Understanding the Times: Prophetic Lessons from the Book of Daniel

Book of Daniel.

I have really enjoyed wrapping my head around prophecy again.

It's been a long time since I really jumped into the subject, and

especially with everything going on in our world today in the

last few.

Even the last few weeks, what's going on in the Middle East.

And we'll be able to touch on that from now until the end of the

year.

Hopefully, we'll finish with Daniel by the end of the year.

But there's so much here.

By the way, Lee Davis had 31 this morning.

They had a special service at Highland Village, so.

Amen.

And two families very interested in the church.

And so really been praying hard for Brother Lee.

He works hard at it, and it's been a little discouraging for him

and see that blessing.

If you haven't kept up with Brother Wiggins as well, they've

started a children's ministry and that has increased.

And again, it started with one or two, I think the last Wednesday

night they had six or nine, I think.

And just seeing that a church that had zero kids, zero to see,

that is just encouraging.

I know to him.

And so him and I talk about every other day or at least text

every other day.

So keep them in your prayer.

And then, of course, Brother Jonathan Moore summer a little tough

in the Aggie country as all the students are gone.

And he continues to work there and building a base, you know, building

a base of residents who live there, of course, but also continue

to reach out to the student body, which I'm telling you, we have

found that he is very gifted in doing that.

And God's already used him in a great way, ministering to students

there.

And so it's encouraging.

And then the church at Nocona, like I said, now we have four that

we'll be working with.

Brother Zach Doty.

Now, Brother Zach Doty is familiar to us, should be to most

of us.

He is Norris graduate from about 10 years ago.

They started.

Him and Tony Roa and Jacob Blumen started the Antioch Church

Planters.

We supported them.

We've supported them for many years.

Brother Lumen ended up taking Friendship Baptist Church in Boyd,

where Brother Terry.

Terry was at.

He took that church here just a few months ago.

And then Brother Tony Roa took a church over on the other side of

Dallas.

What's the name of that town?

Rockwall.

He took a church over there about six months ago or about a year

ago.

And then so Brother Zach Doty is the resident Antioch Church planter

by himself, but he is another student now.

And his wife.

His wife, Brother Derek Breyer, who is also joining the group,

but Brother Zach Doty will be there, our missionary church planner.

So this is a little different in that the church planter is not

coming out of our church, but eventually will.

This is kind of the way this will work is Brother Zach will go

in, he'll get things up and going, and then we'll begin to look

for a permanent church planner to be there.

And so y' all pray about that, that God would send us the right

man to go there, right couple to go there and super excited about

what God's going to do in the little town of Nakona.

And we'll give you more information as time goes on.

So be in prayer.

Be in prayer for our missionaries as we think about God's

protection and God's provision for them.

I've been studying a lot and just again wrapping my head around

prophecy.

Daniel chapter two.

We've been.

We preached the first 30 verses.

Daniel chapter two.

Now remember Daniel chapter one.

Daniel's carried into captivity, him and his compadres,

all the princes, all the elite, if you would, of the young

people, of the kings and princes were carried away in the

first deportation by King Nebuchadnezzar.

So just kind of in your mind again, here's Jerusalem.

It's prophesied that the children of Israel are going to be

carried away, that the.

The southern kingdom.

And so Nebuchadnezzar comes in, he defeats them, and he carries

away this first bunch of people.

And the first bunch of people he takes is the very best of the

young people.

And Daniel's a part of that group.

And Daniel's carried into Babylon.

And there Daniel's put into training.

And we call that, you know, tongue in cheek, but Babylon University.

And he's exposed to the Babylonian system, the Babylonian

gods.

His name is changed to a Babylonian name which represents

one of the gods of the Babylonians.

And so his life changed overnight.

But he determined, the Bible says, not to defile himself.

He determined, and so him and his friends began to stand for the

Lord.

When we come to Daniel chapter two, remember last Sunday night,

King Nebuchadnezzar has a dream.

