Daniel 2, How Do You Know?, Dr. John B. Carpenter

Daniel’s Dream and Nebuchadnezzar’s Demand for the Interpretation

Daniel chapter 2, hear the word of the Lord. In the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebuchadnezzar had dreams. His spirit was troubled, and his sleep left him. Then the king commanded that the magicians, the enchanters, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans be summoned to tell the king his dreams.

So they came in and stood before the king, and the king said to them, I had a dream, and my spirit is troubled to know the dream. Then the Chaldeans said to the king in Aramaic, O king, live forever. Tell your servants the dream, and we will show the interpretation.

The king answered and said to the Chaldeans, The word from me is firm. If you do not make known to me the dream and its interpretation, you shall be torn limb from limb, and your houses shall be laid in ruins.

But if you show the dream and its interpretation, you shall receive from me gifts and rewards and great honor. Therefore, show me the dream and its interpretation. They answered a second time and said, Let the king tell his servants the dream, and we will show its interpretation.

The king answered and said, I know with certainty that you are trying to gain time, because you see that the word from me is firm. If you do not make the dream known to me, there is but one sentence for you.

You have agreed to speak lying and corrupt words before me till the times change. Therefore, tell me the dream, and I shall know that you can show me its interpretation. The Chaldeans answered the king and said, There is not a man on earth who can meet the king's demand, for no great and powerful king has asked such a thing of any magician or enchanter or Chaldean.

The thing that the king asked is difficult, and no one can show it to the king except the gods, whose dwelling is not with flesh. Because of this, the king was angry and very furious and commanded that all the wise men of Babylon be destroyed.

So the decree went out, and the wise men were about to be killed, and they sought Daniel and his companions to kill them. Then Daniel replied with prudence and discretion to Ariok, the captain of the king's guard, who had gone out to kill the wise men of Babylon.

He declared to Ariok, the king's captain, Why is the decree of the king so urgent? Then Ariok made the matter known to Daniel, and Daniel went in and requested the king to appoint him a time that he might show the interpretation to the king.

Then Daniel went to his house and made the matter known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, and told them to seek mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery so that Daniel and his companions might not be destroyed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.

Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. Daniel answered and said, Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might.

He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding. He reveals deep and hidden things. He knows what is in the darkness, and light dwells with him.

To you, O God of my fathers, I give thanks and praise, for you have given me wisdom and might, and have now made known to me what we ask of you, for you have made known to us the king's matter. Therefore Daniel went in to Ariok, whom the king had appointed to destroy the wise men of Babylon.

He went and said thus to him, Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon. Bring me in before the king, and I will show the king the interpretation. Then Ariok brought in Daniel before the king in haste and said thus to him, I have found among the exiles from Judah a man who will make known to the king the interpretation.

The king declared to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, Are you able to make known to me the dream that I have seen and its interpretation? Daniel answered the king and said, No wise man, enchanters, magicians, or astrologers can show to the king the mystery that the king has asked.

But there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and he has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days. Your dream and the visions of your head as you lay in your bed are these to you, O king.

As you lay in bed came thoughts of what would be after this, and he who reveals mysteries made known to you what is to be. But as for me, this mystery has been revealed to me, not because of any wisdom that I have, more than all the living, but in order that the interpretation may be made known to the king and that you may know the thoughts of your mind.

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 the 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. 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. This was the dream. Now we will tell the king its interpretation. You, O king, the king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power and the might and the glory, and into whose hand he has given, wherever they dwell, the children of man, the beasts of the field, and the birds of the heavens, making you rule over them all, you are the head of gold.

Another kingdom inferior to you shall arise after you, and yet a third kingdom of bronze, which shall rule over all the earth. And there shall be a fourth kingdom, strong as iron, because iron breaks to pieces and shatters all things.

And like iron that crushes, it shall break and crush all these. And as you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter's clay and partly of iron, it shall be a divided kingdom. But some of the firmness of iron shall be in it, just as you saw iron mixed with soft clay.

And as the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly brittle. As you saw the iron mixed with soft clay, so they shall mix with one another in marriage.

But they will not hold together, just as iron does not mix with clay. And in the days of those kings, the king of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people.

It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever. Just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold, a great God has made known to the king what shall be after this.

The dream is certain and its interpretation sure. The king Nebuchadnezzar fell upon his face and paid homage to Daniel and commanded that an offering and incense be offered to him. The king answered and said to Daniel, Truly your God is God of gods and Lord of kings and a revealer of mysteries, for you have been able to reveal this mystery.

