Trinity Baptist Church

 

Daniel is one of the most interesting and one of the most essential books in all of the Bible. Daniel is to the Old Testament what Revelation is to the New Testament. You cannot really understand the one without the other. When you study the book of The Revelation, you invariably go to the book of Daniel. When you study the book of Daniel, you invariably go to the book of The Revelation.

 

When Daniel was a teenage boy, he was carried away from his homeland into a strange land. He never returned again. We might think what a terrible, terrible turn of circumstances! Does God really care for a boy He allows something like this to happen to? Yet, when you read the book of Daniel, you will discover that three times we are told that Daniel is greatly beloved. Greatly loved of God!

 

What a strange situation! A boy who is greatly loved by God and yet he is carried away from his homeland and becomes a captive and lives there for the rest of his life.

 

We are going to study prophecy and see how God puts prophecy together and how that the book of Daniel is basically the key to understanding all of the prophecy of the Bible.

 

Also I want to make these messages as practical and as applicable to your personal life as I possible can.

 

 

I want to show you what is the key to the book of Daniel and what the book of Daniel is really intended to convey to you. 

 

Turn to Daniel chapter 2, verse 28. "But there is a God in heaven." That's all I want in that verse. The first thing I want you to know from the book of Daniel is that there is a God in heaven.

 

God is real! God exists! Do you believe that? Turn to Daniel chapter 4, verse 17. "This matter is by the decree of the watchers and the demand by the word of the holy ones to the intent that the living may know." How many of you are alive? He's talking to you. "That the most High (God in heaven) rules in the kingdoms of men."

 

Move from there to verse 25. This is the second time it says, "till thou knowest, thou shalt know that the most High rules in the kingdom of men and gives it to whomsoever he will."

 

Verse 32, he says it the third time. Seems like he is wanting to get it over to us. "Until thou know that the most High rules in the kingdom of men and gives it to whomsoever he will."

 

He is saying, here's what I want you to get out of this book. I want you to know there is a God in heaven and I want you to know that God in heaven rules in the kingdom of men. It is saying I want you to know that God is in charge. God is running the show.

 

 

 

 

What the Word of God teaches is that there is a God in heaven and that He is in charge of the affairs on this earth. If you can learn that lesson, if that can really sink in to your heart and soul, I want you to know that truth right there will be one of the greatest blessings in all of your life. It will keep you calm when the whole world seems to be going crazy. It will keep you stable when it looks like everything is coming to pieces. There is a God in heaven and He rules in the affairs of men. God is in control!

 

I want to show you how that works. Look at Daniel 1, verse 1 and 2. Those verses give us the historical circumstances which resulted in Daniel being carried away to Babylon. In these two verses there are three kings. I want to lay these three kings before you and attach a name to them. The first king is in verse 1 and his name is

 

 

Jehoiakim is called the king of Judah. There were two kingdoms in the Old Testament for the people of God. There was the northern kingdom, Israel. They didn't have a single king who was a good king, and they were carried off into Assyrian captivity in 722 B.C.

 

They were off the scene pretty quick. But down in the southern portion where Jerusalem was, there was the kingdom of Judah. They had twelve kings and eight of those kings were good kings and four of those kings were bad kings. Jehoiakim was one of those bad kings. It was during the days of Jehoiakim that the Babylonians, under Nebuchednazzer, invaded Judah and invaded the city of Jerusalem.

 

It was during that king that Daniel and his friends were carried away into captivity. He was a wicked godless king. It was because of his reign and the departure of the people of God from the Word of God and their defection to idols that they were carried away into captivity.

 

God had been warning the people what was going to happen. They were departing from God's Word. They were disobeying God's Word.

 

Somebody says, "People don't believe God's Word today. They don't believe the Bible is God's Word." It doesn't matter whether they believe it or not. It's still God's Word and God has certain commandments in the Bible and certain requirements in the Bible; and when you disobey God's requirements, you pay the price for your disobedience.

 

They departed from the Word of God. Jehoiakim hated the Bible. Jeremiah was inspired to write some Scripture and his servant carried it to King Jehoiakim and Jehoiakim got hold of the scroll of Scriptures and he reached in his pocket and took his pocket knife out and cut up the pages of the scroll of the Scriptures and threw them in the fire. That's how he felt about the Bible.

 

Of course, he was into idolatry just like the people were. The Israelites had this thing about idols. They just couldn't seem to keep from dabbling in idols. So when they were carried away into captivity, you will notice in verse 2 that it says they were carried to the land of Shinar to the house of Nebuchadnezzar's God. Shinar is Babylon.

