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| > Sermon Archive > Sermons by Author > Rev. Rodney den Boer > God reveals to Daniel future events of great significance | Previous Next Print |
| Order Of Worship (Liturgy) Read: Daniel 8 Sing: Ps 124:1, 2, 3; Hy 82:3; Ps 129:1, 2, 3, 4; Ps 52:1, 3, 5, 6; Hy 55:1, 2, 3 Questions for reflection/discussion
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Dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
As I was preparing this sermon, I found myself, in a small way, identifying with Daniel’s reaction. After Daniel received this vision, he fainted and was sick for some days. There are heavy things in this vision, and as I was preparing this sermon I wondered, why do we need to hear about these things? Why do we need to hear about global domination by kingdoms of the earth, and about terrible persecution against the church? Wouldn’t it be nicer to have a sermon about God’s love for the world, about joyful service in the church, about peace and unity? There is a weight to this vision, a gravitas, a heaviness, which Daniel felt and which we often like to avoid.
And yet, God has revealed this to us as part of his complete revelation. All Scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for us, that we may be complete and equipped for every good work, as Paul writes in 2 Timothy 3. And as we’ll see this morning, this is a chapter that lands in our daily lives. It is instructive for how we understand the world, the church, and how we live our daily lives. This morning we’ll see how:
God reveals to Daniel future events of great significance.
- Significant for the world
- Significant for the church
- Significant for our lives
1. God reveals to Daniel future events of great significance.
This vision comes two years after the vision of ch7. We saw last week the four kingdoms of the lion, the bear, the leopard, and the terrible fourth beast that came out of the sea, and then we saw above the veil of history, the Ancient of Days ruling over all these kingdoms, and we saw him giving a kingdom to the Son of Man. And we saw how the Son of Man receives a kingdom on behalf of the saints – the saints receive his kingdom, their kingdom.
And this vision, two years later, zooms in to focus on the second and third kingdom of ch7, the kingdoms of the Medes and Persians, and of the Greeks. The third year of Belshazzar was the year 550BC, the same year that King Cyrus took over the Median kingdom and became king over the Medes and Persians. God was setting him onto the world stage. You can imagine the headlines of the international newspapers: “Cyrus gains possession of Media.” And at this moment, God tells Daniel in a vision, that the Persian kingdom would be like a ram with two horns.
A ram, who reaches for world domination, pushing westward, northward, and southward. The Persian empire didn’t make lasting ground eastward. But still, the ram makes global impact. He does what he likes and becomes great. No one can stop him. Not Babylon, not Belshazzar. Verse 5 says, Daniel was considering. He starts to consider the implications. He has a good place in the kingdom of Babylon, he’s been preserved through a long part of the exile, but what will the rise of the ram mean for him and for his people?
As he considers, a male goat comes from the west. This goat represents Alexander the Great, the Greek king. We already saw his kingdom represented with a leopard in ch7, a leopard with wings, suggesting speed, swiftness. And here again we see swiftness, he goes across the surface of the whole earth without touching the ground.
And he confronts the Persian kingdom in a great showdown, running at him with furious power, and broke the ram’s horns. The goat is dominant, powerful, the ram is powerless before him. He grew very great (v8), which is a step further than the ram who became great (v4). Other historical sources about Alexander the Great testify to his greatness. He conquered the known world before he was thirty.
But when he became strong, says v8, the large horn was broken. And indeed, at the age of 32, Alexander the Great got sick and died, and his kingdom was divided and shared between his four generals. The large horn of the goat was brittle and broke when it seemed strongest.
And from one of these four, smaller horns came a little horn. This horn had obscure beginnings but became exceedingly great towards the south, east, and glorious land, the land of promise. We’ll learn more about this horn later, but he is known in history as Antiochus IV, he called himself Antiochus Epiphanes. Notice that he is exceedingly great, there is progression from the kingdoms of Persia and Greece to this Antiochus.
What are we to make of these great kingdoms? When Daniel tried to understand the meaning of the vision, Gabriel, God’s messenger, was told to make him understand, and Gabriel said to Daniel, “Understand, son of man, that the vision refers to the time of the end.” We learn from v19 that the end refers to the “latter time of the indignation.”