Then the king gave Daniel high honors and many great gifts and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon and chief prefect over all the wise men of Babylon. Daniel made a request of the king and he appointed Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego over the affairs of the province of Babylon.

But Daniel remained at the king's court. May the Lord add his blessings to the reading of his holy word. How do you know? You ever had a troubling question, a decision you have to make, a mystery, and they had you wondering, how do I know what to do?

How do I know what to major in, in college? What occupation to pursue? How do I know what job to take? How do I know whether to continue this relationship or cut it off? Whether to marry him or her? When it comes to those big decisions, the one that have us wondering how do we know, they're basically two kinds of people give us answers.

There's the rationalist who tells you to be sensible. Use your head. Use your brain. And the romantic who tells you, go with your heart. What do you feel is right? How do I know what I should study in college?

Well, the rationalist says, well, look at fields where there are jobs in which you can make money. You know, there's jobs in engineering and in accounting and health care. Don't major in those. The romantic says, what do you love?

What's your passion? Is it music? Is it drama? Is it poetry? Maybe theology. Seize the opportunity to study what you love without worrying. Don't even worry about how you're going to pay off those student loans when you graduate.

Well, how do I know who I should marry? Well, the rationalist makes a list of the positive qualities he or she wants and we meet someone, kind of he or she coolly, objectively checks off the qualities on the list.

Does he or she make it? Yes or no? You conclude at the end. The romantic just goes with his heart. Now, early in my relationship with Mary, I made the cool, what I thought, the rational decision to break it off.

We'd only been dating about six weeks before she was due to graduate and leave the country. Any sensible, rational, cool-headed, level-headed person could see that this just can't continue. No future for this.

She's too far away, too foreign. A breakup just makes sense. I had to be sensible. I have to use my head. But it was a breakup that my heart just wouldn't let me follow through with. That was about 34 years ago.

On some of the most crucial decisions we make in life, the real crucial question behind it is, how do we know? The question is especially critical as the issues get more and more important. Not only who should we marry, but what we should do with our lives.

What are they about? Even bigger questions, you know, what's my chief end, my purpose? What's humanity for? Why do we exist? What is the end or the purpose of people? What's the goal of history? And some answer with reason, and some answer with feeling.

Some religions claim, you know, we have God's grace, we have God's purpose. And if you ask them, how do I know? How do you know you have that? Well, they will say, well, because we say so. We are the vicar of Christ on earth.

Jesus appointed our founder to be the first pope. You get where I'm going with. And so be rational and follow us. That's what some say. The Mormons say that they have the truth and claim that if you pray, that your heart will be warmed and you'll just feel they are right.

Go with your feelings and you'll become a Mormon, they say. Well, the flesh is pleasure and answers the how do you know question. Well, because it feels good. Yet, when the pleasure fades away and your life is empty, how do you know then?

Well, the question is answered. This question is answered in Daniel chapter two. He tells us how we know, and he tells us in three parts. First, from verses 1 to 30, the mystery. Second, from verses 31 to 45, the history.

And finally, from verses 46 to 49, the victory. First, the mystery. Well, Nebuchadnezzar has a disturbing dream. He's frustrated that he can't understand it. And that's the first of the four parts of this first section, which is the bulk of this message.

First section to the four parts of the frustration, then the revelation, then exaltation, and then explanation. Well, first there's frustration. Nebuchadnezzar wants to know what the dream means, and he's frustrated that he can't get an answer that he knows is true.

Now, he knows that if he tells his staff the dream and then asks them for an interpretation, they can make up something. But how does he know then that it'll be right? He knows his staff can fake it, but he wants to know that those who are telling him what it means really know what they say they know.

So he puts them to the test. He demands that they tell him the dream in verse 9, challenging them that if you really have supernatural insight, then you should be able to tell me the dream first. Right?

Otherwise, how am I supposed to know what you're telling me?

It's true.

So that's what he does. If you can't tell me the dream, then he says, basically, you're fired. Or, in verse 5, more literally, you'll be torn limb from limb, and just to punish your family, too, after you're dead, torn limb from limb, we'll destroy your house.

Okay, so he's incentivizing them to use their powers, if they really have any, so that he will know that they are telling him the truth. It's actually all very sensible for Nebuchadnezzar. If you have the supernatural ability, then tell me the interpretation of the dream to tell me the interpretation of the dream.

If you have that ability, then you should have the supernatural ability to tell me the dream. Otherwise, how do I know you're just not making it up? But, to the magicians, the enchanters, the sorcerers, the Chaldeans, which I don't think means the whole ethnicity, but apparently the native religion of Chaldea, their priest, to them it was unreasonable.

