Getting the Picture

I invite you to turn with me to Daniel chapter 7 and to follow along as I read from the first verse. Daniel chapter 7:

“In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon, Daniel saw 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 eagles’ wings. Then as I looked 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. And 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.” 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; it devoured and broke in pieces and stamped what was left with its feet. It was different from all the 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.

“‘As I looked, thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days took his seat; his clothing was white as snow, and 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 ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him; [and] the court sat in judgment, and the books were opened.

“‘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 beasts, their dominion was taken away, but their lives were prolonged for a season and a time.

“‘I saw in the night visions, and behold, with 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, 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.’”

Well, we’ll leave it there. Amen. Thank God for his Word.

So, let us pray together:

And we pray, Father: what we know not, teach us; what we have not, give us; what we are not, make us. For your Son’s sake. Amen.

The Systemic, Consecutive Exposition of Scripture

I received a telephone call from a fledgling pastor, a young man, this week, and he asked me, “How do you decide what to preach about on any given Sunday?” It’s not an unusual question. It’s asked quite often. I remember asking it myself. And so, in response, I answered by extolling the virtues of the SCEOTS—that is, s-c-e-o-t-s, with a full stop in between each of the letters. It stands for the “systematic, consecutive exposition of the Scriptures.” In other words, it stands for what we endeavor to do here at Parkside Church, and that is to teach the Bible by teaching the Bible—by setting forward the text of Scripture, saying to one another, “Now, you are sensible people. You must examine the Scriptures to see if these things are so.”[1]

In other words, that is the starting point, rather than the starting point being the preacher’s idea or notion or preferred subject, which then becomes the occasion of looking for a passage of Scripture that will enable the individual to set forward the idea. There’s nothing essentially wrong in that. It’s just the pattern that we have chosen not to employ. Rather, what we’re seeking to do is to begin with the text of Scripture itself so that it becomes pretty obvious that it is the text of Scripture that is establishing both the framework and the content of the sermon—so that if you’re listening and that is not happening, then you know that this is not a very good sermon, because what we’re supposed to be doing is finding out what the Bible actually says.

Now, there are distinct benefits in this, and I thought this morning is as good a morning just to remind us of them. Three immediate and obvious benefits of systematically, consecutively expounding the Scriptures are as follows.

Number one: to do so demands that the preacher himself becomes a student of the Word of God. It demands that the preacher himself becomes a student of the Word of God. He can’t just keep going over the same old stuff. He can’t be like a bad lecturer in the university, where he has one book of notes that he put together in 1957, and he hasn’t deviated from them for the last hundred years; he’s just been going at them again and again. He ceased to be a student when he got his postgraduate degree. You can’t do that if you’re working your way systematically through the Bible.

Secondly, it enables the congregation to learn the Bible in the most obvious and natural way. I think you would find that important—that the way we learn the Bible is the way the Bible is provided for us. It has sentences. It has verbs, nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and so on, prepositions. And so we read the Bible as it has been given to us instead of the Bible becoming a kind of gigantic Where’s Waldo? exercise as people ferret around, looking for themselves in the Bible or following a rabbit trail that is established by the preacher, and they wonder if ever there is a destination, and when they get there, they’re not sure why they ever began.

And thirdly, not only because it demands that the preacher is a student, that the congregation is enabled to understand the Bible in its obvious and natural sense, but thirdly, it prevents the preacher from avoiding difficult passages. And here we are at Daniel chapter 7. In other words, “To [your] own self be true.”[2] Here I am, caught in my own web, caught in the web of my own making. I suppose I could have just stopped at the end of 6, but somehow or another, I decided that that showed no courage whatsoever. And so here we are.

It’s not easy, is it? I only read half the chapter. If you’ve read ahead, it doesn’t really get much easier. We have weird creatures, mysterious symbols, perplexing images, enigmatic numbers and phrases. It’s really quite daunting. As a result of that, you will find, if you do even a little research, that it is the occasion of great debate among scholars. Theological scholars debate just about everything in the second half of Daniel. As a result of that, many have decided to vacate the notion of studying Daniel at all and have headed for the hills. And those who regard themselves as what we might refer to as theological sleuths have found in chapters 7–12 a very happy hunting ground. And some of you fit that category; just be honest about it and that will be fine. You fancy yourself as a kind of Sherlock Holmes of the Bible, always managing to unearth secret and hidden mysteries which you use as an intriguing fodder for talking to all of your friends. They look at you in a way, with a glazed eye, wondering, “Where in the world did you get this from?” “Ah,” you said, “I am a theological sleuth, and this is how you come to this.”

