Episode Transcript
Alright, if you take God's precious Word, turn to the book of Daniel chapter 2.
Daniel chapter 2.
God willing, we'll be expounding verses 36-38.
Be in prayer for me as I continue to work through my new book.
I've got the first round of professional editing done from my editor, which means I have work to do, and I send it back, and then the second round means I have more work to do when that happens.
But it's quite a process, and it's a rather large book compared to the other two.
So it's a lot of work, but I would appreciate you all praying that God would give me wisdom, fill me with His Spirit.
Daniel chapter 2, verses 36 through 38, the title of the message this morning is, "A King of Kings."
A king of kings.
How many of you have ever heard that terminology before?
King of kings.
Most all of us have.
And I'm so thankful for the amazing truths that God has revealed in the prophetic dream that He gave King Nebuchadnezzar.
The great image King Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream represented the future of all godless world empires and the devil who is behind them. the stone falling on the feet of the image, as you'll remember, represented the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall break in pieces every world kingdom, and all the repercussions of all rebellion, all rebellious authority that exalts itself against God, when He comes again.
And Jesus will rule as King over all the earth.
This morning in the Genesis to Jesus course, as we were getting into the birth of Christ, the angel Gabriel meant no words at all.
He made sure Mary knew, "He will reign on the throne of his father David."
This is what this is all about.
And thank God for that.
I'll give you a little lecture before we get into this.
You see, in Genesis, Adam rejected God as his king.
In the Tower of Babel, the world rejected God as its king.
In the Promised Land, Israel rejected God as its king.
And what all that's about when Jesus comes back and He sits on the throne of His father David, guess who's king again?
God.
God finally becomes man's king forever and forever.
And it won't be broken after that.
So those who accept Jesus, in turn, receive God as their king.
And the relationship that was broken is broken no more.
The gospel fixes everything.
And all that is inside this prophecy here, this dream that was revealed to Nebuchadnezzar.
We ended in Daniel chapter 2, verse 35, last Sunday, which spoke of Christ's return, saying, Daniel 2, 35, "Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold broken to pieces together, became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors, and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them, and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth."
That was the conclusion of Nebuchadnezzar's dream.
So Daniel has now fulfilled one of the two requirements that Nebuchadnezzar had.
The king wanted, number one, someone else to tell him the dream that he had.
That way he would know that God, who had given him the dream, was now speaking to the person who was interpreting it.
And then number two, Nebuchadnezzar, knowing that God was speaking through that religious leader interpreting the dream, he wanted that religious leader to tell him what that dream meant, so he could understand.
So now, Daniel has fulfilled that first requirement.
He's told him, "Hey, there's the dream.
I just gave you the dream."
And so in verse 26, I'm sorry, verse 36, Daniel says, "This is the dream."
Or, "That was the dream."
Let's pray.
Father, we thank You for Your precious Word.
Thank You, Father Lord, for all the wonderful people who came this morning, for those who tuned in online.
Thank You, Father, for those, Lord, who have been as Gabriel Rippon spoke to me this morning and talked about all that was going on, Father, at his house and what he was dealing with.
And then he ended his text by saying, "Looking forward to being there in the morning."
God, what a blessing for people to make priorities in life, to put you and your house and your work first above everything else.
Thank you, Father, and I pray you'll bless them.
I pray, Father, you'll give a remedy, Father, for Allison to be able to get here in the morning and Luke to be able to get to work this week.
I pray dear Lord God for Karen and her sink.
I pray dear Lord for ours here at the church.
I pray Father for the Bible school coming up for these kids.
I pray you'll bless every single worker, every single child.
And I pray Father to be one of the best Father we've ever had.
And it'll give lasting, lasting help Father, in the truth these children learn.
And I pray now, dear Lord, your Holy Spirit will teach through me these precious people.
We ask it in Jesus' wonderful name.
And we pray, Father Lord, for everyone the devil has attempted to turn away, attempted to discourage and to distract, Father.
We pray, dear Lord God, that you'll recover them, put them back on track and have them, Father God, be faithful in your house.
In Jesus' name, Amen.
Daniel said in verse 36, "This is the dream."
That was the dream you had, King Nebuchadnezzar, from start to finish.
And King Nebuchadnezzar knew that Daniel was right, so now King Nebuchadnezzar knows that the God who gave him the dream is speaking through Daniel.
The king now knows that Daniel is no shyster.
