Daniel 7:2-3 Daniel spoke and said, I saw in my Vision by night, and behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea. And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another.
The study of the Book of Daniel is fascinating! God gave dreams to both King Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel. The King couldn’t remember his dream or the interpretation, so he called for Daniel, who the Lord enabled to do this. read the interpretation of King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream in Chapter Two.
Then in Chapter Seven, we read Daniels's dream. The dreams are the same message, BUT Chapter two is the message through the eyes of man (in the natural) and Chapter seven is the message through the eyes of God. This makes for quite a parallel study.
The message of the dreams is the Prophesy of coming evil empires that have and will, rule the world from then until the coming of the Antichrist. There are many great commentaries on this subject and can be found easily online.
To understand any Vision or Dream from God we must understand the symbolism used. The “great sea” in verse 2 represents a huge number of people. The “four winds of the heaven” are symbolic of wars, strife, and judgment of God. “Beasts” are representative of kingdoms of people ruled by Satan and fallen angels.
In the first part of his dream, Daniel saw four mighty kingdoms (four great beasts) rise up out of the Gentile world (the great sea). These would be the four great empires that ruled the Gentile world. are: The Babylonian Empire, The Persian Empire, The Grecian Empire, and the Roman Empire, all of which were ruled by demonic spirits.
At the time Daniel was given this dream, the Babylonian Empire was in power in the Gentile world. Daniel describes this Empire as a lion. first was like a lion, and had eagle’s wings: I beheld till the 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.
The Babylonian Empire was fierce like a lion and as an eagle swoops down on its prey and snatches it up, the Babylonian Empire quickly conquered its enemies and gained power over the Gentile world.
The Prophesy goes on to tell what would happen to this great Empire. I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked. King Nebuchadnezzar was the leader of this great Empire and gained more and more power. With power comes pride and this would be the failure of this great leader. The eagle's wings would be plucked and he would fall. We read in Chapter Four that King Nebuchadnezzar went insane as a result of pride.
There you have the first part of the Prophetic Dream played out just as the Lord gave it to Daniel. Every Prophesy in the Bible either has or will come to pass exactly as written in the Word of God.
Pride is a spirit that will take down the greatest of people. Here we see the great King Nebuchadnezzar described as a mighty lion with the wings of an eagle, taken down and destroyed by pride. It was pride that resulted in Lucifer being banished from Heaven.
We must guard against pride in our lives. It sneaks up on us but will ALWAYS end in failure and defeat. The opposite of pride is humility. Let us strive to have humble hearts and give all the glory to the Lord Jesus Christ!
When God’s people humble themselves, He will……..turn the tide
To God be ALL glory! Doreen
www.bettsministries.org
