Beastful Vision
Be Resolved: Book of Daniel • Sermon • Submitted
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· 11 viewsA beastful vision, a prophesy of Daniel
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Vision of Daniel
Vision of Daniel
A placement in time, a change, from other dreams being interpreted about kingdoms, to Daniels dreams about kingdoms.
Placement chronologically: Between chapters 4-5
For this is after Nebuchadnezzar and his dreams (Chpt. 1-4)
Belshazzar’s pride and removal and change of kingdoms (Chpt. 5)
Stage is set
Vision, dream in bed while stage set in heaven
No longer is it Daniel hearing and interpreting someone else’s dream, this is now him have dream, having a vision, a prophesy again of what is to come
Time (553BC) -1st year of Belshazzar as king
Four winds and then Four beasts
Four winds of heaven
Four beasts
Lion
Bear
Leopard
Dreadful and terrible beast
Breakdown
Four winds (Dan7:1-2)
Four beasts (Dan7:3-8)
Let me give you the passage in whole then go back and talk about this.
1 In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon Daniel saw a dream and visions in his mind as he lay on his bed; then he wrote the dream down and related the following summary of it. 2 Daniel said, “I was looking in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea.
3 “And four great beasts were coming up from the sea, different from one another. 4 “The first was like a lion and had the wings of an eagle. I kept looking until its wings were plucked, and it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man; a human mind also was given to it.
5 “And behold, another beast, a second one, resembling a bear. And it was raised up on one side, and three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth; and thus they said to it, ‘Arise, devour much meat!’
6 “After this I kept looking, and behold, another one, like a leopard, which had on its back four wings of a bird; the beast also had four heads, and dominion was given to it.
7 “After this I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong; and it had large iron teeth. It devoured and crushed and trampled down the remainder with its feet; and it was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.
8 “While I was contemplating the horns, behold, another horn, a little one, came up among them, and three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it; and behold, this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth uttering great boasts.
Four Winds of heaven
Four Winds of heaven
God in action! Scripture oftentimes portrays wind as God in action our passage (vv.1-2) show that.
(v.2) says: Daniel said “I was looking in my vision by night and behold the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea.”
Wind: Apocalyptic speech as the action from God (Dan7:2; Rev7:1)
1 After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth, so that no wind would blow on the earth or on the sea or on any tree.
Four angels holding back the action God was ready to do until God told them to do it.
So this wind we see in Daniel here was in action, what was it doing?
Four winds stirred up the great sea (Dan7:2; Rev17:15; Isa17:12-13; Dan4:32)
Rev17:15 gives a good definition of the great sea, or what a great sea is.
15 And he said to me, “The waters which you saw where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues.
And that can be further evidenced by Isaiah
12 Alas, the uproar of many peoples Who roar like the roaring of the seas, And the rumbling of nations Who rush on like the rumbling of mighty waters! 13 The nations rumble on like the rumbling of many waters, But He will rebuke them and they will flee far away, And be chased like chaff in the mountains before the wind, Or like whirling dust before a gale.
So the sea is the nations of the world. God is stirring up the people, the nations raising up the kingdoms as previously displayed, prophesied about in Dan2, now being restated and rephrased here in Daniel 7. I know I have not proven the last statement yet, but hold on, we will get there.
I think you can agree that a sea can and is sometimes stormy, we can look at Jesus calming the stormy sea with the disciples. The nations can get stormy too can’t they? While storms sometimes are unpredictable, maybe even unprecedented may we know:
God will always work out His plan for His purpose. He gave Daniel the vision, the prophesy to record (write down in summary) what was going to happen in the future. We have no definition of when that future is at this point, except that it was future to when Daniel was writing down the summary. Keep in mind (Dan4:32)
32 and you will be driven away from mankind, and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field. You will be given grass to eat like cattle, and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever He wishes.’
(Transition) - I want to spend the majority of the time this morning in the vision itself, what did Daniel see
Four Beasts
Four Beasts
Parallelism: There is lots of it between Daniel chapter 2 and Daniel chapter 7, we don’t get the interpretation of the beasts until Dan7:15-28, but will allude to it today as we go.
The Lion (Dan7:4; Dan4:33; Dan2:36-38)
Portrayed as a lion with eagle wings until they were plucked, check out
33 “Immediately the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled; and he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle, and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagles’ feathers and his nails like birds’ claws.
Nebuchadnezzar, who was the head of Gold described and defined in Dan2:36-38 had hair like eagles feathers.
Then it says (v.4) made to stand on two feet like a man and a heart was given- Nebuchadnezzar after his humiliation of 7 periods of time, when he learned his lesson had his senses returned to him, came from living as a beast back to his restored kingdom
Draw a conclusion: Head of Gold; Lion = Babylonian Kingdom
The Great Babylon had not fallen yet, but it was about to. But now, let’s stay in the vision, what Daniel saw.