It was impossible. They answer in verses 10 and 11 that what the king is asking is out of reach of any man. Nobody can do that. They think only the gods can do that, and they're off somewhere else. We can't get in touch with them.

We don't know where they are in another realm. How were they supposed to know what only the gods knew? That's their problem, and that's exactly what Nebuchadnezzar had them on the payroll for. That's what he's thinking.

What do you think I pay you for, fellas? To reveal mysteries, give me knowledge, supernatural wisdom. So he could know, Nebuchadnezzar could know, and Nebuchadnezzar's quandary is, how is he supposed to know if they really know?

Now, people today, like then, often have a way of, want a way of knowing, they crave a way of knowing that they can control. Knowledge that gives them power, insight into the future, that reveals mysteries so they can make the right decisions, they can be in control.

Palm readers, astrologers, mediums, still can make a living purporting to tell people what lies ahead, giving ambiguous advice, vague notices, predictions about the future. It's always very vague. You're going to meet someone important today.

Okay, probably true. They promise supernatural control without having to worry about the controller. Now, for that reason, astrology has been gaining popularity over the past. The Chaldeans practiced astrology.

Here, astrology is described by a webpage. It's advocating it. In other words, trying to sell people on believing astrology. Quote, more and more people have turned to Wicca and the occult for answers that they feel have not been found in Christianity.

In these religions, people feel that they have more control, there's the key word, over their lives. Astrology is one part of that control. It is used to plan for the future and to make decisions in the present.

But the question is, how do you know? How do you know it's true? Nebuchadnezzar has a way to know. Tell me the dream. Try that with some medium. Set up shop somewhere. Go in and say, I have a dream. Whatever they call themselves.

Sister so-and-so, mother so-and-so. I have a dream. Can you interpret it for me? Say, sure. Pay me $100, whatever it is. Okay, but you have to tell me the dream, too. No, they can't do that. When here, Nebuchadnezzar does that to them, when they can't tell him the dream, he knows that they don't know.

So he's frustrated and, it says, very furious. You don't want to make the emperor of the Babylonian Empire very furious. So there's big business still today in catering to people's desires to know, to have the mysteries revealed to them.

Astrologers still today, palm readers, mediums, can make a lot of money off of it. But when people discover that it's often just faking, that even when they can give kind of ambiguous advice, that they don't really have the answers to the big questions, people will be frustrated with them.

And sometimes, like Nebuchadnezzar in verse 12, they'll be angry and very furious. And their frustration with the fakes, they'll conclude that all claims to supernatural revelation are the same. You've got Nostradamus, you've got the Bible, you've got astrology, you've got prayer, you've got seances, you've got the Holy Spirit's spiritual gifts, the indwelling Holy Spirit.

And for them and their mind, their confused minds, it's kind of all jumbled together, although it's all one thing. They'll become agnostics or atheists claiming, well, we just can't know. We can't know anything except what we can see.

And there will be frustration. So Nebuchadnezzar, in his frustration, decides to terminate his whole staff. In verse 13, the decree went out and the wise men were about to be killed. And that included Daniel and his three friends.

So now suddenly, they are on the hit list. And Ariok, the captain of the king's guard, finds Daniel, knocks on Daniel's door, I guess. Come with me. We're about to kill you. But Daniel responds, verse 14, with prudence and discretion.

He knew the right way to answer. And Daniel makes an appointment to reveal the dream and its interpretation to the king. Now, unlike the others, he doesn't have any special tricks. He has no chart that he can consult.

He has no incantations he can recite. Nothing, you know, the stars to look at to help him. He has nothing, no technique that he can use to get the answer that he needs in order to live. He has to depend completely on God revealing himself to him.

How does he know God will? He doesn't. He just knows God can. So he tells his three friends, in verse 18, seek mercy, notice that, seek mercy from the God of heaven. In verse 13, implied both that God is in control of Nebuchadnezzar.

He's the king over the king. And the answer to this is from God's mercy. It's not something that he can earn, that he can twist out of God with the right power words or the right ritual. He can make God give it to him.

God is called the God of heaven. He emphasizes that the Lord is in control of the heavens, of space and the stars and the planetary orbits, the moons and the comets, that he is in control of all the things that the astrologers look to for control.

An astrologer thinks the power is in the impersonal stars. A magician thinks it's in the magic words that he says. A palm reader thinks that he can, he or she can discern something from the lines in your poems.

A tarot card reader thinks that some force guides the order of the cards. A psychic claims that he, to have extrasensory perception. All of these want answers and control. Answers to their question on their terms.

But a believer of the Lord sees that the power is God's. He has control. You can never get it from him. And so the only way to access God is if God himself, in his mercy, seek mercy from God. God, in his mercy, chooses to give it to us.

