Discovering Daniel Finding Our Hope in God's Prophetic Plan Amid Global Chaos

which is the book of Daniel... everybody knows this Daniel... Daniel is invited to a feast with his pals... and the words that appear on the wall, these sort of only phantom hand... Daniel can read them and translate them.

the book of Daniel, which obviously proved enormously influential because it really enshrined in the kind of JudeoChristian imagination the image of Babylon as a place of power, corruption, hubris and great luxury of the feast and then looming disaster.

inspired by the book of Daniel.

Inspired by the book of Daniel.

Daniel's favor will be shown before the whole nation as God protects him from the lion's den, inspired by the book of Daniel.

Inspired by the book of Daniel.

In Daniel 2, verse 47, Surely your God is the God of gods and the Lord of kings and a revealer of mysteries, for you were able to reveal this mystery.

I've read those books also. ... Daniel and in revelation ... I would recommend that for everyone to actually sit down and read the book of revelation cover to cover.

The books of the Bible, like Daniel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Matthew, and Revelation.

And also there are certain additions to the book of Esther and Daniel.

And the first person in that group, one of the first persons is a young man by the name of Daniel, and he's going to be taken into Babylonian exile.

Daniel, of course, writes from the place of exile.

And that's important when people are listening to Daniel to know this is a young guy that really wants to serve the Lord. He's going to be tempted to become like the Babylonians, but he's not going to do it. He's actually going to become one of the real all-stars in salvation history.

And the first person in that group, one of the first persons is a young man by the name of Daniel. And he's going to be taken into Babylonian exile.

Daniel, of course, writes from the place of exile. And that's important when people are listening to Daniel to know this is a young guy that really wants to serve the Lord. He's going to be tempted to become like the Babylonians, but he's not going to do it.

like Daniel will follow his story, right? But others will kind of have just know here's the words of the prophet calling the people to repentance reminding them of God's future restoration.

We've talked about some of those other deuterocanonical books in the past when we read through Judith and we read through those parts of Esther and Daniel and Tobit and Baruch.

chapter four and five of daniel is all about uh king nebuchadnezzar being humbled this king nebuchadnezzar being humbled before the lord and king nebuchadnezzar uh not only being humbled before the lord but being humble before the lord and then being taught by god this is so critical that he's not simply humbled for humility's sake right he is humbled before the lord his power is taken away his majesty is taken away even his reason is taken away so that he can realize that the most high is truly God.

there's no one, I mean, I'm sure his entire life, Nebuchadnezzar was the number one person. He's the top dog his entire life. And God is making it known, actually, actually there are those above you. And he, God himself, the most high, is the highest. He's the most high.

And so this recognition that Nebuchadnezzar learned this is really remarkable and such a gift for all of us to note. Then, of course, in chapter five, we have the story of Belshazzar and the handwriting on the wall that is interpreted noting that he was gonna be taken down, right? He was gonna be surpassed by the Persians.

So we're reading today Jeremiah 20 and 21, Daniel chapters 1 and 2, as well as Proverbs chapter 15 verses 25 to 28.

As much as I love Daniel and we're going to get to Daniel in just a second, I just have to say Jeremiah, we get a sense now of how profoundly hurt Jeremiah was, like how profoundly rejected Jeremiah was here in chapter 20 where he's put in the stocks and we even can get the sense that Jeremiah, he says, what does he say to God? This is incredible.

And so they pray before the Lord and oh, it's so good. Here's Daniel who says, here's the dream. And I know the dream, not because of my wisdom, not because of me, but I know this dream because the God of heaven has revealed this to me.

So what this is an image of is as Daniel interprets, the head of gold is the kingdom of Babylon. Incredible, beautiful, powerful. The kingdom after Babylon is going to be Persia. Persia is going to come to power after Babylon and that's silver. Then you have a bronze and that is Greece. You know, Alexander the Great is going to conquer the Persians.

And all of it is overcome by the kingdom, the empire essentially that God himself establishes. The kingdom of God is the church and that goes throughout the entire world.

We'll read about it when we get to the book of Daniel, so stay tuned.

That happens. We'll read about it when we get to the book of Daniel, so stay tuned.

Just like Daniel prophesied in Daniel seven, all the thrones will fall.

And then the bottomless pit, Daniel chapter seven.