He's not like the other wise man.
Daniel is a true man of God.
Now remember, the king is not yet a believer in the one true God.
He was raised to worship all kinds of false gods, but he knows some God gave him this dream and he's dying to know the message that God has to tell him in it.
So Daniel said, "We told you the dream, look back at your text, and now we will tell the interpretation, underscore the word, you're going to think I'm saying interpretation, but I'm not.
What is the word?
Huh?
You're right.
You're absolutely right.
We, underscore the word we.
Not I, but we, Brother Doug.
Now, Daniel was the one God gave the dream to.
Daniel was the one God explained the dream to.
Daniel was the one speaking to the king.
But Daniel said, "We will tell the interpretation."
And that's because Daniel had previously asked his three godly companions to pray that God would reveal that dream to him.
Look back, if you would, in Daniel chapter 2.
Daniel chapter 2, we'll look in verse 17 through 19.
"Then Daniel went to his house, and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret.
"Pray for me, we're all going to die if we don't pray."
It says here that Daniel and his companion should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
So they prayed.
Verse 19, "Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a vision of the night."
So he sought them to pray, they prayed, and then as a result of their petitions, The dream, the secret of that dream was revealed unto Daniel in a vision of the night.
Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
So Daniel, having been accompanied by these men in petitioning God for the revelation of the dream, now includes them in the interpretation of it.
You all see that?
Daniel, having included these men in the petitioning of God for the revelation of the dream, now includes them in the explanation of it.
Daniel wants to make sure that the king knows that he was not alone in the grace of this divine revelation, but that God had graciously honored the prayers of those three godly men as well.
This was wise, honest, and honorable for Daniel to do.
And we're going to see shortly in another future message the benefit of Daniel doing this.
It was wise because it distinguished the godly leaders from the ungodly leaders, from the shysters.
It was honest because God had also used those three men and not Daniel alone.
It was honorable because Daniel wasn't trying to steal the show.
He was trying to make the grace of God known to Nebuchadnezzar.
He wanted Nebuchadnezzar to know that they were not to receive credit for the dream.
They had no power to conjure up the dream.
But the one true God in heaven had revealed that dream to them at their request.
This is God's work, not man's.
Now, I want you to observe then, the fact that Daniel was speaking, but the four men were telling the interpretation to the king.
Daniel was speaking, but he said, "We... we will reveal the dream to you."
Daniel was speaking, but the four men were telling the interpretation to the king.
Only one of the four men speaking, Three were silent, but they all were telling the interpretation to the king.
Here's the Kingdom Truth for you this morning.
"He that prays for God's servant, ministers with God's servant."
Boy, that's a good one to remember.
"He that prays for God's servant, ministers with God's servant."
What a great promise God gives to those who pray.
What a great encouragement we have here in God's Word for us this morning.
Some of the greatest preachers have never spoken outside their prayer closets.
Think about that.
Some of the greatest preachers have never spoken outside their prayer closets.
They don't speak to people about God.
They speak to God about the preacher who's speaking to the people.
And when they do, when that preacher begins speaking to the people, the people who prayed for the preacher are included in the preaching.
They go to God in prayer and petition God on the pastor's behalf, praying that God will fill that pastor with His Holy Spirit, praying that God will reveal the truth of His Word to him, that he may preach that truth so others can understand.
And God, hearing the prayers of those precious saints, fills that pastor with His Holy Spirit, shines a truth of His Word to that pastor, and then speaks that truth to the people that Sunday morning.
And we learn here in the book of Daniel, that the people who prayed for that pastor Saturday night, preach with that pastor on Sunday morning.
Isn't that something?
The people who pray for a pastor on Saturday night, preach with that pastor on Sunday morning.
And I want to thank each and every one of you who pray for me.
I've been humbled so many times by people telling me that they pray for me. and I tell you there is nothing more I would rather do than preach God's Word.
But there is... like Daniel and those three men, I mean, those are some godly men.
But like Daniel and those three men, they couldn't understand that dream, they couldn't know that dream.
The first thing they had to do, Daniel has no clue what that king dreamed.
Those... his three companions have no clue what that king dreamed.
And even if they did, they wouldn't understand it.
But they go, and they bow their knees, and they petition God.
And then God gives that dream.
I tell you, I have no ability in me to understand God's Word.
Absolutely none.
I remember when I couldn't understand it.