When was this? The indignation refers to the time of God’s anger, when he punished his people for their sins and sent them into exile. But he also punished the nations. He punished the Assyrians when the Babylonians came and took over their empire. He would punish the Babylonians for their brutality to God’s people. And he would also judge the Persians, and the Greeks. The indignation refers to all these judgements in this time towards the end of OT and leading into the NT. The vision was about the end of these judgements.
What was we to make of this? We can say several things. First, if Daniel was expecting Jerusalem to again become great and rule the kingdoms of the world, to have the sort of domination that Solomon had, he had to correct his understanding. The people of Israel would continue to be a small, overlooked nation. They would live in a time when other nations were sovereign, they would be a small player in world politics.
Second, it is notable that these great kingdoms were not directly opposed to the church. We see that especially with the ram, Persia. God used the Persian king, Cyrus, to send his people back to the promised land, Cyrus even helped them with materials to build the temple. And later, people opposed the building of the temple, they appealed to the Persian King Darius and told him, hey, if you let these people build the temple, they’re going to rebel against you! But when Darius looked through the archives, he found the decree from Cyrus and he backed it up, sending them some more stuff to help build the temple. Earthly kingdoms are not always opposed to God, and they even directly help the church at times.
Third, this vision again confirms that God is in control. Daniel didn’t know many details about these world rulers. He didn’t know all the battles they would fight, the blood that would stain history books throughout the ages. But from this vision he could be assured that God is in control. God knows the future, he knows the details, and he controls all those details. He would rule the nations in a way that would give him glory and be the best for his people.
We, too, can be assured that God is sovereign. How do we know? He revealed these things to Daniel before they happened. There is remarkable similarity in the description of this vision and how the events transpired in history. God’s word came true. It always does.
And so, today, we can be assured that world history is in God’s hands, in his control, it’s all unfolding according to his eternal plan. The church of Jesus Christ does not have much earthly power. The kingdom of Christ is a spiritual kingdom and operates within earthly nations and countries. But God is in control over all those nations – he knows who will dominate the world scene and when. He is the master engineer who has already decreed what will comes next in international news. No headlines surprise him. As Christians, we have the best perspective on world politics, our God knows and controls the future.
God revealed to Daniel events of great significance for the world, and also events of great significance for the church.
2. God reveals events of great significance to the church
If we come back to this little horn, he grew, we saw, towards the glorious land, the land of promise. While the ram and the goat did not attack God’s people directly, Antiochus IV did.
He opposed God. In v10, the horn grew up to the host of heaven and cast down some of the host and some of the stars to the ground, he exalted himself as high as the Prince of the host. See his pride. Isaiah 14:13 uses similar language to describe the pride of Babylon, “you said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven, above the stars of God I will set my throne on high.” Antiochus wanted to establish himself in place of God, instead of being under the stars, he wanted to be above them, ruling instead of God.
And he would not only oppose God, he would also oppose God’s people, he would aim his violence at the church. In v11, he took away the daily sacrifices and cast down the place of God’s sanctuary, and he cast down truth to the ground. He would attack worship. In v24, we read that he would use his mighty power to destroy the mighty and the holy people.
And when we read about Antiochus IV from other historical sources, he was a terrible persecutor of the church. The book of Maccabees describes how he attacked God’s people in Jerusalem, and how he went into the temple, the sacred place reserved for the worship of God and his people, he desecrated the temple and took all the sacred objects back home. And two years later he came again to Jerusalem and massacred many residents of the city, and forbade making sacrifices to Israel’s God. He fiercely persecuted God’s people.
Beloved, how this revelation must have weighed upon Daniel! His beloved people would suffer greatly in the future! His beloved people would be persecuted, oppressed, and killed by this little horn who became exceedingly great. You can understand why he fainted at the end of this vision and felt sick. These are the sorts of things that make you sick in the stomach.
And beloved brothers and sisters, this is not just the story of Daniel and his people, this is the story of our Lord Jesus Christ, this is his story and it is our story. Think of our Lord Jesus Christ, who came into this world, who came as a Jew, who read these visions and could look back and see what had happened to his people. He came to a suffering people. He came to a people who had been ruthlessly persecuted. They were his people, he identified with them.
