Let's begin with a word of prayer. Father, we come to you this evening, and we think of this little girl, and we just ask for your healing power in her life, that these, seizures would cease and that you would bring about a change here. We ask that would be our will. We know that we don't always know what's best, but we ask for her that you would do this healing. We ask for our class this evening that you would teach us and give us understanding and recollection of the things we look at. We ask in Jesus' name, amen. Okay, once again, our moving off place of departure is 1 Peter 2, where we're down to verses 9 and 10. But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. In verse 10, for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. And if we only had that verse, we could certainly say the church has replaced Israel. God is done with Israel. And now, there is no future for Israel. So we've been looking at some of the weight of scripture. We always have to compare scripture with scripture, take the full weight of scripture to, if we're gonna be accurate at all, because there's so much intentionally false teaching that goes on that is simply, I'll take this verse and I'll add it to this verse, and then I'll be able to say this, and the verses are taken out of context and so forth. So I don't know whether I promised or threatened that we would go back to the book of Daniel and look at some of the prophecies that are there. Before we do that, I just want to remind you of this. We have to put ourselves in, as much as we can, in Daniel's place. Okay. Here is a godly man, a man who absolutely loves his people. And he has been part of the removal from the land. He finds himself in a foreign land. He sees that his land has been taken over and is under the domination of a Gentile empire. Huge. And if he looks at, okay, Isaiah's 100 plus years before Daniel, okay? Book of Isaiah, roughly. So let's just remind, go back to Isaiah 11, trying to think about what would Daniel think, I assume that he knew this passage, when all of these things happen, can you see the problem? There's a Messiah coming and Jews are gonna run, you know, being under their king over the whole earth. And now instead, there's wicked Gentiles that have taken them off their land, taken them out of Jerusalem, and you can see where he's in disarray, so to speak, about what is gonna happen to my people. And really, very much of the book of Daniel, I like the fact that it's named Daniel. Yes, it's for us, but at that time, it's Daniel that's getting these visions. And he says, and I kept it to myself. And then the Lord said, close it up at the end of the book, conceal it. And so who's carrying this? It's Daniel. And I don't know, maybe we could say it's Daniel predominantly that cares. I don't want to be harsh there, but Daniel's the one with this incredible desire for his people and for God's plan for his people, and he wants to know what that is. Okay. So, Isaiah 11, we hear this often. Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse, and a branch from his roots will bear fruit, and the Spirit of the Lord will rest on him. This is about the coming of the Lord. And the spirit of the Lord will rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And he will delight in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what his eyes see, nor make a decision by what his ears hear. But with righteousness, he will judge the poor and decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth. And he will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth. And with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. And righteousness will be the belt about his loins and faithfulness the belt about his waist. And the wolf will dwell with the lamb. And the leopard will lie down with the kid and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together and a little boy will lead them. Also the cow and the bear will graze. Their young will lie down together and the lion will eat straw like the ox. and the nursing child will play by the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child will put his hand on the viper's den. They will not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the water covers the sea." As the waters cover the sea. So here's Daniel thinking what happened, okay, with the country being taken into captivity and destroyed and Jerusalem destroyed and, you know, Okay, so off to Daniel, over to Daniel, and we're gonna start in chapter two, and in Daniel two, we looked at this so we can do this more quickly. Remember, Nebuchadnezzar had a dream. It's wonderful to me, the way God demonstrates His power, that the dream goes to Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar puts all his wise men into a turmoil over this dream. And remember what he did, he said, you have to tell me the dream, because I'm not going to take an interpretation from you unless you tell me the dream first. And they all say, that's crazy, that's impossible. And Daniel says, yes, it is impossible, unless there's a God in heaven, and there is a God in heaven, and his friends pray, and so forth. All right, so let's come over to verse 31. So here we have, you, O king, were looking, and behold, there was a single great statue. That statue, which was large and of extraordinary splendor, was standing in front of you, and its appearance was awesome. The head of that statue was made of fine gold. Its breast and its arms of silver, its belly and its thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay. Now here we go. You continued looking until a stone was cut out without hands, without human agency, and a while back we looked at Jesus Christ as the rock or the stone. This is referring to him. Okay. Cut out without hands, this is God's doing. And it struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and crushed them. Okay. So, As we look at the expanse of prophecy here, how far does this prophecy go? It goes all the way to the end when all of whatever these different parts of the statue are, are destroyed. The whole thing struck