And it's inferred possibly that he tells his wise men, his astrologers

and all these wise men, he says, tell me my dream and the interpretation.

And the wise men go like, hey, tell us the dream and we'll tell

you the interpretation.

And Nebuchadnezzar goes, no, no, no, you tell me my dream, what

I had.

And the interpretation.

And they say to him, this is no king has ever asked of any wise

men to give them the dream, you know.

And then he go, the wise men go on to say, and there is no man

on earth, not even little gods, that could do that.

But there was.

Daniel, of course, depended upon God.

And so King Nebuchadnezzar got mad and made a decree to kill all

the wise men.

And so they began to search for him.

The Bible specifically says they began to search for Daniel and

his three friends.

Apparently Daniel and his three friends weren't with the other

crowd of wise men.

They didn't hang out with those wise men.

Amen.

We shouldn't hang out with a bunch of turkeys.

Careful who you hang out with.

But word got to Daniel and Daniel said, ask King Nebuchadnezzar

for a little time.

And God answered Daniel's prayer, gave him the dream and the

interpretation of it.

And that's where we were last week.

This week is the.

Is the dream and the interpretation of it.

So look with me in Daniel chapter three.

And let's.

Daniel chapter two.

Sorry, verse.

Let's start in verse 30, verse 29, verse 28.

It's so good.

But there is a God in heaven.

I love that little phrase, There is a God in heaven.

We kind of touched on that last Sunday night.

I'm so thankful for There's a God in heaven.

There's a God in heaven who cares for you that revealeth secrets.

Yes, Lord.

And maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the

latter days, thy dream and thy visions of thy head upon thy bed.

Are these even those how to rhyme?

I'm kidding.

Verse 29.

As for thee, O king, thy thoughts came into thy mind upon

thy bed.

And that's basically saying these are some of the things that

Nebuchadnezzar had been thinking about.

He's older.

He's thinking about what's going to happen after I'm gone into

thy mind upon thy bed, and what should come to pass hereafter.

And he that revealeth secrets maketh known to thee what shall come

to pass.

But as for me, this secret is not revealed to me for any wisdom

that I have more than any living, but for their sakes that

shall make known the interpretation of the king, and that

thou mightest know the thoughts of thy heart.

In other words, this is not coming because of my wisdom.

He's already given credit to God.

There is a God in heaven who knows secrets.

Again, we ought to be careful as Christians to give God the glory

to give him the credit.

Verse 31 Thou, O king, sawest and behold a great image.

This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before

thee, and the form thereof was terrible.

This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of

silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron,

his feet part of clay, of iron and part of clay thou sawest till

that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image

upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to

pieces.

Verse 35.

Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver and the gold

broken to pieces together and became like the chafe of the summer

threshing floors, the chaff of the summer threshing floors, and

the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them.

And the stone that smote the image became a great mountain and

filled the whole earth.

I want to go ahead and tell you who the stone is.

That's Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ, who smites the image and becomes the big mountain.

Verse 36.

So that transitions this is the dream and will tell the interpretation

thereof.

Before the king Thou, O king, art a king of kings.

For the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power and strength

and glory, and wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts

of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine

hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all.

Thou art this head of gold.

So king Nebuchadnezzar, you're the head of gold.

I do want to address something that's not in my notes.

When it goes here and describes that these are the world

powers that you know, the power of the whole earth, well, that's

the then known world.

Also understand, critics try to criticize this passage that King

Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, Alexander the Great, who

conquered the then known world.

Could Alexander the Great have conquered the unknown world as well?

The answer is absolutely yes.

So it's kind of debatable, not even debatable that when you say

that these men, these kings were or the king of the whole earth,

or king empire of power over the whole earth.

Well, they were, and of course they were just over the then known

world.

But had they wanted to exercise their power, they could

have conquered even the unknown.

Alright, so some of you just say, well I don't care, preacher.

Well, I'm just trying to answer the critics.