And he came to suffer for them. He was named Jesus, for he would save his people from their sins. He came to bear the reproach and suffering of Israel, to take their sin and shame upon himself. He was delivered into the hands of the Gentiles. He endured the full indignation of God against the sins of all who trust in him, the Jews and people of all nations. Behold your God! This is not just a story for Daniel and his people, but the story of our Lord Jesus Christ.
And it is also our story. By faith in Jesus Christ, we suffer with him. Christ foretold that in Matthew 24, “They will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake.” When he called his disciples, he did not call them to earthly peace and prosperity, but he told them to deny themselves, to take up their cross, and follow him.
And in Luke 14, he told his disciples that they ought to count the cost of following him. He says, if you build a house, you first need to sit down and see if you have enough money, you work out if you can take out a big enough loan, you count the cost. And in the same way, following Christ involves carrying a cross, we need to know that at the outset of the Christian life. Have you decided to follow Jesus? There is a cross you must carry. That’s what Daniel’s people experienced, that’s what our brothers and sisters experience all around the world today. There is suffering and persecution, there is a cross for us.
Now, you might think, that’s not very nice news, the sermon isn’t really a message of good news today. In fact, maybe you have the same sick feeling in your stomach that Daniel had. But isn’t it kind of our God to reveal these things ahead of time? Isn’t it gracious and loving to give us a realistic picture of the Christian life? He doesn’t give us a false gospel like the one taught by prosperity preachers. That’s a false gospel which says, “follow Jesus, and you’ll not have trouble in this world again – you’ll be successful, you’ll do well in business, you’ll have no problems in your relationships, you’ll have good health, and if you pray hard enough you’ll recover from any sickness…” But it’s not realistic. It doesn’t happen like that. Our Lord Jesus Christ doesn’t give us a false picture of the Christian life, but he says, take up your cross and follow me. He gives us a realistic picture of what to expect. It would be unkind to be falsely optimistic about the future. It is kind to give a fair warning of what we can expect.
If you climb Bluff Knoll with your kids, what do you tell them? Do you tell them, “It’s going to be an easy walk, you can do it in your thongs, just leave your drink bottle in the car, don’t worry about a jumper for the top…”? Of course not. That would be unkind. When they get to the first steps, they’ll say, “you didn’t tell us about these! And when they get thirsty and cold at the top, they’ll rightly say that you were lying. But of course you tell your children it’s going to be a hard hike, they’re going to need good shoes and water and a jumper and a lot of perseverance. It’ll be worth the climb! Yes, but it’ll be tough to get there.
And so, in God’s kindness, he has told us ahead of time that the Christian life is going to require perseverance: take up your cross, says our Lord, and follow me. That’s what it will be like, carrying a cross and dying. Be prepared for a tough hike. That’s the path to glory, a path through suffering. It’ll be worth every ounce of suffering! Yes, but be sure that there will be suffering.
And we bear this cross, partly because God is merciful and he waits until evil reaches its full measure before he punishes it. See verse 23, “in the latter time of [the kingdom of four horns], when the transgressors have reached their fulness, a king shall arise.” God is waiting until those who rebel against him become full of wickedness. He will not punish before the time is right. He gives time to repent.
He continues to show his mercy today, even as he delays the judgement of sin and evil. Sin and evil will increase in this world. As Jesus said in Matthew 24, “lawlessness will increase, and the love of many will grow cold.” There will be antichrists and the antichrist. Paul writes in 2 Thessalonians 2 about the man of lawlessness, also called the man of sin and the son of perdition, and says that he “opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God.” It’s like a repeat of Antiochus Epiphanes. The man of lawlessness will be like him in his evil, in his persecution against the church.
But, when the evil of this world is full, God will bring punishment. In Daniel 8:25 we read that Antiochus will be broken without human means, or literally without human hands, which reminds us of the stone in ch2 that was broken off the statue without human hands and eventually crushed all those other kingdoms. God would bring judgement against this fierce oppressor of his people, and indeed Antiochus died early. And when the man of lawlessness is revealed in 2 Thessalonians 2, we read that the Lord will consume him with the breath of his mouth. God will punish evil when it has reached its full measure.