on the feet and the whole thing comes down and that's the end of it. But realize this, that every one, and we know by the explanation of this, that every one of these kingdoms is a Gentile kingdom until the stone is cut out without hands. So it's not only a Gentile kingdom, it's a world empire Gentile kingdom. What does that tell you for the Jews? So here's Daniel. Well, there's four empires coming, and they're all world empires. What does that say? The Jews are gonna be under the domination of Gentile empires until the end. You can be sure Daniel understood that when he got his questions answered. That's huge. Okay, so it's God saying to Daniel, not only is there trouble in your day, Nebuchadnezzar reigning, destroying Israel and so forth, destroying Judah and the southern kingdom in Jerusalem and so forth. But the next empire, you're going to be under them. And the next empire, you're going to be under them. And the next empire, you're going to be under them. Okay? All right. Verse 36, this was a dream. Daniel says, now we shall tell us interpretation before the king. You, O King, are the King of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, the strength, and the glory. You know, it's interesting how, do you ever find a verse in scripture and say, if I just live by this one verse, without any others, you know, It would revel, it would so simply walk in the spirit, be filled with the spirit. If I did that, you'll see all the time, okay? And the reason I say that is verse 37, you, O king, are the king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, the strength, and the glory. So what's gonna happen? He's gonna have another dream of a tree cut down, you know? You know that tree? And the tree represents him. And Daniel, this is a warning already. Because what does Nebuchadnezzar think? By my might and by my brilliance and by who I am as a leader, I set up this empire and I run this empire. That's what he says when his sanity is taken from him. I just think that that's great that God's warning him. At the end of the dream about the tree, Daniel says, my advice is you move away from your sins, but he didn't listen. Okay, all right. And wherever, verse 38, and wherever the sons of men dwell or the beasts of the field or the birds of the sky, he has given them into your hand and has caused you to rule over them all. You are the head of gold. Reminds me of Romans 13. Every single government is of whom? God. The tough one, we don't like that. We'd rather have governments we couldn't rebel against. Okay, so the Lord says, you're the head of gold. Just one more thing about Nebuchadnezzar. So what's he do next? He builds a statue 90 feet high, and the entire thing is gold. And then he says, all you leaders in my empire come and worship my statue. Where is he? I can't imagine that he didn't get that idea from here. You're the head of gold. Okay, so he's, it's all about him, so he makes the whole statue, okay, and that's where the Daniel's three friends refuse to fall down and worship before that, what is basically an idol. Okay, so he says, you're the head of gold, and after you, there will arise another kingdom inferior to you, because we're moving down in what? The value of the metals, okay? But what's the inverse of that? We're getting stronger. And after you, there will arise another kingdom inferior to you, then another third kingdom of bronze, which will rule over all the earth, world empire. Then there will be a fourth kingdom as strong as iron. inasmuch as iron crushes and shatters all things, so like iron that breaks in pieces, it will crush and break all these in pieces. And in that you saw the feet and toes partly of potter's clay and partly of iron, it will be a divided kingdom. But it will have in it the toughness of iron inasmuch as you saw the iron mixed with common clay. And as the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of pottery, so some of the kingdom will be strong and part of it will be brittle. And in that you saw the iron mixed with common clay, they will combine with one another in the seat of men, but they will not adhere to one another, even as iron does not combine with pottery. Verse 44. And in the days of those kings, the feet, the kings that are part of the feet, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed. And from that, can we not think the context that that kingdom is a kingdom here on earth, because all the rest of the kingdoms are. I mean, if you move that kingdom to heaven, then have you done disservice to the passage where we're looking at earthly kingdoms, okay, And in the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom, stone cut out without hands, which will never be destroyed. And that kingdom will not be left for another people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. In as much as you saw that a stone was cut out, out of the mountain without hands, and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold, the great God has made known to the king what will take place in the future. So the dream is true and its interpretation is trustworthy. Okay. Now let's go next to Daniel chapter 7. Okay, just for reminder. What are those four kingdoms that we just looked at? We start off with Chaldean, Nebuchadnezzar. Okay, we move to what? Medo-Persian, okay? Persian Empire comes up second and is stronger. So in all of the pictures that we'll see, there's two of something, okay? To represent the Medes and the Persians. But the Persians end up being the strong ones. That's why we're gonna have the bear lifted up on one side, okay? All right, third kingdom. Greece, world empire under Alexander the Great, okay? And fourth empire, the Roman empire, okay? All right, we could put Julius Caesar there, okay? All right, so now chapter seven. Daniel says, verse one, chapter seven, 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. And Daniel said, I was looking in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea." Oftentimes in Scripture, the ocean or the seas, especially in Revelation, coming out of those are Gentiles, coming