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Scripture is taken from the New Living Translation.
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On Friday morning terrorists threw grenades into a group of Christian nurses in Pakistan as they emerged from chapel. Three died and 23 were injured.
This is just the latest attack by Islamic terrorists on Christian targets in Pakistan. Earlier during the week six died in an attack on a Christian school in Pakistan.
Of course, the frustrating thing is that all of the victims of these attacks have absolutely nothing to do with the war in Afghanistan. But the perception on the part of many Muslims in that part of the world is that the United States is a Christian nation – in the same way that Saudi Arabia or Pakistan are Muslim nations. Therefore, anything that can be done to Christians will be a blow to the evil American empire.
None of this makes sense to us because we don’t exactly see ourselves as a Christian nation. To the contrary, we Christians are deeply concerned about the moral direction of our nation. The US has become an extremely secular nation.
But in the Eastern world view you can’t separate religion from government. Thus, since there was a lot of Christian influence in the founding of the US we are a Christian nation.
So, in their minds when the US attacks an Islamic nation it is a Christian attack on Islam -- a new crusade.
When US culture – including the raunchy movies and the pornography – make their way into the Islamic world – these things which we perceive as anti-Christian -- are perceived in the East as being the fruit of Christianity.
So people are rising up to hit Christian targets, to make a statement, hoping to get back at the evil crusading American empire which just took over Afghanistan.
Again, this doesn’t make sense to us and really there is no way we can understand it.
As a matter of fact when we see acts of terrorism like the attacks in Pakistan or the attacks of 9-11, we get the sense that the world is spinning out of control. Nothing is making sense. A the future is a lot less
stable than we originally thought.
When the Iron Curtain unraveled we had this sense of WOW! We really are on top of the world. We’ve won -- peace, stability, security...
And when the economy grew like crazy in the 90’s we thought that maybe in this new world order would be unstoppable.
Now, though, our bubble has burst and we’re a bit more reserved and even anxious about the future. We are not unlike the Hebrew people who had been exiled in Babylonia. Things had gone from good to bad for them.
Jerusalem had fallen. Many people had been carted off as prisoners in a foreign place. They were in grief and they were wondering if God was still on the throne.
Well, the book of Daniel seeks to answer that question for them – and subsequent generations of troubled believers.
Two weeks ago we heard how Daniel and his Hebrew friends were chosen for the king’s executive training program – which they aced – even though they were only eating veggies and drinking water – a God thing!
Last week, all of this good fortune turned a bit sour as King Nebuchadnezzar had a terrible dream. And he demanded that his executive advisors tell him not only what the dream meant but what was actually in the dream. And if they couldn’t do so – the king would execute the whole lot of them -- including Daniel and his three friends!
So the four of them prayed and God revealed in a vision to Daniel what the King had dreamt and what it all meant.
In our text this week Daniel goes to the king with the interpretation of the dream. Verse 24, “Then Daniel went in to see Arioch, who had been ordered to execute the wise men of Babylon. Daniel said to him, ’Don’t kill the wise men. Take me to the king, and I will tell him the meaning of his dream.’
"Then Arioch quickly took Daniel to the king and said, ’I have found one of the captives from Judah who will tell Your Majesty the meaning of your dream!’
"The king said to Daniel (also known as Belteshazzar), ’Is this true? Can you tell me what my dream was and what it means?’
Daniel replied, ’There are no wise men, enchanters, magicians, or fortune-tellers who can tell the king such things. But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and he has shown King Nebuchadnezzar what will happen in the future.
"’Now I will tell you your dream and the visions you saw as you lay on your bed...’"
Notice Daniel’s self-effacing approach. “There is noone who can tell you your dream and what it meant – but there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets!”
“King – this is a God thing. This is bigger than you. And it’s bigger than all of your so-called wise men – including myself.”
Verse 29 -- "While Your Majesty was sleeping, you dreamed about coming events. The revealer of mysteries has shown you what is going to happen. And it is not because I am wiser than any living person that I know the secret of your dream, but because God wanted you to understand what you were thinking about."
This is what God is saying:
“’Your Majesty, in your vision you saw in front of you a huge and powerful statue of a man, shining brilliantly, frightening and awesome...’"
(By the way, this was a common motif in ancient dreams – giant figures)
"’The head of the statue was made of fine gold, its chest and arms were of silver, its belly and thighs were of bronze, its legs were of iron, and its feet were a combination of iron and clay. But as you watched, a rock was cut from a mountain by supernatural means.’"
More literally, non-human means.
"’It struck the feet of iron and clay, smashing them to bits. The whole statue collapsed into a heap of iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold. The pieces were crushed as small as chaff on a threshing floor, and the wind blew them all away without a trace. But the rock that knocked the statue down became a great mountain that covered the whole earth.