Just imagine that the power thou art king art him at the head

of the gold.

Verse 39.

And after these and after thee shall rise another kingdom inferior

to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear

rule over all the earth.

And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron, forasmuch as iron

breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things, and as iron

that breaketh in all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.

And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes part of potter's clay

and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided, but there shall

be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest

the iron mixed with miry clay, and as the toes of the feet were

part of iron and part of clay, so that the kingdom shall be partly

strong and partly broken.

And again, we can't dwell on some of this very long, but apparently

there is a break between verses 41 and 42, and that is addressing

the kingdoms that are coming, the kingdoms that are coming, that

are going to subsequent kingdoms that are going to follow

Babylon.

And then it skips ahead to the everlasting kingdom.

So kind of keep that in mind.

Now it skips ahead to what we were going to call the revived Roman

Empire.

This is the ten toes.

And this will make sense.

If you stick with the book of Daniel and stick with the study with

us as we go forward, we'll make more sense of how this works.

All right, A near fulfillment.

All the prophets do this.

A near fulfillment and then a far reaching fulfillment.

And that's what's happening between verse 41 and verse 42.

And as the toes of the feet were part of iron and part of clay,

so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly broken.

And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, and they shall

mingle themselves with the seed of men, but they shall not cleave

one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay, and in the

days of these kings, so it's referring to these, the 10 toes,

the part iron and part clay, and they represent ten kings.

And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a

kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall

not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and

consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.

Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone now refers back to Christ

again, who is the ultimate king of kings and Lord of lords,

who's going to reign forever and ever was cut out of the mountain

without hands, and that it break in pieces the iron, the brass,

the clay, the silver and the gold, the great God hath Made known

to the king that what shall come to pass hereafter.

And the dream is certain and the interpretation thereof.

Sure.

The dream is certain.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, do bless tonight as we read your word.

God.

God, may you help and give wisdom and we thank you in Jesus

name.

Amen.

All right.

When you come to prophecy, it's important to understand that

when the prophets are prophesying, they do not see the

church age.

They do not see the church age.

If you could get a.

If you could get a picture in your mind, and I wish.

I need to get some visuals and I should do better.

The visual is this.

Think of a mountain, then a valley, and then a mountain.

All right, so that's what you need to kind of picture in your mind.

So mountain, valley, mountain, picture.

The prophet is here.

He's prophesying.

When he prophesies, he's prophesying about things that are

going to come to pass, you know, ultimately maybe even in his

lifetime or, you know, 700 years from now.

We think about, for instance, Isaiah, prophesies about King Cyrus,

even names him 700 years before Cyrus ever gets to the throne.

All right, that's prophecy.

That's amazing, isn't it?

Names him, gives the name.

I love it.

Daniel, I believe.

I think I just can see Daniel going into King Cyrus and go, hey,

look, you're in our book 700 years ago, your name.

And so the prophets are prophesying about future events.

But when it comes to the first coming of Christ, his birth, when

they look, they're seeing the cross, they're seeing the coming

of Christ, the Messiah, they're seeing that.

That's the first top of the mountain, the first mountaintop.

And then the valley represents the church age, the age of grace.

And then the second mountain represents his second coming at the

end of the tribulation, at the battle of Armageddon, when he defeats

all the enemies.

What an amazing time when the Jews see him for who he is and accept

him for who he is.

Right?

That's the second mountaintop.

That's the second coming of Christ.

So when you're interpreting Old Testament prophecies, you've

got to remember that those prophets will not prophesy about

the church age.

None of those prophecies are going to concern the church.

It's just like when people try to use the feasts, the seven feasts

of Israel, and apply them to the church.

They have nothing to do with the church.

They have everything to do with the Messiah and the Jew.

And certainly that includes us as Saved, born again Christians.

Aren't you glad he came the first time?

And the first feast, the second feast, the third feast, all

represent his life and his death.

And then that fourth feast, the feast of Pentecost, representing

Jew and Gentile coming together.