Well, let me suggest to you that if ever there was a place, if ever there is a place, for applying the maxim “The main things are the plain things and the plain things are the main things,” then it is when you come to the apocalyptic passages in Daniel, and also in the book of Revelation. In the Westminster Confession of Faith, in its opening section on Scripture, it makes very clearly the point that “not all things in Scripture are equally plain in themselves or equally clear to all.”[3] “Not all things in Scripture are equally plain in themselves or equally clear to all.”

And Chad Van Dixhoorn, in the wonderful book that he’s done recently on the Confession of Faith, picks up on that, and he makes these statements: We

cannot fail to notice that we all read the Bible at different levels and so, as the confession puts it, the Scripture is not “alike clear unto all”. Some Christians understand the Bible better than other Christians. We are not all teachers. And we are not all seasoned saints. In fact some people have just entered the Bible for the first time. Some things they have seen, but do not yet understand. There are many doors which they have not yet entered, and many corners they have yet to explore.

That may describe you this morning: You’ve recently professed faith in Jesus Christ, the Bible is an unfamiliar book to you, and you are just beginning the adventure. “Given,” he goes on,

that certain portions of the Bible are demanding, especially for some people, it is important to be humble as we approach the Bible and listen to those who teach it. We must[n’t] reject an interpretation of the Bible … because it is challenging to understand, either for us, or for everyone. On the contrary, we should remember that this is God’s revelation of himself, and we should not expect that everything revealed about the triune God will be easy for humans to grasp.

And then he concludes with this wonderful sentence: “Mapping the high points of the Bible is tiring work.”[4] “Mapping the high points of the Bible is tiring work.”

So, I hope that I won’t tire you now, but I do want you to know that I have been engaged in tiring work. Because it is tiring.

Now, with that said, you’re saying to yourself, “Well, you’re obviously stalling for time. You haven’t really done as much tiring work as you’re suggesting to us, and so you’re hoping that the clock will run out before you even begin.” Well, no. No. The reason… You know, when you play golf, it is possible that every so often someone will say to you, “Do you want to hit balls before you begin?” And the person says, “No, no, no. I don’t need to hit balls. I just step up. I just get out of the car, walk up to the first tee, and hit it.” And, yes—and then you spend a long time in the woods looking for it. It would have been a good idea if you had actually prepared for it.

So, this is preparation. That’s why I’m explaining about exposition. That’s why I’m doing what I’m doing. Because if we start from the wrong place in this apocalyptic section, within a hundred yards we will all be completely lost in the trees. In fact, this is one of the areas of the Bible in which it is possible to be unable to see the wood for the trees. And therefore, we have to be very, very careful.

Daniel 7–12: Distinctions and Connections

I think the heading for our study should simply be “Getting the Picture.” “Getting the Picture.” And if we’re going to do so, it’s important that we realize that there is a distinction between the first six chapters and the last six chapters. There’s a distinction in the literature that is actually used—the form of writing, the genre. Those of you who are into art know that often the word genre is used in relationship to art: it’s the genre of modern art or postimpressionist art. It’s the form of it. It’s the style of it. And the style changes here between 6 and 7, and it is apocalyptic literature. Apocalyptic literature.

And the first six chapters are written in the form of stories, in each of the chapters as we’ve seen them. That’s why it has been relatively easy to move swiftly through them and get the big picture, get the story, as it is conveyed. Most of the first six chapters are recorded in the third person; they are reported as having taken place. Now, you will notice, as we go into the second half of the book, after the first verse, it immediately goes into the first person: “Daniel declared, ‘I saw in my vision by night…’” So, it moves from the third person into the first person, and it is no longer a story form, but it is the reportage of dreams and of visions and of that which captured his mind in his bed, on his bed, in the darkness of the night.