out of those are the peoples and the Gentiles. But we'll see that at some future time. And four great beasts were coming up from the sea, different from one another. So here we go. The first one was like a lion. Okay, who's that gonna be? What kingdom? Nebuchadnezzar. And had the wings of an eagle, usually speaks of speed of some type. But then it says this, I kept looking until its wings were plucked. it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man, the lion was, a human mind also was given to it. Now that's a tough thing, I just think that that may well be a reference to what God did to Nebuchadnezzar, where he humbled him, remember, put him out to pasture, made him like a beast of the field, then his senses returned, but after that, he praised God. He praised the God of heaven. You know, people could argue about it, but I believe he was saved. Okay. So there's Nebuchadnezzar. And behold, another beast, a second one, resembling a bear. And it was raised up on one side. Persian side, okay, the strong side. And three ribs were in its mouth. When Cyrus came and attacked the Chaldean Empire, and remember what happened to Daniel that night? So incredible. How could you be in two great world empires and be in leadership in both of them? Remember? It was called in to read the handwriting on the wall. He reads the handwriting on the wall and he basically says, and you're going to die tonight. Okay. And they give him, you know, all that stuff. And he says, keep your gifts for yourself, but they make them the third ruler of the, of the kingdom. And Cyrus and the Medes come in later to be the Medes and the Persians and Daniel comes right over and he's put right into the leadership of the Medes and the Persians. Can you imagine the history of what that man saw and what that man did? Okay, when Cyrus attacked the Chaldean Empire, and it was raised up on one side and three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth, between his teeth. Thus they said to it, arise devour much meat." Chaldean Empire was separated into three areas, all of which of course Cyrus took over. Babylon on the east, Egypt to the south, and over in Asia Minor, which is now, we call it, it is Turkey, is the Lydian kingdom. All those three, and that's probably what's represented here by those three ribs that the bear has in its mouth. All right, 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. This is, of course, the Grecian world empire, and that's Alexander the Great. Got four wings. This is this. 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. What do you see here that's amazingly different in the description of this fourth beast? We start off, we got a lion and we got a bear, you know, and we've got a leopard. And now we got just something like you never saw. Okay. And I think about this, this isn't exaggeration. Okay. When Daniel sees this, he's terrified of it. Okay. And all he can say is, and everything about it. Notice this. And I kept looking in the night visions to behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying and extremely strong, and trampled down the remainder with its feet. It was different from all the beasts. that were before it and had 10 horns. This is like nothing's ever been, okay? And as we're gonna see, out of that Roman empire comes another kingdom. That's what scripture says, okay? In other words, a revival, it comes out of the Romans, and I'll show you that here in this passage. And it's gonna be something like it's never been seen on earth. And dreadful, terrifying, how would I say it? There were some good things in some of those previous kingdoms. I think that God portrays that by gold. silver, bronze, the valuation that I believe God put on it is declining terribly. And we finally end up with iron and clay, and just a brutality that is I don't know any other words, terrifying. And that is gonna take place still in the future during the time we call the tribulation. I guess, here's the way I think about it. Midway through that tribulation, Satan is cast out of heaven, he comes down to, you know, he's thrown down to earth. And it says he comes down in great wrath, okay? And this is Satan's best that he can do to destroy the things of God. Okay. And there's passages where God says he's gonna let him do it. In other words, to some degree, he's gonna, in fact, right here. Okay, so let's get, next thing it says, While I was contemplating, okay, it had 10 horns, last part of verse seven, and it had 10 horns, and then it says, Daniel says, 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. Okay, so we start off with this, and if you've studied this, you'll find the phrase, the little horn of Daniel 7. Okay, when you hear that, the little horn of Daniel 7, we're talking about the future antichrist, okay. But notice, I just love the way the Lord does this. He goes on and says, he pulled out, you know, in other words, these 10 horns are 10 kings. Another one comes up among them, pulls three of them out, evidently takes over their kingdoms, destroys them, okay, rips them out of their place, okay? And behold, this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth uttering great boasts, okay? Now, here's the big question in this discussion that we're looking at. There are lots of people today who say that's Nero. That's Nero during the Roman Empire, and it's Nero, and if that's true, then all this is over. I mean, all those animal stuff, that's all done. And the reason I'm addressing this is not because I want to confuse you, but I don't want you to be surprised when somebody says, oh, you don't know that's Nero? 666, that's Nero. But notice what we have here. It says this, I kept looking until thrones were set up, Daniel says, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. I believe that's representative of God the Father. His vesture was like white snow and the hair of his head like pure wool. His throne was ablaze with flames. Its wheels were a burning fire. A river of fire was flowing and coming out before him. What will those things speak of? Judgment. Okay. Thousands