It's an awesome, awesome thing.

But it's a Jewish timetable, not a church timetable.

You cannot use the seven feasts and church prophecy.

Every book you go buy at the bookstore, if you went down to Lifeway,

they still call it Lifeway.

If you go down to the Babas bookstore and you buy a book on the

seven feasts, you're going to see them kind of jumble that up.

I'm like one of the elementary foundational parts you should know

about prophecy is it doesn't include the church age.

Again, the prophet's eye is looking.

He sees the top of the first mountain, Jesus Christ being born,

being killed, dying, rising from the dead.

He sees the cross, that's it.

And then we go into the church age.

He doesn't see the age of grace.

And then he sees the second coming when he returns.

Is that visual enough?

Prophecy is history written in advance.

The prophets were forthtellers and foretellers.

In other words, they were preachers.

Man, you think about the prophets getting up and just letting

them have it, the children of Israel trying to correct and trying

to get them back on track.

And then they were also foretellers prophesying of that which

was to come.

And Daniel was a prophet.

And man, was he ever a prophet.

The book of Daniel was written by Daniel himself around 555, 540

BC in the 6th century.

The 6th century, not the 2nd century.

Liberals believe it was the 2nd century.

And the reason why they believe that is because of the very

precise prophecy by Daniel of the Maccabean revolt.

And because it's so precise, they say there's no way Daniel, there's

no way Daniel could prophesy that.

Well, that's because Daniel wasn't given the information, he

was given that information by God.

Just like Isaiah knew the name of Cyrus 700 years before he was

ever born, before he ever stepped on the throne.

So again, liberals have come up with the idea that during the

Maccabean revolt that somebody wanted to encourage them.

And so they began to write about what Daniel prophesied about

to encourage them and blah, blah, blah.

And it's if you believe that, if you believe that this book was

written around 160 BC, 170 BC around that area, then it discounts

most of the prophecies why even have them in the book, by the

way?

It makes God a liar because he says these are the things that are

gonna come to pass.

Makes Daniel a liar.

No, Daniel very specifically said.

He says, I.

Daniel, I know I'm getting a little passionate here, but it's

ridiculous.

I have read I don't know how many books and I'm so thankful for

conservative scholars who believe like we believe when it comes

to salvation, when they believe like we believe, they don't

try to discount the miracles found in the Bible.

But boy, there's a large segment of, very large segment of

scholars who try to discount the miracles.

And not just the Old Testament prophecies, but also the New Testament

miracles as well.

Can I tell you that God's an all powerful God and God's done great

miracles and he's still doing miracles.

He's the God of gods.

He is the God of heaven.

There is a God in heaven.

So be very careful when you begin to.

Especially Daniel.

Daniel is the most attacked book, honestly, frankly, in the entire

Bible because it is such a foundational book when it comes to

prophecy.

It is the ABCs of prophecy.

It is the book that gives you the panoramic view of what's going

to happen.

It lays it out for you.

And then the other prophets fill in the blanks.

And we're going to go over that a lot, especially chapter seven

and chapter nine.

Man, it's amazing what Daniel prophesies.

Its prophecy is again so accurate that liberal scholars said

it has to be written afterwards, not before.

But we know that's not true.

Limits the power of God.

One of the proofs is found in Matthew 24:15 where Jesus says he

Matthew 24:15

attested to Daniel was written by Daniel.

When he said that we ought to listen to the words spoken by Daniel.

I'm quoting spoken by Daniel.

He says that in Matthew 24, verse 15.

Matthew 24:15

In other words, that Daniel spoke the book of Daniel.

That's Jesus.

We certainly wouldn't want to go against what Jesus said.

The theme of the book of Daniel is God rules and the affairs

of man.

Just to remind you of that.

The second chapter of Daniel is key to God's entire prophetic

program.

It again is the ABCs.

Revelation is the XYZ and you need the foundation in order to understand

Revelation, the Book of Revelation.