“’That was the dream; now I will tell Your Majesty what it means. Your Majesty, you are a king over many kings. The God of heaven has given you sovereignty, power, strength, and honor. He has made you the ruler over all the inhabited world and has put even the animals and birds under your control. You are the head of gold.’"
Now, this was not what the Hebrew listeners wanted to hear as they heard the story – for they saw the king as evil!
But from the perception of the prophets the king of Babylon rose to power so that he could be the judge against God’s wayward people in Judah. This is why Nebuchadnezzar is the head of gold. It’s a God thing. Even in the invasion and conquest God is working out his will.
Verse 39 – “But after your kingdom comes to an end, another great kingdom, inferior to yours, will rise to take your place. After that kingdom has fallen, yet a third great kingdom, represented by the bronze belly and thighs, will rise to rule the world. Following that kingdom, there will be a fourth great kingdom, as strong as iron. That kingdom will smash and crush all previous empires, just as iron smashes and crushes everything it strikes."
From our Western American perspective history is always improving – overall speaking things are always getting better. But the picture presented in the statue is that of things getting progressively worst.
Moving down from Gold to silver, to bronze, to iron, and then finally, to clay feet.
Verse 41 – "The feet and toes you saw that were a combination of iron and clay show that this kingdom will be divided. Some parts of it will be as strong as iron, and others as weak as clay. This mixture of iron and clay also shows that these kingdoms will try to strengthen themselves by forming alliances with each other through intermarriage. But this will not
succeed, just as iron and clay do not mix."
Now, there has been a lot of speculation about the identity of the various parts of the statue. So I put together a little chart on the message guide which outlines the two major theories.
I couldn’t resist having a chart. After all we’re studying Daniel and in all of the old prophecy conferences the preachers always had elaborate charts and diagrams for Daniel and Revelation.
They were all based on dubious biblical scholarship but charts became the way of explaining Daniel. So here is mine.
And basically there are two approaches.
The Roman theory sees the head of gold as that of King Nebuchadnezzar. You kind of wonder, did Nebuchadnezzar see a picture of his own head in gold in the dream? Kind of freaky to think about --
Then after he’s gone, enters the Medo-Persian Empire, which by the way, is in the not too distant future. The Babylonian Empire is relatively short-lived and by chapter 5 in Daniel the Medes take over.
The Belly and thighs of bronze represent the Greeks, and then the legs are the Roman Empire. That’s the Roman theory.
The Greek theory also has king Nebuchadnezzar at the top. But it breaks down the Medo and Persian Empires into separate sections. The legs are the Greek Empire. The feet refer to general instability in the Egyptian region.
On to verse 44 –“During the reigns of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed; no one will ever conquer it. It will shatter all these kingdoms into nothingness, but it will stand forever..."
Where before have you heard of a king whose kingdom has no end?
Clue: Luke 1:31. The angel is speaking to the Virgin Mary, "You will become pregnant and have a son, and you are to name him Jesus. He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. And he will reign over Israel forever; his Kingdom will never end!”
Hold that thought in the back of your mind for a minute. We’re toggling back and forth here for a minute.
Back to Daniel 2, verse 45, "That is the meaning of the rock cut from the mountain by supernatural means, crushing to dust the statue of iron, bronze, clay, silver, and gold.
“’The great God has shown Your Majesty what will happen in the future. The dream is true, and its meaning is certain.’”
Now, I’ll tell you own my personal take on the identity of those in the dream – the statue. You don’t have to take notes here if you’re planning to buy my next prophecy novel because it will all be in there.
But if you don’t read much on prophecy you might just jot this thought down.
Here it is – my take on the various identities of the sections of the statue -- with all the charts and stuff --
It doesn’t matter...
It doesn’t matter...
For while it was important to Nebuchadnezzar, the dream itself isn’t the point of the story. No, it has more to do with the fact that God reveals the meaning to Daniel and then what happens after he does so.
You can imagine the first Jewish audience hearing this story – perhaps during the exile or during one of the painful periods afterward.
They aren’t particularly concerned over the order of
the empires. Oppressors come and go and in the end God breaks their clay feet anyway. Remember the theme of Daniel, in spite of present appearances God really is in charge.
I suspect that it’s the image of verses 46-47 that speaks the loudest to the original audience.
Remember, they were captives – prisoners in exile, humiliated in defeat at the hands of the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar. But here in verse 46 is this
same pagan king laying prostrate in front of Daniel, offering sacrifices, and making political appointments in his favor...