So perhaps the power to change, the power to believe, the power to be born again and love God, to know him, is all from God's mercy. And here is the power to reveal the mystery. Now seeing that, the only recourse is to seek mercy.

Now for God to give us what we do not deserve, that's what mercy is. So God expects us to seek mercy for him to reveal himself. When we plead for mercy, we admit that we're asking for something that we haven't earned.

That we have no right to. That is beyond our power. That we can't control it. And this is exactly what natural people so desperately do not want to admit. They want control. They want some technique. The words, the incantation, the stars, whatever, the ritual, that gives them some power over God or the gods or whatever power they think is in control to get what they want.

Here, all Daniel can say is, seek mercy. Because that's what we depend on. Here Daniel says his three friends' very lives are outside of their control. Continuing to live. Understand what's going on here.

He makes an appointment for tomorrow, and if he shows up in Nebuchadnezzar's throne room with no interpretation, no answer, he's dead. That's what's on his mind. Continuing to live depends on God's mercy.

It's totally outside of their control. His ability to know the mystery is outside of his control. So they plead for mercy in verse 18. So that is the reason why they plead for mercy. Daniel and his companions might not be destroyed.

They were pleading for their lives. For their physical salvation. And then having made the reservation first to tell the king the next day, pleading for mercy from God, having done everything they can do, he shows he believes God by going to bed.

Says Daniel gets a vision of the night. In other words, it's a dream. In verse 19. Notice that. He gets a dream in verse 19. Which means he was asleep. Now imagine you had an appointment the next day, tomorrow, and if you don't have what it takes tomorrow, you're dead.

And you think you sleep that night?

No, not normally.

Unless you're Daniel. He goes to sleep. And he did what little he could do. Made his reservation. He prayed. He trusted God so much.

Went to sleep.

The Mystery Revealed by God’s Mercy

Second, the revelation. In verse 19. Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel. How do we know the mystery? Well, God reveals it. In verse 23, Daniel praises God. To you, O God of my fathers, I give thanks and praise for you have given me wisdom and might.

I don't think it just means like Samson might. It means ability. You've given me the ability, the ability to know, to know the mystery. And you have made known to me what we ask of you. God reveals the mystery to those who are humble enough to pray and plead for mercy.

And then go to sleep in faith. Third, exaltation. Daniel praises God from verses 20 to 23. The credit for the revelation is not Daniel's skill, not in his techniques or to discern the stars, what it says or the sensitivity of the spirits, his intuition.

The glory belongs completely to God who reveals deep and hidden things, he says in verse 22. That is always the reaction when we understand that our understanding of God's mystery, that how we know is a gift from God in his mercy.

Our reaction when we understand that is exaltation. Blessed be the name of our God forever and ever. To whom belong, that is to God belong wisdom and might. Again, ability in this context, the ability to understand the mystery.

A lot of people like to take credit for themselves for having the ability to understand God's mysteries, the deep things of God, that they think they have a keen enough spiritual understanding, that they were sensitive enough, they were sensible enough, they're intellectual enough, they've done enough studying, they can exegete right, their family is connected enough, that they were educated enough.

That's why they think, in their self-congratulation, that they understand the mystery. But Daniel sees that the mystery is purely because of God's mercy. And because he sees that, he has exaltation. He praises God.

And that's what he says in the explanation. So this fourth, the explanation, in verses 24 to 30, Nebuchadnezzar asks Daniel if he can explain the mystery. And Daniel admits at first, just like the magicians and the rest of them before that, he says, you know, no man, no person can do that.

But, there's the big difference, the but, but God can. In verse 28, there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries. There's all those magicians, they didn't know about this God. There's a God in heaven who reveals mysteries.

And again in verse 30, this mystery has been revealed to me, not because of any wisdom that I have more than all the living. It's not because of me, but it's so that you will know it's because of God's mercy, which answers our question.

How do we know?

How do you know?

You know when God reveals the mystery to you. But what is the mystery? Will God answer your own personal mysteries.

When you have them?

Like what you should study?

Or who you should marry?

Is this what this passage is about? Things like that? Will he give you a vision? Or speak in a dream? Send a prophet to tell you? Yes, marry him.

No, don't.

Is that what you're supposed to depend on? Likely, like 99 .5 likely, he will expect you to depend on some combination of your head and your heart to pray and to plead for mercy and then to trust him and then go to sleep.

But he will supernaturally reveal the mystery here. This mystery that's in Daniel 2. It takes supernatural revelation. For you see, the mystery here is not just an historical mystery for a king long ago.