So thankful there's a God in heaven.

And I'm thankful Daniel gave him Credit.

So verses 30 through 35, we have the description of the image.

We don't have to go back through this.

But just remember it says it was a great image.

It certainly had a profound impact on King Nebuchadnezzar.

It was bigger than life.

It was bright.

It towered before the king.

It troubled the king.

It made him afraid.

Had a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, thighs of brass,

legs of iron, feet of iron and clay.

Notice the decline of the value of the metal.

Notice the decline in the value of the weight.

Can I tell you that civilization is on the decline?

Oh, the world would like to say, no, no, no, no.

We're evolving.

We're evolving.

We're getting better and better.

The answer, no, that's not the case.

We're getting worse.

Worse as a civilization and really, even in America, worse as

a society.

We're not evolving, we're devolving.

We didn't come from monkeys, by the way, just to let you know,

if we are evolving, and I was a monkey, why don't I still have

a tail?

Because that would sure come in handy.

Got stuff on your hands, you know, to open a door?

Kind of like you ladies with your fancy cars, that you can open

the back hatch by waving your foot under the car?

No.

Okay.

Sin and selfishness makes mankind trend downward.

And we see that very, very evident today.

Amen.

But I'm glad there's hope one day that will not be the case.

Verses 36 through 45.

Daniel gives the interpretation, the head of gold

is Babylon.

Makes that very.

There's no doubt the head of gold is Babylon, representing Nebuchadnezzar,

who again had put Israel under his domain.

This lasted from a very short time, as far as him being over the

Israelites, from 526 to 536.

This is also according to Luke 21, verse 24.

Luke 21:24

These again, where Jesus speaking begins the times of the

Gentiles.

All right, so there's two different designations.

We won't go over this tonight, but there's also the fullness of

the times of the Gentiles, and we'll cover both later.

But the times of the gentiles runs from 586, when Nebuchadnezzar

defeated Jerusalem, until the second coming of Christ, when he.

When he defeats his enemies and sets at the millennial kingdom.

That's the time of the Gentiles.

In other words, Israel is no longer the power.

Israel is no longer the dominant power in that part of the

world.

And now it is.

It is Gentile powers.

So it's the time of the Gentiles.

Israel was supposed to be the mouthpiece for God.

It was Israel who was supposed to be over the nations of the of

the world as such.

King Solomon in his reign is the example as people nations around

the world came to Solomon to give him presents.

That's what was supposed to happen, but it didn't because again

Israel sinned, worshiping other gods and so forth.

And so we have the times of the Gentiles now.

In fact it makes it very clear not only in Daniel, but Ezekiel says

it, that is God who set up Nebuchadnezzar.

Jeremiah.

I'm sorry, Jeremiah.

It's God who set up Nebuchadnezzar.

It's God who's put Nebuchadnezzar on his throne.

The legs of the legs.

And then the next is the head of gold and the breast and his arms

of silver.

This is talking about the middle Persian Empire who replaced

Babylon and inherited dominion over the Israelites.

The third is the belly.

His belly is of thighs of brass.

Speaking of the Grecian Empire, Alexander the Great who conquered

the then known world.

The legs of iron represent the Roman Empire.

The Roman Empire from 40 to 4076 A.D.

even the Roman Empire in this dualistic rule when they split into

two kingdoms, the Romans, Rome split into two.

And we can see that and the two legs.

And then you come down to the mixture of the iron and clay.

There's so much here.

I just the iron and clay represent again in that near fulfillment

represent Rome as it began to decay.

So some scholars think, well, the iron is monarchy and the clay

is democracy.

When Rome was kind of both and then as it melded back into an empire

rather than a democracy.

And you know that Rome wasn't defeated because of their lack of

an army.

It was Rome that decayed from the inside.

So the representation here is that Rome was mighty, strong, invincible

to a certain extent.

Just amazing the way they could take their armies and go in

and just take over anybody.

