Nebuchadnezzar's Fall

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Well, turn with me, Will, turn with me, if you will, there we go, not an auspicious start, to Daniel chapter 4,
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Daniel chapter 4, a familiar passage, a few thoughts based upon it this evening.
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Daniel chapter 4, beginning with verse 19, Daniel chapter 4, beginning with verse 19.
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Then Daniel, whose name is Belteshazzar, was appalled for a while as his thoughts alarmed him.
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The king responded and said, Belteshazzar, do not let the dream or its interpretation alarm you. Belteshazzar replied, my lord, if only the dream applied to those who hate you and its interpretation to your adversaries.
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The tree that you saw, which became large and grew strong, whose height reached the sky and was visible to all the earth, and whose foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant, and which was food for all, under which the beast of the field dwelt, and in whose branches the birds of the sky lodged, it is you,
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O king, for you have become great and grown strong, and your majesty has become great and reached to the sky and your dominion at the end of the earth.
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And that the king saw an angelic watcher, a holy one, descending from heaven and saying, chop down the tree and destroy it, leave the stump with its roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze around it, and the new grass of the field, and let him be drenched with the dew of the heaven, and let him share with the beast of the field until seven periods of time pass over him.
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This is the interpretation, O king, and this is the decree of the most high, which has come upon my lord the king, that you be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place with the beast of the field, and you be given grass to eat like cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven.
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And seven periods of time will pass over you, and so you recognize that the most high is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever he wishes.
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And in that it was commanded to leave the stump with the roots of the tree, your kingdom will be assured to you after you recognize that it is heaven that rules.
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Therefore, O king, may my advice be pleasing to you. Break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.
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All this happened in Nebuchadnezzar the king. Twelve months later, he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon. The king reflected and said,
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Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?
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Well, the word was in the king's mouth. A voice came from heaven saying, King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared, sovereignty has been removed from you and you will be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place will be at the beasts of the field.
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You will be given grass to eat like cattle and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize that the most high is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows on whomever he wishes.
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Immediately, the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled and he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like birds' claws.
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At the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me. I blessed the most high and praised and honored him who lives forever.
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For his dominion is everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but he does according to his will and the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth and no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done?
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At that time, my reason returned to me and my majesty and splendor were restored to me for the glory of my kingdom and my counselors and my nobles began seeking me out.
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So I was reestablished in my sovereignty and surpassing greatness was added to me. I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise, exalt, and honor the king of heaven for all his works are true and his ways just as he is able to humble those who walk in pride.
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Now, this is a familiar story to most of us. A large majority of Old Testament Bible scholars just sort of chuckle at the story because well, obviously this was written by a later
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Jewish man seeking to demonstrate that even the great Nebuchadnezzar had acknowledged the true
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God of the Jews as the true God of heaven and earth. Of course, I chuckle at their chuckling personally because if anything would have been kept from the archives and records of the king of Babylon, it would have been a period of time where he had basically lost his mind.
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He lost his reason. He lost his sanity and was driven and kept in some place where he chewed on grass and lived in the outdoors.
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Something very unusual happened in that you would think that given how kingship worked back then, if something like this had happened to Nebuchadnezzar, that there would have been immediately an overthrow of his rulership.
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And yet something unusual happens in that even in the dream, a band is placed around the tree, the root is left there, and he is restored after this period of time to his kingship.
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We would assume seven years, seven periods of time. And so there's a little bit of a background, the dream,
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Daniel's ability to interpret dreams. But notice a couple of things.
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First of all, Daniel, as soon as he hears the dream, is troubled for obvious reasons.
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And if I had been Daniel, I would have been troubled because certainly there would have been a temptation to Daniel to not deliver the message to Nebuchadnezzar.
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Someone who had Nebuchadnezzar's power and authority. We think of what happened to the three young Jewish men and being cast into the flaming fire.
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He didn't have a real good track record along those lines. He doesn't.
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Daniel recognizes this is a bad dream. This is a call to repentance. But he does not, in fact, back away from the duty that is his.
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He wishes that his thoughts alarmed him. He wishes that these were to be applied to his adversaries.
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But he has to tell him honestly, this is about you and this is about the fact that your kingship is going to be removed from you.
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And so he gives advice to him. Break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.
