Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

-{Daniel 7}

-Over the years there have been a plethora of books and videos that have come out that claim to be people who have had near death experiences and have been given glimpses of heaven or hell.

These have become popular because people want to get some sort of knowledge about the seemingly unknowable great beyond.

People want to find some comfort (or warning) through these.

I would highly caution us on relying on these accounts to shape what we believe and where we find our solace.

These experiences may or may not be true.

But the accounts given are very subjective and I also believe that it is possible for the enemy to give false visions.

-There is only one place to find truth about heaven, hell, and the after-life, and that is Scripture, and I would not put much stock in any other account.

The only problem is that the visions of heaven or hell are very miniscule and don’t seem to give a lot of detail.

And there might be a reason for that—our human limitations on this earth can’t handle much more than what is given.

God has revealed all He has revealed for a reason, and He has not given us any more, and what we do is live by faith that what He says is true even if He doesn’t give us all the details that we want.

If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you can take comfort in the fact that the glories of heaven are so wonderful that they are beyond human words.

If you are not a believer in Jesus Christ, you are warned that the terrors of hell are even more horrible than what humans can begin to even imagine.

-But every once in a while in Scripture God gave a vision to a prophet of the happenings in heaven, and Daniel 7 is one such vision.

The vision actually begins on the earth where Daniel is standing by the turbulent, great sea and there are these four creatures/beasts/monsters that arise from the water one right after another.

These beasts represent kingdoms of man that were present and would come in the future.

The first beast that looked like a lion with eagle’s wings represents Babylon.

The second beast that looked like a bear eating ribs represented the Medo-Persian empire.

The third beast looked like a leopard with four wings and four heads represented the Greco-Macedonian empire.

And the fourth beast didn’t look like anything man had ever seen and was massive and terrifying and it represented the Roman Empire.

On the head of the fourth beast were 10 horns and a little horn came and plucked out three of them by the roots.

The beasts represented the powers that be in the Ancient Near East that affected what happened to Israel.

Israel would be under the dominion of all four beasts at some point.

-This was quite a weird dream or nightmare, but then the scene in the vision changes and Daniel is given a glimpse of what is going on in heaven during this time.

God is not passively looking on as these governments come and go.

God is not ignoring Israel or the happenings on earth.

In fact, God in His heavenly throne room was executing the plan that He already had in place from eternity.

But what this vision specifically addresses is that while all these kingdoms on earth come and go, God in heaven was preparing His kingdom for mankind.

So here is a glimpse of some of the goings on in heaven and how it affected Israel and affects us and affects the future.

-Let’s consider the details of this part of the vision (as we remember it was a continuation of the first part of the chapter).

-The vision moves from the sea on earth to a courtroom in heaven.

In the Ancient Near East it was the king or royalty that would make important decisions and judgments and the king would sit on His throne and hand down the verdict.

Now, the description of the throne itself sounds weird to us because it says that the throne has wheels, but the kings in the Ancient Near East had chariots that were also thrones by which they would travel and make their judgments.

-But the court being held and the king sitting in judgment is no ordinary throne room or monarch.

This is a glimpse of God the Father sitting in the midst of His heavenly court surrounded by His heavenly counsel.

As God has shared the work on earth with man, so God shares the work in heaven with His heavenly counsel, but God alone is sovereign and God alone reigns and God alone passes judgment.

-The description of what is going on in this vision is so telling of who God is and what God does.

God is described as the Ancient of Days.

It is so difficult for mankind to grasp the nature of God, especially the fact that God is eternal—He has no beginning or ending—He has always existed and will always exist.

The only way that Daniel could describe this being who has existed before time itself is to call Him the Ancient of Days.

As God is described in:

-How do you describe the One whose years are unsearchable—He is the Ancient of Days.

The way that God depicts Himself in this vision of Daniel is the same way that Jesus Christ Himself is described in:

-There is no denying the deity of Christ as the description for Him was borrowed from this vision of Daniel.

The Ancient of Days had clothing that was white as snow, depicting His purity and holiness and glory and grandeur.

His hair was like pure wool that depicts old age, but not just the fact of many days, but the wisdom of many days—God has the wisdom of an Ancient of Days, the eternal wisdom of the One True God.

The chariot-throne upon which He sat was a fiery flame.

Fire was often associated with the presence of God (just think of the burning bush of Moses’ time).

