Sermon Tone Analysis

During the last week of Jesus’ life on earth, Jesus taught His disciples many things.

A few days before the Passover, Jesus instructed His disciples on the very topic (possibly the very text) we’re going to study this morning.

In Matthew, Jesus’ disciples came to Him privately and said, “Tell us, Jesus, when will this [the destruction of the temple] happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”

Jesus shows them grace for the run-on sentence and answers them saying:

What Jesus alerted His disciples to—wars and rumors of wars—is precisely what Daniel’s vision (ch.

11) revealed to him.

Remember: Daniel 10-12 is one, long, extended vision of the future.

For our purposes and for the sake of time, we’ve broken it up into three pieces.

Daniel 10 is a behind-the-scenes look at things: Daniel glimpses a bit of the glory of God as revealed by one of the Lord’s angels.

And this angelic messenger lets Daniel (and us) in on a little-known reality: there is an ongoing battle taking place in the heavenly realm, the Kingdom of God versus the kingdoms of this world.

Daniel 11 is a glimpse of the earthly, the physical, flesh and bone.

Daniel 11 is earthly king versus earthly king, worldly kingdom against worldly kingdom.

Daniel 11 is the truth.

The heavenly messenger speaking with Daniel says in verse 2: “Now then, I tell you the truth...”

This is true for Daniel and it’s true for us.

This truth, from Daniel’s point of view, concerns the future.

The truth is largely a history lesson for us, though some of it has yet to happen.

Nevertheless, it’s true.

>Out of curiosity, what is (what was) your favorite subject in school?

My favorite subject was English or composition.

Meghann’s favorite was Math (weirdo).

Most people aren’t altogether interested in history.

“History is more or less bunk.

It's tradition.

We don't want tradition.

We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth [anything] is the history we made today.”

Henry Ford, Interview in Chicago Tribune, May 25th, 1916

Some, like Henry Ford, believe history to be mostly irrelevant, unimportant.

Others argue that history is meaningless:

“[History is] a trash bag of random coincidences torn open in a wind,” so says Joseph Heller, the famous author.

Some think history is just boring, like one of Jane Austen’s characters:

“History, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in…I read it a little as a duty; but it tells me nothing that does not either vex or weary me.

The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars and pestilences in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all—it is very tiresome.”

There are some, still, who are skeptical of history altogether, like Napoléon Bonaparte, who said:

“History is a set of lies agreed upon.”

>Daniel 11 is history, and, honestly, as far as words on a page go, it’s not very interesting.

It’s a little dull.

It is as the fictional character in the pages of that Jane Austen novel believes: “very tiresome…quarrels of popes and kings, with wars and pestilence on every page.”

One highly respected commentator, Herbert Carl Leupold, says this about Daniel 11:

“This chapter might be treated (used) in Bible classes.

[But] We do not see how it could be used for a sermon or for sermons.”

Well, get ready, Herbert!

Here’s a sermon on Daniel 11. It’s not the most inspiring passage in the Bible, but it is inspired.

I believe there’s at least a couple of lessons in Daniel 11.

There are lessons here for us because this isn’t just history.

This isn’t a boring retelling of historical events.

This is prophecy.

Some believe Daniel 11 to be “prophecy after the fact”—something written later than the events because of the detail and accuracy of what it predicts.

They believe that because it’s all too perfect (the prediction and the actual events) that this wasn’t written prior to the events, but after they occured.

The Bible makes it clear that God is able to declare well ahead of time what would happen in the future—and this to show His power, His good purpose, and His sovereignty.

Daniel 11 is an expression of the kindness of the Sovereign God—the One who knows all, the One who sees all, the One who is aware of all things lets His people know what is to come in order to steady them and uphold them.

The people in Daniel’s day needed assurance.

They needed to know for sure that God is Sovereign and in control of history.

The OT people of God were about to be restored from exile; they were about to return to the land that was promised to them, but they weren’t really free.

As the prophecy in Daniel 11, the vision of the future that’s given to Daniel, reveals, the people would be subject to the Persians and then to Alexander’s Greeks; after that, it would be caught in the middle (literally) between powerful heirs of Alexander’s empire (the Seleucids and the Ptolemies).

>I hesitate to read this entire chapter aloud this morning because, on paper, it’s a little dull and kind of confusing (and it would take somewhere between 10-15 minutes to read it).