Now, apocalyptic literature is, if you like, kind of a literary shock treatment. It is, if you like, a genre that is to be used in emergency. It is employed in the Bible when, if you like, the drama of the thing is so perplexing and so overwhelming that it cannot be encapsulated by the normal mechanisms of addressing the difficulties of life. So, for example, how do you describe the indescribable of all that is going to happen when the end of the ages is brought to consummation? Well, there’s no… How could you use language? The language that was employed for the initial readers, if it was written in exactly their way, would not make any sense to us two centuries later on. Or if we were to write about these things from the perspective of the twenty-first century, then those who were in the first century would not have the mechanisms or the language to be able to understand it. God knows that. And so he employs apocalyptic language in order to express, if you like, that which falls before the normal boundaries of our use of language.

Now, for many people, their view of apocalyptic material in the Bible, here in the balance of Daniel and in Revelation, is almost—they press a button in their heads, which immediately says to them, “What we’re supposed to find here is God charting out his plan for the future in a really hard way to understand so that future generations can draw up calendars and understand.” But if you think about that for a minute, it doesn’t make sense. If God wanted Daniel to know what was going to happen in the future, why make it so jolly complicated? Why not just say what you mean and mean what you say? Well, because he was not simply seeking to provide material to chart the future for subsequent generations to say “Aha!” but he was actually making clear that contrary to appearances, that in the midst of these indescribable realities, God is on the throne, God is sovereign, and the future is securely in his hands.

You say, “Well, that’s what the first six chapters were about.” Exactly! And the second six are about the same thing. It is the perspective that changes. They are no longer being told in terms of the historical, unfolding drama of the subsequent kingdoms that were represented for the exiles who’d been taken away—Daniel and his friends and all their colleagues—but now it is being provided in this amazing dimension, so that, as a result of that, Bible scholars will differ in their interpretation; Christians may deviate from course in relationship to their understanding of it and so on; and most of us, I think, will be helped by reading it to our children and our grandchildren and allowing them to tell us what it means.

God is on the throne, God is sovereign, and the future is securely in his hands.

You say, “You’ve now officially lost your mind.” No, I haven’t. I haven’t! Our children and our grandchildren live in a visual world. They live in the world of video games. They process information, they see it visually, and they’re making deductions all the time: “What is that big monster doing? Why did that big monster go away and another big monster came? Where did that big horn come from? Did you see what the little horn did? The little horn ate three horns. The little horn was smaller than all the other horns. It popped out! Apparently, this: the little horn talks! Have you ever seen a talking horn?” And before you know where they are, they’re actually beginning to piece it together, and they’ve gone through the whole chapter, and they’ve begun to say, “I think I get this!” And you said, “You do? Tell our pastor! Because he doesn’t get it!”

Actually, Chesterton, in one of his children’s books, actually says essentially the same thing. He says, you know, “Apply your minds as adults, but do not lose your sense of childish apprehension. Because in the drama and in the pictures…” In fact, I think it is, he goes on to say, “Don’t trust anything that can’t be conveyed in pictures.”[5] In other words, if you can’t draw it out and it makes sense, you might be careful as to the language.

Now, Daniel doesn’t find this intriguing; he finds it terrifying. We should learn from that. He doesn’t experience this and then describe all of the intrigue attached to it. No, he tells us that this experience was a terrifying experience. He mentions it in the middle of the chapter, around verse 15. He comes back to it at the end of the chapter: “This is the sum of the matter,” he says. “[This] is the end of the matter. … My thoughts greatly alarmed me, … my color changed, but I kept the matter in my heart.” Just as I read that, it makes me think of Mary, doesn’t it, in the drama? “‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you and overshadow you, and the child that will be born of you will be called the Son of God. And he will have a throne that is greater than any throne, and his kingdom will be to the ends of the earth.’ And Mary was greatly troubled, and she pondered all these things in her heart.”[6]

Lesson: what we receive here in these beasts and in the insight into the throne room of heaven is an indication of the awful conflict which exists in the world beneath and behind the unfolding drama of history—the conflict that is at the heart of the human condition. That’s why we often say that it is impossible to truly understand history without biblical history, without reading your Bible. Because the Bible says, “What you’re seeing here on the face level of the news right now is to be understood in light of that which lies at the very heart of humanity in the ferocious anti-God movement and in the ultimate triumph of God, who is sovereignly ruling over these events.”