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Now, we're not told what Nebuchadnezzar's response is. You'll notice there's a 12 -month jump from the last word of Daniel to then the fulfillment, which makes me wonder just a little bit.
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How did Nebuchadnezzar respond? He had told Daniel, tell me the truth.
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Don't know what the interpretation of the dream is. But we're not told how he responds.
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What is it like to be a sovereign king like Nebuchadnezzar was over a vast territory?
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He's not a king like you have in the Queen of England today. It's funny, the
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Brits, they have a soft spot for the royalty, but the fact of the matter is the royalty really doesn't do anything.
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It just doesn't have any power anymore. You have parliaments and it's just sort of symbolic.
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That wasn't the case in this situation. And so Daniel says, break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity.
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Repent, do righteousness, show mercy to the poor. Not really something that kings in this day were known for doing.
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And we're not told whether the king was angry. We're not told whether he was just silent. Obviously, Daniel is sent away and 12 months pass.
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What was Daniel thinking during this time? What is Nebuchadnezzar thinking during this time? Might there have been a period of time, at least initially, where Nebuchadnezzar gives thought to these things?
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He possibly ponders some type of repentance? We're not told.
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All we're told is that a year later, did he remember it was a year later? Does he remember it was the anniversary?
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I don't know. But a year later, he's walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon.
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Now, we have archaeologically dug these places up.
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Impressive. The ruins are impressive. So what was it like in that day?
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The king reflected and said, is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?
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Whatever had happened, 12 months was sufficient time for the warning of God's prophet to have become very faint in the year of the king.
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And he really wasn't thinking about that dream anymore. And evidently, things have been going pretty well and money was flowing into the treasury and buildings were looking pretty good.
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And so though the warning had come, Nebuchadnezzar had not taken it to heart. So the voice comes from heaven.
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Sovereignty, rulership has been removed from you. You'll be driven away from mankind.
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We can't imagine what this looked like. All we know is that he began eating grass like cattle.
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I'm not sure how that works, to be perfectly honest with you. When my cats eat grass, it results in a real mess in the house.
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So, you know, some of that grass just isn't, the human body really wasn't designed for that. His body was drenched with the dew of heaven.
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That means he's out in the elements. He's not fit to live amongst humankind.
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His hair had grown like eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws.
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Now, I've seen a few of those folks pushing shopping carts down the road, downtown Phoenix. I know what they look like.
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But at the end of that period, I, and now notice the switch. Up this time you have narration and now it switches into the first person.
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I would imagine the reason for that is that when Nebuchadnezzar did have his reason returned to him, one of the things he would have remembered was that, you know,
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Daniel told me this was coming. And I had already had more than enough evidence that Daniel's God is the one true
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God. Maybe he had been drawn back to the worship of ancestral deities or something.
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There's a lot of, there's a lot of pressure along those lines. But maybe once his reason returned to him, he wanted a testimony of what he had come to understand to be written down.
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And the best person to give that to would have been Daniel himself. And what was that meeting like?
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We're not told, but certainly Daniel would have been called into the presence of the king after his restoration.
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And Daniel would have known, Daniel would have known during that entire period was, was
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Daniel consulted by those under Nebuchadnezzar during that period of time?
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If it was general knowledge amongst the king's men that Daniel had prophesied this, would that not be the natural thing to go to do?
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Go to Daniel? Did Daniel have a role in keeping the government together? Did they come to him and say, now you told, tell us what you told the king because he's eating grass in the backyard and he's gone nuts and none of us want to take over.
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Did they keep it from the public notice? Again, don't know. But if I had been them, the first person
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I would have consulted would have been Daniel. What did you say? What should we do?
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Whatever the situation was, we're not told Nebuchadnezzar in the first person reports to Daniel, has it written down for Daniel comes to Daniel.
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Daniel records his first person words. I don't know exactly how it works, but at the end of that period,
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I never can as a raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the most high and praise and honor him who lives forever.
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You know, history will tell us that when men multiply gods, they know in the midst of all that, that that, that worship of these other deities, that worship of these lesser gods, it's not true worship.
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They know the one true and living God exists and they know that they're rebelling against him.
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No matter how fervent they might become in their worship of these other gods, it never takes away the fact that God has implanted upon man that knowledge of his true sovereignty.
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And so when his reason returned, when he began thinking properly again, as a man should think, what does he do?
