Good Morning! - Daniel 7:3-4 - The Lion With Wings Day Three - 2009.11.19

And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one fromanother. The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I beheld tillthe wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth,and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man's heart was given to it (Daniel 7.3-4).

These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth (Daniel 7:17).

The four great beasts are four kings which shall arise out of the earth. These great beasts correspond to the Gold, Silver, Brass, and Iron of the great image God showed Nebuchadnezzar in chapter two. The metals of the image were progressively reduced in quality from gold to iron. The four animals also begin with the king of cats and progress to the lesser animals.

The first was like a lion with wings. This is symbolic of Babylon's ferocity. The wings indicate the speed with which Babylon could move her army. There is no doubt that Daniel knew about the artistic lions that were part of the designs in ceramic tile at the Ishtar Gate and perhaps in many other places of the massive walls and gates surrounding Babylon. This is how the Babylonians thought of themselves. They were the king of the beasts. They were fierce and cruel and fast in battle.

But Babylon was not to last forever. Its speed was probably related to the influence of Nebuchadnezzar. When he went insane for seven years and ate with the cattle in the fields, it had an impact on the lion. The lion came to realize that he was just a man. And then a man's heart was given to the lion. Many believe this corresponds to the physical and mental healing and the conversion of Nebuchadnezzar in chapter four where he wrote his testimony of the great change that had come over him.

We must keep in mind that God did not have Daniel to record these details as merely interesting parts of a theatre production. God gives each part of the vision as an important part of communication to the people of that time and to the millions around the world who were to follow. As great as Babylon was, and Medo-Persia and Greece and Rome, none of these places are where God has chosen to put His name.

At the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea is the land we today call Palestine. "It is the geographic center of the earth and the center of God's activities with Israel and the Gentile nations at the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Strauss)

If the Bible speaks of the north, it is north of Jerusalem. If it speaks of the south, it is south of Jerusalem. It is the place where God instructed Abraham to go to sacrifice his only son and it is the place where God sacrificed His own Son for the sins of the world. You should be interested in that place because some of your belongings were left there: your sins!

God has chosen to put His name in Jerusalem forever (2Kings 21:7). And unto his son will I give one tribe, that David my servant may have a light always before me in Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen me to put my name there (1Kings 11:36). (See also 1Kings 9:3; 2Chronicles 33:7).

Memory Verse for this week:

(Hebrews 3:12,13) Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called Today; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:12,13).

Digging Deeper

"Evil heart of unbelief." In our culture a state of unbelief may be a virtue rather than an evil. When one embraces by faith the idea that there are no absolutes, of necessity there remains one absolute: "There are no absolutes." It follows then that one may decide to reduce the number of absolutes to one absolute but the last one cannot be eliminated. As one short-sighted skeptic said: "There are no absolutes! Of this I am absolutely certain!" Hmmmmmm.

God says that unbelief comes out of an evil heart. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9) Unbelief is an act or a state of rebellion. It is a ramming of the soul into a rock wall and renders the soul damaged and reduced in its capacity. Unbelief is not ignorance but rather it is an aggressive attack upon knowledge. But his citizens hated him, and sent a message after him, saying, We will not have this man to reign over us (Luke 19:14). Therein lies the problem….I will not. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not! (Luke 13:34)