If you read later on in the chapter—and I stopped halfway through. And it just occurred to me this morning that one of the indications of this great anti-God move is that the individual, this fourth beast who speaks against God, he actually shall “think to change the times and [change] the law.” He’s going to “change the times and [change] the law.” Do you see what the ruler of North Korea just did? He created his own time zone! It doesn’t exist anywhere. He’s decided what time it is in North Korea. It’s no longer 2015 in North Korea. He’s changed that. It’s now, like, 134. “Oh,” you say, “this North Korea’s in Daniel 7?” I didn’t say that. I’m just telling you that when man opposes God, he opposes him on every front: “I’ll decide what time it is. I’ll decide this. I’ll decide that.” It’s at the very heart, here, of Daniel chapter 7.

It is impossible to truly understand history without biblical history, without reading your Bible.

Now, the distinction between them and the connection between them. The connection between 6 and 7 should be very obvious to us, because you will notice that it begins, “In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon…” In other words, chapter 7, the events of chapter 7, took place during the reign of Belshazzar. It doesn’t come subsequent to the events of Darius the Mede. Therefore, what Daniel experienced in his bed, on the night, happened before the events recorded in chapter 5. Because Belshazzar dies in chapter 5. So, if this happened in the first year of Belshazzar’s reign, then we know that the connection between them is very clear.

There is another connection which will not be immediately obvious to us, which is by way of the writing itself. Daniel starts in Hebrew, moves immediately into Aramaic. The Aramaic section does not end at chapter 6; it ends at the end of chapter 7. And then it reverts to Hebrew again for the balance of the book. And the indication would seem to be that the cohesive element of what is taking place is such that chapter 7 stands, if you like, like Mount Everest, rising as a peak over all of the affairs that are described in the book. In other words, it is a summit. And it is tiring work climbing the summits of the biblical record.

I take it that what we have described in Nebuchadnezzar’s statue in chapter 2 and what we have here in chapter 7 in terms of the four beasts is a description of the same kings and the same empires. Notice my language: “I take it that…” That doesn’t mean you have to take it that or that some of my esteemed colleagues in ministry take it that. But as I read chapter 2 and as I read chapter 7, it seems fairly straightforward to me that the four kingdoms identified by four metals in the progression of the statue are akin to the four beasts which arise out of the chaos of the sea—so that what we have understood in chapter 2 we would then be able to apply in chapter 7.

Now, you will notice that this happens when Daniel is lying on his bed. It is in the nighttime. “Nighttime heightens, darkens each sensation.”[7] He is giving to us the substance of it. Verse 1: this is “the sum of the matter.” And it is clearly significant, because he writes it down. It is, if you like, no ordinary dream.

Now, let’s try and get to it in the time that we have left to us. We make a beginning at least.

The Wind and the Sea

“I saw in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea.” What is that folk song that begins “Four strong winds that blow lonely, seven seas that run high”?[8] It’s a folk song. It’s a folk song. There are obviously more than four winds, but it is customary for people to talk about the winds in this way: north, south, east, and west, covering all of the directions.

And these winds, he said, were “the four winds of heaven.” “Of heaven.” “Well,” you say, “of course. We think of wind, we think of heaven.” But I think there’s maybe just a little hint here of what he has been making clear from the very beginning of the book. Remember, at the very beginning of the book—in fact, you can look at it; a couple of pages will show it to you—he starts the book by reminding us that “in the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim …, Nebuchadnezzar [the] king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it.” And then here’s the point. Verse 2: “And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand.”[9] “The Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand.” In other words, God was sovereignly overruling the triumph of Babylon over Judah; that God was sovereignly in control of the exile of his own people; that, if you like, as the winds blow from heaven over this great sea, which I take simply to be an indication of the reality of humanity in all of its chaos and all of its disorder…

You say, “Well, where do you get that from?” Well, just from reading the Bible. For example, you know in the Bible it speaks of how “the wicked are like the tossing [of the] sea.”[10] The Babylonians thought of the sea as a monstrous place, as a scary place, and they had their own monsters that came up out of the sea and so on. And the sea, in all of its churning and movement, in all of its chaos and in all of its disorder, is representative of sinful humanity. “The wicked are like the tossing [of the] sea.”