That's the iron part of it.

But the weakness of Rome was the immoral decay that was happening

on the inside and thus brought about the downfall of Rome.

So strong militarily, but full of internal decay.

By the way, the US is very similar.

It's good to be reminded of this.

As you saw as you read about the history of Rome, you read the

history of America, you really do you see Rome mighty and strong

in their military and strong in so many ways and in beginnings

much somewhat democracy.

And all of a sudden boy just began.

They got rich, became prosperous, like to lay around and

swim and I'm just kidding, but I mean you Know, they just.

Pleasure was all they sought and they saw the decay, the implosion

of the Roman Empire.

And we see the very similar things happening in America today.

We need revival.

We need a God sent revival.

We need an America to come back to God.

These 10, as I said, there's a break somewhere between verse 41

and 42.

There is absolutely a break.

And scholars can't agree on where exactly in those two verses

there's a break.

But we know that it's referring not just to the Roman Empire,

but to what the scholars refer to as a revived Roman Empire.

These kings that are set up, these 10 kings, or maybe 10 kingdoms

or a confederacy of some sort of 10.

How do you know this, preacher?

How do we know emphatically that this is not just referring to

the revived or to the Roman Empire?

Well, because it says that the stone cut out without hands is going

to destroy these 10 kings.

Well, that hasn't happened in history.

So it has to be future.

It has to be future.

So people way smarter than me and most of you, I guess, who study

this thing a lot and I appreciate Brother Stewart and I've

read through a lot of his stuff on this too, and, and I'm going

to give you some more of his material.

I know that offends you a lot.

But these revived Roman Empire, these ten kings, as we come

to the end times, as we come to the end, as we come, get closer

to Christ appearing and then we get close to Christ coming at

his second coming.

So the Rapture and the second coming of Christ are different.

The Rapture is the catching away and the calling up of the saved.

And then seven years later we have the second coming of Christ

when he returns with his saints at the battle of Armageddon.

We know in those last days, and Daniel's going to cover this

too, we're going to talk about the Antichrist.

The Antichrist is going to rise up.

These 10 confederacies, these 10 nations.

It really seems as though it's not 10 nations.

It seems 10 confederacies.

You think about even the United States, right?

United States.

Think about the old Soviet Union with many nations inside it.

Think about England, who you also have England and Scotland and

other countries that they're over per se.

Right?

It's going to be something similar to that.

But they'll be strong and weak again.

The stone is a description of.

It's a messianic description.

We know this also because there's a reference in Genesis 49:24

Genesis 49:24

where it describes from.

It Says this from thence is the shepherd, and it calls the Messiah

the stone of Israel.

That's a good cross reference.

That's Genesis 49, verse 24.

Genesis 49:24

It says that this stone is cut out without hands, possibly referring

to the virgin birth.

And this stone destroys the image, by the way.

It doesn't destroy the head, but it destroys the feet.

And these 10 confederacies, these 10 kings, and the whole thing

comes down and it says the stone became a mountain.

So we think about Jesus Christ setting up the kingdom, the millennial

kingdom, and as he rules and reigns over the entire earth, and

he does so forever and ever and ever.

I'm giving you the most common interpretation of this passage.

There are some variances and variations of this, but that's the

most common interpretation.

Lays out for you what's going to happen.

Daniel, here's what's happened.

King Nebuchadnezzar, here's what's going to happen.

There's going to be four nations that follow you, but ultimately

there will be 10 revived nations.

And there'll be one who comes and destroys those nations.

Those.

Those nations.

And he will set up a kingdom eternally.

Amen.

And we know by cross reference and lots of other prophecies that

that's what's going to happen.

The Antichrist will be defeated.

Jesus Christ will stand on the Mount of Olives, it'll split in two.

He will defeat his enemies by the word of his mouth.

Not really going to be a fight, by the way.

Just a word, and they're all destroyed.

What an amazing event that will be, by the way.

We'll get to witness that, because we're going to return with

him.