I thank God I can understand it now.
But I'm the same person that couldn't understand it that now can.
I'm the same fellow.
It's not me.
It's the grace of God.
And it's the people who pray for God's people.
I have no doubt about that in my mind.
I love to shine the glorious light of God's Word, but like Daniel, I realize I'm not alone when I do.
There's people who've been praying for me, and when you pray for me, you preach with me.
When you pray for the people overseas, you preach with them.
Brother Candela asked me to pray for him yesterday, I believe it was.
It was yesterday or Friday, I can't remember, but I think it was yesterday.
He asked me to pray for him.
He was about to go to a group of pastors, about to travel out of town to go preach God's Word to them and to give out the books we had sent them.
And so I prayed for him and asked him to pray for me.
And what a privilege!
And so, if I pray for Brother Candela, then I get to preach with Brother Candela, even though I've never been to Zambia before.
And so it's a privilege that we get to enter into ministry together.
Those who pray for me, preach with me.
And let that be an encouragement to those of you whom Satan has made to feel inadequate to serve the Lord in any meaningful way.
Brother Chris Johnson, I've heard him twice lament his physical disabilities.
And he has some serious physical disabilities.
But you know what?
With all those physical disabilities, that man can do any ministry in the kingdom of God.
Because when he prays for a particular ministry, he enters into that ministry.
And brother Chris, if you're watching this morning, if you will pray for me, and you'll pray for brother Shepard, And you'll pray for the people at VBS who are doing the teaching.
And you'll pray for Brother Doug when he's preaching this afternoon.
You'll pray for these people who are teaching these people overseas and who are sharing God's Word.
If you'll enter into prayer for us, you'll be laboring with us.
And not only that, I don't know if God would have given Daniel that dream had it not been for those three men praying.
There had to be some reason Daniel asked them to pray. that it'd be some reason God included their petitions in the Bible.
If they didn't mean anything, why would God include it?
This is a cooperative effort.
We are a body.
We are the body of Christ, and no member stands alone except our head.
That's it.
I need your prayers.
Brother Shepherd, you want their prayers?
Boy, you know he does.
And he said, "Yes sir," for those of you who couldn't hear.
"Absolutely.
You pray for me, and we'll preach together.
You pray for Brother Shepherd, you're going to be teaching Sunday school together with him.
You pray for the men who work on the sound, and the men who cut the grass if you're unable to.
You pray for the people who pay the bills here at church if you don't have any money, and you're going to be working and praying and preaching and paying all together.
Daniel said, "We will tell the interpretation..."
Look back in your text, "...thereof before the king."
"Having told you the dream, we will now, here in your presence, without delay, tell you what the dream means."
Let's get into it.
You ready?
Verse 37.
"Thou, O king, art a king of kings."
Wow, how about that?
By saying this, Daniel is not complimenting the king.
He is interpreting the dream.
Remember, this is the interpretation.
So when he says, "You, O king, are a king of kings."
This is not a compliment, it's an interpretation of the dream.
He's telling the king, "King, you're dreaming about yourself."
Now, remember, the dream starts at the beginning.
It always started at the top, at the head of gold, and worked its way down chronologically, remember?
And so, the dream begins at the top of the image, with the head of gold, and it works its way down to the end of the image, to the feet.
So, as the dream begins at the top of the image, that is where the interpretation begins.
So when Daniel begins with the top of the head of gold, he begins by interpreting and saying, "You, O king, are a king of kings."
Are you making the connection here?
The top of the image is King Nebuchadnezzar himself.
When Nebuchadnezzar saw that head of gold, He was being told that he was a king of kings.
_King of kings_.
King of kings.
I get excited thinking about this.
What does it mean to be a king of kings?
I used to work in a small rural county that had some small police departments in it.
And some of those police departments only had one officer.
I don't know if there are any departments like that around here anymore.
I'm sure there are in some rural towns here in the state, but back then it was pretty common.
They only had one officer, and even though the officer had absolutely no employees under him, he was still called the "Chief of Police."
And a chief is typically the highest rank that you're going to obtain in a police department.
So that small town officer outranked every member of the Dallas Police Department but one.
The chief.
How about that?
A Dallas police cadet, who hadn't even graduated the police academy yet.
He's not even wearing a gun yet, not even a police officer yet.
Just in the academy was making more money than those small-town police chiefs.
A Dallas police corporal supervised more people because the police chief in a one-man department had no one under him.
