (Daniel 11:45).
Do you get the picture? Daniel & Co. needed to hear over and over again that God’s kingdom is very real and that God is not worried one bit about the kingdoms of this world. That He is sovereign. He is in control. Sure, the kingdoms of this world might oppose Him and attempt to frustrate His plans, and persecute His saints, but ultimately, what are they compared to Almighty God?
And I wonder if we need to hear that, too?
You know what the Bible tells us about the nations compared to God? Look at Isaiah 40:15: “Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket; they are regarded as dust on the scales.”
HAVE A BUCKET AND A DROPPER – HAVE A SCALE
I just want to illustrate this for us… I have a bucket… and I have a dropper… let me show you what the nations are like compared to our God… here come the nations… any minute now… BEHOLD… the nations… not just nations today… nations past, present, future… all nations in all of human history… what are they compared to our God?
What about dust on the scales? I happen to have a scale too… let’s zero it out… how much do they weigh compared to God? Lets put some nations on the scale of the LORD… how much do they weigh? They weigh nothing compared to God!
God is saying to Daniel, and through Daniel to us … trust in My promises… rest in My purposes… find peace in My sovereignty… because He is so much bigger and the nations are so much smaller and their purposes are inconsequential to His eternal plans and purposes.
And if you’ve ever doubted this, turn no further than Isaiah 40… here’s some of the highlights… READ highlighted text in Bible…
THAT’S HOW BIG OUR GOD IS.
What’s their weight compared to God? They are as nothing compared to Him! But the sad truth is that nations aren’t the only kingdoms out there. Daniel has this moment of prayer and repentance in chapter 9 where he recognizes the sin in him and in Israel (which is what got them in this mess in the first place)… his heart breaks… he realized the same beastly qualities of these nations were present in him… so he prays a prayer of repentance…
We have kingdoms, too. And they can be just as animal-like. As Henry David Thoreau once remarked: “We are conscious of an animal in us. . . . It is reptile and sensual, and perhaps cannot be wholly expelled.”
The great Russian author Dostoevsky concurs when he says that “in every man . . . a beast lies hidden.” It’s like what Robert Louis Stevenson was trying to teach us: we’ve all got a bit of Dr. Jekyll but we’ve all also got a bit of Mr. Hyde.
What these guys say here explicitly is what we know to be true implicitly. Not that you and I are animals, but that figuratively, there’s something animal-like in us. We are the kind of people who, while capable of fantastic good, are often quite prone to lie, cheat, and steal. Prone to connive, plot, and scheme. We find ourselves drawn to what is crude and sensual, to what is debased and corrupt. We give into what Paul calls our “flesh.” We vie for autonomy and in our pride say, “I don’t need God! I can do it all on my own!” And in doing so, we wind up hurting ourselves and those we love.
Let me ask you: anyone have a boss like that? Anyone have a landlord like that? A “friend” like that? Maybe you’re in a relationship right now with someone like that? Are you married to someone like that? And may I humbly, lovingly ask: could you be someone like that?
These three visions tell us that there are two kingdoms, but they also relay that, ultimately, there’s only one hope for the world. And man do we need hope. For the world and for ourselves. In Daniel’s very first vision in Daniel 7, we read a passage about who is truly going to rule and reign as Lord of the universe and do so rightly.
“In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.” (Daniel 11:13-14)
That’s what all of this is pointing to for Daniel. And that’s what all of this is pointing to for us. What God shows Daniel and what Daniel is showing us is that God’s kingdom reigns supreme and that He will supplant these arrogant rulers with an even better/greater ruler.
And because of that we have hope. We need not fear irrationally when things don’t go our way… when stock markets change unexpectedly, when politicians do what politicians do, when the media spins falsehoods, when it looks like all else is crumbling and were wondering, “God, where are you? Are you gonna come through?”
We need not worry. We can trust God! And the reason is simple: think about how the nations compare to God. These nations are animals—snarling, stomping, destroying, chewing on flesh… Compare that with God. What animal is He? He’s not any animal! He’s human. He’s the “son of man,” meaning the human one: a total contrast in both nature and character with the beastly kingdoms of this world! As we flip to the New Testament, we find out that “son of man” is the most common way Jesus referred to himself. Why? Because he saw himself bringing a kingdom.
Jesus is the one fulfilling all that Daniel had seen, bringing to a close the exile of Israel and grafting in all who follow Jesus as Savior and King! And He does this – not through military might and power… not through greed, not through backdoor deals and corrupt plots, not through conspiracy and fear-mongering, but through crucifixion.
Men cast lots for His cloths… He was exiled like Israel before Him… insulted and mocked… a sign hung above Him – “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” The son of man came and was treated like a beast. And the beastliness of humanity came out. Like conniving snakes, the religious world falsely accused Him and condemned Him. Pilate and Herod allowed their government along with their systems of justice to be run by the misguided masses… rather than by truth… the crowds laughed and jeered… the Romans spit on Him, and beat Him, and mocked Him, and crucified Him.
Bearing the punishment of our transgressions upon Himself. He took the full beastly nature that humans can possess and bore it in Himself, dying on the cross. And when all hope seemed lost… He triumphed over it… that first Easter morning. He triumphed over Death by death and resurrection. The kingdoms of this world were brought to shame. And He showed us a better way… and He now sits enthroned next to the Ancient of Days… waiting patiently to bring the fullness of His Kingdom to bear.
Daniel had 3 visions… of 2 kingdoms… but Church… there’s only one hope. His name is Jesus. And He reigns supreme.