Bible says we're going to be on white horses.

So.

Preacher, that's figurative.

No, I'm going to be riding a white horse.

That's what he says.

Are there going to be horses in heaven?

You can interpret that for yourself.

Apparently there is the promise to David of the Davidic kingdom,

that David descendants one day would sit on the throne, that his

descendants would sit on the throne and that throne would be forever.

That is going to be fulfilled.

That's going to be fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ.

The stone cut out of the mountain, made without hands.

The stone that crushes.

Crushes.

It doesn't just crush them, it says it grinds them as chaff.

Like you would, you know, the wheat.

Chaff the wheat, throw it up in the air and the chaff blows away.

That's what the nations are.

They're going to be gone.

And he that is, Christ will rule and reign forever and ever as

he promised to David.

Apparently, according to other prophecies, David's going to be a

part of that.

And what a kingdom that will be.

Wouldn't it be great to have a just king?

Adjust means fair.

Wouldn't it be great to have a king who sits on the throne, who

always makes the right decision, who cares and loves?

And what a day that'll be.

Verses 46 through 47, we didn't read it and we're out of time.

But of course, King Cyrus falls down and worships Daniel.

And that word worship there is speaking of respect.

He gives Daniel respect and he rewards Daniel and elevates him in

his kingdom.

Makes him basically vice president, puts him over the entire

kingdom.

Remember how old he is?

He's a teenager when he comes to Babylon.

Maybe he's 21 at this point.

Imagine that.

Imagine that young person.

I'm thankful God uses everybody.

Amen.

Young and old.

God's so good.

God rewarded Daniel for his faithfulness and God rewarded Daniel

for his acknowledgement of him.

In other words, Daniel again giving credit to God of the interpretation

of the dream.

So much so that he's able to testify to King Nebuchadnezzar.

I personally believe, and I know many scholars do believe, that

Nebuchadnezzar is going to be in heaven.

Imagine that.

Because as you read, you know, as you read even this passage at

the end, you'll see that Nebuchadnezzar began to recognize

the Trinity even.

It's an amazing thought.

The Middle east is the center of the news today.

Prophecies are being fulfilled before our very eyes.

We have seen nations arise.

Some of these old nations even going back to their Bible names.

Go read Ezekiel 38.

Something you want to pray about.

The battle of Gog and Magog and the confederation of countries.

It describes the confederation of countries we're seeing right now.

The battle of Gog and Magog.

May not be, you know, after Christ returns.

That battle could be before.

Maybe we're going to see that battle.

I'm glad God rules in the affairs of man, aren't you?

He's the one who sets up kings and puts them down.

He's the one who rules and reigns.

And I don't have to be afraid.

I'll never forget.

I'll end with this.

We had a lady in our church.

And some of you'll remember Ms.

Dorothy Neal.

She's a widow lady.

And Lib had an an adult son who had, you know, was mentally handicapped.

And I would go to her house about every other week or every third

week.

And she was a widow.

Indeed.

She had no family.

She is the reason why I started reading the Star Telegram.

I'm talking about.

This is 30 years ago.

I started getting the Star Telegram to deliver my house so I

could read enough local news to be able to talk to her about the

Texas Rangers.

That was her favorite thing to talk about.

But every time I went to her house, she lived over in Halton City.

She would say, preacher, I'm just afraid.

I'm afraid.

She'd hear the news and the national news, and she just.

Every.

Nearly every time I visit her, she was afraid.

Said, I don't know if.

Is it okay for me to go down here?

Ms.

Neal, you don't have to be afraid.

God is on the throne.

He will not forget his own.

God is on the throne.

I think it's good for us to be reminded that from time to time,

God will take care of you.

God is such a gracious and wonderful God.

Certainly we should not be afraid.

In fact, look up.

For your Redeemer draweth nigh.

I think for the Christian, this is a positive thing.

It means the time's close, it's near.

Maybe it'll be the day let's all stand.