Now, the wind blows from heaven. And as a result of the wind blowing from heaven, the control of heaven is over the emerging of the beasts out of this mess. You see, because one of the great things, remember, when Jesus steps forward amongst the people, and particularly amongst his followers, and they get all really, really worried on the Sea of Galilee, and he stands up and stills the sea, and they say, “What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the [waves] obey him!”[11] God is sovereign over the tides and over the oceans. The four winds blew, and as a result of the blowing of the winds of heaven, “four great beasts came up out of the sea.” So we ought not to think of God going, “Oh wow! Where did these beasts come from? What in the world is happening now? Dear, oh dear! My world that I’ve made! Look what’s happening! Where are all these kingdoms coming from? What am I going to do?” No! No, no, no! We need to remember that when we’re thinking about ISIS, when we’re thinking about Pakistan, when we’re thinking about Syria, when we’re thinking about North Korea, when we’re thinking about all of these things: the same God who is sovereign over these affairs is sovereign over the kingdoms and empires of our world this morning. I wonder: Do you believe that?

God is sovereign over the tides and over the oceans.

Now, these “four great beasts” that “came up out of the sea” were “different from one another.” We needn’t be in any doubt about the fact that they represent kings or kingdoms, because verse 17 tells us that they do: “These four great beasts are four kings who shall arise out of the earth.” Now, if we’re correct in tying the vision in chapter 2 with that in chapter 7, we can safely assume that we’re dealing with the same empires. We identified them as the Babylonian, the Medo-Persian, the Greek, and the Roman. Now, again, not everybody agrees with this. Some people think that it ends up with the Greek Empire. Some people think that you ought not to tie it to any empires at all, that it is simply a symbolic reference to the movements of humanity over time—a bit like the “times of difficulty”[12] and the seasons of animosity that Paul mentions when he writes to Timothy in the first century, in chapter 2 and chapter 3. Be that as it may, we’re starting from the perspective that just in the same way as we recognize that beasts are often used as identifying symbols of a nation—for example, Russia and the bear, Scotland and a rampant lion, America and an eagle… Incidentally, we should be thankful that Benjamin Franklin did not get his way, right? Otherwise, we’d have a turkey rather than an eagle. It’s good that he was overruled on that. I don’t even want to think about that for now. But anyway, here we go. So, these beasts are identifiable as elements of kingdoms.

The Four Beasts

First of all—we’ll just go through them very quickly, because we’ll have to come back to this in any case; it’s impossible not to—first of all, one “like a lion” that “had eagles’ wings. … Its wings were plucked off, … it was lifted up from the ground,” it was “made to stand on two feet like a man, and the mind of … man was given to it.”

Now, what have we already said? We’ve said that these represent these different empires. When you read in Jeremiah, you discover that one individual is identified at certain points as a lion and at other points as an eagle. Who is that person? Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar is identified in that way. And so I take it that what we have here is a description of this Babylonian Empire. The lion is the most powerful and formidable of the beasts on the ground. The eagle is the great sovereign of all the birds. But in this dream, the wings are plucked off. Well, Nebuchadnezzar had his wings plucked off, didn’t he? Sure did! It’s a picture. It’s a metaphor. He thought he could flap around anywhere he wanted to, and he ended up crawling around in the ground, until God stood him up on his feet and renewed his mind and renewed his heart. Vision number one.

The vision fades, only to be replaced by another. This eagle and lion… Incidentally, I should say in passing that Babylon had this as a symbol on many of its gates—that was, a lion with wings. So, Daniel would have been familiar with this when he moved around the city. You often say to yourself in your dreams, “How come I thought about that? How did I dream about that? Where did that come from?” We can’t usually be right, but it’s no surprise to realize that he sees the embodiment of this. If you like, the thing that is the symbol of the power of Babylon is there in his mind as this monstrous creature and the triumph of God over it.

The bear. I just noted Calvin, who says, “We know a bear to be a mean and foul animal, slothful and inert, as well as cruel.”[13] Well, I must go to the zoo with Calvin sometime. He’s got such a love… “Let’s go see the bears, John.” For those of you who are bear lovers, I do like teddy bears. But this is presumably a Syrian bear, which could be as much as 550 pounds—a real brute of a thing. Horrible thing! Scary in the night, I would think: “Whoa!” And “it was raised up on one side.” Medo-Persian Empire: one side was stronger than the other. Is that the indication? I don’t know.

