Worship the Ancient of Days

Daniel 7: Worship the Ancient of Days

Introduction:
The whole remainder of the Book of Daniel transitions here from historical narrative to Apocalyptic literature. Some of the most apocalyptic literature of the whole Bible. Let’s try to break this chapter down a bit and attempt to uncover, what I believe is the central point of this text; let’s read 7:1-6.

I. Read Daniel 7:1-8
Overview:
The nice thing about Daniel’s vision here is that we don’t need to wonder what its saying. In fact, we’ve already been told the meaning of these four beasts back in chapter 2 because the four beasts correspond to the four sections of Nebuchadnezzar’s statue. Both Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar were given the vision, but only Daniel was given its meaning and that for our benefit so that we can know the meaning of hidden things.

Daniel has just been given an overview of the last 2500 years of human history. Let me moderate what we’ve just read (without diminishing its importance) by saying that I do not believe that the main point of chapter 7 is the timing of the anti-Christ. Nor is it intended to reveal the identity of who the anti-Christ will be. In fact, the vision of the four beasts is only an introduction to the main part of the vision, so I don’t want to get all caught up in speculating about dates and people and miss the whole point of this vision.

Let’s revisit Nebuchadnezzar version of this vision in 2:31-35:
“You saw, O king, and behold, a great image. This image, mighty and of exceeding brightness, stood before you, and its appearance was frightening. The head of this image was of fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its middle and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay. As you looked, a stone was cut out by no human hand, and it struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. 35 Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold, all together were broken in pieces, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, so that not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth. (Dan 2:21-35).

The statue underlines the importance of the interdependence between these four empires that traces back to Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon. There would be no Medo-Persian empire without the previous Babylonian empire. And without the Medo-Persian Empire, there would be no Grecian Empire. Alexander the Great took Greek culture as far as India; and on the way, he also absorbed the thought and culture of the Medo-Persians. Even to this very day, we can still find traces of Alexander the Great’s attempt to Hellenize the world. It was the rediscovery of Greek philosophy that produced the Enlightenment and modern science. And because of Alexander, so too does Babylon and Persia extend their influence from ancient times to this very day in our religious systems, politics and culture. Read 7:7-9

The fourth empire is probably the most the enigmatic because there is a finality to it must continue to exist to this day; until God Himself destroys it in a final judgment.[1]
Likewise every generation has tried to interpret Daniel 7 as applying to their generation. The early Christians saw the horn who spoke pompous words as a prophecy about Nero; later Christians saw it as a prophecy of Constantine, whose legalization of the church eventually led to the triumph of the church over Roman culture as well as the triumph of Roman, Greek, Persian and Babylonian culture and religion over the church taking it captive by many pompous heresies. Right up to our present day, outdated Christian literature about the ends times can be uncovered to reveal that at one time, Napoleon, Kaiser Wilhelm, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and even Saddam Hussein were the anti-Christ. And in a sense, they were antichrists in as much as they may have been godless persecutors of the church.

So if the vision is not about the antichrist, then what’s it about? Let’s read vv. 9-10:

II. Read vv. 9-10
1. Daniel has now been lifted up to heaven and granted a vision of the end of the ages. Don’t think that this description is a literal description of God. That’s too minimalistic. John Calvin explains that,
God here shows himself to his Prophet in the form of man. We know how impossible it is for us to behold God as he really exists.… As our capacity cannot endure the fullness of that surpassing glory… [so] whenever he appears to us, he must necessarily put on a form adapted to our comprehension.[2]

So Daniel is given a representation of God that highlights certain attributes that give us a sample of some elements of God’s character. For instance, the casting down of the thrones described in verse 9 (whether it is the thrones of the Kings which are being cast down or the thrones of judgment- it is ambiguous) demonstrates the omnipotent power of Almighty God. He is called the Ancient of Days; the French call him L’éternal- the eternal one. God has no beginning; His being extends to the infinite past. We struggle to comprehend an eternal being because we try to conceive of it in terms of time; but eternity has no time; it has no beginning; it exists outside of time. Neither does He have an end; He determines the times and the seasons and His decrees are never altered because He alone knows the purpose for which He works all things.

The seating of the Ancient of Days represent God in session the way that we talk about Parliament in session. He is the great King and Lord whose Kingdom shall never end. He is always seated in that He is always in session ruling over the affairs of men. His white garment represents His moral purity; we know his judgment is not tainted by any evil motives or failure to be fully just. His white hair and beard represent his innocence- God is free of evil. The fiery stream is His wrath and power to efficaciously defeat sin.