AND, well, hear it again from the text -- "Then King Nebuchadnezzar bowed to the ground before Daniel and worshiped him, and he commanded his people to offer sacrifices and burn sweet incense before him."
Verse 47, and this is the punch line of the story, "The king said to Daniel, ’Truly, your God is the God of gods, the Lord over kings, a revealer of mysteries, for you have been able to reveal this secret.’"
Wow, can you imagine the response when the Hebrews, the Jewish captives, heard this?
This can only be a God thing! Maybe, just maybe he is still on the throne. In spite of all of the garbage we’ve seen in the world, God really is in control.
He must be the ruler over all kings – even all history! Indeed there is hope for the people of God.
After all the prophecy says that his kingdom, the rock that breaks clay feet, is coming and it will stand forever.
I mentioned a minute ago that this passage, verse 44, is quoted in Luke 1:33 where the angel tells Mary about
the coming of Jesus and that his kingdom will have no end.
And throughout Jesus’ earthly work he kept talking about the coming of this kingdom.
If you’ve payed close attention to the gospel readings these past couple of months – they’ve pretty much all been about the kingdom. Jesus describing his kingdom.
And all of these little parables or stories kind of reach a climax in the incident in today’s gospel passage where finally Peter blurts out in the midst of his own crisis situation -- "Truly you are the son of God."
The disciples fall down prostrate in front of Jesus. (Kind of like the king in front of Daniel).
Then in John 18 – when Jesus is on trial in front of Pilate we have another revealing dialog:
"Then Jesus answered, ’I am not an earthly king. If I were, my followers would have fought when I was arrested by the Jewish leaders. But my Kingdom is not of this world.’
"Pilate replied, ’You are a king then?’
“’You say that I am a king, and you are right,’” Jesus said. “’I was born for that purpose...’”
The kingdom – the rock – that eventually breaks the clay feet of all the power mongers is Jesus’ kingdom –the kingdom of God. This is the kingdom foreseen in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream and identified by Daniel.
The future is bright – not for all – but for all who are aligned with the kingdom of God – the rock. That’s why this is such a message of hope to people living in turbulent times – such as ourselves.
In spite of present appearances, the kingdom of God rocks on – forever – toppling the nations and bringing hope to god’s people. Therefore, in spite of current conditions we need to rock on – God is in charge!
This is the key point this morning. I know it’s kind of long and wordy – but there is a lot packed into the story here.
In spite of present appearances, the kingdom of God rocks on – forever – toppling the nations and bringing hope to god’s people. Therefore, in spite of current conditions we need to rock on – God is in charge!
Even though I swore I would never do so, when they replaced classical music with talk radio, I was listening to Talk of the Nation on NPR for a few minutes this week and they were talking about investment strategies for this new era.
One man called in to describe how he had lost all of his retirement money in the stock market. He was in his late 50’s and his voice had the sound of desperation. He didn’t know what to do.
He knew that he was going to earn a lot more money before retirement but he didn’t know what to do with it. He was gun shy about doing any investing for the future.
After all, he said, “I followed all the rules. I did everything my financial planner told me to do. And I still lost it all.”
Well, I muttered to myself, you shouldn’t have put it ALL in the stock market. I’m no financial wiz but I could have told you that.
Fortunately, I was in the car with no one to hear my jaded unsympathetic response. For really, these are uncertain times.
People are following all the established economic rules and still ending up poorer.
We don’t know when another terrorist attack will come and what that will do to the economy.
We could all easily end up poor -- if we survive.
We don’t know if our president will decide to attack Iraq – and what the ripple effect of making war would be.
These are uncertain times – and we can’t afford to be
paralyzed by hopelessness. And indeed we needn’t be. To the contrary, even if we all end up as captives in some foreign country, it would be devastating, but we wouldn’t be without hope.
Because we know that in spite of all present appearances, God the rock who breaks clay feet, really is still on the throne and his will is being worked out. So we need to rock on – move forward – living with confidence and covered with grace.
The future is a mystery to us – but not to God!
As that great theologian Nebuchadnezzar put it: “Truly, your God is the God of gods, the Lord over kings, a revealer of mysteries...”
Let’s pray:
God of gods, Lord over kings – there are no secrets hidden from you. There is no thought, no attitude, no action, which takes you by surprise. You have a plan for your world and you are working it out. Grant us the ability to trust your judgment and to have faith that you are there, busy at work, even when we don’t see any signs of activity.
Lord, some of us are desperate. We’re going through tough times and we need to hear your voice and to understand not necessarily how we fit into your picture but we need the reassurance that there is a big picture and that we’re a part of it. We trust it to be so for we are trusting Christ Jesus as our
Savior, Lord, and sovereign king. Amen.
