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The Bible Breakdown
Daniel 08: Visions of Victory
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The More We Dig. The More We Find.
Well, everybody, welcome back to the Bible Breakdown podcast with your host, pastor Brandon, today, daniel, chapter 8, and today's title is Visions of Victory Visions of Victory. We're going to continue this journey through the second half of the book of Daniel, where he is having this wonderful opportunity to see the future, in a way, of things that hadn't happened yet in his timeline but have now, but then all the way into things that haven't even happened yet, and this was over 2,500 years ago when God gave him this vision. So we're going to get all that in just a moment. But if you want to go and get your Bibles out Daniel, chapter 8, get your coffee ready, whatever it is you're doing right now. While you're doing that, if you're new around here, take just a moment to like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five-star review on the podcast. Make sure you're telling other people about what's going on. It doesn't cost you anything, but it really helps us to spread the word and the community of Real Life Church excuse me, real Life Church of the Bible Breakdown, which is part of Real Life Church, and also make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown discussion on Facebook. There's a wonderful team of people who are so faithfully just adding these devotions just to enrich our life and our pursuit of God together. And, as always, the more we dig, the more we find. Well, once again, if you've been joining us for the past little while, you know this.
Speaker 1:But if not, the overall focus of the book of Daniel is God is in control and, if you remember, the nation of Israel has been destroyed as far as in their homeland we had. The Babylonians came in, destroyed Jerusalem, destroyed the temple, and the people have been just exiled all over the known world. And Daniel was a few of the people who had been exiled to the capital of Babylon and he was put through kind of the Harvard of Babylon at the time and he is now in leadership. But he is writing this book, this letter, to the different people all over the Jewish people all over the known world, to remind them that God is in control. And so for the first six chapters, he is sharing the stories of his life and how God was in control, no matter what, if you remember the three Hebrew teenagers that went through the fire and God was with them. And then you look at the dream that God gave Nebuchadnezzar and was sharing with him that God's in control. And then you had Daniel in the lion's den. Just all these different reminders. God is in control. Well, now he is going to pivot, as he did starting in the last chapter yesterday, and that is, he is now saying that God isn't just in control of right now, but he is in control of always. And so he is getting these series of visions and then God is giving him the interpretations as well.
Speaker 1:And it's amazing, because that's why we call this the Revelation, the book of Revelation for the Old Testament so much of the book of Revelation in the New Testament is taken from books like Daniel, ezekiel, isaiah, stuff like that, and so, as we are reading through this, remember these are things that haven't happened yet, and the narrative type of literature, rather literature genre, has changed. Narrative type of literature, rather literature genre, has changed. The first seven chapters would have been or, excuse me, first six chapters would have been historical narrative, so there's telling what happened. This last section, the second section, is apocalyptic literature, so along the lines of Isaiah, jeremiah, ezekiel, all of those where many symbols would be used to describe future events, and I love that because you think of the wisdom attached to it that there's probably things where many symbols would be used to describe future events. And I love that, because you think of the wisdom attached to it that there's probably things that Daniel saw that he would have no idea how to describe because it hadn't been invented yet, and so God would show it to him in symbols and things that he could get his head around so that he could describe them. And so it's amazing to see how God has this wonderful way of describing things that's universal, that can be understood to a point throughout time. And so let's read this together Daniel, chapter 8, and just see how God does this as we look at visions of future victory, you ready.
Speaker 1:Daniel 8, verse 1, says this or victory, you ready. Daniel 8, verse 1, says this and during the third year of King Belshazzar's reign, I, daniel, saw another vision, which, by the way, pause real quick. Remember, belshazzar was the guy who was alive when, you know, the freaky hand you know showed up and mine, mine, tekel, farsen. So some of these visions happened throughout the life of Daniel, and so he's writing down what he saw, so we're going to make sure we understand these didn't all happen like over the course of a weekend. This was a process of visions that Daniel had, so let's try it again.
Speaker 1:Verse eight or, excuse me, verse one of chapter eight, says during the third year of King Belshazzar's reign, I, daniel, saw another vision, following the one that had already appeared to me. In the vision, I saw the fortress of Susa, that's, the capital of Babylon, in the province of Elam, standing beside the Uliah River. As I looked up, I saw a ram with two long horns standing beside the river. One of the horns was longer than the other, even though it had grown later than the other one. The ram butted everything out of his way to the west, to the north, to the south, and no one could stand against him or help his victims. He did as he pleased and became very great. While I was watching, suddenly a male goat appeared from the west, crossing the land so swiftly that he didn't even touch the ground. This goat, which had one very large horn between its eyes, headed toward the two-horned ram that I had seen standing beside the river, rushing at him in rage, the goat charged furiously at the ram and struck him, breaking off both his horns. Now the ram was helpless, and the goat knocked. He said.
Speaker 1:Then, from one of the prominent horns came a small horn whose power grew very great. It extended toward the south and the east, toward the glorious land of Israel. Its power reached to the heavens, where it attacked the heavenly army, throwing some of the heavenly beings and some of the stars to the ground and trampling them. It even challenged the commander of heaven's armies by canceling the daily sacrifices offered to him and by destroying his temple. The army of heaven was restrained from responding to this rebellion, so the daily sacrifice was halted and truth was overthrown. The horn succeeded in everything it did.
Speaker 1:I heard two holy ones talking to each other. One of them asked how long will the events of this vision last? How long would the rebellion that causes desecration stop the daily sacrifices? How long will the temple of heaven's army be trampled on? The other replied it will take 2,300 evenings and mornings. Then the temple will be made right again.
