73. Beginner Bible Course: Daniel's visions of the parade of human history

EPISODE 73  The simple Bible overview of…DANIEL’S VISIONS OF THE PARADE OF THE REST OF HUMAN HISTORY

The little town I grew up in...

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...had a festival every summer that ended in a parade. I vividly remember as a young boy sitting on the curb, watching the marching bands, floats and the big old men with funny hats on little motorcycles go goofing by my favorite part of course, was waiting for some of the floats to throw handfuls of candy at me though. They happened every year. I never knew exactly what to expect. I just had to sit there and wait for each of these units to pass by in my little town, just off the parade route was the tall water tower. There was a metal ladder attached to the frame, and if a person had enough guts and lacked enough common sense, he or she could climb to the top of that water tower.

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If you did, during that festival, from that water tower, you could see every single spot in our little town. I could see every single float band and where those goofy guys on motorcycles were. I could see where the parade began and ended and all along the line all at once. I think of those parades in my little town, in that water tower. When I read Daniel chapter seven through 12, it's like God allowed Daniel to climb the water tower, to get a high level view of the parade of the rest of human history. Daniel chapter seven quite simply is remarkable in Daniel chapter seven in the first year of Belshazzar, Daniel's lying on his bed.

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He's not sure if he has a vision or a dream, how it happened was kind of fuzzy. But what happened in this vision or dream was vivid and very unsettling. Daniel sees a vast sea and out of this sea come four beasts. The first is like a lion it's fast and conquering, and then stands upright like a Man. The second is like a bear it's ferocious and devours. The third is like a leopard stealthy and lightening fast. And then a fourth beast comes up. He can't even really give it a metaphor. It's just vicious and awful. It has iron teeth and 10 horns, everything it's iron teeth, doesn't smash and eat it tramples below its feet.

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Then in Daniel's vision, as he watches three of these 10 horns on the beasts are pushed out like a tooth, pushing out another tooth. And up from that spot comes a little horn. Then in Daniel's vision, he's whisked into a courtroom scene. The old one, the ancient one comes. He clearly knows this is the most ancient one. God, the ancient one opens the books then destroys this lasts ferocious beasts, then its little horn. Then in Daniel's vision, one like the Son of Man comes with the clouds of and walks up to the ancient of days. This ancient one gives this Son of Man dominion over all people everywhere for all time.

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He's a King over an everlasting kingdom. Does that sound familiar? Daniel in this vision speaks to one standing by and says, you've got to tell me what this means. The person he asks, perhaps one of God's bell, boys and angel says, Daniel, I'd be happy to the four beasts you see are for Kings of Four kingdoms and they will arise one after the other. And then this eternal King will arrive and he will be with God's people no longer slapped around by human Kings and kingdoms. And it will be that way forever. They're in one vision or dream Daniel has given the sweep of human history to the very end as you move forward in chapters eight through 12 Daniel has given more visions where God begins to flesh out the details of his chapter seven, till the end of time, vision Daniel is told in chapter eight.

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Babylon is the first kingdom medio. Persia is the second Greece is the third. The fourth is left on identified, but with many, many clues in chapters, 10 through 12, God gives Daniel even more details about these kingdoms it's as if Daniel on the water tower gets a pair of binoculars. Extremely specific details are given about the third kingdom, Greece unmistakable details about Alexander. The great, the four generals who replaced him upon his early death and one leader who'd flow out of these four leaders. Antiochus the third so specific.

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Are these details that many scholars believe Daniel couldn't of been written in five 40 BC that had to be written after one 90 BC after the life of Antiochus Epiphanes there are also many details given about the fourth kingdom. Many say that kingdom was the kingdom, the replaced Greece, the Roman empire. I want to remind you Daniel is a prophet. Prophecy is its own genre. Also, perhaps it would be good to go back to episode eight. In that episode, I reminded us all. We are Pygmies and God, and his word in plans are an iPhone. God is trying to explain things to us about his plans, some millennia in the future, perhaps the best he can do his crude metaphors.

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Please also remember, as I talked about an episode 14, God is outside of time, he's on a different clock than we are all this to say, as you read the prophecies of Daniel and again, in the new Testament, when we get to the prophetic book of revelation, keep these things in mind, have the attitude of humility, jot your notes with a pencil and make sure there's a good eraser on it. We'll learn later in the book of revelation prophecies about the future from God are meant to give his kids comfort and hope what's important or not the exact order or timing of events, but the outcomes in the case of Daniel that one day God will hand authority and dominion for all his kids over to an eternal King who acts justly, loves mercy and lives among his people.

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Daniel further identifies that King, that eternal King, his term, the Son of Man please file that term away. The Son of Man. I get the sense Daniel had been in the prophecy of Jeremiah. When we get to Daniel chapter nine in Jeremiah, 25, 11 and 12, Jeremiah prophesized, the Judah will be in Babylon as exiles for 70 years. Daniel realizes the clock is ticking and those 70 years are almost up. So in chapter nine, Daniel prays a prayer of purification for the exiles in Judah. He pours his heart out to guide for the sins of he and his people.

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He prays, Oh Lord, for your name sake, cause your face to shine on Jerusalem and your people don't delay don't hesitate at the end of chapter six, we were told, so this Daniel enjoyed success and the reign of Darius and in the rain of Cyrus, the Persian, that probably explains why the historical book of Israel begins by telling us that Cyrus, the King of Persia proclaimed throughout all Persia, that any exiles of Judah could go home to Judah and rebuild. We'll look at Ezra and his account of that proclamation and the return of a remnant of exiles to the land. God promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in our next word picture.