upon thousands were attending him and myriads, a myriad is tens of thousands, tens of thousands, and myriads upon myriads were standing before him. The court sat and the books were opened. Then I kept looking because of the sound of the boastful words which the horn was speaking. What is Daniel saying here? While the court is in operation here, what's still going on? Antichrist is still saying these things, okay? So, and I kept looking because of the sound of the boastful words which the horn was speaking, I kept looking until the beast was slain and his body was destroyed and given to the burning fire. Hold your finger here and go to Revelation 19, and in Revelation 19, I want you to start in verse 11. He judges and wages war. Who is that? That's the Lord Jesus Christ, okay? And his eyes are a flame of fire, and upon his head are many diadems, and he has a name written upon him which no one knows except himself, and he is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, John 1. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following him on white horses. And from his mouth comes a sharp sword, that's his word, so that with it he may smite the nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron. And he treads the winepress of the fierce wrath of God the Almighty. And on his robe and on his thigh he has the name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out with a loud voice, saying, to all the birds which fly in mid-heaven, come, assemble for the great supper of God, in order that you may eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of commanders. What is that talking about? All you birds of prey, all you vultures, and anything that'll feed on carrion, come. Not pretty. and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of those who sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free men and slaves, and small and great. And I saw the beast, that's the Antichrist, and the kings of the earth. How many were there? There was 10, three were taken out, okay? and their armies assembled to make war against him who sat upon the horse and against his army. And the beast was seized and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence by which he deceived those who received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone, and the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of him who sat upon the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh." All right, remember the verse we ended up on? I kept looking, I'm back in Daniel 7-11, I kept looking until the beast was slain and his body was destroyed and given to the burning fire. Okay? Covered in Revelation there, 19. As for the rest of the beasts, those kings, their dominion was taken away. They're no longer reigning. But an extension of life was granted them. They weren't thrown, what? Immediately into the lake of fire. Probably have to wait for what? Great white throne judgment. Okay? But an extension of life was granted to them for an appointed period of time. I kept looking, Daniel says, verse 13, I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like a son of man was coming. What's that? The second advent return of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him, and to him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom. that all the peoples, nations, and men of every language might serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion." What are we looking at here? The stone cut out without hands that destroys the whole Gentile system of world domination, okay? His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away, and his kingdom is one which will not be destroyed. Now, you know, it's an interesting thing. How many, you know, I just asked, how many of you have friends that you know are Reformed? Have you ever talked to them about Revelation? But you know what? A lot of times they say, I don't study that. And of course, you might say, well, why would you? It's all history. I mean, I know people that just, listen, if it was Nero and all that's taken place, that's all history. There's still nothing. The last thing that has to happen is the return of Christ. There is no millennium. We'd go directly into the heavenly situation and it's over. You know, I've been thinking about why has there been this, I've been hearing things, reading things that are so toxic about anybody that's dispensational. Anybody that believes that this is still future, that God's not done with Israel, that you get the idea. And I've been trying to think about what's going on here. And if you think of the world's viewpoint, it's this. We're going to make this a better place. We all need, I see it all the time, you need to give back. You need to, you know, you need to do this. You need to do that. We're going to, we're going to have a utopia is coming. Okay. And what do dispensational Christians do to that? Well, you think about it. It's exactly what they don't want to hear. Because we're saying, oh no, it's going to get way worse. It's not fixable. It's men and Satan and fallen angels and the whole world hating God and bringing this planet to a place you know and none of us want to see. Okay. But that's where it's headed. And the only answer is the return of Jesus Christ. He's the only one that can fix it. He's the only one that will fix it. He's the only one that can set up a righteous kingdom on earth. There's no way man can do it. Okay. I really think the thrust of more laws, more laws, more control, more is what? It's so that you can put everything under one roof, so to speak, and get it the way you want it. And I do believe that there's many, many, there's people that think this time we're gonna do it right. It's failed in other times and so forth, but we're going to get it right this time because we're good people. We're enlightened and we're going to make it work. I just want to throw that out that we're in a position that is not likable, except by believers. And I should qualify that, except by those who hold to that these things have not all been completed yet, that there's still