The Dallas police chief was a chief of police over 2,000 Assistant chiefs, majors, captains, three thousand now.
Lieutenants, sergeants, corporals, officers, and civilians.
The small town police chief was the chief of police over nothing.
Nothing.
As it is with the chief, so it is with the king.
Some kings in the Bible were over cities.
Other kings in the Bible were over larger sections or empires.
King Herod, you remember King Herod?
Who examined Jesus before his crucifixion?
He was over one-fourth of a territory.
He was a tetrarch.
Means he had one-fourth of a territory, but he was a king.
Even though he just had a quarter of a territory under his command.
Luke chapter 3 verse 1a says, "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar..."
Now that's the king over the whole empire, you see.
"In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar..."
That's the king over the whole empire.
"...
Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee."
So King Herod was a Tetrarch over one-fourth of a territory.
Caesar, however, was a king over him.
He had the whole empire.
Herod was a king.
Caesar was a king.
Herod was a king under Caesar.
Make sense?
And there were many kings under Caesar.
Because if you're going to have the fourth of an empire and you're going to be a Tetrarch, That means there's got to be at least three other Tetrarchs somewhere.
So when the Jews wanted Pilate to crucify Jesus, in the Gospel of John chapter 19 verse 15b, "Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your king?"
Now watch how they responded.
The chief priest answered, "We have no king but Caesar."
So Caesar was the king.
Herod was a king.
Since Caesar had many kings under him, what was Caesar?
He wasn't the king of a city.
He was what?
A king of kings.
That making sense to you?
He was a king of kings in his time, the highest power over reigning powers in the earth.
But Nebuchadnezzar came before Caesar.
Caesar comes much further down in the image.
Caesar is a king of kings further down in the image.
Nebuchadnezzar was at the beginning of the image.
He was the head of gold.
And as the head of gold, God had made him the king of kings during his time on earth.
But Nebuchadnezzar didn't become a king of kings by his own power and might.
He didn't get there on his own.
He was a king of kings for only one reason, that's because God had put him in that position.
Daniel said, "You are a king of kings, Nebuchadnezzar."
Look back in your text.
"For the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom."
That's the only reason.
Because God's put you in this position.
He's given you a kingdom.
"You may be a king of kings on the earth, Nebuchadnezzar, but there's a greater king in heaven who has power over you."
Power to give you this position of authority.
Your authority has trickled down to you from a higher authority above. the one who gave you this dream.
Nebuchadnezzar, you wouldn't have power over anything if God had not given that power to you.
Pontius Pilate belonged to the same part of the image in Nebuchadnezzar's dream that King Herod belonged to.
Pontius Pilate, who examined Jesus, who crucified Jesus, belonged to the same part of King Nebuchadnezzar's dream that King Herod belonged to.
And when Pilate told Jesus that he had power to crucify Jesus, or to release Jesus, Jesus said in John chapter 19 verse 11, it says, "Jesus answered, 'Thou couldest have no power at all against Me, except it were given thee from above."
He's saying, "You have no authority at all except it's given to you from above."
Where does Caesar get his authority?
From God of heaven.
Same place Nebuchadnezzar got his.
So do you realize what was happening here?
When Jesus told Pontius Pilate that he would have no power over him at all, except the God of heaven had given him that power, Jesus was speaking to the lower part of the image in King Nebuchadnezzar's dream.
A part of the lower part of that image.
Jesus was speaking to the lower part of the image in King Nebuchadnezzar's dream, telling Pilate the same thing that he told King Nebuchadnezzar through Daniel.
God gave you this power.
The only reason you have any power at all is because the God of heaven has given it to you.
That's pretty humbling news to people who've grown accustomed to having power.
It's a polite way of saying, "You, king, are nothing without God."
Nothing.
Nebuchadnezzar, God has given you a kingdom, look back in your text, power and strength and glory.
The size of your dominion has given to you by God.
The power of your authority in that dominion, given to you by God.
The strength of your military, given to you by God.
The fame and the glory that you have in the earth, all given to you by God.
It wasn't achieved by your own. doing.
Verse 38, "In wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beast of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all."
God has put all things under your feet, Nebuchadnezzar.
Wherever men dwell, you reign.
The beasts of the field, the fowls of heaven, everything's under your power here.
And He's made you ruler over all of them, Nebuchadnezzar.