Yes, we can be comforted with the knowledge that the reign of evil, the extreme persecution will be limited. Verse 13-14 show that the time of extreme persecution would be limited to 2,300 days. If you add that up it’s a bit over six years, which is significant but limited. For the Jews who later had to endure these evils, for God’s people at that time, for our brothers and sisters in faith, they could know that the time was limited. It’s coming to an end, soon. God is in control, and soon he'll punish evildoers for what they’re doing. Whatever evil is coming in the future, for us and our brothers and sisters around the world, we know it is limited. It, too, is under God’s control.
So, how does this impact our daily lives? This vision has gravitas, weight. It concerns great things for the history of the world, great things about suffering for the church. How, then, shall we live?
3. God reveals events which have great significance for our daily lives
First, God calls us to trust him, through whatever happens in world politics, and whenever the church is oppressed. Whatever suffering we experience now is limited. God will bring it to an end. Believe that. Endure. Hold on to the end. We can trust God because we know the truth that lies at the heart of the world, we know that his is the kingdom, the power and the glory. We know the truth behind the veil of history. We know that God has given a kingdom to his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and by his grace he has made us to share in that kingdom. Jesus is King. And we wait for him to return as Judge. He, who has already borne God’s judgement in our place, he comes as our Saviour, and he comes to cast all his and our enemies into everlasting condemnation, and he comes to bring all his chosen ones to himself. Believe that and trust him.
Second, this text clarifies our task and mission in this world. We are reminded of the vanity of idolatry and the ephemeral or fleeting nature of earthly kingdoms. Earthly kingdoms come and go. The ram and the goat and the little horn became great and were proud but they all got cut down quickly. So, God tells us not to trust these kingdoms and not to invest in them, not to build treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal, and where kingdoms rise and fall, and are cut down and destroyed.
When we’re reminded of a true perspective on this world, our task and mission in this world is clarified. We ought to live for God and for his kingdom, which is the only kingdom that cannot be shaken. We are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, says Hebrews 12, so let us serve God acceptably with reverence and awe. And let us be bold in our witness to the Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns forever, who is the Saviour of the nations, and who will be revealed as the Judge of the nations.
God reminds us in this chapter to trust him and to maintain a clear focus on our vision. It can be easy to get distracted. So, let’s finish by reflecting on v26. Gabriel told Daniel to seal up the vision, for it referred to many days in the future. He had to seal it up in order to preserve it for a time when it would become relevant. The words may not have had complete relevance to him in his day, although it was about his people. But many days in the future, these words would be very relevant, and all who took them to heart would be glad that they did. They would be thankful they had been prepared.
And so, beloved congregation, we do well to take these words to heart and seal them up for the future. Be prepared for suffering in the future. When you teach your children about the Christian life, teach them about the joy of knowing God in Jesus Christ and the joy of fellowship with the Father and the Son. Yes. And, also teach them that following Christ involves carrying a cross, teach them about the history of persecution throughout the ages, teach them about the persecution of our brothers and sisters around the world today, teach them to expect such persecution as they, too, take up their cross and follow Jesus. Prepare them to suffer for the gospel. Warn them ahead of time. Seal up the words, preserve them, take them to heart and reflect on them. Who knows when they may be relevant in our own life? Who knows what suffering and persecution will come to us or our children?
The message does have gravitas, weight, and perhaps it even gives you a sick feeling in the stomach. But wouldn’t it be far worse, beloved, wouldn’t it be far worse if we didn’t know about hard things that would come? If we expected an easy life, and then, when tribulations and persecutions came along, the seeds of the gospel we thought we believed were drowned out? If we didn’t expect to suffer and then when it became hard, we denied our Lord Jesus Christ? That would be far worse. It’s good to be prepared.
And so, let’s remember to trust God. The battle is his. It may be fierce, but he will preserve us through it. The fierce opposition will be limited, and God will cut the days short, and in the middle of our suffering and persecution we may lift our heads and eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to bring us to himself. Amen.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Rev. Rodney den Boer, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
(c) Copyright 2025, Rev. Rodney den Boer
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