It's kind of back there as an example or it's just back as history for us. Interesting story about Daniel. No, there's a lot to it than that. It's not something remote and detached from us. The mystery here has to do with the kingdom of God.

It is the mystery of those big questions. In fact, of the biggest question. We see that in the history, 2. The history from verses 31 to 45. Daniel shows Nebuchadnezzar what his dream was and what it meant and he tells him and us the answer to the big question as to where history is heading.

This is history. What Daniel foresees in Nebuchadnezzar's dream. Now something that religious knowledge has everything to do with the heart. It's subjective. It's just feelings. It's a sense of God. A kind of awareness of Him.

Even through your hard times when there's only one set of footprints in the sand. But not doing anything about those hard times. Not as though God's in control of them. He just kind of gives you good feelings through them.

That's many people's view. How do you know that Jesus is Lord? That He rose from the dead? Well, the rationalists would give reasons. And there are reasons. The romantic, who are more popular in our day, would say, well it's because it makes me feel good.

I know that I know deep down in my soul even if that power, that knowledge they say they have deep down in their soul never seems to enter into real life. The real life of how they live day to day. So that it changes them.

The life of dating and marriage and jobs and spending and eating and drinking and family and entertainment and conversation and politics and business. That real life. Revelation, they think, has to do with the soft and the warm and the fuzzy feelings.

Not the hard facts of dollars and cents.

And decisions.

But here Daniel shows the mystery has to do with the kingdom of God that comes and not just into our hearts as a feeling, but it comes into history and changes it completely. Nebuchadnezzar had a dream of a human-like statue.

It glistened.

It gleamed.

It glowed. In four sections, this whole gold head, a silver chest and arms, a bronze abdomen and thighs and iron lower legs, I guess calves, with some clay in the feet. And Daniel carefully tells the king, carefully with a lot of, you know, polite praise of the king, you're the king of kings, that kind of stuff.

Daniel carefully tells the king that his vision has to do with coming history. That he's foreseeing what's coming.

In the earth.

The four sections of the statue are four successive kingdoms from the time of Nebuchadnezzar until the time the kingdom of God comes on earth. Now, this passage is a favorite of those who are looking for a way to predict when Christ returns and what will be happening when that happens, when He returns.

And they say it is, His returning is in the time of that last empire, when the kingdom comes smashing the earthly kingdoms, and it's still in the future. So He must come during the time of a fifth empire, a revived Roman empire, symbolized by the feet.

Right? That's a common interpretation of this passage. It's out there.

You go on YouTube,.

You'll find all kinds of people saying one version of that or another. But then they will conclude then, so you watch out for revived Roman empire. But is this interpretation true? Common out there? Well, first, look at the conclusion.

Seem to be the easiest way.

To settle this.

The conclusion, remember, the kingdom of God comes smashing like a big rock coming out of the mountains and smashing it and pulverizing it. That's the kingdom of God. Has that been fulfilled or are we still waiting on that to come?

Now, those with that interpretation say we're still waiting on it. Well, Jesus said in Luke 11, verse 20, If it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons. Remember Jesus going around casting out a lot of demons.

And he said, If it is by the finger of God that I cast out. Now, was it by the finger of God that he cast out demons? Yes. The Pharisees were accusing him of doing it by Beelzebub, by Satan himself. Jesus was saying, If it's by the finger of God, God's power, that I'm casting out demons,.

Then, this is the conclusion,.

Then it must be the kingdom of God has come. Past tense. It has come with him upon you, Jesus said. And in Luke chapter 17, verse 21,.

He said,.

The kingdom of God is, present tense, like it is right now, it is in the midst of you. Because Jesus was in the midst of them. So the kingdom of God had come. In other places, Jesus teaches that same thing.

The kingdom of God had come with him. So the thing that Daniel speaks of as the end of this process, four successive kingdoms and then the rock that is the kingdom of God, carved out not by human hands, not the product of any human work, that thing, that end result of coming into history and smashing the kingdoms of man, according to Jesus, that has been fulfilled.

Now, if we say, It doesn't seem to have come all at once, like it's not smashed every earthly kingdom. Some people say, Well, it's not smashing its way as described here.

Remember,.

In the parables of the kingdom, in Matthew 13, Jesus describes how the kingdom of God is coming into the world. He says the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed. It starts out small, but eventually grows enormous.

He says it's like leaven, but a little bit of dough, and then it spreads through the whole thing, so it's gradually infiltrating all the world. Daniel here just tells us, here in Daniel 2, Daniel is telling us that the kingdom of God will come into history during a time of a certain kingdom, the fourth one after him, and obliterate worldly empires.