But fire is also a symbol of judgment and wrath.

The Perfect Judge is sitting in court to hand down a perfect verdict upon the affairs of men, specifically the governments of mankind as depicted by the beasts.

-This eternal King who judges all the earth is served by an untold number of heavenly beings.

The number 10000 is the largest number that the Hebrews had a word for, and so what is depicted is untold number of being who ministered to do His bidding, especially here in the sense of judgment.

These beings are the ones that will carry out His sentences upon the wicked nations after the verdict has been determined.

We this depicted throughout Scripture:

-God has an untold number of heavenly servants ready for the word from God to execute the judgment that the Eternal Judge decides upon mankind.

In front of the judge the books were opened from which He would determine His judgment.

The Bible speaks of two books when it comes to heavenly judgment.

The first is the Book of Life—whether you are a citizen of heaven by faith in Jesus Christ.

If your name is in the book then you are saved and you get to spend eternity with God.

The other book is what I call the book of deeds.

For final judgment it is the book of everyone’s words and attitudes and actions on earth from which your punishment or reward will be determined.

In Daniel this is a book of the deeds of these nations, and these nations are found wanting and will eventually be destroyed.

-The focus of judgment in this particular visions is upon the fourth beast who had the ten horns on its head with a little horn that had a big mouth.

This beast is the Roman Empire.

It is possible that the Roman Empire is judged because the Caesars spoke boastfully about being deity.

The little horn might be Nero it might be Domitian and because of them eventually the empire would fall.

If it speaks of later times, it could mean the Antichrist who, like the Roman Caesars, claims great things for himself.

-V. 12 says that the other beasts had their power taken away but they themselves continued in some way for a time.

This could be referring to how the previous empires were absorbed by the new empires, but then after the Roman empire fell they were all dissolved in a way.

But the point is that these human governments are short-lived, and because of the injustice and wickedness by which they ruled, they came under the judgment of the Ancient of Days.

But, whereas human governments are temporary, there would be a Ruler who would be given a kingdom by the Father that would last forever.

-In the same heavenly courtroom scene Daniel sees one enter the room who is described as being one like a son of man—that means that this person is human.

But at the same time this person is not merely human, because He is described as coming with the clouds of heaven.

That might not mean much to us in our day and age, but in the Ancient Near East it held a lot of significance.

In many of the religions of the day the gods in general were described as riding the clouds.

The Canaanite god Baal was often described as riding the clouds.

But to offset that false notion, God made sure that people understood there was no God like Him and would use that epitaph for Himself, for example:

-So, here is depicted one like a man who is riding the clouds, a picture of deity.

Here is one that is both man and God.

There is only one such Man to ever have existed, and that is Jesus Christ.

This is a picture of the coronation of Jesus Christ as being the king of God’s kingdom for all of eternity.

And so, knowing who He was, Jesus would use these descriptions to describe Himself.

Jesus often called Himself the Son of Man, and did so with a double entendre.

Jesus was surely human, but He was also the Son of Man as described in Daniel.

You also find Jesus describing Himself as riding on the clouds, which is His claim to deity.

21st century Americans would not pick up on this necessarily, but when you read Jesus saying He is coming on the clouds it is not literally that He is riding on clouds, but it is a reference to His work as God the Son.

And when He used that description, the Jews knew exactly what He was saying.

Take for example this long passage:

-Why would the High Priest charge Jesus with blasphemy?

Because he knew exactly what Jesus was saying.

By saying that He was the Son of Man who would come on the clouds He was claiming to be the One who is described in Daniel 7:13-14.

You better believe that this passage is speaking about Jesus.

He is King of kings and Lord of lords and He has been given a kingdom that transcends all current national identities.

He has been given dominion and glory and a kingdom wherein all people and nations and languages will serve Him.

His is a kingdom that is everlasting and will not pass away or be destroyed, unlike the nations of men like those represented by the beasts.

-The kingdom of Christ came during the time of the fourth beast, the Roman empire.

It has been set up and is ever expanding.

Like the vision in chapter 2 where the stone not cut out by hands destroys the statue of kingdoms and grows throughout the earth, so now Christ’s kingdom is expanding and will continue to do so until He returns.

-What this means for us is that no matter how good or wicked we might think a human government is, it is only temporary and will disappear someday (yes, even the US).