These thousands of thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand are the innumerable multitude of the redeemed. Imagine: we’re going to be there. We’re going to see it; it will be more real to us then anything we’ve ever experienced in our lives because we’ll experience it free of the bondage of sin. Can you imagine yourself feeling the feeling and sensing the sensations of being in the presence of the climax and the unraveling of history?
All our worship is a sample of that day. All our singing, all our meditations, all our enjoyment of the exaltation of God, is a dress rehearsal for the day when we will minister before God and sing with the choir of saints and Angels as one voice giving glory to the Ancient of Days. Revelation 5 gives us a fuller picture of this event:
Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain
To receive power and riches and wisdom,
And strength and honor and glory and blessing!”

And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying:

“Blessing and honor and glory and power
Be to Him who sits on the throne,
And to the Lamb, forever and ever!”

Then the four living creatures said, “Amen!” And the twenty-four elders fell down and worshiped Him who lives forever and ever (Revelation 5:11-14).

III. Read vv. 13-14
This is the point that God has been making to Gentile kings since ch. 1; that is (v. 14), that his “dominion is an everlasting dominion…” not a temporary one like the rulers of men, His Kingdom “shall not pass away… and shall not be destroyed”. Don’t under estimate the importance of the Kingdom of God. Jesus preaching was called the message of the Kingdom; it is equivalent to the Gospel. Jesus’ parables were the parables of the Kingdom and were often about human Kingdoms; He used things like seed and Yeast to describe how the Kingdom advances; he once told the Pharisees that if he cast out demons by the finger of God then the Kingdom of God had come upon them; he told others that the Kingdom of God would reside in their hearts; he told Pontius that he was a King, but that his kingdom was not of this world; and after his resurrection, when the disciples asked him if was about to restore the Kingdom, he replied that they would receive power to be witnesses to the Kingdom to ends of the earth.

I guess the only thing different about chapter 7 of Daniel then what God has already been saying over and over again in the last six chapters about his Kingdom is that it’s about His Son Jesus! It’s about him receiving his Kingdom.

What we are seeing here is what happened after Acts 1:12: “as [the disciples] were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight…” and into the sight of Daniel who four centuries early, foresaw this event as the restoration of Christ to the riches of heaven, which he left in order to suffer and die at the hands of the very men for whom he had come to save. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all nations should serve Him.

The book of Hebrews records in chapter 1:8 God the Father says to the Son
“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom….

And,
“You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning,
and the heavens are the work of your hands;
they will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment,
like a robe you will roll them up,
like a garment they will be changed.
But you are the same,
and your years will have no end.”

And so the Ancient of Days says to the Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.”

Oh why do the nations rage and the kings of the earth set themselves against the Lord and against his anointed saying, ‘let us cast of the rule of God and have it our way’? God laughs! He will hold them in derision,
Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you Perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Conclusion:
Now I am running out of time and I still need an application. How can I turn this text into a message on “How to Make your Marriage Sizzle” or “How to Communicate with your Boss”?

If there is an application for us and a key point to this text I believe it is in verses 21 and 22 (read the text). You see, I think that the spirit of antichrist has been in the world since the days of Jesus. And this spirit of antichrist has been waging a war against the church always, it seems, to the point of prevailing over the church. But he is not outside the providence of God. God will allow this spirit of antichrist to continue and even climax in the last days in the most intense outpouring of tribulation under the hand of man who will epitomize all the other butchers of the church who have come before. And then the Ancient of Days will intervene and then Christ will hand the Kingdom over to his Father and we will be allowed to possess that Kingdom with him.
This is what has not been revealed so far in the book of Daniel and is now being revealed at the end of verse 22. This is how to make your marriage sizzle… Look at verse 27,
And the kingdom and the dominion
and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven
shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High;
their kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom,
and all dominions shall serve and obey them.’

We are Kings kids. We will rule with him. And our Kingdom is not like any kingdom that has ever been.

Prayer
Grant, Almighty God, since we must be daily exercised by various assaults against our faith, that we may never yield to the infirmities of the flesh, and never forget your Holy calling. Strengthen us for all hostile engagements; may we stand unbroken against all the assaults of Satan and the wicked; and give ourselves up and devote ourselves to you. May we never hesitate to suffer death itself, if necessary, and even to offer ourselves daily to various kinds of death, until we shall have discharged our warfare, and enjoy that happy and eternal rest which you have prepared for us in your only-begotten Son. — Amen[3]

NOTES:
[1] And it is true to say that Rome has never really been defeated or destroyed. Even American architecture reflects the influence of Rome. In fact, America today is reminiscent of the Roman Empire, just as Great Britain was a hundred years ago and France and Spain before that. Hitler’s dream was the restoration of the Roman Empire to it’s ancient splendor because the hopes and dreams of Rome lives on in the hearts and minds and imaginations of every succeeding generation for a thousand years.
[2]John Calvin. Commentary on Daniel - Volume 2 (18).
[3]John Calvin. Commentary on Daniel - Volume 2 (41).