Speaker 1:As I, daniel, was standing trying to understand the meaning of this vision, someone who looked like a man stood in front of me and I heard the human voice calling out from the Ula River Gabriel tell this man the meaning of this vision. As Gabriel which, by the way, is an angel approached the place where I was standing. I became so terrified that I fell with my face to the ground. Son of man, he said you must understand the events you have seen in your vision that relate to the end of time. While he was speaking, I fainted and lay there with my face to the ground, but Gabriel rose, aroused me and touched me and helped me to my feet. And then he said I am here to tell you what will happen later in the time of wrath. What you have seen pertains to the very end of time.
Speaker 1:The two horned rams represent the kings of Media and Persia by the way, those were the two kingdoms that were about to take over. The shaggy male goat represents the king of Greece and the large horn between his eyes represents the first king of the Greek empire. The four prominent horns that replace the one large horn show that the Greek empire will break into four kingdoms, but none as great as the first. At the end of their rule, when their sin is at its height, a fierce king, master of intrigue, will rise to power. He will become very strong, but not by his own power. He will cause a shocking amount of destruction and succeed in everything he does, he will destroy powerful leaders and devastate the holy people. He will be a master of deception and will become arrogant, and he will destroy many without warning. He will even take on the prince of princes in battle, but he will be broken, though not by human power.
Speaker 1:This vision about the 2,300 evenings and mornings is true, but none of these things will happen for a long time. So keep the vision secret. Then I, daniel, was overcome and lay sick for several days. Afterward I got up and performed my duties to the king, but I was greatly troubled by the vision and could not understand it, to which some of us are going. Yeah, me too. What in the world does this have to do with anything? Well, once again, remember, that's the overall idea of apocalyptic literature.
Speaker 1:It is veiled with various layers of meaning. So, as people have studied this over the years, one of the primary meanings here is, if you notice, it mentions the Medes and Persians. It mentions the Greek kind of city-states, the different kingdoms, and then it mentioned that there would be one king who would try to take over but then fail, and so there are some scholars who believe that, even though there's no way, daniel, of course, would have known this. It was given to him by the Spirit of God. It shared what was in the immediate future, which is the Medes and Persians were going to take over. Then the Greek city-states would start to happen, but then they would all come together under Alexander the Great, who would try to take over the world and come pretty close to doing it, but then be devastated, then be defeated. Now the second layer is that some think that this comes around to the end of time and that this great leader represents the Antichrist, and so there's a lot of different layers to this.
Speaker 1:But what I want to do is I want to kind of lean back on this a little bit and get back to the title of our chapter today, and that is Visions of Victory, and that is to understand that all the things that happen in history are not a surprise to God, that God knows what's going to happen in history, and the thing is is it said that at one point, these different people were going to try to take on the Lord, but the Lord was going to be victorious, and that should be a great comfort to all of us, because when we see things happening in our world, if we're honest, there's parts of us that go I don't know how we're going to get through this. I don't know what's going to happen. I didn't expect this to go this way. How are we going to survive this? All these different things? You know, as one famous scholar once said, I'll never financially recover from this. If you know the reference, there you go.
Speaker 1:But the reality is is that none of the things that happen in history are a surprise to God. God knows, god sees, and God is already victorious. And so, whereas Daniel says that when he got up from this, he lay sick for several days because he did not understand what it meant, the one thing that he does understand that it means and we're going to see this in the coming chapters is that there is a war that we don't see. There is a war in the spiritual realm that our eyes are not attuned to see, but it's happening all around us, and it's happening now. It happened then and it will happen into the future, but the great thing is that we don't really have a word for what it is, because war is not the right word, because war seems to indicate that there's a battle and we don't know who's going to win.
Speaker 1:The reality is that God has already been victorious. He is just laying out for Daniel what it's going to look like and how he is going to ultimately win. So can I tell you how that brings all the way back down to our life, that in our life we're going to have battles, in our life there's going to be difficulties. And can I go ahead and just make you a guarantee, there are going to be moments when you're not going to understand what's going on. I am positive. There's going to be moments when you're just not going to have a clue. Well, pastor, I wish you'd be more positive. Okay, I am positive that's going to happen, but the reality is, none of that shakes God. He already knows, he's already got a plan and he's already victorious in your life. And so can I even say right now maybe right now you're going through a season that you just don't understand God. I have no idea why you're doing it this way, and if you were very honest, you would say God, it looks like you're not winning. But can I tell you, just because it doesn't look that way doesn't mean it's true, god's winning, he's already won.
Speaker 1:And what we see in this chapter is, no matter how big the enemy looks, he cannot overcome the Lord, and the same is true in your life. Let's pray together right now. God, thank you so much for today. Thank you, god, that you are with us and you are for us, and thank you, God, that you already see the end from the beginning and you've already declared victory.
Speaker 1:God, there's times in our lives when it doesn't seem that way, if we're honest. There's times when we have no idea what you're doing. But, god, we're thankful that knowing what you're doing and trusting you don't have to coexist. We can trust you and not know. Because we trust that you do and you always lead us in the right direction. I pray you will help us to see our lives and to see our future as assured victory. You already have won and because of that we can face every tomorrow. We're thankful for that. Today, in Jesus name, we pray Amen, amen. Well, god's word says you remember? Three Hebrew teenagers said this to the most powerful person in the world at the time. They said in Daniel three God is able to save us, but even if he doesn't, we will never serve your gods. My prayer is that you will have that kind of courage to look in the face of every enemy and say God is in control, I love you. I'll see you tomorrow. For Daniel, chapter 9.
