For Thine Is The Kingdom, The Power And The Glory Series

Pastor Doug Koehler

Faith Lutheran Church

Oklahoma City, OK

Christ the King Sunday

November 22, 2009

For Thine Is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory

Daniel 7:9-14

In the name of our Savior and King, dear friends,

In God’s Word for today, we have part of a vision that God gave Daniel, and one of the things he sees is the Lord himself on the throne of heaven. He is the King of kings and the Lord of the universe! He is he one who is in charge! We need to remember that when it seems that all of the other important things are falling apart. Daniel needed to see this, because his world was filled with trouble and what the Lord had showed him was that it was going to get worse. Sound familiar? When all the things we can see are going from bad to worse, we need to be sure about the things we cannot see. This glorious vision leads us to say:

For Thine Is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory

1. That’s our Certainty in Troubled Times; and

2. That’s Our Confidence in Living Now.

1. Our Certainty in Troubled Times

What Daniel saw had troubled and bothered him greatly. . He says The visions that passed through my mind disturbed me. What was so disturbing? The Lord had shown him four great world powers, described as beasts, ferocious attack animals all. First was a lion with wings of an eagle, which was the present power of Babylon. Next came a bear with someone’s ribs in its mouth, which was the Persian power. After that a swift moving leopard, with four wings and four heads. We know that this was fulfilled by Alexander the Great and the 4 kingdoms after he died. And finally, the beast that was Rome, which was not even identified as anything like an animal we know, but it had iron teeth, it devoured victims and crushed them, and had ten horns. For us this is all ancient history, but remember for Daniel, none of this had happened yet except for the winged lion which was Babylon. After the most terrifying beast of all, Daniel saw the Lord on heaven’s throne.

What’s the message? The powers of this world are ferocious and evil and oppressive. They cause terrible things to happen to the people of this world. But they never last. There is One, the Ancient of Days, who has been around a lot longer than any earthly power, who is sitting on the throne and is presiding over everything for all eternity. Yes, THINE IS THE KINGDOM & THE POWER AND THE GLORY FOREVER AND EVER! That’s our certainty in troubled times!

And certainly there is enough trouble to topple our certainty about where our country and the world is going. There is the problem with the banks and the stock market. Almost all our major companies are in danger of going under, which means loss of jobs. All of that has made people forget that we are also fighting a war against terrorism, whether Iraq or Afghanistan. It’s like a little story I read about a shipwrecked sailor who had been stranded on a deserted island for three years. One day, he was overjoyed to see a ship in the distance, and watched as it came closer and dropped anchor in his bay. A small boat came ashore and an officer handed the marooned sailor a bundle of newspapers. He thought that was a very strange thing to do, but the man in the boat explained: “The captain suggests that you read what’s going on in the world. Then you can let us know if you still want to be rescued.” It makes us wonder, where is the Lord in all of this mess?

Let’s see what Daniel saw. It still applies. "As I looked, thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. This is God the Father, the Ancient of Days, on the eternal throne. And we say, THINE IS THE KINGDOM. His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white like wool. His throne was flaming with fire and its wheels were all ablaze. We see him in pure whiteness and holy fire. THINE IS THE GLORY. 10 A river of fire was flowing, coming out from before him. Thousands upon thousands attended him; ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him. The court was seated, and the books were opened. All the angels are at his bidding when the fires of judgment start to flow, and it’s time for judgment. THINE IS THE POWER.

11 "Then I continued to watch because of the boastful words the horn was speaking. I kept looking until the beast was slain and its body destroyed and thrown into the blazing fire. The Lord explains to Daniel that this horn is a different kind of king, rising out of the old Roman Empire, God explains that this king will speak against the Most High and oppress his saints. That takes us to the present time, because on Judgment Day he will be slain and thrown in the lake of fire. And who is presiding over all of this?