I encourage you to read this at some point today or this week.

But this morning, I’m going to do my best to sketch the broad details for us.

You will be well-served by having a copy of the text of Daniel 11 open in front of you this morning and we walk through it together.

>The angelic messenger who is speaking to Daniel begins with a declaration of the truthfulness of what he’s about to relay to Daniel.

This section of Daniel’s vision spends one verse on Persia (v. 2), two verses on Greece (vv.

3-4), and then an extended segment on the kings of the south and the kings of the north (vv.

5-20)

In Persia, Cyrus gave way to Xerxes, the fourth king.

And then Xerxes and his forces were mauled by the Greek Navy in 480 B.C.

The mighty king who arises is almost certainly Alexander the Great who ruled from 334-323 B.C. who then passes his kingdom to those outside his family (because he had no descendants).

No sooner does Alexander come to power and amass his empire than it splinters.

After Alexander’s kingdom is parceled out, the king of the south, Ptolemy II, forms an alliance by giving his daughter in marriage to his ally, Antiochus II.

The alliance forged through this marriage (Antiochus + Berenice) doesn’t last.

Antiochus dies, his first wife, Laodice, takes over, leaving Berenice to fend for herself.

Some time later, about 242-240 B.C. the king of the north, Seleucus II invades Egypt but, being defeated, has to return to Syria.

Then comes Antiochus III who raises a large army—62,000 infantry, 6,000 cavalry, 102 elephants—but this is given over to Ptolemy IV.

After Ptolemy IV smashes Antiochus’ huge army, Ptolemy’s power evaporates into nothing.

Apparently some Israelite thugs tie their fortunes to some other king and kingdom and find that their misplaced allegiance comes to nothing.

Antiochus III gives his daughter Cleopatra to Ptolemy V in order to undercut him, but Cleopatra loves Ptolemy and all things Egyptian, so Antiochus’ scheme falls to nothing.

Antiochus III conquers the Mediterranean islands and coastlands.

But the Roman Scipio crushes Antiochus’ force and makes him pay tribute to Rome.

Antiochus III, reeling from his defeat is now only able to head east; this is short-lived; he’s killed when he’s found robbing a temple in order to pay off Rome.

Seleucus IV takes the throne after his father (Antiochus III), but ends up in the royal cemetery next to his father because his head tax collector poisons him.

The person who follows Seleucus IV is one bad mamma-jamma:

This is Antiochus Epiphanes—a despicable, contemptible person.

All of verses 21-35 focus on him; his reign (vv.

22-24), the people who took the brunt of his hostility (vv.

25-32), and the cost of his savage behavior (vv.

33-35).

Antiochus Epiphanes gets a lot of attention in this chapter.

Verses 2-20 cover a time period of 355 years.

Antiochus Epiphanes (the subject of 15 verses) only reigned for 12 years: 175-163 B.C.

Antiochus Epiphanes gets a great deal of space in this vision, namely because he instituted a religious rampage unlike the world had ever seen; he was set on destroying Biblical faith and was determined to see every Jew turn from the Lord:

He forbade religious sacrament (circumcision), sacrifices were illegal (unless you sacrificed to Zeus), observing the Sabbath brought a death sentence, reading Scripture or having Scripture in your possession would cost you your life.

These 12 years of Antiochus Epiphanes’ reign was a terribly lethal time of tribulation for God’s people; God’s people clearly needed to know about this time in advance.

Hence the 15 verses of this prophecy dealing with the ruler who would be Antiochus Epiphanes.

Is that not the grace of God to let His people know what was coming down the conveyor-belt of history?

All of this vision up to point 35 is, for us, history.

It’s long, long ago.

It’s a couple thousand years past.

We don’t have to worry about Alexander the Great or the Seleucids or Ptolemies.

But Daniel 11 doesn’t end with verse 35, and there’s still chapter 12.

>Daniel 11:36-45 speaks of another king—a king who looks like and behaves like and treats others like Antiochus Epiphanes did.

You see, the historical account of Antiochus Ephiphanes will serve us well; Antiochus is a foreshadowing, a scale-model of the final opponent of God’s people.

The final scourge will be like Antiochus Epiphanes, only worse.

This one will deify himself.