The Bear (Dan7:5; Dan2:39; Dan8:3; Dan8:20)
Described with three ribs in it’s mouth. There is some symbolism here that will be explained about the Medes-Persian Empire (Dan2:39) that replaces the Babylonian Empire
The ribs symbolically could represent the three countries that the Persians and the Mead’s conquered quickly (historically speaking); Lydia, Egypt and Babylon;
There is also the note that one side is lifted up.
This is the dominance of the Persians over the Mead’s
We also see there was instructions about the bear that it was to devour much meat.
Again, symbolically speaking, devouring much meat can be the veracity that the Medo-Persian empire conquered that around them much like a bear would devour things in it’s path.
Not to confuse you, but to inform you that when we get to Daniel chapter 8 you will see more symbolism and the bear will be referred to as a ram both, along with what was seen in Dan2 helps us to be able to draw a conclusion about the bear.
3 Then I lifted my eyes and looked, and behold, a ram which had two horns was standing in front of the canal. Now the two horns were long, but one was longer than the other, with the longer one coming up last.
And in Daniel 8 we have the definition given
20 “The ram which you saw with the two horns represents the kings of Media and Persia.
Drawing a conclusion on the bear: Breast of Silver (Dan2:32); Bear (Dan7:5) and Ram (Dan8:20) = Medo-Persian empire
The Leopard (Dan7:6; Dan8:8; Dan8:21-22)
Look at the description
Four wings of a bird - a leopard moves quickly upon it’s prey; the wings here can be symbolized as helping the Grecian empire move quickly
Four heads -The four heads will see as four horns (Dan8:8; Dan8:21-22) that will have
Dominion given to it - after the untimely death of Alexander, his 4 generals took command of the divided Grecian kingdom, historically you can read outside of scripture who they were
Ptolemy I
Seleucius I
Lysimachus
Antipar and Casander
Hey, but how about some scripture about the leopord that in Dan8 shows to be a goat?
8 Then the male goat magnified himself exceedingly. But as soon as he was mighty, the large horn was broken; and in its place there came up four conspicuous horns toward the four winds of heaven.
And the definition of the kingdom
21 “The shaggy goat represents the kingdom of Greece, and the large horn that is between his eyes is the first king. 22 “The broken horn and the four horns that arose in its place represent four kingdoms which will arise from his nation, although not with his power.
So, draw a conclusion about the leopard
Drawing a conclusion: Bronze (Dan2:39), Leopard (Dan7:6); shaggy goat (Dan8:21-22) = Grecian empire, kingdom
(Transition) While the Grecian kingdom was strong, swift fast in conquering the world under Alexander, believed to be in a 3 year period, the kingdom after him was divided and not as strong, per se. That leads to the last beast
Dreadful and terrifying beast (Dan7:7-8; Dan7:24; 1Sam2:10; Ps132:17; Dan6:26-27)
Look at the description
dreadful, terrifying
Exceedingly strong
Iron teeth
Devouring
It was different
had 10 horns
There is much speculation about those 10 horns, some believe it is 10 kingdoms, but I think we already established it one kingdom, 10 kings representing the Roman kingdom
Horn in the scripture is symbolic of king, ruler, authority. Look at
24 ‘As for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings will arise; and another will arise after them, and he will be different from the previous ones and will subdue three kings.
One kingdom, ten kings as defined by the scripture itself. And as to horn meaning ruler, authority look at
10 “Those who contend with the Lord will be shattered; Against them He will thunder in the heavens, The Lord will judge the ends of the earth; And He will give strength to His king, And will exalt the horn of His anointed.”
17 “There I will cause the horn of David to spring forth; I have prepared a lamp for Mine anointed.
Just for fun, FYI here are the 10 toes (Dan2:40-43); 10 horns (Dan7:7-8, 24)
Augustus
Tiberius
Caligula
Claudius
Nero
Galba
Otho
Vitellius
Vespasian
Titus
As we continue the study here in Daniel there will be more to say about the little horn (Dan7:8). In our historical look back at what was a prophesy of Daniel developing on the dreams given to Nebuchadnezzar it is easy, or should be for us to remember the words of Darius
26 “I make a decree that in all the dominion of my kingdom men are to fear and tremble before the God of Daniel; For He is the living God and enduring forever, And His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed, And His dominion will be forever. 27 “He delivers and rescues and performs signs and wonders In heaven and on earth, Who has also delivered Daniel from the power of the lions.”
Summary:
Lion/Head of Gold = Babylonian Kingdom
Bear/Ram; Chest of silver = Medo-Persian empire
Leopard/shaggy goat; legs of bronze = Grecian empire
Dreadful, terrifying beast; Iron, clay = Roman Empire
From historical to apocalyptic as we continue to look at the prophesy, the dream, vision of Daniel while he lays on his bed, we will see it historically looking aback from our view today.
Regardless if you have the view historically, or prophetically for someday in the future we canknow
That God is the living God and His kingdom endures forever (everlasting, eternal, cannot be destroyed)
He delivers, He rescues, He instills,and He instructs
May we remember He is our great vision, we need not have a beastful vision!
No dread, no fear, may we have hope for Jesus Christ is our hope
No wonder for Jesus has made covenant promise to us today.