“It had three ribs in its mouth.” “Well, I wonder what the three ribs are?” Spend the afternoon figuring it out. Don’t send me a note. I think it’s straightforward: it was his lunch, for goodness’ sake! He had a voracious appetite. He devoured people. He devoured things. And when you looked at him, in the same way that you could see somebody, you’d say, “You’ve been eating again, haven’t you?” “No.” “Open your mouth!” And you can see the elements of it right there. The three ribs are there. He “had three ribs in [his] mouth between [his] teeth.” “You’ve got something between your teeth!” And there he showed it.

And he had done what he’d done as a result of a word from outside of him: “Arise, [and] devour much flesh.” I want you to notice that in the first three beasts, the verbs are all passive. They’re passive. They are operating in response to.

Thirdly, quickly: “[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.” Wow! This is scary too! The leopard: swift, dangerous, if you ever see National Geographic on TV. And it had wings as well, to speed, presumably, and enable its progress. And it “had four heads,” presumably giving it the ability to look in all directions simultaneously—unless, of course, it had four heads all looking in the same direction, which it could have, I suppose, but it doesn’t seem likely to me. What would you want four heads for, all looking in the same direction? But anyway… This is it.

Where are we now? We’re in the Greek Empire. Who was the head of the Greek Empire? Alexander the Great. Did Alexander the Great move swiftly to destroy the Medo-Persian Empire? Yes, he did. Did he move powerfully? Yes, he did. History records that with thirty thousand troops, he took on the power of the Medo-Persian Empire in a number of battles. One time, one hundred and fifty thousand went against his army. Another time, four hundred thousand went against his army. Another time, eight hundred thousand went against his army. He defeated them all. He controlled the entire region within ten years, by the age of thirty-two. And the world looked on and said, “How in the world can this young fellow do this and destroy such a vast empire?” The answer is right here, if my assessment is correct: “And the beast had four heads, and dominion was given to it.” Given to it by whom? Given to it by God!

How do you explain the British Empire? Dominion was given to it—and taken from it! How do you explain the rise of the Soviet Empire? Dominion was given to it. How do you explain Korea? The same way! You see, what we’re supposed to get from this is not a kind of crazy preoccupation with trying to fit all the bits together like some gigantic, cosmic jigsaw puzzle or Rubik’s Cube but to stand far enough back from the picture to say, “Oh, I get it!” Because now, in the fourth beast, there is no point of resemblance to any creature on earth. Notice that. It’s as though the thing has got so amazing that there isn’t a creature that can be used to describe the “terrifying and dreadful” nature of this beast: “It had … iron teeth; it devoured,” it “broke in pieces,” it “stamped what was left with its feet. It was different from all the beasts that were before it.”

So, here we are at the Roman Empire. Remember, when we did chapter 2, we said, “And it was in the time of this empire that one would arise like unto the son of man.” Now, if you read anything of church history, you know that the Roman Empire managed to go from sea to shining sea and beyond. I’ve said to you before that they came to Britain. They did well in Britain. Julius Caesar did well in Britain. They didn’t manage to take Scotland! But they did pretty well down in England. And the brutality and the terrifying nature of the advance of Rome is recorded here in this visionary picture.

“And it had ten horns.” Here we go! I grew up… As soon as there were ten members in the European Common Market, I was good on chapter 7: “Here we go! The ten horns, the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire’s still around. They moved it to Brussels. Ten countries. I’ve got it clear as a bell.” Then there was eleven countries: “Hm! Maybe the little horn; maybe not.” Then twelve, then fourteen, then fifteen. Then I thought, “Maybe not. I don’t think so.”

How many horns do you usually have on your head, a beast? Two. This is five times two. That’s ten. I figured that out. In other words, this is really, really, really powerful.

“Yeah, but what are we going to do with the little one, the little horn?” Well, actually, Daniel doesn’t know what to do with the little horn, and he asks later on, which means we’ll deal with it later on. But the fact is that the progression here in this vision of the night is increasingly daunting. The picture seems to be that these pernicious creatures are increasingly bold in their activity and in assuming their independence from the source of all dominion and power.