coming this man of sin and this one world government and the revived Roman empire. Verse 15, Daniel 7. As for me, Daniel, my spirit was distressed within me. And the visions in my mind kept alarming me. Daniel was a very, I think he was a brilliant man. And what he just got was very upsetting to him. I approached one of those who were standing by in this vision, dream. and began asking him the exact meaning of all this. So he told me and made known to me the interpretation of these things. These great beasts, which are four in number, are four kings who will arise from the earth. But, here's a summary, but the saints of the highest one will receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever for all ages to come. Then I desired to know the exact meaning of the fourth beast, which was different from all the others. Exceedingly dreadful, he says it again, with its teeth of iron and its claws of bronze, notice, and which devoured, crushed, and trampled down the remainder with its feet. And the meaning of the 10 horns that were on its head. and the other horn, which came up, and before which three of them fell, okay, yanked out the three, remember, tore out the three, and before which the three of them fell, I love this, namely, that horn which had eyes and a mouth, uttering great boasts, which was larger in appearance than its associates. But what do we call it? The little horn of Daniel 7 evidently comes up little and grows to be larger than the others because it's the one that's going to control the whole thing. And notice what it says, I kept looking and that horn, the Antichrist, was waging war with the saints and overpowering them. until the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was passed in favor of the saints of the Highest One, and the time arrived when the saints took possession of the kingdom." So, if this is talking about Nero, then somehow the Lord had to come back way back here. That's always a good thing to discuss. How do you see that happening? And if you say, well, that was his return, then is he not coming again? Is it over? I mean, you get to, there's a lot of problems here if you, okay. Now, but here's the one. Thus he said, Verse 23, thus he said, the fourth beast will be a fourth kingdom on the earth, which will be different from all the other kingdoms. And it will devour the whole earth, tread it down and crush it. Now don't, to me, the great verse, they're all great, but this 24th verse is so important. As for the 10 horns, Out of this kingdom, do you know how important those four words are? Out of this kingdom, out of this Roman Empire, out of this kingdom, 10 kings will arise. We're saying there's an extended period of time between those two things happening. And we call it again and again, the revived Roman Empire, that out of that original Roman Empire, there's going to be another Roman Empire come out of that. And that's what Daniel's talking about. You with me at all? Out of this kingdom, what was the kingdom? The Roman Empire. So then there has to be another Roman Empire. that arises out of that Roman Empire. Did everybody see how important those words are? Okay. As for the 10 horns, out of this kingdom, 10 kings will arise. That's why I was looking for some kind of a, you know, when the European common market, you remember that? And there was 10 at one time, and everybody was like, whoa, that's it. Well, We don't know how God's going to allow this to take place and form up, but ultimately there's going to come out of that Roman Empire ten kings. And another will arise after them, and he will be different from the previous ones and will subdue three kings. Now, verse 25, and he will speak out against the Most High. What did Daniel say? He kept hearing what? The words of this mouth that, okay. And he will speak out against the most high, blasphemous things. And get this, and wear down the saints of the highest one. What words? And he will intend to make alterations in times and in law. Okay? Maybe that's a change of the calendar or whatever. And he also wants to make a change in the law. And what does it say? And they will be given into his hand. He's going to do it. And they will be given into his hand for a time, singular, times, plural, and a half a time. Take the seven-year period of Daniel's 70th week, cut it in half, you have a time, one year, times two years added to one year is three and a half, is three and a half years. I love that, the way God sprinkled that duration of time throughout His Word. And we'll look at this some other time, but we have the middle of the week, seven years split in half. We have a time, times and half a time, which we have here. We have 42 months. is another way it's described. And we have 1,260 days, which is another way. They're all talking about the same period of time, but just said in all those different ways. Okay, so he's going to have it. But the court will sit for judgment and his dominion will be taken away, annihilated and destroyed forever. Then the sovereignty, the dominion and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the people of the saints of the highest one. His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom and all the dominions will serve and obey him. At this point, the revelation ended. As for me, Daniel, my thoughts were greatly alarming me, and my face grew pale, but I kept the matter to myself." Okay, whoa. So Daniel just found out, whoa. In a sense, we're just getting started, okay, as far as what is going to happen to his people. But you can be sure that when Daniel saw the words, and then the kingdom will be given to the saints of the highest one. He was thinking Israel. All right. Father, how we thank you for your Word and the excitement of learning these things, as difficult as they are. We thank you for your sovereign plan and your will and for the restoration of Israel that will come and the remnant that will be saved and for your plan for the Church, the Bride of Christ, all these wonderful things that are revealed in Scripture. We thank you for them in Jesus' name. Amen.