 

 

That's where the Tower of Babel is. That's where the famous Babylonian hanging gardens were. It was the center of idolatry in the world at that time. It's almost like God said, "Okay, if you want your idols, I'm going to just let you go right back where it all started. I'm going to let you get to idolatry to its deepest level and show you what it will do for you."

 

The prodigal son had the far country in his heart long before his heart was in the far country. It was as if the father said, "It looks like this boy is going this way." He did not try to stop his son. He let his son go into the far country and experience the far country to its depths. With the far country there always comes the hog pen, the bottom.

 

The word I want to attach to Jehoiakim is depravity. Where is God in all this? It was God who allowed them to go into captivity. It was God who arranged the circumstances which brought about their captivity.

 

There's a second king, Nebuchadnezzar. What word should we attach to Nebuchadnezzar?

 

 

Cruelty! In many ways Nebuchadnezzar was one of the great rulers in the history of the world. He was a magnificent military strategist. He never lost a battle as far as I've been able to read. He was a brilliant statesman. He was tremendous builder. Some of his building projects were unbelievable. That magnificent image of a man, that magnificent building construction he put together out in the plains! What a builder he was! Yet, he was a man who was characterized by tremendous brutality.

We have just deposed a man in Iraq named Saddam Hussein. His hero was Nebuchadnezzar. In fact, he was in the process of rebuilding the city of Babylon. He had inscribed the name of Nebuchadnezzar and his own name on the bricks he was using to rebuild the city of Babylon.

 

He not only emulated his hero in his cruelty, he outdid his hero in cruelty. The stories that came out of the atrocities of Saddam. We read about his torture rooms and his rape rooms. We read that he slaughtered his own people in the hundred of thousands and even the millions. Cruelty! Yet the Bible says that this man, Nebuchadnezzar, was allowed by God to conquer the very people of God.

 

You think it can't happen again? You think it can't happen to us in America? America is on thin ice. As a nation we have departed from the Word of God. As a nation we are caught up with our idols of every kind and description. There comes a time when the patience of God is exhausted. If America doesn't come back to God, I fear for the future of our land.

We see Jehoiakim and Nebuchadnezzar. Where is the third king mentioned? He's in verse 2.

 

"And the Lord..." that's the third king

 

 

There is something in the text here that is not apparent in the King James and English versions. It is not the word "Lord" that is used sometimes, but it is the Hebrew word "Adonai." It is a word for God. Adonai! Lord! Which means ruler or sovereign.

 

 

Note verse 2, "And the Lord, (the sovereign God in heaven, God who rules over the kingdom of men) gave Jehoiakim into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar."

 

Nebuchadnezzar thought he conquered Judah. The Bible says that God delivered, God gave Judah to Nebuchadnezzar. That means that God was in charge.

 

He got the vessels of the temple of the Lord. The Bible says he took those vessels and went back to his own land and went into his own temple, the temple of his primary God, Marduke. His God!

 

He took those treasures from the house of the Lord and put them in the temple of Mardukr. In those days, as a symbol of a king's supremacy and his god's supremacy over the god of the nation they had conquered, they would take their treasures and put them in his temple. It's as if paganism has won. It's as if God has been defeated in the matter.

 

Yet, Daniel says, "No, I want you to know what is going on here. I want you to know it was not Marduke that did it. The Lord, the ruler of the universe, gave him into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar.

 

It's saying that God is in charge! God is moving in the affairs of men.

 

Everybody with any sense is all shook up over Obama and his policies. And some of you democrats think I’m just being political. I could care less about his label. I’m talking about his anti-American policies and socialistic convictions and unchristian beliefs. 

And sometimes people get elected to office and it shakes us up and we think the world is coming to an end.

 

We get nervous and think, what's going on? Just keep in mind that there's God in heaven and He rules in the affairs and in the kingdoms of men.

 

Let me read you this quotation of Benjamin Franklin. He's one of my favorites in American Colonial history. At the American Constitutional Convention in 1787, Ben Franklin rose and addressed these words to President George Washington. "I have lived, sir, a long time and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs in the affairs of men."

 

Who's in charge? God's in charge!

 

We men love these TV remotes. Talk about a feeling of power. You sit there with that remote and click and watch this ballgame, you click and watch the orchestra playing in Boston. You can click and see what is going on in Iraq. Click! Click! Click! It just drives the women crazy. You are in charge.

 

I have something really good to tell you. The remote of this universe is in the hands of God and He is in charge.

 

Let's bow our heads in prayer.