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He blesses the most high. He doesn't bless the
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God of Israel amongst other gods. No, he recognizes who the true
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God is and he blesses the most high and praise and honors him who lives forever.
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Not one of these gods that came into existence because one God cut another God in half and you know, the heavens came out of one half, the
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God in the earth came out of the other half, the God, and then he got blood splatter that creates other gods.
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It's actually sort of a Babylonian myth. I mean, that would have been one of the things that he would have been familiar with, but he knows that's not, that's not the true
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God. There's a God who lives forever and notice what he understands.
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His dominion is an everlasting dominion. Nebuchadnezzar thought his dominion was great and that he should be honored and given glory, majesty for what he had accomplished.
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But now he understands there's a most high God. He lives forever. His dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.
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All of a sudden Nebuchadnezzar sees himself. See, when a man's reason returns to him, he sees himself as a man, a creature under God's sovereign control.
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No man is ever so unreasonable as when he does not see himself as God sees him.
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Man is most reasonable when he sees himself as God sees him as a creature.
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Notice his words, all the inhabitants of the earth and that includes great and powerful kings.
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All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but he does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth and no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done?
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Sometimes we're told that our belief in Reformed theology is, you folks just like to cross your
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Ts and dot your Is. You like to argue about obscure points of theology.
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I don't know about you, but it sounds to me like when Nebuchadnezzar's reason returned to him and he had a clear, unambiguous revelation of who the one true
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God is, it didn't seem like an obscure point of theology to him that if there is one true
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God who's creator of all things, then you know what?
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He's not just a servant of mankind. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing before this
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God. And if he's truly the God of heaven and his dominions and everlasting dominion, then he does according to his will in the host of heaven.
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The host of heaven, obviously, many people think the host of heaven is, you know, you've got all these deities and sub -deities and they're all warring with one another and, you know, no
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God is really supreme over all that and what comes from heaven is sort of the result of it. No. Nebuchadnezzar realizes if God's God, then
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God's God. That means he rules. That means his will is accomplished in the host of heaven and, you know, there's a lot of folks, even
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Christians, that don't mind letting God's will be done in heaven. But you see,
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God is so sovereign that evidently he's given up his sovereignty over the inhabitants of earth. Nebuchadnezzar sees no.
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He does his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth.
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God's sovereignty is a sovereignty that impacts his creatures. He hasn't just wound this thing up and let it go on his own.
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He hasn't decided to cede his sovereignty to us so much so that he says no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done?
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See, Nebuchadnezzar all of a sudden sees the hand of God. He sees God's fingerprints in the activities of what's going on around him and he recognizes it is foolishness for the creature to put
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God in the place of being judged and saying, so why have you done what you've done?
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God is under absolutely no compulsion to answer to his creatures.
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The pagan king, when his reason returns to him, understands these things.
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So Nebuchadnezzar says, at that time, my reason returned to me and my majesty and splendor restored to me for the glory of my kingdom and my counselors, my nobles began seeking me out.
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So I was reestablished in my sovereignty and surpassing greatness was added to me. But now
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I, Nebuchadnezzar, though I've been given all of these things, though I once again have all this power over so many,
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I praise, exalt and honor the king of heaven for all his works are true and his ways just and he is able to humble those who walk in pride.
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And you see it. That's why, again, the Old Testament scholar, oh, the story made up by the
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Jews to show how great their God is. But you know, the
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Babylonians would have hidden him away and his successors would not ever want this word to get out.
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That's why I just have to believe Nebuchadnezzar called Daniel in and my suggestion would be he then dismissed everybody else.
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And here you have one of those instances where a man who had been given so much,
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God humbles him and he reveals to him who he is and that there's only one true king and everybody else who's given authority is derivative from this one.
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What's a lesson he learned? It's interesting, it sounds very similar to the lesson that Job learned for, though Job never had the power and the position that Nebuchadnezzar did.
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Yet he had an interview with God. And when he questioned God, God then questioned him, and the result was
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Job placed his hand over his mouth and he said, I will not speak. And Nebuchadnezzar learned the same lesson.
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Both saw God as God truly is. And that, of course, is always what we want.
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We want to see God as he truly is. We want to see God as he's revealed himself to be because it's only when we see him as he is that we actually see ourselves as we are.
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Wherever God has placed us, we never have a true knowledge of ourselves until we first have a true knowledge of him.
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And that is, of course, what we gain when we look into the pages of Scripture.