And then He goes on to sum it up.
He says, look back in your text, "Thou art this head of gold."
Nebuchadnezzar, that you're the head of gold in your dream. the top of the image to the bottom of the image, it's ruled by a king of kings.
Do you see that?
From the top of the image to the bottom of the image.
If Caesar is a king of kings at the bottom and Nebuchadnezzar is the king of kings at the top, it's ruled like that all the way down, for the most part.
That's the concept.
But each of those king of kings fail because the head of gold is replaced by a chest of silver, right?
And arms of silver, which is then replaced by belly and thighs of brass, which is then replaced by something else, which is ultimately replaced by the stone that becomes a mountain.
In each case, the God of heaven gave the King of kings his domain until the image was broken into pieces because it failed to acknowledge the God of heaven.
And when the image was broken, it was replaced by a stone, Jesus.
Now in the book of the Revelation, the kings in the lowest part of this image will make war with Jesus.
In Jesus the stone will smite them on the feet and break the image to pieces.
The Holy Spirit described this to the Apostle John in Revelation chapter 17 verse 14a saying, "These shall make war with the Lamb and the Lamb shall overcome them for he is Lord of Lords, say it with me, and King of kings.
That's why he has this title in the book of the Revelation.
So, a king of kings is getting replaced by the king of kings.
You see what's happening here?
Nebuchadnezzar was a temporary king of kings, and as a temporary king of kings, the very beginning of the image.
Nebuchadnezzar was a head of that body.
Isn't that something?
But in the end, it all gets destroyed.
King of kings, head over the body.
What was lacking was that yielding to the authority of God.
God gave him power, but having been given that power, these kingdoms would not acknowledge that power.
The Bible puts it this way, "When they knew God, they would not glorify Him as God, neither were thankful.
But became vain, and their foolish imagination, and their imagination's foolish heart was darkened."
And so, Nebuchadnezzar was a temporary king of kings, and the head of a body that shall forever be destroyed.
Jesus, however, is the eternal king of kings, and the head of a body, the church, that shall never be destroyed.
That shall live with Him forever.
See, all throughout the Bible, Satan is always trying to counterfeit what God's doing.
He's always trying to contradict, counterfeit, to replace God's plan with a similar corrupted plan of his own.
And so God is showing this in this image here.
But at the end, all he has to do is strike defeat.
And everything goes away.
Head and all.
The head of gold was about Nebuchadnezzar.
The stone was about Jesus and us.
When Nebuchadnezzar dreamed that dream, he looked at that head.
There's Nebuchadnezzar.
That's me.
But when we look at the head of gold, we see King Nebuchadnezzar. but when we look at the stone, we see Jesus.
And that stone that strikes the feet then becomes a mountain.
What did we learn about the mountain last week?
The mountain means a kingdom.
Well, now you can't have a kingdom without a king, but a king can have a kingdom without what?
Without his citizens, who are part of that kingdom.
So the stone comes down, strikes the feet, and then becomes a mountain that fills all the earth.
We are part of that mountain.
We're part of the kingdom of God.
Jesus said, "The kingdom of God is within you."
We are part of the body of Jesus Christ.
He is our head.
We are His hands, His feet.
And listen, where the church is gold from the top all the way down to the sole of the feet.
It doesn't fail, it doesn't corrupt over time, because Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
When we look at that mountain, we see us, Jesus' kingdom, ruling with Him on earth forever.
Church Nebuchadnezzar was dreaming about you.
He was dreaming about you and about me.
And with that, we'll go ahead and close this morning. and God willing, we'll take back up in our next verse next week.
Kind of neat studying about yourself, isn't it?
Lord, thank You so much for Your precious Word.
Thank You, Father, for Your exceeding great and precious promises.
Thank You Lord that, Lord, You're going to replace a head and a body that fails with a head and a body that will never fail.
Lord, we thank You Father that the stone will never strike us, because we believe on the stone.
And now in that stone, we become part of His mountain.
And it fills all the earth.
And we're so looking forward to that time, Father.
Thank You, Lord, for giving us a King of kings.
And Lord, making Him a King of kings, that means we will be kings under Him.
We will rule and reign with Him forever.
Even as you told Adam, or said of Adam and Eve, we will give them dominion.
And Father in Christ, we'll have dominion again.
And in Christ, we'll have You on the throne of our hearts once more.
In Jesus' precious name we thank You.
Amen.