So, the little horn, if you like, is essentially evil personified—that when you take the embodiment and give it eyes, intelligence, and a voice, and a strutting stare, in all that is in opposition to God, you realize why it is that when you read in the New Testament, as Paul speaks about the spirit of lawlessness that is present,[14] as John anticipates the presence of the antichrist—although the spirit of antichrist, he says, is already in the world[15]—you begin to realize that in the midst of all of this chaos, in the midst of all of this opposition, in the midst of all of this order, faced by this mouth speaking great things in opposition to God, boy do we need some kind of intervention!

You can imagine Daniel getting up and having a drink of water, and then going back to his bed, and then verse 9: “[And] as I looked, thrones were placed.” “Oh,” he says, “this is a little better.” “And the Ancient of Days took his seat.” God, who, if you like, in the first eight verses here has been at work behind the scenes, steps forward and sits in his rightful place of authority. To this we will return. And in these night visions, he saw one who came

… with the clouds of heaven
 … like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
 … was presented before him.
And to him was given dominion
 and glory and a kingdom.

Well, of course, we’re at Jesus, aren’t we? Jesus stands up and he says, “The time is fulfilled, … the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe … the [good news].”[16] “I am the King. I’ve come to establish a kingdom. I invite you to bow down under my rule and my reign.”

You see, loved ones, it’s really possible to go through material like this, and even think about a King who comes to reign and the cosmic rulership of God and his intervention in the affairs of history and his final triumph over all, and go through all of that, and tick all the boxes, and yet walk out and go lie down on your own bed, and Christ does not reign as King on the throne of your heart. He does not reign as King on the throne of your heart. And you can be as intrigued as the next person about what this means. You could write stories about it, books on it, describe it to many people, as many can.

But the real issue is: this King who comes to reign comes first to rule and reign in me—to subdue my rebellion, to forgive my sin, to fill my broken life with his greatness and his wonder, to allow me to read my newspaper, to face the coming elections, to discover the inhumanity that is represented in the injustice of our world and to stand far enough back from it and say, “You can raise up any empire you want, and you can raise any little horn that you want, and you can be the embodiment of evil in all of its fullness. But here there is one like unto the son of man, and he will reign forever and forever.” The only way you will come to this is by grace through faith.

Even as I speak to you now, I see my own television screen, I see my own newspapers, I see the headlines, and I hear my voice saying, “Lord Jesus Christ, you are sovereign over all these affairs.” And I find myself saying, “And how did you come to this conclusion, Alistair?” How did I? How did I? Because a Sunday school teacher, when I was six years old, told me who Jesus was; told me why Jesus came; urged me, as a little, sinful Scottish boy, to trust Jesus—which I did. How about you?

Well, we’ll come back—unless we decide not to. A very short series on Daniel 7.

Lord, come and reign in us. Come and reign in our hearts, individually. Come and reign in our church family. Lord, we need all of our rebellion subdued. We do so desperately require the invasion of your power and majesty in heart and in home, in church, in school, and in government. Oh, look upon us in your mercy, Lord, we pray. For we humbly ask it in the name of your Son, Jesus. Amen.

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[1] See Acts 17:11.

[2] William Shakespeare, Hamlet, 1.3.

[3] The Westminster Confession of Faith, Modern English Study Version, 1.7.

[4] Chad Van Dixhoorn, Confessing the Faith: A Reader’s Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2014), 21–22.

[5] “Lines Written in a Picture Book,” in The Collected Works of G. K. Chesterton, vol. 10, Collected Poetry: Part I, ed. Aidan Mackey (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1994), 304. Paraphrased.

[6] Luke 1:28–38 (paraphrased).

[7] Andrew Lloyd Webber, “The Music of the Night” (1986). Lyrics lightly altered.

[8] Ian Tyson, “Four Strong Winds” (1963).

[9] Daniel 1:1–2 (ESV).

[10] Isaiah 57:20 (ESV).

[11] Matthew 8:27 (KJV). See also Mark 4:41.

[12] 2 Timothy 3:1 (ESV).

[13] John Calvin, Commentaries on the Book of the Prophet Daniel, trans. Thomas Myers (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1853), 2:15.

[14] See 2 Thessalonians 2:1–7.

[15] See 1 John 4:3.

[16] Mark 1:15 (ESV).